On Tuesday I was sitting at lunch with the math department. We were tasked with “building culture”…whatever that means. I generally do not think highly of manufactured team-building exercises. In fact, I tend to think they all suck. Since this particular exercise did not include free food but still stole my lunch-time, I expected it to be especially worthless.

Of course we had a list of questions to answer. The first questions were pretty basic – Who are you? What do you teach? No trouble there. We whipped through that in no time. Boring.

The next question was not nearly so nice — What do you do when no one is watching? This was one of those trick questions, those fake I-am-going-to-make-you-have-team-culture-whether-you-like-it-or-not questions. This was the type of question you might answer with friends. But these were not friends. These were not even acquaintances. These were co-workers I had just met, and thus they were not even in the acquaintance ballpark yet.

So naturally I decided to tell them nothing. Nothing real would leave my mouth, much less something potentially embarrassing. Come on. I wanted to make a good impression.

“Well, I usually do it when no one is around, but if I am comfortable with you, I’ll just do it in front of you…I pick my nose.”

So said the first volunteer. I was slightly taken-aback. Actually, I was shocked. This girl, this new girl, just said something real about herself. Real and embarrassing. I didn’t know what to do with this information. Should I laugh? Should I react at all? Or pretend it didn’t happen?

I made no reaction. It was better to gauge the group that way. Some other people asked questions, but really, there was surprisingly little commotion.

When it was my turn, the words “I pick my nose too,” popped out of my mouth. Before the error of mouth’s action could set in, a table-wide conversation broke out about how everybody picks their noses, and about how satisfying it was - especially when it was a big one (I am kind of getting embarrassed just writing this in my bedroom right now).

What is interesting to me though, beyond the fact that nose-picking is such a great topic of conversation, is that girl. That new girl.

Where I planned a reserved answer, she was bold. Where I planned on some kind of mask, she was herself. Where my answer would have undoubtedly done nothing for anybody, her answer freed our group to actually accomplish the goal of the questions; indeed we created culture.

I don’t know what exactly it is about just being yourself that is so powerful, but her truth telling, her truth living, had an immediate impact on our group. By no means are we all best friends, but this shared experience, in this case nose-picking, was so un-normal that it brought us together in a way the team building could not have hoped for.

And what’s better, her actions have inspired me. They have challenged me to be more…well, me. Though I still don’t pick in public. That’s just gross.

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