Say Good, Ashlee Eiland. NavPress (ISBN: 9781641587006), 2024.
Summary: Offers a four-part process for finding one’s voice to navigate the tightrope of challenging public discussions, using one’s voice to “say good.”
Engaging in public discussions, online or in-person, often feels like walking a tightrope. Ashlee Eiland says it begins with balance, finding one’s center in Christ. In walking a tight rope, it means fine-tuning that starts low and short and goes slow. Don’t try to walk over Niagara Falls without a lot of training. Likewise, with public engagement.
Eiland outlines a four part, four pillar process of finding one’s voice, using the acronym PAIR:
Passion
It begins with discerning our passion. It is figuring out what we love enough to suffer for it. What is something you are willing to devote enough time to gain the experience you need to accomplish your goal? Our passion is that for which we’ve wept at its absence. Are we willing to identify with the Savior who wept?
Accountability
Accountability is the discipline of consistently showing up with others. It means character and integrity, boundaries we will not cross, having others to hold us to our commitments. It means learning to take initiative, with all its risks–and discerning when not to take initiative. Facing hard truth is another aspect of accountability. Who will we trust to tell us the truth? Will we take the posture of a learner and listener? Eilund recounts the parting advice of dean in graduate school.
Influence
We all have influence. the question is, how will we leverage it? But we can’t influence everything. We need to know our place and space and stay in it. It is learning to use our voice with authenticity, I liked this description of authenticity:
“Authenticity is about discerning the intersection of what’s real and true, both in what we are speaking into and in what we’re speaking out of, for the health and wholeness of the entire body”
You can’t talk about influence without talking about power. She talks about sources of power, power dynamics, and how we use power well. Eilund describes how Steve, a white, dynamic leader, empowered her, a Black woman, in public speaking.
Relationship.
Relationship reminds us that we use our voice with people. Confession is an important part of the use of our voice, sharing with trusted others who we truly are. The author describes confessing to her friends her deep struggle, as a pastor, with depression. Eilund challenges us to know people by name–the pharmacist, the clerk, the wait staff–and not just close acquaintances, or the ‘important.” It’s all about affording dignity to every person. In turn, she asks us to reflect on what we would hope they would say of us in our eulogy. By asking this, she invites us to consider who will see our work and how we will steward our voice to “say good” in light of that. And how we use our voice with people will determine whether we leave chasms or build bridges.
Many people use their voices in ways that widen the chasms that separate us. Sometimes this is intentional. But for others, the question is learning to use one’s voice for good. It means discerning what we truly care about. It means being accountable rather than a loose cannon. We need to learn how to use influence well. And all of this occurs in the context of relationships. Ashlee Eilund charts a clear path toward the better use of our voice. By using her voice and her journey, she shows us how her four pillars integrate into a life of “saying good.”
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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.