#16 Be the tree (eng & fra)
The Art of accepting compliments
Dear readers, thank you so much for being here. Today’s tale is about the tricky Art of accepting compliments which sometimes feels like more than we can take. I hope you like it and if you do, please forward it to your loved ones to help me spread the rodeo spirit!
Here is where to further discover my work:
My podcast and book “The rules of the Game” about being a woman at work.
My podcast about how to invest one’s savings “The Starter Pack” (Fra)
So last week I was invited to give a speech. But a different kind of speech.
The invite came from SEO London, a nonprofit I didn’t know at the time but that I came to deeply admire since, whose mission is to break walls. Since the 1960s SEO has been helping bright young people from modest backgrounds to make it into the professional field of their dreams. They provide high level trainings that include resources, information and network, forcing the gates of fortresses such as market finance, and they shall fight until determinism drops dead.
All the young ladies I met that evening were bright, determined and very ambitious. No “this is too big for me”, no impostor syndrome in sight - and that left me wondering where it all starts really, how the professional world creates the monster that eats its children alive? Next letter!
Beyond that fountain of youth and the honor / responsibility of addressing this audience at the doorstep of their professional life, SEO offered me a gift.
They had contacted me 2 months earlier on LinkedIn with the invite and at the end of their message added a PS.: the portrait video of one of their alumni.
Fatma is a young French girl whose dreams came at odds with her background but whose intellect and abilities are so obvious determinism did not stand a chance. She has the iron determination of someone who takes no bullshit, the gravitas of an old soul, and when she starts talking you know you’re in the presence of no ordinary character. Well in that 2 minutes video about her already impressive journey, this young rock lady holds my book in her hand, all highlighted and dog-eared as it should be, and explains how important it has been to her and how much it has helped her in her professional first steps. I cried, because it made me feel proud and useful and because that one minute gives meaning to 7 years of work. And I thank Fatma for it.
And so last week I got to meet her and tell her all that in person. She listened to my very emotional acknowledgement, looked at me in the eyes and said: “thank you”.
Boom. No less, no more. No need to keep the ball rolling, no need to diminish the praise. There she was standing, taking in the compliment, pleased but not overwhelmed, like a tree. A very grounded, sound, unwavering tree. Everything else in that moment felt like floating little leaves, airy and light but gone with the wind. She was there to stay. She could take it.
Compliments are a scary thing. Sometimes too big to handle. One wonders what they hide. It’s a common go-to reaction to refuse them, let them slide, or slalom between them in order to avoid taking the risk of realizing they were something else - a lure or a cheat.
It takes courage to accept a compliment head on. It’s a true expression of power to acknowledge that it can of course be true but also, to a deeper, even more powerful level, that it does not really matter. Because the tree is there to stay.
It takes generosity as well. It’s a generous act to accept someone else’s word just for what it is, without loading it with any meaningful impact. The tree is there to stay.
So next time someone comes to you complimenting you on what you did, said or accomplished, pats you in the back saying “good job there”, “you did well in that meeting”, “bright question you asked”, take it in. Even if you’re distrustful, just acknowledge it as someone who believes it, not overwhelmed by joy nor fear, easy as a “thank you”.
You can take it.
You’re the tree.
Now, on your saddle, and off you go!
Clara
PS.: My darling book The Rules of the Game 2nd edition with more about money, motherhood at work and the great art of transgressing without looking like it is coming out this march 19th and pre orders are available here!!
French version ici!
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