—————

“And the nights, bigger than imagining: black and gusty and enormous, disordered and wild with stars.”

—–

Donna Tartt 

=============== 

“This is the way the world ends

Not with a bang but a whimper.”

―

T.S. Eliot

==========

Well. Despite the fact most nights remain the same amount of hours, minutes and seconds day to day, a sleepless night can often look bigger than imagined. I have found that sleepless nights are less about restless minds and more about capacity in a squeezed space.

Huh?

Let me tackle squeezed first.

In general the world is a pretty vast place and our lives can seem fairly inconsequential.

The good news about this is that within all that vastness there is a lot of room to let some of the more horrible or horribly mundane crap just slip by.

The bad news occurs when all of a sudden Life, and the world, shrinks and you feel squeezed. And this can happen a lot easier than one may think.

Ponder what I am going to say as “the big squeeze.”

Everyday everyone faces some naturally occurring ‘shrinking’ aspects which in and of themselves can’t shrink your Life enough to matter. Let’s just say this is the daily grind of work, chores and family & Life commitments. Some things go well and some things don’t.

And then, of course, there will be a day or two where the things that “don’t” significantly outnumber the things that “do.” because this is day to day shit I view this as getting squeezed from the sides. They kind of suffocate you a little.

But set that aside for a moment.

And then there will be some days where you have that ad hoc shit you have to plan to get done — the faucet is dripping, the car engine light is on, someone hit the mailbox, crap like that. 95% of the time this kind of shit never goes as planned. It takes too long or it doesn’t get done right the first time or … well … suffice it to say … the easy stuff never gets done as easily as you would want.

And then, of course, there will be a day or two where the things that never get done as easily as you want actually end up just not going right. This is stupid little shit … but maybe think about it as maybe getting squeezed from underneath – an unexpected aggravating shift on the ground below you.

But set that aside for a moment.

And then there will be some days where you turn on the TV or maybe scan the internet news breaks and … well … some shit has hit the fan. Your country has made some monumental decision that seems to shift its place in the world.

Some nutjob terrorist has committed some heinous act to innocent people.

Some “thing” happens that feel like a shift in the bedrock of ‘what is.’ It may not directly affect you but you sense that it is a monumental thing which will most likely affect you <even though you aren’t sure how yet>. This is big shit … this just makes you feel a little like the weight of the world has gotten a little heavier and the world as you have known it has become a little murkier. You are getting squeezed from above.

But set that aside for a moment.

Now. I will now get to capacity.

Let’s assume on one day all there of things happen … you get squeezed all on one day. Oddly, this becomes a test of your capacity <which implies largeness>. And, yes, maybe it is about largeness. As in how large you can remain as you get squeezed.

Some nights it isn’t easy to not get suffocated.

Other nights you find your capacity and push back a little.

Most nights you find just enough largeness to not get, well, too little.

But the nights in which all three aspects I outlined squeezed you I would suggest the word ‘forlorn’ comes to mind. 

====================

“Oft hope is born when all is forlorn.”

J.R.R. Tolkien

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I use forlorn because I associate it with capacity as I am discussing it today. Forlorn has a sense of shrinking to it in that the good in Life seems to shrink and that which is bad seems to grow and you are left with that wretched forlorn feeling which dogs you throughout a sleepless night. Forlorn seems like it is more appropriate than lonely or lonesome in that it specifically embraces a senses of wretchedness and desertion or abandonment … in my mind … ‘despairing of the arrival of a friend … in this case … a friend called Hope.”

To me all of what I just shared with regard to squeezing and capacity captures the essence of the worst of the worst sleepless nights. And, if I were a betting man, I would bet we have all had a few of these.

Ok. Here is what I know.

Most of us get through these nights. Despite the vast emptiness of a night, more vast than we imagined it should be, we cast about among the chaos of the stars and find some light. I like to think of it as we clamber through the clouds and exist.

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“I will clamber through the clouds and exist.”

