Kindly Candid Feedback | Success with a Simple Text

Last week, I received a text message from my mom. “I fell skiing and have a minor concussion. I’ve talked to my doctor. He says it is minor. I’m OK, but call me.”

I would like to publicly thank my mom for sending this cool and collected text and for immediately letting me know that she was all right. Not only did that text message feel like a big hug from her, but it also gave me hope that offering kindly candid feedback can, in fact, improve relationships, including the one I have with my mom. Here’s why:

I don’t think my mom would mind my sharing that she has a long history of sending SOS text messages in far-from-emergency situations. Two of my favorites are “CALL ME RIGHT AWAY, ” sent at 2:15 am Mountain Time when she wanted my opinion on a leather jacket she had found in Paris and forgot to account for the time change, and my all-time favorite: “I’VE BEEN IN AN ACCIDENT. CALL ME IMMEDIATELY,” sent while I was in a board meeting. When we broke from the meeting, and I saw her text 30 minutes later, I was unable to reach her. After four excruciating hours had passed, I learned that she had knocked over the ticket meter in the Vail parking garage driving two miles an hour, and in her “distress” she had forgotten to bring her phone with her after she parked and went skiing.

After casually kidding her but still receiving those boy-who-cried-wolf texts for years, I recently decided to have a more serious conversation with her to honestly share how those cries for help affected me. This recent text made me feel I was heard, and I’m grateful that she is willing to make a change, especially given this particular situation. She was tired, frustrated, and in pain, but she still remembered to let me know that she was all right. She implicitly gave me permission to call her when I had the space to do so. I chose not to call her right away.

Yet, despite the fact that I felt I had permission to wait, I felt tremendous guilt about failing to immediately pick up the phone. Stay tuned for the lessons learned from that head trash (pun intended) in my next post…