Three years ago, a live BBC interview was interrupted by a couple of kids being kids. Instead being treated like a perfectly natural and understandable occurrence for a man who was obviously working out of his home office, it was discussed and debated for many days following. Some criticized how the parents handled the situation. Some thought it was an adorably human moment. But it was news, and it was news around the globe.

Why was this such a hot topic? Simple. Because it didn’t happen that often. The formality of an official interview of a credible individual was suddenly interrupted by the reality that we are all humans, living messy human existences, with kids, families, and the complicated balance of life.

The realm of self-imposed professional optics are fascinating. While most of us feel like we live lives of constant surprise and unexpected chaos, we do everything we can to create a professional persona that gives the appearance of being in complete control. Even though we all struggle with the complicated, imperfect, and sometimes painful realities of day-to-day life, we rarely let it cross over into our professional contexts, fearful that it will pull back the proverbial curtain and betray our carefully manicured workplace image.

Until now.

Last night my wife was watching a country music show on TV, where some of the top country artists were performing from their homes in the name of social distancing. I’m not much of a country music fan, but I was entertained by the artists that were performing with their children in the room, or from a horse stall, recording on a mobile device and singing an unedited piece while strumming an acoustic guitar. The formality of polish was gone. The mix, the sound, the tone—all were imperfect. No 360-degree jib camera costing millions of dollars, no lavish lighting setup or professional makeup job…just people singing real music, entertaining and giving hope to Americans with their talent. There will be no performance critics, no “what was she wearing” comments or suggestions of seedy scandal. Instead, people will just be happy that some of their favorite artists found a way to inspire them, even in these difficult times.

My wife and I are, for the most part, working from home. And where video meetings and conference calls used to have a scripted formality, lingo and expectation, today they’re arenas for acknowledging that the barriers between work and personal life are suddenly and completely vanquished. Finding the most creative background photo for our teleconference, or seeing how many cats we can have in our lap while participating in Zoom meetings—these are the new and beautiful bulldozers of a false professional world we have been trying so hard to maintain since the beginning of the workplace. Suddenly we start every meeting with an honest account of what we are going through, how we are feeling, and the human reality that is daily life in a COVID-19 world.