A Winters Tale

There is a time when the best thing we can do is run through the darkness.

It is an act of faith. It is a statement of trust to run through the night.

We trust our memory of the terrain. We trust our memory of the twists, the turns, the curves, the rise and the fall of the path.

It is a flowing moment of liberation.

Why we run is a winter’s tale.

Sometimes when we run we run toward things.

Sometimes when we run we run away from things.

Sometimes, I would say the best of times, we simply run because we can.

I left the ranch about eight p.m. I had spent the day idly and felt the need to run rising as the evening overtook us. I dressed warmly, in layers, so I could peel them off as I went.

It was a short jog out of the ranch yard to the road and I turned north. It is a mile and a half along a relatively straight road to the mailbox.

I started out slowly, moving at an even pace until my eyes adjusted to the night. The world was cast entirely in shades of silver and gray. Once my eyes had adjusted to the night I could make out the strand of the road, light against dark.

I kept my paces short to keep my feet underneath me, to keep my balance centered, to land surely on each foot.

Aussie ran alongside me, ranging ahead and behind, coursing back and forth across the road.

Somewhere to the east coyotes were howling. I could see occasional fields of stars amid the mostly overcast sky.

It has been a long time since I ran through the South Dakota night. Time folded into itself and those moments joined with these. The run took on that timeless sense that all good runs do. Something surrenders into the purity of the moment.

I reached the mailbox and turned for home. My pace was faster, surer, covering the road I had covered moments before. I picked up the pace, felt my legs starting to burn, felt my lungs drawing in the sharp cold South Dakota winter nights air.

Aussie pulled in close to me on the run home. The pace was fast enough that when he ranged from side to side he got left behind and I could hear the rapid pace of his paws as he would rush up behind me.

I pushed myself hard when the yard lights of the ranch approached, lengthening my stride running with speed through the darkness. The approaching yard lights began to affect my night vision, I could feel it fading.

Some, as I approached the ranch, I was running at speed through the darkness, trusting entirely to my memory of the terrain I had just crossed.

My memory was flawed.

Not badly, but enough.

Just at the turn of the ranch road I hit a rock. I good sized one, slight domed, a sudden solid strike. It did not break my stride but I felt the blow. I slowed down and took the last quarter of mile at an easy pace.

I was limping by the time I reached the ranch. I went inside and stripped down. I took off my shoe and checked my foot. Tender, but nothing broken – just a solid blow in the darkness to the bridge of my foot.

I am sitting here now icing it and feeling that soft throbbing.

Every moment of the run was worth it. Sometimes we run simply because we can. Sometimes we pay a price because we decide to run, because we decide to trust, because we run for the sake of running.

Trust

Trust.

It is a pretty astounding thing. That we function at all in society is a result of a vast interlocking system of trust. We approach a green light at the intersection and we trust the people approaching the red-light are going to stop since it is "our turn". There are a million other daily examples.

I was reading up on negotiating techniques today (I negotiate a lot in my work, finding ways to move through the conflicting interests that are common in any large complex organization) when I came across an article by Seth Freeman, a teacher of negotiation and conflict management at New York and Columbia universities.

The article was primarily about the current credit crisis, but it laid out six steps toward building trust very concisely and I thought I would take a few minutes and share them with you all here, just in case you ever need them. The high level framework of establishing (and re-establishing) trust is universal.

1.) Who can serve as a credible bridge of trust? If two parties do not trust each other, is there a third party that both parties trust that is willing to serve as a bridge of trust? Picking a successful mediator to establish that bridge of trust is often tricky. This most effective mediator is someone who a.) has a general interest in resolving the issue but b.) does not have a vested interest in a specific outcome.

2.) How can we most effectively watch or test the two parties ability to perform? In any issue of trust it is important to remember something. Both parties think they are in the right. Both parties have a legimate reason to not trust the other. Any effective monitoring solution must monitor both parties - to the satisfaction of each party.

3.) What incentives and penalties can best encourage performance? The parties will want to construct a system that rewards trustworthy behavior and penalizes untrustworthy behavior. Be as explicit as possible with the events or milestones that will trigger both behavioral modification alternatives.

4.) Build in mild, moderate, and strong trust supports within the incentive/penalty process. A range of behaviors allows the parties involved to begin the intervention process early and mildly if it starts to go astray - and at the same time allows both parties to have options, enabling them to feel in control of the process, and reducing the coercive feel of it.

5.) Does the solution satisfy all parties key interests? It is important that the solution be both simple (easy to comply with, easy to monitor, easy to enforce) and comprehensive (covering all of the key points at dispute). The vast majority of negotiations break down because one or both parties have one or more key interests that are not satisfactorily addressed in the solution. It is often very tempting in any negotiation to set aside the really sticky break points and address them later. This is almost always a mistake. Be sure and include them in your roadmap to establishing trust.

6.) What if the worst case scenario happens? It is always best to think of that worst case scenario before it happens. When they happen, our emotions, our ego, our pride, our feelings, all get tangled up inside of them. Take the time in the process to determine what the worst case scenario is and discuss how it will be addressed when it occurs (not if - when). If you prepare for the worst case scenario you will find that everything short of it is much easier to handle.

(Seth Freeman is currently writing a book called "Promises: Making Commitments More Reliable in Business and Beyond".)