John Keats

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And the outcome of most of these nights, in addition to being tired, is out of the gauntlet of forlornness we seem to come out with a degree of hope. Hope for a better day <at minimum> and maybe Hope for something better <at maximum>.

In other words, out of the bigness which seems to squeeze us, if but for a moment, we rummage through a sleepless night … one black and gusty and enormous, disordered and wild with stars … and come out a little less black, a little more calm, a little more ordered and a little more focused on some star.

===

“Not in the clamor of the crowded street, not in the shouts and applause of the many, but in ourselves, are triumph and defeat.”

–

Longfellow

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“Because to influence a person is to give him one’s own soul. He does not think his natural thoughts, or burn with his natural passions.

His virtues are not real to him. His sins, if there are such things as sins, are borrowed. He becomes an echo of some one else’s music, an actor of a part that has not been written for him.

The aim of life is self-development. To realize one’s nature perfectly-that is what each of us is here for. People are afraid of themselves nowadays. They have forgotten the highest of all duties, the duty one owes to one’s self. Of course they are charitable. They feed the hungry and clothe the beggar.

But their own souls starve, and are naked. Courage has gone out of our race. Perhaps we never really had it. “

—

Oscar Wilde

====

Well. This is Life: shit happens. And, more importantly, inevitably shit happens to us. When that happens, the shit, suffice it to say … we all have a talk with our self.

Unfortunately, most times we have a shitty talk with ourself. Yeah. We tend to know diddleyshit about talking to ourself. At the root of our shittiness of self conversation is typically a variety of creatively destructive aspects:

You can blame external ‘forces’ <”not my fault”>.

You can blame yourself <blame spans lack of confidence to lack of skills>.

Let me stick with the latter <because only losers consistently think the former>.

To begin. What I will tell you is that when the shit hits the fan you can get a startling clear picture of who & what you are. And sometimes it ain’t pretty. And it ain’t pretty because we do not even begin the conversation right.

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“Some conversations are not about what they’re about.”

Anne Carson

==

More often than not the conversation you have with yourself aren’t the conversations you think they are. What I mean by that is when bad shit happens most of us, in the moment or near the moment, are thinking causally – stimulus/response stuff.

“Shit happened because this shit was done.”

At worst, this conversation with yourself, sounds something like “you stupid shit.”

Most of us can deal with that. It is really only later that the problems truly arise because that initial conversation continues and you start delving deeper & deeper inside yourself. Yeah. These shitty conversations are sometimes call ‘soul searching.’

I, instead, refer to them as ‘soul wrenching.’

During the deeper conversation you encounter doubt, fears of being good enough, imposter syndrome, self-uncertainty. These are the assholes you sometimes have a conversation with when bad shit happens. And, unfortunately, they all went to a debate school and unfortunately they all like to talk a lot when given the opportunity.

Here is what I have to offer <as someone who has certainly had his share of both bad shit happening and shitty conversations with myself – albeit I tend to believe all of us have>.

We spend far far <far> too much time in these conversations on comparison type shit.

Yeah. It is natural … I mean … well … how else can you decide whether you are worth a shit unless you compare yourself to someone who IS worth a shit? But, frankly, most of our sins are borrowed – just echoes of what is around us.

So when bad shit happens the conversation really should be about you and with you.

And therein lies the next level of a self shitty conversation. It is a little weird because it is a Life paradox.

In general, research shows over and over again that we overestimate our abilities … we think we are better than we really are at things. And, yet, when bad shit happens and we start having this shitty conversation with ourselves … we have a tendency to think of ourselves as flawed … not good  … flawed.

<figure that one out …. Will ya?>

Somehow you gotta find the middle ground in that paradox.

You have to first uncover a realistic perspective of whatever shit that happened and then focus on … well … moving on.

====

“One does not walk into the forest and accuse the trees of being off-center,

Nor do they visit the shore and call the waves imperfect.

So why do we look at ourselves this way? “

Tao Te Ching

=====

I imagine I could just suggest here that bad shit happens, you have shitty conversations with yourself and that you should have these conversations with the non shitty aspects within you when it happens, but I kind of think what gets you through shit sometimes needs a little more ‘oomph’ to get you through it. The ‘oomph’ is rooted in the ‘moving on’ thought I just shared above.

