A Heravi Legacy Editorial
James Baldwin was an American writer and social critic known for addressing human relationship and identity. He had a profound ability to put words to things most people feel but struggle to articulate. He wrote that “love has a way of removing the masks we think we need to survive”. It’s a simple idea, and one that resonates with me in a world that seems to reward us for deciding quickly who people are and to pick a side.
As the head of human resources and often the centering point of conflict between people, I’ve learned that our own certainty is often built on a very small slice of the truth. Real people are more layered than we often give them credit for. Our enemies aren’t really our enemies in most cases. Whether manager and employer, parent and child, or colleagues at different sides of an issue, we have more in common than not.
Unfortunately, the divisions we feel and the “cancel culture” that permeates our culture are exacerbated by dynamics that we cannot escape. In a world where AI and technology are training us for speed and efficient decisions, our brains are being rewired to abandon the very thing we may need the most to work through our differences. Efficient thinking tends to eliminate the middle of the issue and quickly move us to yes/no, right/wrong thinking. And in human relationships, losing the middle of the conversation is pulling us apart.
When the world is screaming to “go fast”, strong partnerships and human relationships are build on slowing down. Fast judgements lead to more conflict. But deep relationships are built on a foundation of genuine curiosity about why someone sees the world the way they do. Every person carries context we can’t see, experiences we don’t fully understand, and intentions that don’t always match how something comes across.
When we rush to judgment, we don’t just risk being wrong. We miss the chance to truly understand them. Seeing someone as a position, and not a person, brings us further from the healing power of connection. In this regard, efficiency in human relationships can be replaced with presence. When curiosity is paired with patience, you are no longer trying to resolve the person to a position of “I agree” or “I don’t agree”. You create friends and partners.
I’ve seen this play out in my own life as I replace “doom scrolling” the news with entering in a more meaningful way with my community. I find when I’m participating in “Alpine Days” and attending a parade, or honoring new graduates, all of the problems I feel in the world take backstage, and it is replaced with an appreciation for my neighbors and friends.
It applies to my worldwide connections as well. I’m part of a Collective made up of people from all walks of life, brought together by a shared desire to do some good. There’s a chef in Ukraine feeding thousands in the middle of a war. A Porsche race car driver who empowers other women to pursue their own big dreams. A poet who has spent years writing about the human experience of grief and love. A woman in Africa who rescues rhinos.
If you looked at us on paper you might assume we’d struggle to find common ground given our vastly different locations, geo-political leanings and industries. In another setting, some of those differences might even put us on opposite sides of an argument or the political spectrum. Instead,we are fast friends, intertwined by what we share in common, rather than what our differences are. What stands out is not whether we like our president, where war is necessary, or our views on immigration. Instead, our focus is on our shared instinct to contribute, to care, to show up for something bigger than ourselves and to focus on bettering our world wherever we stand in it.
It is in the common ground that we learn to love each other. With that deepening of the relationship, then and only then does it provide the space and curiosity for conversations about those sensitive topics that otherwise would result in us flattening others into villains.
Maybe that’s where the opportunity is for all of us. Not in solving every disagreement, but in slowing down just enough to see more clearly. To pause before we decide who someone is. To ask a question instead of making an assumption and to focus on the person rather than the position. More often than not, what turns distance into connection isn’t perfect agreement. It’s the willingness to sit in curiosity and presence with one another. In doing so, the masks we wear are no longer needed for survival and in seeing each other we are given the gift of true connection.
Tessa White
Chair, Board of Trustees, Utah State University
Author of The Unspoken Truths for Career Success: Navigating, Pay, Promotions and Power at Work, and the upcoming Five Stages of Career Growth: The Invisible Communication Shifts of a Career