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This year I am writing a blog post for each of the twelve days of Christmas as I have done a few times before. I don’t have a theme this year, so my topics come from what is on my mind that day. Sometimes the posts will be connected and sometimes they will not. Here is the fourth post of this Christmas. It was supposed to be the third, before yesterday’s post about hope spawned from it 🙂

As I wrote yesterday, I have been pondering a lot about how we can make the world better.

We have the power to do this.

In the first post I wrote how we can make the world a little bit better by being mindful of our words. I wrote about my long-lived believe that we can make the world better by doing things for others that matter a lot to them and a little to us. For the second post, I wrote that we can choose who we want to be every day. We can choose to do good with every decision. And yesterday I wrote about hope. Hope is the energy that will drive our actions.

I believe that these are the things we need to change the world and make it better.

Things are bad in the world. We can’t flip a switch and change it right away. We can’t wish it away. What we can do is choose how we act, and we can choose who we are.

“I wish it need not have happened in my time,” said Frodo.
“So do I,” said Gandalf, “and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”

J.R.R. Tolkien “The Fellowship of the Ring”

We can choose what to do with the time that is given to us; we can choose every day to be someone good. We can choose good in every decision and every action. It won’t be easy, and we won’t always succeed; and then we get a new day with new options. We can do a lot of small things that will build up, make ripples in the water, and become something bigger. Together these small things can create a bigger change. Ripples can spread far; ripples can become a wave; waves can create big changes.

I have been listening to the 12 audiobooks of “How to train your dragon” by Cressida Cowell. Marvelous books that are funny and has important messages. I have 15 minutes left of the last book, and all the pieces are coming together for the finale and closure. Close to the ending there is the following quote, which fits so well with other things in my head:

“Everything we do, you see, has its consequences and repercussions, every kind act, and every bad, every friend we make, and every enemy. Everything is connected.”

― Cressida Cowell, How to Seize a Dragon’s Jewel

Everything we do creates ripples. We might not think that they do, but they all do. As the author, Cressida Crowell has the power to make all the things connected in the dragon books, so they have consequences. We cannot write the story and connect things; we cannot ensure consequences – good or bad.

What we can do is to create those ripples; we can start things of by choosing to do good. By being kind, by doing good, by respecting, accepting and sending love into the world, we can create those ripples.

I have the hope that we can do this, and my hope fuels my actions.

We can create change for the better.

Blogpost for the first day of Christmas 24/25: Making the world a little better
Blogpost for the second day of Christmas 24/25: Who do you want to be?
Blogpost for the third day of Christmas 24/25: Hope is real
Blogpost for the fifth day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the sixth day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the seventh day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the eight day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the ninth day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the tenth day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the eleventh day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the twelfth day of Christmas 24/25:

This year I am writing a blog post for each of the twelve days of Christmas as I have done a few times before. I don’t have a theme this year, so my topics come from what is on my mind in that moment. Here is the third post of this Christmas. Another post that started one way and ended up another. I have so many things I want to talk and write about 🙂

I have been pondering a lot about how we can make things better in the world. I want a world of accept, respect, tolerance, care, and love. I want a world, where people can be who they are without fear. I want peace and harmony. I don’t want fake harmony, where we pretend that everything is fine. I want harmony, where we embrace differences and cherish differences as part of the whole. I want peace, where we can disagree and still respect each other, love each other, care about each other. As a minimum accept and respect each other.

I know that we will never truly get there, so I am hoping that we can keep moving forwards; that we keep making things better; that we keep improving.

Things are bad in the world. No doubt about that. There is so much pain and intolerance, wars, tyrants, apathy, diseases, violence, hunger etm. etm. I feel like things are going backwards in many places. It does not look good.

And yet I can take a step back and see progress over time. Things are better now than it was 100 years ago, and we keep moving forward even with the setbacks that happen. I just don’t think that it is fast enough. I want to see the improvements happen faster. I hope that we can make improvements happen faster.

We need hope:

We must accept finite disappointment but never lose infinite hope.”
– Martin Luther King Jr.

We must accept that there are setbacks, and that some things do no work out. We must not lose hope that things can get better. That things will get better.

Hope is not a strategy; many have said this and many keep saying this. I disagree. Having hope as the only strategy is not good, because then nothing will happen. We need to change things by doing and by speaking. A strategy without hope is not good. We need to combine hope with action and words.

We need the hope: hope is the energy that will drive our actions. If there is no hope for better times, we will not make an effort to make that happen. With hope, we can choose to do good, because we know that it will matter. We have the hope showing the way.

I am in it for the long haul, and while things can be dark, I try my hardest to get back to a place of hope. Hope that we can make the world better together.

