Diversity and Inclusion Matters

Chapter 2DE&I Fundamentals, CAPE, and Organizational Change

Overwhelmed and Needing a Process

When I was a graduate student at the University of Wyoming, I remember being overwhelmed with the thought of starting my thesis. It had to be over 100 pages and, in some way, add to the field of study. At that point in my life, I had never even written more than ten pages, so writing 100 pages seemed like an impossible task for me. I remember thinking, Why did I even start this graduate program?!? There was no way I could write 100 pages of anything. I had no idea where to start or even what to start researching. With my history of being a slow reader and terrible writer, the task was way too big, and I stopped doing anything.

As luck would have it, a faculty member, Dr. Garth Massey, saw me struggling and told me a story I will never forget. I often reflect on this story when I begin to feel immobilized by a task that seems too big. Dr. Massey shared a parable with me about a parent, their young child, and a large walnut tree.

As this story goes, the child (who was about six years old) was called out to the front yard of the home where there was a large walnut tree. The parent pointed to the walnuts that had fallen out of the tree and said to the small child, “You need to pick up all these walnuts.”

Apparently, this tree was quite large, and there were walnuts everywhere. I did a quick Google search and found that a mature walnut tree can produce up to 350 lbs. of nuts. The average ...