What 300 Strangers Taught Me on a Zoom Call

Three hundred people. One gesture. Like a flash mob of compassion and connection.

I'll get to that. First, a radical observation: We are living in a time when people want to live. Really live.

The last few years pushed a lot of us to the wall. Many of us still feel the persistence of that flattened contraction. And “it” isn't “over” yet, of course, we know. Yet, even as we continue to navigate all that is hard and painful, what I see emerging from the constant turbulence is kind of thrilling.

We are becoming less willing to abandon ourselves.

Less willing to spend our lives exhausted, performing, pleasing, achieving, numbing, swallowing what we know, or contorting ourselves into lives that look fine from the outside but don't actually feel like our own.

People are asking harder questions: Do I want this? Is this mine? What do I really care about? What am I sacrificing to keep this going? What would it mean to actually feel alive? What world do I want to see? How can I be a part of that change?

Really, every day in my personal and professional life, I see iterations of this renewed commitment to thrive, a direct response of living in the face of years of darkness, much of it ongoing.

And yes, capitalism has absolutely gotten its hands all over wellness. There is no end to the commodification of “self-care.” But that is not what I am talking about. I am pointing to a much deeper ripple across humanity that shows me we are headed for more healing than destruction.

Rest. Boundaries. Meaning. Breath. Nervous systems. Grief. Presence. Things that not long ago earned a “new age” eye roll have entered the mainstream conversation.

There is a hunger for something more honest, more embodied and much more alive.

People aren't just asking how to survive their lives anymore. They're asking how they want to thrive in alignment with their deepest connectings to themselves and what they care about.

Two weeks ago, in a Zoom class of all places, I watched 300 strangers give me a glimpse of just how deep that hunger goes, and how much of what we are searching for IS already inside us and immediately accessible.

For the past several weeks I've been taking an incredible course through Coaches Rising called Unlocking Leaders, a training in coaching through raising consciousness. It's primarily taught by Jim Dethmer (alongside his colleagues Joyce Chen and Jim Fallon), one of the founders of the Conscious Leadership Group.

If you've never come across CLG, picture a clearinghouse for decades of spiritual, psychological, and personal growth work. Almost every teacher I've ever learned from shows up somewhere. And Jim D. is a very special human. Look him up.

About 300 of us log on, little boxes on a screen, from literally every corner of the globe.

A few weeks ago Jim showed up and taught the way he always does. Steady. Present. Nothing unusual. Someone asked a question, and as he answered, he started to drift toward grief. He talked about how grief is the deepest expression of love we have, and a doorway into the most transformative of human experiences.

Then he paused. Swallowed. Breathed and said:

“Some of you know that our oldest child passed away suddenly three weeks ago.”

I felt 300 boxes go still.

Three weeks! This man had been teaching us, class after class, carrying that. Tears came. He talked about staying with his grief instead of running from it, and letting it move through him. He said he believes this, being present with our grief, is how we build a world that actually thrives. Because there is so much grief out there. In all of us.

The moment he shared his news, my hand instinctively moved to my heart. I make this gesture a lot when I am comforting myself or connecting inward. And I find now that anytime anyone shares pain or struggle, delight or deep joy with me, there she is, palm to chest.

I couldn't see every screen. But on every one I could see, every hand was in the exact same place as mine.

Three hundred people. One gesture.

Nobody cognitively decided to do it. Nobody glanced around to see what everyone else was doing. There was no cue, no “let's hold space for Jim.” The hands just went. Different countries, different languages, different politics I'm sure, different everything. Same act of connection and love.

I know. “We're all one humanity.” I hear the greeting card too. That's not my point.

My point is where that gesture came from. It didn't come from anyone's head. Our heads were probably still scrambling for the right thing to say. It came from a place so much more inherently wise than thinking. The body knew before we did.

Our bodies knew because grief is a language we already speak. Maybe not this grief, maybe not this loss, but we know what it is to hurt, to lose, to love something enough that losing it changes us. Somewhere beneath thought, we recognize that in one another. We don't have to be taught to reach toward each other. We just do.

Jim could share his grief openly because he had let himself feel it. He didn't abandon himself. Or run from the pain. He is truly and profoundly present with all that is in life. And we could meet him because, at least once, at least a little, we'd done the same with our own pain.

That's what true aliveness is. It's the willingness to stay with yourself when it hurts. And that turns out to be the exact same muscle we use to stay with each other.

You cannot meet someone else's pain any deeper than you've met your own.

People are constantly telling me the world is too broken, too divided, too much. Nah. I just know that’s not the whole reality. No amount of arguing would get 300 strangers to agree on anything. And yet in a split second, without a word, they agreed on the thing that matters most: I see you. You're not alone. I'm here. I care.

That capacity isn't rare at all. It is not reserved for the enlightened or the fully therapized. It's in you right now, and it always has been. It's some of the oldest wisdom there is.

So I choose to remain not just hopeful, but (brace yourself) even joyful about where we are as a species, which might sound strange in a piece about a father losing his child. But I watched 300 people prove in real time that the answer isn't something we have to figure out. We already have it. We just have to stop running from ourselves long enough to feel it.

The world doesn't need more people who have it all figured out. It needs more people who can stay. Lead from the center. And when in doubt, simply raise your hand to your heart. I promise, you'll feel a shift.