What do you want?  Nourish your hope for that and pick your actions.

Hope is real and it is there.

Blogpost for the first day of Christmas 24/25: Making the world a little better
Blogpost for the second day of Christmas 24/25: Who do you want to be?
Blogpost for the fourth day of Christmas 24/25: Ripples in the Water
Blogpost for the fifth day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the sixth day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the seventh day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the eight day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the ninth day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the tenth day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the eleventh day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the twelfth day of Christmas 24/25:

This year I am writing a blog post for each of the twelve days of Christmas as I have done a few times before. It went well with the first post, even if it was posted late in the day. Then the second day came, and I was too tired after the Christmas celebrations, so here is the second post even if it is the third day.

First day of Christmas I wrote about making the world a little better; that post spawned out of writing about decisions, and then my brain went on a journey 🙂

This happens regularly, and then I chose if I want to follow my brain or go back to my original plan. I make a decision; I make an active choice.

Making active choices is important. It is the way we take control of our lives. Going with the flow is easy: Doing what we are “supposed” to do (from inner or other expectations), doing what we always do, doing as we are told, not doing anything which is also a choice. There are many variations of giving up control of our lives.

Some of you will already know that I like to talk about active choices in many different settings; I use it when I work in organisations and with individuals, and it is often in my talks. In this post, I want to address the choices we make about who we are, and the impact that we have on the world

My inspiration for this post came after watching the Christmas movie “Red One”. I love this message:

“Every day we have a choice about who we want to be. Every decision, big or small, is an opportunity to do good and to leave the world a better place.”

Red One aka Santa aka Nick aka Sankt Nicolaus of Myra.

It speaks of choices, and it speaks of making the world better. We have the choice to decide who we want to be every single day. We have that choice even if we don’t know that we have it. This also means that we have the choice to change if we want to. Every day gives us a new option to choose who we are, who we want to be. We have the ability and the power to decide who we want to be. Not just once, but every single day with every decision we make. We can choose.

We have the option to make the world better every single day. We have that option even if we don’t know that we have it. We have that option even if we don’t think we have any influence. Sometimes we can feel small and insignificant in the bigger picture. We might be small, but we are not insignificant. Like I stated yesterday, we can make a difference by holding the door, by smiling to someone, by asking how a friend is doing, we can make a difference; and those are just the small differences. It is part of what makes us who we are. Do we seize that opportunity to do good?

You have that choice, so make it actively; take control over who you want to be.

Did you choose, who you want to be today?

Blogpost for the first day of Christmas 24/25: Making the world a little bit better
Blogpost for the third day of Christmas 24/25: Hope is real
Blogpost for the fourth day of Christmas 24/25: Ripples in the Water
Blogpost for the fifth day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the sixth day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the seventh day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the eight day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the ninth day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the tenth day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the eleventh day of Christmas 24/25:
Blogpost for the twelfth day of Christmas 24/25:

Earlier this week my friend and discussion partner Daniel Hommel posted on LinkedIn about authentic leadership, and how it has become an unrealistic expectation; you cannot share everything with your employees and you will have to play theater to do what is needed. He claims that by expecting them to be authentic, we also force them to play more theater.

To no-one’s surprise, I disagree with the premis. To me it is very important to have integrity, and to be honest and authentic. I see myself as an authentic leader and what you see is what you get. No hidden agendas.

I have many strong opinions on this, so my answer to his post on LinkedIn was too long even for two comments. Therefor I have turned it into this blog post.

Even if I don’t agree with Daniel in this case, he does write good stuff, so consider following him on LinkedIn for posts on change and leadership.

I agree with some of what of what Daniel writes. I agree that as a leader/manager, there are things you cannot share whether it is about a person or the company. I agree that there are sides of yourself that you may not want to show at work.

I agree that integrity is important – having high morals and living by them. I agree that honesty is important; I believe that transparency is important.

Authenticity is important; what the discussion on Daniel’s post showed is that we use the same word for different things. It does not have to mean that all of you is exposed at all times also the personal stuff. It is a scale and a balance, but what the leader does expose should be genuine. Being yourself at work does not mean that it has to be all of you that you bring; there is a context, and there are things that you may want to keep private. We can choose.

It is like transparency and honesty.

Being honest does not mean saying every thought that pops up in your head. Nor does it mean saying it in the way that pops up. Transparency does not mean expose everything.

Sometimes you will have two or more values that contradict, so both can not be fulfilled. Like a leader, who knows there is a firing round coming up. They want to be transparent. They also want to create a safe environment for their employees, follow union rules, have time to prepare good conversation. At a time like that the leader needs to make a tough decision. I still think they can be genuine and authentic.

