By Derrick Brown (follow on Twitter @dbrowndbrown)
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Watershed Moments (686 Words)
By Derrick Brown (Join Our Mailing List!)
There are “life” moments that do more than “mark time”.
They carve channels.
They redirect the current.
They become “watersheds”.
I have lived through several “watershed moments”.
Marriage.
The birth of my daughter.
The birth of #StandupStorytelling.
The creation of #TheSeeSayShow.
Each one raised the waterline … raised the “standard” … for what I deem a “turning point”.
These are not just “milestones” … they are “uprisings”.
My “education” has not been a neat sequence of classes, degrees, or credentials.
It is everything I remember after I have forgotten what I was supposed to have “learned”.
It is what I have LEarned … with a capital “L” … and a capital “E” … through life’s “crooked” paths.
Our present times do not define “what” or “who” we are.
Present times tell us “where we are” … and “where we are going”.
The life I have lived speaks for me … and tells me “who” I am.
Naming Who I Am (and Who I Am Not)
For years, I wore titles that felt accurate … and incomplete.
Teacher.
Researcher.
Professor.
Engineer.
Businessman.
Each of these roles carried respect.
Each demanded effort … and expertise.
Yet none spoke to the whole of who I am.
I am not a religious leader.
I am not just a teacher.
I am not just a researcher.
Nor just a professor.
Nor just an engineer.
Nor just a businessman.
I am a #StandupStoryteller.
I am an “autoethnographer”.
I am a “thought leader”.
Today, I grant myself renewed permission to “lean into” those names.
#StandupStorytelling is the art of fusing rap, spoken word, traditional oration, song, and teaching … into messages generate hope, healing, change.
“Autoethnography” is my way of testifying … not simply describing what happened to me … but showing how it felt … how it shaped me … and how it reflects broader systems.
“Thought leadership” is not about having followers.
It is about daring to define the conversation … even if it means standing alone … and waiting.
“Crooked” Paths
I have LEarned to trust “crooked” paths.
They do not travel the “straight lines” of ambition … nor the “fast lanes” of status.
They wind toward patience.
They bend toward peace.
Along the way, I have LEarned to clothe my heart … with humility, grace, gentleness, mercy and patience.
These garments are required when you live in tension.
They are protection.
They are preparation.
Because the “causes” of our times … “politics”, “evangelism”, “discipleship”, “multiculturalism”, “freedom”, “equality”, “education”, “reform”, “tradition”, and “conservative”, “liberal”, “progressive”, “independent” … can easily become “camouflage”.
Sometimes they each mask the real work of healing.
Sometimes they hide agendas … that hide deeper wounds … deception … delusion ... marginalization … and control.
“Watershed moments” force us to unmask disguises.
To look in the “mirror” … and through the “window” at once.
What am I clinging to?
What am I covering up?
What am I chasing?
What am I fleeing?
Where is this current carrying me?
Permission to “Become”
In my “last days” of teaching high school, I am convinced that the sustainable work is not in entering enough grades … avoiding unnecessary adult interactions … or fighting murmurs in the “classroom cauldron”.
The sustainable work is in telling stories.
Naming truths.
Planting seeds of dignity and humility … that can grow even in soil that resists them.
The “watershed moment” we have been waiting for … is here.
It does not ask me to abandon the past … but to claim all that it has taught me.
It asks me to see “crooked” paths not as “detours” … but as “design”.
It asks me to become … who and what I already am.
I am a #StandupStoryteller.
I am an “autoethnographer”.
I am a “thought leader”.
This is not arrogance.
It is acceptance.
It is obedience.
It is alignment with what the waters have been carving toward all along.
Closing the Circle
“Watershed moments” demand that we pause.
Mark the crossing.
Affirm by saying “The waterline has risen, and I will not flow the same again”.
This is one of those “watershed moments”.
Selah.
(The "Follow The Leader (changED - Volume 2)" Audio and Video Album / Mixtape is also available at TeachersPayTeachers.com)
(The "changED (Volume 1)" Audio and Video Album / Mixtape is also available at TeachersPayTeachers.com)
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I am a “standup storyteller.”
I fuse rap, spoken word (poetry), oration (traditional public speaking), singing, and teaching into messages of hope, healing, and change that I write, direct, and produce to help people who help people.
Everything must change - and stay changED.
Tradition begins and ends with change.
Change begins with me and the renewing of my mind ... then continues through efforts to effect small-group discipleship (equipping others to equip others) with audiences that respect and embrace mentoring, mediation, and problem solving as tools of change.
I am the product of my mentoring relationships, peacemaking (and peacekeeping), and problem-solving ability.
My education began when I finished school.
After school, I enrolled in a lifelong curriculum that includes classes in ministry, entrepreneurship, stewardship, literacy, numeracy, language, self-identity, self-expression, and analysis / synthesis.
My projects execute a ministry that has evolved from wisdom earned through lessons learned.
I want to share this wisdom to build teams of "triple threat" fellows - mentors, mediators, and problem solvers.
We will collaborate in simple, powerful ways that allow us to help people who help people.
I now know that power is work done efficiently (with wise and skillful use of resources, interests, communication, and expertise).
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