The Step to Others

[The Stage is on Fire] is a page-turner in which, much like life, there are no easy answers and yet each step of the journey yields insight and hope. This work of heart must not be missed!

Melanie Faith

Creative Writing Teacher, Essayist & Poet.

Katie Steedly’s first-person piece [The Unspeakable Gift] is a riveting retelling of her participation in a National Institutes of Health study that aided her quest to come to grips with her life of living with a rare genetic disorder. Her writing is superb.

The Society of Professional Journalists

In recognition of receiving the Dateline Award for the Washingtonian Magazine essay, The Unspeakable Gift.

I thank you … It is the authenticity of your “class notes”; and it is the delicacy and skill with which you present the nuances of classroom life and the actuality of your students’ and fellow teachers’ lives.

Maxine Greene

Philosopher and Education Scholar

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We wander and think no one will ever find us. And lifting our sorry head, we are next to each other. –
Mark Nepo

The step to others urges us to begin.

Beginnings are powerful. Not that there is a competition between the importance of beginnings and endings, but I am not so sure beginnings are not more important. Finishing can not happen if we don’t start. The step to others is a beginning.

The step to others allows us to reach out.

It can be hard to reach out beyond our mind and heart. Reaching out toward a partner, an inner circle, a family, a community can evoke fear of rejection, pain, and loss. Staying inside ourselves does not solve the problem. It creates new problems. Sadness. Loneliness. Despair.

The step to others asks us to be vulnerable.

I have been reading about the power of vulnerability. Brene Browns talks about vulnerability as the embodiment of courage and strength. I know that is true. Vulnerability is petrifying, but we do it anyway. It means we own our shortcomings in ways that ignore judgement. It means we are honest in ways that may hurt before they heal. It means we invite others into our pain in ways that allow a load to be shared and compassion to be found.

The step to others takes us back to ourselves.

Perhaps the most important thing about taking a step to others is taking a step toward ourselves. It is easy to forget that connecting with ourselves is an important of part taking a step toward others – we attract what we believe. Taking a step toward ourselves allows peace to live in our heart and that peace invites others in. Taking a step toward ourselves allows connection and connection is life’s breath. Taking a step toward ourselves provides wisdom and that wisdom is our truth. Taking a step toward ourselves makes the step toward others possible.