Expectations

I agree that we should stop having unrealistic expectations that leaders cannot live up to. There are already many things a leader is expected to be and do, and they don’t always get the support to grow into this if they don’t already have the skills for it.

What I do not agree on, is that it means you cannot be authentic, if you are a leader.

Being authentic is about being genuine. It is about living your values. You can be authentic and still show different sides of you. You can be authentic in a meeting with the executives and discuss the crisis in the company, and you can be authentic around your reports without mentioning the crisis. Authenticity can be answering a question by saying that you cannot answer that.

Being an authentic leader means truly caring about your people and not pretenting. It means truly caring about the company. An authentic leader must take both into account. They set up frames that the employees might not agree on. They do things that they don’t like. And they do it because they genuinely think it is the right thing to do.

We sometimes mistake authenticity for total transparency as if we were made of glass and everything was visible to everyone at all times. Perhaps we should start talking about what we really expect instead of using one word; create discussions about the expectations instead serving them ready made. (If you did not already know, clear expectations is another thing that I feel very strongly about 🙂 )

Is it easy to be authentic? Is it easy to have integrity? Is it easy to be honest? No, sometimes it can be very hard and that is when our values are truly tested.

As an example: it is hard to fire people. It is also part of being a manager. If you cannot fire someone, you should not be a manager. We don’t always chose, if we are to fire people. What we do chose is, if we show up in an authentic way.

Being a leader is also about doing the things that are hard when it is necessary. This is part of what we can expect from a leader. We should not have unrealistic expectations, but I believe we should have high expectations of a leader. We should not expect them to be perfect, but we should expect them to have self-reflection and self growth. And we should expect a company to provide support for this.

So no I do not agree. I think it is a realistic expectation to have authentic leaders. It may take them a while to get there, but what is the alternative? To have “ungenuine” leaders? Questionable leaders? Dishonest leaders? Insincere leaders?

Authentic leaders help make a good organisation – and they may need help to get there. So the answer is “yes, authentic leadership is good”.

The worst part about having your own company is all the work that is not your core work. I really just want to coach, train, do talks and workshops, mentor – well I want to help individuals and organisations become better versions of themselves.

But it is not enough to run a company…

Potential clients need to know that I exist and what I can do – how else can they find me and get my help?

I have been spoiled with a really good market in most of the years that I have been self-employed, so I have not had to do much besides speaking at conferences and tweeting to get work. And of course network network network.

Well Musk killed twitter and the market is very different now for me as well as for my network… I need to make an effort (gasp).

So I am updating my webpage, which is not my favorite thing to do. Right now I am trying to write about my speaking; things like where I will speak this year, and what I normally speak about in case someone wants to hire me. Eventually I plan to have links to former talks there as well.

On the side I am working on describing what I do in more words than “work on whatever is the most important thing with frequent feedback and collaboration with the client”. I have a variety of skills and knowledge in my toolbox, and since each context is different, different tools apply in each situation. I have worked on creating better planning, on going from vision to something applicable in daily lives, communication, OKRs, psychological safety, conflicts, collaboration, retrospective etc – and that is just for the organisations…

I am collecting testimonials for my webpage as well. But then I have to ask for them, which is probably one of the hardest things for me. Asking people to say nice things about me, if I helped them, feels wrong somehow; I have learned to receive nice statements about me, and even appreciating them and take them in for the most part. Asking for them is a whole other ballgame. That is the hard part. My logic knows that people will often like to help, or they will tell me if not. People also say yes to writing one and then they don’t; they forget, they become busy, they don’t know what to write or maybe they didn’t like to say no to writing something for me. I am practicing asking and have even made a list of people to ask. I haven’t asked that many yet… working on it 🙂

If I helped you somehow whether it was as an individual or as an organisation, please consider writing a nice testimonial to me that I can put on my webpage 🙂

Gitte

Doing marketing and promoting myself is another non-favorite. Things like writing regular blog posts, when I am used to doing my writing, when I am inspired and only then; or writing about some of my successes. I have been brought up to not talk about the good stuff that I do; if I worked hard and did well, people around me would notice. Which is sometimes true, but people are not always around me, my best work is not noticed as it elevates others; and besides promoting yourself is mostly to people, who do not know you yet. Even though I have learned to be proud of my achievements, it is still hard to speak up about it 🙂

There is writing on linked-in and then doing the right things to be seen. Ask friends to comment and share, post at the right time.. So many things to think about.

