Bravely Connected

I’ve been speaking about bullying for more than 20 years. I’ve stood in school assemblies on Pink Shirt Day. I’ve talked with kids, teachers, parents, communities and workplaces about bullying, belonging and what happens when people use their power to make somebody else feel small.

Lately I’ve been wondering: What if telling people not to bully isn’t enough? Of course we need boundaries. Of course harmful behaviour needs consequences. Of course people need to take responsibility for how they treat others. But what if bullying begins long before someone says something cruel, excludes somebody from the group, spreads gossip or humiliates someone online?

What if sometimes bullying begins with how we have learned to see human worth? And what if one of the ways we stop bullying is by teaching people something much deeper:

You don’t have to make someone else smaller in order to become bigger.

Bullying Creates a Hierarchy of Human Worth

Think about the social hierarchies we learn incredibly early.

Cool. Weird.

Strong. Weak.

Beautiful. Ugly.

Popular. Unpopular.

Successful. Failure.

Accepted. Rejected.

Enough. Not enough.

Somewhere along the way, we can begin believing that our job is to stay on the right side of those categories. Because if being accepted means I’m safe, then I desperately don’t want to be the person who isn’t accepted. If being cool means I belong, I don’t want to be the weird kid. If being strong gives me value, I don’t want anyone to see my weakness. Once belonging becomes a hierarchy, somebody needs to be underneath somebody else.

If I feel small, making you smaller can temporarily make me feel bigger. If I’m afraid of being rejected, joining the group that rejects somebody else can make me feel safer. If I don’t feel powerful, humiliating someone else can give me a temporary sense of power.

This doesn’t excuse bullying. We are responsible for how we treat people, but if we want to stop bullying, I think we have to become curious about what is underneath it.

What If Some Bullying Is Pain Looking for Somewhere to Land?

I’ve been thinking about this question: What if some bullying is pain looking for somewhere to land? Not all bullying. And understanding someone’s pain doesn’t mean tolerating their harmful behaviour. But I wonder, what if the kid tearing someone else apart is carrying a brutal internal voice themselves? What if the adult who constantly criticizes everyone around them is also constantly criticizing themselves? What if the person obsessed with pointing out everyone else’s flaws has become incredibly skilled at noticing flaws because that’s exactly how they’ve learned to look at themselves?

You’re stupid.

You always screw everything up.

You’re embarrassing.

You’re too much.

You’re not enough.

Nobody wants you here.

You’ll never change.

Imagine hearing those sentences every day. Except the person saying them is you. Eventually, I think something leaks, because we don’t leave the way we see ourselves at home when we walk into a classroom, workplace, marriage or community.

We bring our internal lens into the room with us.

We See Other People Through the Lens We’ve Practiced

Imagine that every one of us is walking around wearing an invisible pair of glasses. Those glasses influence what we notice. If I spend my life scanning myself for weakness, failure, inadequacy and rejection, I become very skilled at noticing those things, and eventually I start seeing them everywhere.

What’s wrong with me? becomes: What’s wrong with you?

I’m not enough becomes: You’re not enough.

If I already feel inadequate, your success can feel threatening. If I don’t believe I belong, your belonging can feel like there’s less room for me. If I hate something about myself, seeing that same quality in you can trigger something in me.

The battle inside of us can begin spilling into the relationships around us.

What if we looked for strength?

What if we also taught ourselves how to see differently? Instead of only asking: What’s wrong with me? What if we taught ourselves to ask:

What’s strong in me?

What have I survived?

What have I learned?

What am I good at?

What do I bring into a room?

What is unique about the way I’m wired?

Where am I growing?

What do I have in my hands?

Because I’ve noticed something. When I learn to see strength in myself, I become better at seeing strength in other people. When I have compassion for my weaknesses, I become more compassionate toward the weaknesses of others. When I allow myself to be imperfect, I don’t need everyone around me to be perfect. When I know I have value, I don’t need to steal value from somebody else.

That’s why I believe an asset-based way of seeing people could be incredibly powerful in conversations about bullying. We aren’t ignoring what’s wrong. We’re refusing to believe that what’s wrong is the whole story.

The Day “The Bully” Stepped Into the Circle

I’ll never forget something that happened while I was working with a group of Grade Five students. I was leading an activity called I See You. It’s an intentionally vulnerable activity, and there’s a lot of work I do with a group before we get to this point. One person stands in the middle of the circle, and the people around them name strengths they genuinely see in that person.

