I’ve Been Down Here Before

“This guy's walking down the street when he falls in a hole. The walls are so steep he can't get out.

"A doctor passes by and the guy shouts up, 'Hey you. Can you help me out?' The doctor writes a prescription, throws it down in the hole and moves on.

"Then a priest comes along and the guy shouts up, 'Father, I'm down in this hole can you help me out?' The priest writes out a prayer, throws it down in the hole and moves on

"Then a friend walks by, 'Hey, Joe, it's me can you help me out?' And the friend jumps in the hole. Our guy says, 'Are you stupid? Now we're both down here.' The friend says, 'Yeah, but I've been down here before and I know the way out.”

— Aaron Sorkin, The West Wing, “Noël” (Season 2, Episode 10)

Experience in anything has lasting value. Prior knowledge and familiarity are easy to undervalue, especially in a world so often pulled toward AI, younger voices, and the promise of immediate results.

The quote above, from one of my favorite television shows of all time, The West Wing, captures what experience can accomplish. Simply having faced a problem before - having waded through its turbulent waters - gives a person a perspective that someone without that experience cannot yet fully have.

At fifty-seven, with some experience of my own, I am still guilty of overlooking that truth in my parents and in other elders I respect. I sometimes forget that while time may change a person’s physical appearance, it does not diminish the value of what they have to offer through a lifetime of experience.

On the other side, I see younger people than me, sometimes even my own children, not listening to the advice of someone like me, someone who has been there, done that, and has the T-shirt to prove it.

Listen, I get it, experience is not the only thing to consider when making a decision, but it should rank pretty high up there. And it goes beyond just age-related experience and what is on a job resume.

Experience benefits us all - in parenting, grief, marriage, leadership, failure, fear, watching parents age, and raising children who eventually stop needing your advice. It is also there in the strange realization that you are now the older person whose experience younger people sometimes discount.

Experience does not mean someone is always right. The person who has “been down here before” remembers a different hole. The world changes. Technology changes. Culture changes. Your children will understand things you do not.

Wisdom is not blindly following experience but knowing that it exists and knowing when to follow it.

The bottom line is this: We need each other.

The young person may know something new.

The older person may recognize something old.

And sometimes what looks like an entirely new problem is just another hole somebody has climbed out of before.

Someday one of your children, a friend, or perhaps someone you barely know is going to find themselves in one of life’s holes. You won’t necessarily have the prescription or the prayer or the perfect answer.

But you might be able to climb down.

Because you’ve been down there before.