I suggest something simple. It’s kind of a mindset. Not any ‘happy hippie shit Secret stuff’ just an attitude that can kind of get you through when bad shit happens.

I don’t know where I found this quote but I love it:

=========

“I didn’t come this far, to only come this far.”

Unknown

==============

I love it in its simplicity.

Bad shit happens.

In work and in Life.

And inevitably we have those shitty conversation with ourselves when bad shit happens.

But … you know what?

You didn’t get that far just to get that far.

None of us do.

And sometimes you just have to remember that and, possibly, one of the best times to remember that is when you are in the middle of a shitty conversation with yourself.

—

“It is not the strongest of the species that survive, not the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.”

=

Charles Darwin

—————————-

Survival. A topic we all care about. This quote should make everyone think about Life as well as with their business. I love this quote mostly because those with ‘brawn’ scoff at those with ‘brains’, and the ‘brains’ scoff at the ‘brawn’, when survival (and that doesn’t have to mean life & death, but rather success or failure) is being played out.

Regardless of the side someone is on, both brawn & brain believe they have the advantage regardless of the situation in terms of survival. But. Chuck (as Darwin was called to his closest friends) suggests you don’t have to be the sharpest knife in the drawer nor do you have to be the strongest tool in the drawer to survive. You just have to be flexible. Responsive to what is happening. Have a willingness to adapt to the situation.

Flexibility is certainly an advantage if you have the desire to succeed at anything you do (ask any coach). We all face times when we have to deal with situations that do not “fit in” to our routine or our ‘comfort zone.’ I say “tough noogies” (not sure exactly what that means, but I bet you get the point).

Adapt or die.

Just ponder. One of the most frustrating things in life is when you have done your best and yet things still go wrong. Or maybe you didn’t get to where you wanted to get to (what you were ultimately aiming for).

You have to be flexible.

You have to adapt.

You have to have the ability to fit into a changed situation … or … to modify your behavior & actions accordingly to fit the changed situation.

And if you don’t? If instead you stubbornly hold on to some things that don’t work, and stubbornly repeat mistakes (because it matches best practices or “what worked in that past“) this inflexibility will cause failure (or simply not reaching what it is you were aiming for which is a derivative of some type of failure). By the way, in other words, continuous behavior along those lines means you will not survive.

Ultimately you have to decide to do things differently to experience different results.

Easy? Nope. It can be uncomfortable. It can be emotionally draining.

We know that when we are asked to change again and again, the physical and psychological reaction, which is actually excessive stimulation to the system, puts our ability to adapt under massive strain. All the change produces stress and carries with it a physical and emotional price tag. The more radical the change — the bigger the price tag.

Excessive stimulation has at least three levels: sensory, cognitive and decisional. To help us function <or survive>, each of us has developed strategies, or destimulation tactics, to lower the level of stimulation when we feel uncomfortably close to the limits of our adaptive range. We use these tactics every day, often unconsciously. Yet. By becoming conscious of them we can increase their effectiveness. By examining our own responses to overstimulation we can learn ways of consciously influencing change. We can begin by influencing small events, then expand our influence to larger patterns of experience. All these mental tactics are designed to detach from the shit … and rise above all that you are today so that you can be the best you can be tomorrow.

To do all of this you need to be aware. You need to not only be prepared to recognize when change needs to occur (typically there is a threshold on where you need to stop fighting the change or risk falling so far behind you cannot catch up or just be ‘eliminated’ at that time … oh … that survival thing) but you also need to be ready to change.

Look. Everyone has the capability to change. In fact I have a nifty chart which shows how most people accept & accommodate change.

Its pretty simple but shows that we need to work through the different levels of response to effect change. I would imagine there are several points to be made but here are the two from me:

–          you learn as you move through each phase at each point actually changing how you think about future problems/challenges to further change

–          you can get stuck anywhere in any phase at any time (the nifty chart actually helps show how easy it is to NOT change because you get stuck somewhere).

