A few days ago, I was discussing with some fellow fundraisers how to simplify and explain a complicated fundraising situation. At one point, I said “in order to explain this point, you’ll have to stick the landing on a fundraising triple lutz that lays out blah, blah, blah…” Which I thought was terribly clever. But you’ll be upset on my behalf, Substack, to hear that I was roundly mocked for using a Winter Olympics term during the Summer Olympics.
I then insisted that a “triple lutz” was, in fact, a gymnastics move (not a figure skating jump) and that everybody else on the call was wrong. I ignored cries of “Google it, Dan!,” shook my head, announced I couldn’t be convinced otherwise, and suggested we might as well just drop it. So we did. Until now.
The only Olympic sport I tune-in for is diving. Not because I enjoy it, but because I can’t look away. It’s the most terrifying, dangerous, confusing sport at the Olympics. What compels somebody to stand on their tippy toes at such an insane height and then propel themselves off it?
But as Vera Monstera mused in a fantastic post last week, there’s an earnestness to people who climb onto diving boards, and there’s only two ways off: into the deep or back the way you came.
It’s true for Olympians. It’s true for fundraisers. And it’s true for Child #2 who sneaks into a membership-required, neighborhood pool every summer.
Let’s take a dip…
Our neighborhood has a community pool which (I assume) has a diving board. I don’t know for certain because our family isn’t a paying member of this community pool. And has never been. So, I have no idea.
Nevertheless, Child #2—she of the “Hot Girls Hit the Curb” bumper sticker and dressing up as a carton of strawberry milk for Halloween fame—has spent numerous summer afternoons over the years frequenting this members-only pool without (a) being herself a member; (b) being invited by a member; or (c) paying for the privilege. She’s actually invited friends over to our house expressly for the purpose of hanging out at a community swimming pool that—I remind you again—we don’t belong to.
I asked her how she gets into this pool. She shrugged, looked completely unbothered, and said: “You just walk in like you’re a member and nobody really stops you.” Brassy!
S I D E B A R
I suspect part of Child #2’s success in getting into the pool has less to do with her budding career as a con artist and more to do with her friends working there and waving her in.
It’s hard for me to get too upset about teenagers taking advantage of their friends’ summer jobs. You did it, too. We all did.
As teenagers, my sister and brother worked at a movie theater. My sister worked the box office and I’d roll up and squeak: “One “ticket” for the 3:15 showing of Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls, please!” She let me into that movie like five times, you guys.
For Child #2 and fundraisers, there are two ways off a diving board: forward or backward. I envision Child #2 walking out onto the diving board with the same moxie that she walks into the pool. No membership? No problem! There’s a diving board? Watch this!:
But could she be just comfortable walking off the diving board as leaping from it? She can do one with a lot of confidence. Can she do the other? This is what I want to talk with her about.
For fundraisers, walking out onto a diving board can mean any number of things. Things that feel sorta risky and scary when everybody is watching. Like introducing yourself to a new prospect. Or asking for a big gift. Or simply doing something different that shakes up how you meet and engage with others to grow and sustain relationships.
Look, I’m not trying to fire you up for the next time you’re bouncing on a diving board. I’m actually doing the opposite. I’m here to remind you that sometimes the better choice on that fundraising diving board is to go back the way you came. Maybe there’s just too many people treading water in the deep end who you’ll collide with. Or maybe the bounce of the board isn’t right. Or maybe you haven’t decided if you’re going for the cannonball with the big splash or the headfirst pike with a twist. Isn’t it better to turn around and wait until it feels right? Maybe climb back onto it when the coast is clear, somebody tightens those springs, and you decide the degree of difficulty you’re comfortable with. Otherwise, you’ll resurface with a mouthful of water and a pink belly when this happens:
I won’t torture this metaphor any further. Suffice to say, I’m more impressed by people who know why they’re on the board in the first place than whatever fancy jumps they have on deck for us all to see.
Because when you’re ready and the water is just right, you can do the most amazing triple lindy lutz off a diving board this side of the Paris Olympics!
A triple lutz—you might be surprised to learn—is not only a gymnastics move, it’s actually a choreographed series of twists, flips, and somersaults that platform and springboard divers perform (not to be confused with whatever figure skaters do). A few of my close acquaintance continue to be mistaken about such things.
Now go out and splash around in the water while we still have some summertime to splash around in. Thanks, as always, for reading.
No gif of Rodney Dangerfield doing the triple Lindy off the high board in Back to School? I’m a little disappointed, Dan.