Welcome back to the latest issue of The Beat Within, celebrating 29 years of service, The Beat goes on! We hope you enjoy this issue and all the amazing writing from all The Beat Within participants as they explore the topics of being heard, the draw of the streets, shame and our favorite songs.
Michael “Einstein” Kroll is back with the editorial note today sharing a wonderful story and example about speaking up for yourself in a productive and respectful way. Michael explores the topic My Voice, Your Voice in his journey to the Peace Corps.
You have all heard the expression, “A closed mouth doesn’t get fed.” But a closed mouth also doesn’t get heard. Can I tell you a story? Many years ago, when I was just twenty-two, I applied to join the Peace Corps. It was a new government organization that President John Kennedy created in 1963. It asked anyone who wanted to give at least two years of their lives working in another country to volunteer. It might be to help communities dig wells for water, or to set up community health clinics where none existed before.
In my case, the Peace Corps invited me to train to become a teacher in the Southeast Asian country of Malaysia. I had never heard of Malaysia, and had to look for it on a map. I found it just below Thailand and next to the Philippines on one side and Indonesia on the other.
Before being accepted as a Peace Corps volunteer, you had to undergo three months of training that included learning the language of the country, something about the government of the United States itself, and of course, something about the history and culture of the country you were assigned to. But there was one more thing that had nothing to do with either the United States or Malaysia. You also had to demonstrate that you could work with people of different backgrounds and cultures.
I have always been a very outspoken person. Even in high school, I was known for expressing my opinions about everything, often disagreeing with my fellow students and even my teachers. So, during training I was outspoken as usual. I openly criticized certain aspects of training, like never having any time to ourselves. I also openly opposed a requirement that we judge our fellow trainees by giving names of those we thought would best represent the values of the United States and those we thought would not.
Being heard always carries consequences, sometimes positive and sometimes negative, and you must be willing to accept both. The risk was, by giving my honest opinion, the Peace Corps might decide to kick me out. On the other hand, if I remained silent, and did as I was told, it would be hard for me to look at myself in the mirror.
If you guessed that I spoke out, you guessed right. I told the staff that I did not want to judge my fellow trainees and refused to do so. About a week later, I was called into the office of the psychologist in charge of deciding who would make a good volunteer and who would not. She told me she was recommending that I be kicked out of the program because I spoke my own mind openly.
“You’re way to visible,” she said. “Everybody knows who you are. The best volunteers are those who are invisible. The ones who keep their mouths shut. You are the opposite.”
I was stunned. I wanted to cry. But instead, I decided to speak again, this time to her superior. I made an appointment with him, and calmly and respectfully told him why I thought she was wrong, not just about me, but about her judgment that the best volunteers are the ones who never speak up. I had excelled in all the components of training, and told him I thought it was very unfair to judge whether or not I would make a successful teacher based on the fact that I spoke up, expressing myself honestly.
In the end, he overruled her decision to kick me out, and I was able to spend the next three years teaching English in a Chinese high school in Borneo. Those were some of the most wonderful years of my life, and the friends I made there, including many of my students, continue to be my friends today, nearly sixty years later.
The point is this. Using your voice is risky. Sometimes it does not work out for you. Sometimes it gets you in trouble. But unless you use your voice, you will never know which way it might go. If I had not spoken out, the recommendation to kick me out of the Peace Corps would have been followed. I would never have had the incredible experience of seeing our country from an outsider’s perspective, of making life long-friends, and of learning a new language (Malay) and a new culture. Instead, today I am part of a “family” that has lasted all the years since.
There will always be people who want to silence you, people who think your opinion is not worth hearing, that you’re too young, or too opinionated, or the wrong kind of person, or just not worth listening to. Even as I write this, the President of the United States is trying to silence those who disagree with him. But the founders of this country, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson and the rest, understood that the right to speak freely is the only guarantee that those in power will not abuse it. That is why they wrote in the very First Amendment to the Constitution, “Congress (government) shall make no law… abridging the freedom of speech…”
I don’t mean to make this a Civics lesson. You already know that lesson. You learn it every time you are in court and have to listen to others speak for you or speak about you, while you are required to remain silent. But when you silence yourself, it is even worse, because then you are doing the work of those who would tell you to shut up. There is power in your voice. Use that power for change.
-Michael “Einstein” Kroll
Thank you, Michael for all you do as a core member of The Beat Within staff! We are so grateful for the passion and commitment you bring to this work every day. Thank you for reminding us of the risks and benefits of sharing your voice. Especially in this growing age of electronic communication, Michael illustrates the important value of learning constructive communication.
Improved communication is something each and every individual should work on for their own personal growth. Michael has given us a perfect example of how with respectful communication (instead of an aggressive emotional outburst of anger) he was able to change the outcome of an important decision. Thanks for this important reminder!