Wyrd

The World Wide Web is another interwoven network and a well-named one.
It is truly a web of almost endlessly interconnecting nodules (of which this page is one)
linked together by invisible strands of electronic connectivity.
This page has existed, waiting for you. You arrived here to learn of Wyrd
because of what you selected on your path to this knowledge.”

I have always felt weird in most work settings.

When I moved to Cleveland after college and after an adventurous year of backpacking around the world, I worked for several years before making the leap of faith in starting a consulting company. I did not follow all the recommendations for starting a business. I did not have a completed business plan, or six months of income in the bank, or my first client in hand; but I did have a driving desire to find and conduct work and build working relationships with respect and positive outcomes. I brought to the table what I knew and had known to be good and valuable — marketing consulting, internal and external relationship building for the brand, and how to drive growth and good process. I used my foundation in learning, teaching, and design to conduct market research and market planning for start-ups and small- to mid-sized organizations. Each day was an adventure. I unlearned procrastination — it will kill the business fast — and learned persistence. I added many new competencies to my toolkit — one’s flat sides will also lead you down the path of business failure.

I didn’t know what I didn’t know. So, thus was fearless. And maybe naïve.

I was also the youngest person in most meetings. I was not from Cleveland and heaven forbid I mentioned where I was raised, Pittsburgh — Cleveland’s greatest rival in football. I was frequently the only woman in the room and after completing my graduate degree in organizational development/change management, I was the only person with a ‘soft-science’ orientation.

My questions were weird. My positioning was weird. My affect was weird. I was just different in so many ways. I got comfortable in my weirdness very quickly. I found if I was always learning and observing, increasing my competence, acting with good character and good will, and seeking to be contributing, I could get past any aspect of my weirdness that kept me on the outside of the circle looking in.

As I age, I have woken from simply accepting my status, which was created by my youth, my gender, and my career orientation. Until, one day, I realized I had arrived — I was the elder stateswoman in most meetings. How did that happen? Not only did I traverse thirty-five years of business boot camp and survive, but I arrived happily in my weirdness — older, with more diversity at the table in a work world where my field of study is now not new or unknown but integral to the function of organizations. Has the world caught up to my weirdness or I am just too comfortable?

This Spring as I was enjoying the podcasts of Marcus Buckingham, in which he shared key concepts from his new book ‘Love + Work,’ he affirmed my weirdness with research. Buckingham uses a Norse term ‘Wyrd,’ an idea that “. . . each person is born with a distinct spirit. This spirit is unique to you and guides you to love some things and loathe others. The things you love and loathe produce a network of synapses in your brain that is massively different from anyone else’s.” These one hundred trillion synapse connections in your brain are the true extent of your individuality and the size of your wyrd.

Wow! I didn’t become weird. I was always wyrd. Thanks for accepting my weird/wyrd and including me in your tribe of uniqueness.

• Does this concept resonate for you?

• How do you use your uniqueness as a strength or superpower?

• Are you comfortable with your weirdness and that of others?

• Does the culture you are creating and supporting leave space for each person to be themselves and seen?

I may seem weirder to you than ever because with the aging process and my experience I have grown comfortable and confident in what makes me wyrd. So, don’t be surprised if my wyrd makes itself known when we are together.

It ain’t weird, it’s my wyrd.

Leslie

“Wyrd often saves an undoomed hero as long as his courage is good:
— Beowulf
Lines 572-3

The implication is that while a man’s courage holds out,
he has a hope of winning through
since wyrd ‘the way things happen’
will often work to help such a man.