So. As change is introduced to you & your life you are forced through all four levels. I would imagine the most important thought would be to attain the fourth level as quickly as possible.

Anyway. Survival, and change, pretty much always depends on the most basic first step – believe that you are able to make the changes.  And take the first step.

Without that? You have the thought, but no action.

And the result of no action? Lack of survival again.

All that said. I tend to believe a lot of people will read the Darwin quote and seek to find meaning within ‘survival of the fittest’ bigger picture. I have some strange advice (coming from me).

Think small.

Think day-to-day.

Think “me.”

Think that survival is about adapting to the environment around you.

Think adapting means “initiating a new order of <personal> things ….”

—

“It must be considered that there is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things.

For the reformer has enemies in all those who profit by the old order, and only luke-warm defenders in all those who profit by the new order.

This luke-warmness arises partly from fear of their adversaries, who have the laws in their favor, and partly from the incredulity of mankind, who do not truly believe in anything new until they have had an actual experience of it”.

Machiavelli

=

Bottom line.

Always think about how can you adapt.

By the way, I am not suggesting (and I believe Chuck Darwin wasn’t either) 100% change to adapt (although some situations demand it). Successful change typically begins by pinpointing anchors of stability (one you either have or can develop) which help to make the transition change not only viable, but more likely successful for you.

Regardless. Make change your constant companion and friend.

===================

“How many people long for that “past, simpler, and better world,” I wonder, without ever recognizing the truth that perhaps it was they who were simpler and better, and not the world about them?”

–

R.A. Salvatore

===========

“There is a trail of existence that follows everyone, threads of life that people spin out and leave behind wherever they go. Threads cross all the time. Threads cross and cross again – time and place if in no other way – even when the people appear unaware of each other. No one pays attention to others around them unless the overlap happens again. Sometimes, people miss each other only by a few seconds, yet they are connected.

Sometimes place is the reason for the overlap, but time is not. Sometimes the overlap is purposeful other times happenstance.

The threads are there, no matter. Ah. When they glow, they are one destiny.” 

–

Inspector O

========================

In general, 95+% of us think the past was simpler or let’s say we think it was less tangled.

In general, 95+% of us view the present as complicated, complex and peppered with shit we never had to deal with in the past … in other words … a tangled mess.

Maybe we should view it differently.

Maybe we should view us, the individual, as more complicated, more complex and more peppered with shit than we were in the past.

Maybe we have forgotten the past when we did what we felt was right versus wrong & what felt good and not bad without getting tangled up in a whole bunch of … well … things Life whispers and shouts into our ear.

Maybe it isn’t Life that is more complex, it is us … & we are tangled up.

Now. In my opinion life has a nasty habit of getting us all tangled up. I will not say “confuse us.” It more likely just twists us pretzel-like between suggesting right things to do, wrong things to do, right ways to do, wrong ways to do and, well, what you are supposed to like versus what you actually do like.

All of this tangling makes us view the world as the villain <or the ‘tangler’ as it were>.

Wrong.

Stop for a second and admit that about maybe we are the ‘tangler.’

Why do I say that?

The world is what it is.

We either respond to the world or we don’t.

We either accommodate the world or we don’t.

We either do everything the world suggests or we don’t.

I say that because Life is indifferent to us. It chugs along in a fairly consistently inconsistent way in that it remains linear while everyone crisscrosses each other, all the experiences and moments crisscross, and good decisions and bad decisions made by everyone crisscross … meaning that all of that gets tangled up … in every moment.

The more people we meet the more paths & branches crisscross and cross again.

It becomes a tangled confusion of so many choices and paths and interlinked branches it becomes easy to think of it all as chaos. Especially if you think of people and events as threads and not dots in a moment in time.

Yeah. As your path crosses with others … others who are also making choices — choices of strangers, family, friends, enemies, whomever — their choices do affect our path. And then we walk in to this multidimensional space bombarded with molecules of other’s choices and contextual environment situational type stuff and … uhm … we have to make a choice.