And don’t get me started on design – because I really don’t know much about it 😉

If you follow me anywhere, you will also know that I dislike accounting. I have been doing the stuff myself the last three years – and messed up two years. So I now found an accountant, who will start with figuring out what I messed up, and try to fix it. I guess it is a bit like debugging 🙂

I think that all these other parts of running a company are super important. I am just not very good at them and I don’t like to do them. Some things you can pay others to do and some things you can’t. Plus you need to make money before you buy services, and you need to promote yourself before you get money… darn I guess I need to get to work on it 😉

The good thing about being self-employed is that you get to decide for yourself; which jobs you take, which conferences you go to, which things you want to work on – all the things. You also face the consequences of your choices and that is how it should be. With freedom comes responsibility 🙂

I like my core work and I really like my freedom. So I guess there is no other way. At least I got some of my frustration out now 😉

This post is based on a thread I did on Bluesky yesterday, which became much longer than I had intended. I only planned to write about AIDS day and WHO’s campaign. And then I started thinking. Remembering how it was for me as a young teenager when AIDS started. Many more thoughts appeared and words just came out of my brain and into my hands. I therefore decided to write a blog post and add some things that are not as easy to add on Bluesky. This is the long post that came from that.

Yesterday was World AIDS Day and WHO celebrate the role of communities in driving progress towards ending aids. This would not be possible without communities.

Today most people can live with HIV if they get the right medications – and if it is discovered early enough. Please go get tested if you have a suspicion that you might be infected.

There is research going on about how to cure it. The research that developed the medication for HIV patients have helped in other areas as well. You can read more about AIDS and HIV here or watch a video with an NHS speciality doctor in HIV.

Memories

I recall the 80s, when AIDS was a deadly disease – to begin with no-one even knew about HIV and it was difficult to figure out what the disease was all about; we were afraid to be infected with touch, some even after scientist found out it only infected through bodily fluids.

Many healthcare professionals were afraid to help treat people in the beginning- well to touch people; and some did not want to help as it seemed to only hit gay men. It was late 80s before all started get help. Well almost all in the Western world that is.

I still remember the picture of Princess Diana holding hands with an HIV patient; she gave them hugs as well; she did this to comfort and to show that it was not dangerous to touch patients. And because they needed it. We all need care.

HIV does not make people dangerous to know. You can shake their hands and give them a hug. Heaven knows they need it. What’s more, you can share their homes, their workplaces, and their playgrounds and toys.

Princess Diana of Wales, 1987

Princess Diana’s role modelling changed the narrative and remove (some of) the stigma. She remained an HIV activist till her death.

As a young teenager it was somewhat scary, but didn’t feel super relevant to me.

I recall that gay people had it, but I didn’t know anyone except my cousin, who I lost touch with when he moved to Copenhagen. He ended up dying from aids after having been sick for 4 years.

My cousin was disowned by his dad as soon as he told him that he was gay. Furthermore he forbad his wife to see their son ever again. She was not even allowed to go see him when he was sick and dying from HIV. I never talked to my uncle again even when we were in the same room. This was the first time I encountered homophobia, and even then in my early teens I could not grok how anyone could disown their own kids just because they love people of their own gender. I still don’t understand it.

Homophobia then

In the 1980s I did not see what was going on in the gay community. I was young, not sexually active, and not gay, so my information was mainly from the news, which I did not watch very much. It was not until later that I learned my cousin had died from HIV.

In school we got this cute little comic in 1989 with two young people meeting at a disco, having sex with a condom and talking about how AIDS spreads and does not spread. A very mild way of learning about AIDS and condoms. No fear, just a fun little comic.

So back then I did not see what really happened to the gay community. Aids had spread there first and it was killing people in large numbers; some say that the gay community lost a whole generation. People died at first because no-one knew what was happening; then they died because it was a “not important” minority group. The already exiting homophobia grew.

My friend @the-qa-guy.bsky.social shared this article with me about San Francisco Men Chorus ; they lost many members to AIDS and created a very powerful picture illustrating just how many did. It gives me the chills. It really shows how the gay community suffered from this and how many lives was lost. Shocking. And then the harassment is not even mentioned. It is like it is forgotten somehow.

Bare with me with the following, you will see the context soon: I saw a mini-series “Des” a week ago about a serial killer. The series shows the time from the killer getting caught until the trial and prison, showing how the police tried to identify victims and collect evidence while being shocked about the case. The killer killed 15-16 young men 1978-1983 until he was caught because he clogged a drain with human remains – only 8 were ever identified. He picked the victims that no-one would miss; those living on the streets; hungry people; young gay men who had run away from home. At that time many people went missing in London and few were found.

