Sam Wells who used to be the Dean of the Chapel here at Duke (and now leads a large prestigious Church of England congregation in central London) contrasted two kinds of service-- doing forand being with—in a sermon some years ago.

Doing for is about helpingpeople who “need” it. Someone or some cause requires time, money, or food/clothing and we chose to provide it. Doing foris, I would argue, the default service setting for most of us--what we fall into if we don’t make a conscious effort to do something different.In contrast, being withrequires active engagement with another. It means, in Wells’ words, to be faithfully present to and with another and to be motivated by deep care and concern.  Being withis much harder than doing forbecause we give not time or talents or money in measurable and distinct increments, but ourselves in a manner that is not clearly bounded and thus in a manner that doesn’t guarantee safety, security, and that we will stay on our current path. The way Wells’ characterizes these two (how to say?)…styles of service suggests that we should be striving for being withrelationships. (Here is a link to Wells’ useful discussion: http://thecresset.org/2013/Easter/Wells_E2013.html)

Wells’ distinction was very helpful in launching and running the Lab five years ago. And over the years, we have read and discussed his piece. In the last several years, however,  I haven’t been assigning it and then a couple of weeks ago, Nitin, a student in the Lab reminded me about the article/sermon and got me thinking about how it fits with the Lab today.

To begin with, our experiences in the Lab suggest that doing for is more valanced than Wells suggests. Indeed, we have found that doing forcan often be part of a being withrelationship. Father Greg Boyle, who is the Founder of Homeboy Industries in Los Angles and who visited the lab during our rocky first year and helped us understand what we were trying to do, distinguishes two kinds of helping: helping people who needit and helping people who wanthelp.

I think most of us are still in the mind set of “helping people in need.” Few of us get to know someone well enough so that either they can ask for help or that what they want is clear, even if unstated. Even when we do know someone well it is hard to ask for help.  It took me weeks before I felt comfortable asking for the COVID masks that Mustafa—who has been in the Lab since it began—kindly offered over and over.

We don’t have any students in the Lab who “need” help, or what I think amounts to the same thing, who would ever say they need help.  Indeed, our biggest, most spectacular failures have occurred when a Durham student felt they were being treated as someone who needed something—tutoring, conversation, or even mentoring-- from a Duke student.

Wanting and getting help, on the other hand, are part of a relationship—of being with—and they happen all the time for everyone in the Lab.  Duke students, Durham students and Suzanne and I all ask for help in moments in the Lab.  In the closest friendships that we have in the Lab there is a lot of doing for after being asked. Given his years of experience it just made sense for Mustafa to call the FASFA helpline to find out for Alliance if it was okay to shorten her last name so it would fit on the form.  In this COVID moment it even made sense to ask this question in a generic manner without Alliance being present. That was clearly what Alliance clearly wanted.

A second and related lesson about Wells’ distinction is that being withis really, really hard. Or, to put the issue another way, doing forsomeone in need (or when we have decide they are in need) is relatively easy. These days I am wondering if one can simply choose, decide or even work their way to what might be called a being withway thinking and doing?  Today I think you can’t or—if you can—you can only do so in a strategic and calculated manner that is not unlike the measuring out that animates doing for people in need.

I have been thinking a lot about the challenges of building a Lab neighborhood that realizes being withas an everyday, default style. We are certainly clear that the relationships we aspire to in the Lab--care, concern and, if love means wanting the best for another, love—require being with. After all, you can’t know what is best for another if you don’t actually get to know them, engage with them in an open-ended manner.

But most of us in the Lab aren’t there yet. We spend most of our time in the “doing for people in need” space. Take me, for example.  Even as I was telling myself and anyone else who would listen that we were trying to grow being withrelationships, I was also sending signals that the Lab was about meeting needs in a circumscribed manner.  So, I would say the goal of the Lab was to rent space in our heads for another similar in age but wildly and excitingly different than us—so far so being with…. But then in conclusion I would say the Lab commitment entailed just “coming to the Tuesday night lab meeting and Friday staff meeting.”

More broadly, the nature of the refugee resettlement experience is such that critical glaring needs are ridiculously evident every day. For example, this fall it is very likely that the refugee high school students—who are not well connected to the District in any sense-- will get left behind in school like they did last spring as instruction goes virtual. To prevent this students have to actually have the computers the school has bought for them, possess internet hot spots at home, be in possession an appropriate academic schedule, and have a network of supports.

This sounds like classic “doing for someone in need” and it is safe to say that at least some of the high school students in the Lab would not be asking to be better connected to their school.  And while there are many existing relationships in the Lab that connect the Durham and Duke students, it would be easy for me and the Duke students to fall into a check list mentality and just start problem solving,  Within this kind of mentality being withjust slows you down. Such is the seductive logic of doing for someone in need.

The ease with which we fall into doing for someone in need, has me wondering if self-consciously changing our mental outlook and/or social context is the only way to help us prevent the collapse into doing for those who need.

I am going to test this hypothesis this semester in two ways.

First, I am going to suggest that we all adopt the following mindset in our relationships with the high school students in the Lab: Imagine your younger brothers and sisters are attending very poor high schools in Durham that have--despite many good intentions-- not provided adequate education for them in person and now will be educating them remotely.My hunch here is that it is hard to think of a family member as someone in need, someone who you will decide to help in some clear, discreate, check list manner.

Second, I am going to try to be clearer and more consistent about what is required. As my bottom-line statement of the Lab commitment above suggests, I have not been communicating my real expectations in a clear and unambiguous manner. I think, in the back of my mind I was worried that stating the expectations clearly and comprehensively would discourage Duke students from giving the Lab a try and I knew we had a large number of Durham students who were looking for partners. (We never turn away anyone who wants to join the lab.)

This fall I want to talk about what will be needed of all of us if we are going to be good big brothers and sisters. Thus, I am thinking of including in the job description something like this:

Your Adaptive—that is open ended—Challenge for the Semester: How will you forge a relationships of trust with your siblings so that needs—spoken and unspoken—emerge naturally and are addressed no matter how long they take?  Older siblings don’t stop until their younger siblings are in a good place so this relationship will be focused on Tuesday nights but continue throughout the week. A big brother/sister never lets a younger brother/sister get left behind no matter what. (Throughout the semester we will explore examples of these kind of relationships.)

Not sure what will happen here. But watch this space: future blog posts will detail the results of this experiment to, if you will, tease out being withrelationships over the course of the semester.