Living with Gretzky

You are co-teaching, co-working, sharing, paddling, gardening, living, married, interacting in some way with someone else who is brilliant. Brilliant at this one thing in particular. They are the Gretzky of permaculture. The Ken Robinson of teaching. The Alex Baisley of life coaching. There is a moment when we realize this. When we get that we are working with brilliance. That this person is shining. Truly radiating out the gift they have to give to the world. And there is a moment when we decide. We decide what to do with that shine. We can go two ways. Support the light. Or kill it. Support them to open up more light. Or get out the black curtains. And shut it out. For if they are brilliant, what does that say about me? I am not. I cannot do what they can do. So I am not enough. I am not brilliant. I am stupid. They were right in school. I am pretending. And people will notice. They will see through my ruse. This person is a threat, in fact. Unless I take their brilliance down a notch. Take their shine off a little. Or a lot. As if there is a limited resource of light in the world. A limit to brilliance. Not quite enough to go around. And if that person has it, then there's got to be less for me. So we slow our partners down. We keep our kids in check. So they don't run past us. We put an arm out. We trip them. They stumble, and we're there to support them get back up. And we look good. We look great. Until they catch up again. And each time, we have a choice. To blow oxygen on that flame. Or snuff it out. And if we add sticks to their fire, we may indeed discover that love is not a limited resource. That brilliance breeds more light. If we let it.