The series was scary but well presented, and I wanted to know more, so I found three different documentaries. All of them showed how homophobia had allowed the killer to kill without being discovered for so long. Afterwards the press had main focus on the killer and not the victims. They were just gays (or worse terms); even if not all victims were gay, there were put in that box, and there was nothing interesting to write about. No interest in how it could have gone this badly.

At least four young men had escaped the killer and reported it to the police, but it was pushed aside as lovers’ quarrel and nothing was done. Not all police was homophobic, but it was widespread.

It was terrible to watch. I knew that there was a lot of homophobia then, but I was not aware that it was so bad and so ingrained in police, in the press, well in society. Even if it had not been about a killer, it would have been terrible to watch. The way people talked about the gay community as if they were not even humans.

Because of the stigma the police struggled to find witnesses, because people were not willing to be seen as gay in public, or they were terrified. The investigators convinced some of them to be witnesses which helped convict the killer and put him away for life.

One of the documentaries not only showed the stigma and the homophobia in connection with the case, but also how AIDS affected that. The homophobia that was already strong in society grew stronger, and it became even harder to be gay. Papers talked of “the gay plague”, gay papers and bars were burned down etc. And it was seen as a punishment for gay men for their lifestyle.

While I logically knew it was bad for the gay community, I did not know just how horrible it was; I was really just a big kid, but so were some of the people who died then.

Homophobia and other phobias today

Is it better today?

Yes it is; for the most parts gay people are accepted in the Western society; there are actors, football players, politicians, writers who are openly gay. Gay and lesbians can legally marry in a growing amount of countries – latest in Nepal. And not just better for gay people, but for all queers; I hear young people talking about these things as if it is not special; it is one part of people but not their identity. LGBTQIA+ people are visible.

Is it good enough?

NO

This week Russia decided that the “LGBT movement” is an extremist movement. Several countries have death penalties for being gay. Hungary has laws against promoting these “things” to kids (what the rest of us call sexual education).

Yes these are extreme, but even when it is not , there are still hate crimes (some deadly), homophobia, harrassments, homophobs telling horrible stories that are not true about gays. And it seems to get worse – or maybe I am more aware, so I see it more.

I have friends who have to consider if it is safe to hold the hand of the person they are in relationship with, because they might get bullied or worse: beating up or killed.

In Denmark one of the nationalist politicians said that gays and lesbians refugees should be sent back to the countries they come from even if there is death penalty for that. They could just pretend not to be gay and not act it out.

There are libraries that have story time for kids with drag queens, who have had to cancel or get guards because they got so many threats. Last year there was a session planned in a library in Denmark, where the head of the library had to stop answering the phone due to harrassment, and had to tell their staff to never says their last name in case the harassers tried to find them. We are talking about a drag queen reading a story to kids. The excuse for harassing and trying to stop story time is the lie that the drag queens are “grooming the kids”. They are not. They are telling a story- the only ones sexualising the situation are the homophobes.

There are even gay and lesbian communities who go against trans people, which I totally don’t get. Not to mention the discussions on pronouns. Oh I could go on and on.

All the LGBTQIA+ “movement” wants to do is live normal lives, be able to love who they love, be able to walk down the streets without being afraid, be represented in society and just be people.

That is what they are: humans just like us. There are differences but no more than with other people.

Why do I care? I am cis and straight – none of this is relevant for me. I can love and marry who I want (if I can find someone); I can walk safely in so many places in the world. Places where other people cannot.

I care because I believe that you should be allowed to love, who you love, as long as there is consent and all parties are grown-up humans. Love is hard enough to find as it is. I once saw a post saying “You don’t like gay marriage? Don’t marry someone your own gender.” and that is so true.

I care because I have seen what a difference it makes for people to be able to be themselves. These people can be themselves, and we can make a difference for them by seeing them as they are.

We can make a difference for these people even by small things. It can be a bit difficult to learn new pronouns, but it is still a small thing if it helps someone else feel better in their skin. We can see them as they are. We can stand up for them. We can help those less privileged than us no matter what our privilege is.

Allowing people to be who they are and love, who they love does not harm the rest of us.

Gitte Klitgaard 2023

Mostly I care because LGBTQIA+ are humans. Humans have human rights. Giving them these rights do not hurt us. In fact human kind would be better off if we followed human rights in more places. The world is bad enough as it is.

This blog post started with me just wanting to create a small post about AIDS and how communities help; then my thoughs went into the care and worry I have for the LGBTQIA+ people and I ended up with this post.

Please be kind to other people; we are all humans that deserve respect, acceptance, to love and to live. Also be kind to people that are different than you; especially to people that are different than you. And be kind to yourself.

Know that you all matter and you are loved!