How Do You Help Your Clients Talk About This Era of Rampant Change?

Language is changing. Connect with your clients in ways they can hear.

Visiting with a retired pastor some years ago, he shared some wisdom I’ve hung onto. He leaned back in his chair and cupped his hands on the back of his head. “I’ve had to remake myself four times in the course of my ministry. Times are changing fast and I’ve got to keep up.” Shaking his head, he continued, “some days it seems like an awful lot of work.”

As I reflect back on the years, I realize I’m in my fifth transition. Eras of Reformation demand that. 

Reformations. I’ve decided they’re a lot easier to study in retrospect than they are to live through. Yet, here we are. In the midst of another of history’s Reformations. 

The late Phyllis Tickle, in her book The Great Emergence, proposes the world goes through some version of a Reformation every 500 years. She made a strong case for her argument. It seems Reformations happen whether we want them or not. 

It’s been about 500 years since the last huge world-altering Reformation. There was another one around 1000 CE. They also occurred around 500 CE, at the turn of the first century, 500 BCE and 1000 BCE. These Reformations are always times of profound change. That means they come with loss and opportunity. 

The Last Reformation

As a life-long Lutheran, I’m most familiar with the profound shifts that took place in the late 1400s to 1500s. It was a century of extraordinary change and innovation. 

• Nicolaus Copernicus proposed the revolutionary–and heretical–idea that the earth revolves around the sun. He refuted the notion that the sun revolves around the earth. Bold guy, Copernicus. The Pope wasn’t impressed. 
• Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci transformed art. 
• In music, the Dorian scale became the primary basis for musical composition. We still use it today. 
• The Gutenberg Printing Press made information available to common folks which led to people learning to read. That actually caught Luther a little unaware at first, but he adjusted quickly and learned to take advantage of it. I’ve got all 55 volumes of Luther’s Works. Digitally, of course. Talk about a guy who never left a thought unpublished.
• Exploration of new continents beyond the boundaries of Europe changed trade and business. Silk came from China and tobacco from the “New World” and even the common people wanted some of that. Money exchange became common in business and labor.
• Social unrest abounded.
• In China, Neo Confucianism reformed the old faith tradition the same way the Protestants and a few Catholic leaders reformed Christianity in Europe.  
• In the meantime, the Roman Empire was losing its power as the national governments in Europe rose up and wanted more autonomy. (Luther questioned why they were sending “German gold to Rome.” The German princes thought Luther was a pretty smart guy.)
• An especially horrible event was discovering that Africans could be kidnapped and sold into slavery. Portugal started it. Then Spain. Then England. Then the English pioneers in North America. Before that, western Europeans usually enslaved eastern Europeans, people from the Slavic countries. Hence, the English word “slaves.”
• To make their Reformation complete, they even had a pandemic. That time the bubonic plague caused it. 

The Current Reformation

Sound familiar? I think our current Reformation started in the 1960s and 1970s. And we are certainly still in it. Consider how space exploration has flourished over the last 60 years. And how many more forms of communication we have now with the advent of the Internet and technology. Digital music and graphic arts have changed artistic expression. Business, healthcare, education, spirituality, entertainment, government–all are in the process of finding new ways to function. 

I didn’t sign up to live or lead in a Reformation. How about you? It happened anyway. The challenge, it seems to me, is to help people recognize it, claim it, and grow through it.

This is what I know at this stage in the current Reformation. With the worldwide pandemic, many of us have had a forced retreat of sorts. It’s provided time for some self-reflection and re-evaluating parts of our lives. When we can’t run away into our busyness, we might be left to look at ourselves. 

The economic recession gives us The possibility to rethink our relationship with money. 

The protests for Black Lives Matter and the new energy recognizing our racist systems are helping many of us realize we need to change and act. 

What an opportunity! 

I admit, reformations are certainly messy. But they’re also ripe with possibilities for greatness. 

Embracing the Current Reformation

Are you helping your clients embrace this time in history? Are you changing your language to acknowledge the stress of the Reformation and its richness? 

Naming this era as an historic Reformation can help normalize the experience. It can reduce people’s stress. They might even find it to be a time for heroic decisions and great adventures. 

How do you use words to inspire your clients to rise to these days? Naming their losses and discoveries can help people forge ahead in the uncertainty of a Reformation. Your words are important. Spoken and written. 

Have you noticed the written language is getting more conversational? Lots of the rules Mrs. Penning taught me in 7th grade English no longer apply. You can legitimately end a sentence with a preposition if you want to. Write phrases as sentences. And even start a sentence with “and.” Adverbs are losing credibility. Too bad. They used to be lovely descriptors.

Writing is changing like most everything else. Keeping up with the changes, the reforms, is crucial so you know how your clients absorb information. How you communicate is changing. That you must communicate effectively is not. 

Questions:

1. If you hadn’t been born in the midst of a world-wide Reformation, what century would you have preferred?
2. Copernicus or Gutenberg. Which one changed the world in a bigger way?
3. What words are you using to talk about these decades of rampant change?

If you would like to spend your time doing what you do best and want someone else who 

• thinks Reformations are interesting,
• can help you find just the right words for your business, 
• is nerdy enough to track how long or short a written piece should be, 
• understands persuasive structure in business writing, and
• writes effectively in a variety of media,
  contact me at carmala@carmalaaderman.com or check out my website at https://carmalaaderman.com. I would like to learn about your work. We can decide if and how I can write to help promote your business.