Sometimes it just works!

As 2024 comes to a close, all I can say is, "It's ALL about the team." You know how that goes, when everybody supports everybody, and the collaborations are on fire with creativity?

That's what's happening now for EBT. There is a collective resonance in which we bounce positive energy off each other. For example, today, I met with Debbie, who is working with Shelby, Laura, and Cassidy to redesign our provider training.

Then, the group emailed a video they had made, and I inadvertently clicked on a Zoom line and entered their meeting, where everyone was in rapt attention, surely making magic. We chatted briefly and solved one last problem at hand.

Passion for purpose

Each person there and those who were not – Michael, Dev, Andrea, Kelly, Walt, Frannie, and our whole provider team – has one thing in common: a passion for purpose.

Oddly enough, when it is all said and done, perhaps that is the real core of EBT. All the science brings us back to basics: if we can clear away enough of the inevitable trauma circuits any great life is apt to encode in the brain, the energy of seeking meaning shines through. You feel it, and others can feel it in you.

When the system is not working

I think back to some of the work environments that weren't working. There was my first job at Burger Queen, which earned me $1.50 per hour in Radcliff, Kentucky, right after graduating from UC Berkeley as an army wife, with drama thicker than the fries. Then, there was working at Blue Cross in the financial district of San Francisco in the complaint department, where nobody spoke to anybody (cold as ice). And another job, all before going back to grad school, as an escrow secretary in a firm in which sexual boundaries were routinely crossed. It was the 70s.

Yet even then, there were so many lessons learned. At the Burger Queen, I learned how to ask the boss for more hours, even if those hours were spent scrubbing the outdoor tables with cleanser. And how to be a One no matter what. It was actually rather fun.

At Blue Cross, I learned that a seemingly sweet boss could turn aggressive right when she discovered that she did not need me anymore. I trusted her and felt affection for her, and when I left to go to Kentucky to be with my husband in the military, she said, "That solves my problem." I learned how aggression can wilt one on the spot. Wisdom gained for me there for sure.

At the title company, I learned that work could be dangerous, as there were so many crossed boundaries with the affections of the management and staff. I also liked making chaos orderly, which was as simple as typing up a closing statement on a complex deal.

The gifts vary, but there are always gifts

Although this blog began as an Ode to the EBT Team, in retrospect, I experienced what I needed to experience all along the way. So many images from my early scruffy jobs light up with images of extraordinary people overcoming huge obstacles and living their own style of a purposeful life.

The gift right now is to be part of a magnificent team that is making magic together, and I'll savor it, but perhaps appreciate even more that it is all perfect, no matter what. We get just what we need when we need it, at least I did over the years.