And that is where we really get all tangled up.

While, yes, we have to make a shitload of ongoing choices – small and large and every size in between – the majority of them we make more difficult than we have to. This most often happens with good intentions in that we try and figure out the “best” choice <in the midst of all this chaos swirling around us> and we overthink.

Then it gets worse.

We look to the past and it appears to be a neat set of choices made … and not made.  It often appears in a nice schematic of context in which we simplistically made some choice based on what we saw and experienced.

Oh <nuts>.

The reality is that we made some choice in some situation which looked a shitload like what it does in the present <and what most likely looks like the future>. Yes. It appears to look a lot like sheer chaos — a snarled thread of paths and choices.

Oh <shit>.

We get all tangled up.

Okay. Let me try and help.

In each tangled chaotic web of events, threads and paths, everything is actually bounded by the practical — the practical aspect of what you can actually do, and cannot do, within the choices you make.

This is the actual reality of what can be done.

This is simplicity.

This is the untangled you.

And if you actually untangle you will find some really good decisions and choices available for you. I am not suggesting it will make the repercussions black & white but … well … shit … I do not believe our Life, or destiny, is pre-ordained in a black & white definition anyway. I tend to believe Life is just a huge map of possibilities in which you kind of forge your way through a relatively chaotic Life by being the best tangled you.

Look. I like … no … love the thought that we get tugged by duty <right thing to do> versus desire <some type of self-gratification – spanning from full indulgence to full altruism> as we make all these choices.

And while we certainly can be impacted by others or ‘things out of our control’ … what remains in our control, always, is the untangled choice.

The choice to do what we may with the circumstances at hand.

The choice remains with us.

The time, the moment, demands one thing — to tangle or untangle.

My thought? Choose to untangle yourself. It will most likely make you better and simpler.

———————————–

Alvin Toffler thought:

Two apparently contrasting images of the future grip the popular imagination today. Most people to the extent that they bother to think about the future at all … assume the world they know will last indefinitely. They find it difficult to Imagine a truly different way of life for themselves, let alone a totally new civilization. Of course they recognize that things are changing. But they assume today’s changes will somehow pass them by and that nothing will shake the familiar economic framework and political structure. They confidently expect the future to continue the present.  This straight-line thinking comes in various packages. At one level it appears as an unexamined assumption lying behind the decisions of businessmen, teachers, parents, and politicians. At a more sophisticated level it comes dressed up hi statistics, computerized data, and forecasters jargon. 

Either way it adds up to a vision of a future world that is essentially “more of the same.”

—————————————————

………. axial shift in economics Otto Sharmer ………

————

“To recommend thrift to the poor is both grotesque and insulting.

It is like advising a man who is starving to eat less.”

==

Oscar Wilde

—————————

Well. I wrote Society of Fairness in February 2016. I revisited it due to 2 things:

• I just wrote “guilt free accumulation” which explored the shallowness of values versus the pleasures of capitalism
•  just discovered Otto Sharmer and read his piece “Axial Shift: the New Coordinates of Societal Change.”

Both of these pieces explored some of the societal challenges we face but, at their core, both revolve around what we view as fair – for I and We and Us.

To be clear. Fair  and fairness is a much more difficult topic to discuss than one would think. Maybe it is more difficult because I believe we are living through a period of simmering anger. People are angry with government, with capitalism, with media, with religion, with inequality, with immigrants, with Europe, with big business, with Russia, with how they get treated and with, well, everything seems to be changing.

In my eyes all of this is rooted in an overall question, and concern, at an individual level of “with all this change as the world transforms I am afraid change will not treat me fairly.” <this is a derivation of my post of “I get angry when people screw with my hope”>. Therefore we rage against anything we can attempting to insure the tentacles of fairness touch us at some point. In other words. When the world seems t be going to hell in a handbasket we grab on to our basket, fill it up with anything we can grab and protect it with clenched fists.

———

“The most dangerous moments are not when people are their poorest but rather when their expectations of significant improvement are raised … and end in frustration.”

de Tocqueville

—————

Interestingly, the whole discussion of fairness ITSELF creates a sense of anger.

