It is also the twentieth in the open second group of
Experiences Of A Friend
(click
here
for the complete first group of thirty five
Experiences Of A Friend):
I am indebted to Mark Spirtos who inspired this conversation.
For the most part, when you have a
face-to-face
experience of
Werner
for the first time, it's not like any other first-time
face-to-face
experience of any other person.
In any other first-time
face-to-face
experience of any other person, there's that sense of familiarity, that
sense of ordinariness even, the sense that although it's a
new person, it's just another new person - with their own
unique traits, their own unique accent, their own unique story (yes,
story), and their own unique characteristic
ways of being.
In other words, "new" isn't new. Look: couldn't that be said about all
your first-time
face-to-face
experiences of all new people? In a real sense, aren't all first-time
face-to-face
experiences of other people ordinarily familiar, even though they're
experiences of new people / even though they're first-time experiences?
A first-time
face-to-face
experience of
Werner
is never like that. It's the exception. It's never familiar. It's never
ordinary. "There's something else going on here ..." you
may curiously surmise, something not familiar, something out of the
ordinary, something which should be familiar,
something which should be ordinary (it is, after all, just another
experience of just another person) and yet is neither. You may not be
able to put your finger on exactly what it is - at least, not
immediately. But whatever it is, stands out, begging the question
"Who is this
guy?"
or even
"What is this
guy?"
and more ... until the inevitable
"Whatever he's got, I want
it.".
People with whom he resonates, are thrown to surmise that way. The
enrollment of his being is an awesome power to confront -
one about which you may ask yourself "Why didn't I know about this
sooner?" and / or "What took me so long?" following which it's totally
natural to be thrown (once you get the full promise of the possibility
of it) to try out
ways of being
like
Werner
for yourself. The trouble is when you're being like
Werner,
you're not being like
Werner.
Allow me to explain.
The almost subliminal
"Whatever he's got, I want
it"
and its corollary "If I could have whatever he has, then I'll be the
way he be's" inspires people who want so much to be the way
Werner
be's, that they'll go as far as duplicating his wardrobe. If it's not
that then perhaps they'll copy his hairstyle. If it's not that then
perhaps they'll try on his accent, vocal inflection, and timbre. If
it's not that then perhaps they'll get a dog like Polo, his erstwhile
Great Dane. "If I could have some or all of the above that
Werner
has, then I'd be being the way
Werner
be's, the way I want to be.". This goes way beyond "Imitation is the
sincerest form of flattery" (flattery's got nothing to do with it) and
the inevitably futile "If I imitate you, I'll be being the way you
be.".
The almost subliminal
"Whatever he's got, I want
it"
and its corollary "If I could do whatever he does, then I'll be the way
he be's" inspires people who want so much to be the way
Werner
be's, that they'll go as far as developing workshops which purport to
deliver what
Werner's
deliver. They'll go as far as writing papers which purport to deliver
what
Werner's
deliver. They'll maintain unwavering eye contact when they communicate
- another way of doing what
Werner
does. "If I could do some or all of the above that
Werner
does, then I'd be being the way
Werner
be's, the way I want to be.".
I'm sorry
but being like
Werner
ie being the way Werner be's, calls for none of the above. It's when
you're being the way you be ie when you're being like
yourself, that you're being like
Werner
be's. It's that simple: people who are being like
Werner,
are being like themselves. So when you're being like
Werner,
you're not being like
Werner.
When you're being like yourself (ie when you're fully being who you
really are, when you're being the way you be), you're
being like
Werner.