One boy put up his hand. He walked into the middle, and for a moment, nobody said anything. Then one student called out: “He’s the bully.” Another student agreed. “Yeah. He’s the bully.” Then more kids joined in. He’s the bully. I looked at the teacher, hoping she might help redirect what was happening. Instead, she said: “Oh yes. He’s the bully.”

And I watched his face. I watched him shrink. Something struck me in that moment. We were reinforcing the very identity we wanted him to change. We had essentially told him:

This is who you are.

This is your role.

This is what we expect from you.

This is what everyone sees when they look at you.

And I remember thinking: If that’s all we see in him, that’s all we’re giving him permission to become. So I stopped the activity, and I asked: “What else do you see?” I didn’t want fake compliments. I didn’t want kids saying nice things because the adult in the room told them they had to. I wanted them to actually look at him.

It took some time, and then somebody noticed something. Someone else added something. Slowly, they began naming real strengths. They saw something other than the bully, and I watched this boy change right in front of me. He stood differently. His head came up, but perhaps even more importantly, the circle changed too. They saw him differently. There was reconciliation in that circle.

For a moment, a child who had been reduced to his worst behaviour was allowed to become a whole human being again.

Shame Isn’t the Same as Accountability

This is where I think we need an important distinction. Seeing strength in someone doesn’t mean excusing harmful behaviour. Compassion doesn’t mean removing consequences. Understanding someone’s story doesn’t mean allowing them to hurt people. We need accountability. But I don’t believe shame transforms bullying.

Imagine someone already believes:

I’m bad.

I’m worthless.

Nobody wants me.

Something is wrong with me.

And then our strategy for changing their behaviour is essentially: “Yes. You’re a terrible person.” We’ve reinforced the worldview underneath the behaviour we’re trying to change.

What if instead we could say: “What you did was not okay. And I also believe you are capable of something different.” We can hold people accountable without reducing them to the worst thing they’ve done. That’s not weakness. That’s refusing to give harmful behaviour the power to become someone’s entire identity.

Your Strength Does Not Require Someone Else to Be Weak

Maybe this is one of the most important things we can learn: Your strength does not require someone else to be weak. Your belonging doesn’t require someone else to be excluded. Your intelligence doesn’t require somebody else to be stupid. Your beauty doesn’t require somebody else to be ugly. Your success doesn’t require somebody else to fail. Your voice doesn’t require somebody else’s silence. Your dignity does not increase when someone else’s decreases.

There’s enough dignity to go around.

What if children understood that before they ever entered middle school? What if adults understood it before they entered a workplace? What if we understood it in our marriages, neighbourhoods, community groups and online conversations? Maybe we’d spend less energy trying to establish where we sit in the hierarchy and more energy discovering what each person brings.

Secure People Don’t Have to Steal Dignity

When I remember there is something strong in me, I enter rooms differently. Instead of: How do I compare to you? I can ask: What can I learn from you?

Instead of: Who am I better than? I can ask: What’s strong in you? Instead of: Do these people approve of me? I can ask: How can I make this room better? Who can I add value to?

Curiosity changes relationships.

People who are secure in their own dignity don’t need to steal dignity from someone else. That’s why I think our conversations about bullying need to go deeper than behaviour.

Maybe Bullying Prevention Starts With Belonging

What if our goal wasn’t simply to create schools where kids don’t bully? What if we wanted to create communities where people genuinely understand:

I belong here—and so do you.

I don’t have to make myself small.

I don’t have to make you small.

There’s room for both of us.

There’s room for your strength and mine.

There’s room for both of us to be learning.

There’s room for us to be different.

There’s room for us to grow.

Maybe one of the greatest gifts we can give ourselves is helping them become people who don’t need to diminish themselves or anyone else in order to belong. Perhaps that begins by helping them recognize their own worth. Because when I learn to see strength in myself, I become better at seeing strength in you. When I learn compassion for my own humanity, I become more capable of compassion for yours.

A Different Kind of Anti-Bullying Challenge

So perhaps this year, alongside telling kids to stop bullying, we could give them a different challenge. For one week, start noticing.

Notice the voice you use with yourself.

When you make a mistake, what do you say?

When someone else succeeds, what happens inside you?

When you feel rejected, what story do you tell yourself?

When you look in the mirror, what do you notice first?

Are you speaking to yourself with contempt? Shame? Comparison? Impatience?

And then notice how you look at other people. Do you use the same lens?

Then try something different.

Every day, ask: What’s strong in me? And then ask: What’s strong in you?

Maybe stopping bullying isn’t only about teaching people to be nicer. Maybe it’s about dismantling the belief that someone has to become smaller for someone else to become bigger.

Friends, I don’t know about you, but that is brave.