The reason for this is that fairness sounds simple, but is complex. The most basic logic of fairness suggests choosing between which poor people, or who is most in need, are more worthy of the help of the generous and “morally superior” wealthy. That is the mental logic we apply as we attempt to parse out fairness rather than have fair become mired in “equal for all.”

Yet, while even struggling working people will agree those in truest poverty, particularly children, are first in line for ‘fair’ their personal anger is not even partially quenched. They are not quenched because fairness is both an “I” thing AND a “we” thing which is not selfishness, but self preservationness.

A society of fairness is one in which we are fair with each other and the system, in turn, is fair to us.

It is about attitude (and persistently holding onto that attitude).

It is, at it’s core, frankly, not glamorous.

It is the nitty gritty stuff and not the college education and wall street or even the government.

It is about marrying principle and pragmatism and gradual improvement.

It is infrastructure like streets, trains, highways and roads, public parks & community centers, easily accessible fountain water, lower level easy access good public education, stuff like that.

It is basically common sense bricks & mortar actions within a … well … the hard part … an equality based moral order frame.

Jobs is the tangible <which we need> and moral order is the intangible which creates the structure for behavior within the tangible. Jobs may be hierarchical <at the moment>, but morals should not be hierarchical.

These are not problems which can be fixed by simply suggesting rich white folk save the poor or “marginalized working people.” In addition it’s not just about people fighting back against injustice and working hard. It is about personal responsibility AND shared responsibility. It is about people being active positive participants in their own lives and society, itself, positively participating in individual lives.

A ‘society of fairness’ clearly reaches into the heart, and soul, of what most of us care about, it reaches into our attitudes (because it is hard work), but almost immediately runs into the economic obstacles of ‘what is fair’.

I tend to believe all of us know that it doesn’t mean everybody has the same income. It translates more into equality of opportunity. The difficulty resides in putting dollars & cents and tactics & objectives against ‘fair & opportunity.’ No one, and I mean no one, couldn’t simplistically point out the extreme unfairness in today’s society, but the true society of fairness is defined not by the extremes but rather what happens in the majority.

I share my thoughts today not to suggest we shouldn’t seek a society of fairness, but rather to point out that “fair”, in and of itself, is significantly more complex and complicated than when looking at it on a superficial level.

That said. We can do something to make the world the place we want it to be if we get our heads on straight.

What do I mean? I found a fabulous little article at a site called Common Cause Foundation on Values  . But it was in the middle of the article where the author nailed the issue with regard to attaining a Society of Fairness.

==

Common Cause Foundation has recently conducted research in the UK and the US looking at the values people hold, and the values they think their fellow citizens hold.

We’re still analysing this, but here are two early results. Firstly, a large majority of people hold self-transcendence values (generally concerned with the wellbeing of others) to be more important than self-enhancement values (based on the pursuit of personal status and success). But this isn’t seen by most people, who believe that their compatriots hold self-transcendence values to be less important, and self-enhancement values to be more important.

Perhaps this is a key reason why many people don’t get engaged and active, although sharing values that would otherwise lead them to – because they believe that they are in a minority, and that society at large doesn’t share their values. We call this the ‘perception gap’. It’s a gap that many in our media, and many in government, seem to work hard to perpetuate.

==

In America we are certainly living out that ‘gap’ quite vocally, but as we wrestle with fairness and shared self-transcendence values I will note some reality — America has always been defined by a combination idealism and materialism. A balance of the two & it would be silly to suggest ditching one for the other. I would also note both are powerful sources of motivation.

The idealism expresses the best of human instincts in that it sanctifies the fixing America break someone else prioritizing of others over oneself and requires social and political respect. The materialism celebrates individualism.

===

“It is not fair to ask of others what you are not willing to do yourself.”

Eleanor Roosevelt

===

The combination has coexisted because one never sought to fix itself by breaking the other. The natural coexisting conflict sparks greatness, opportunity and progress.

In my words it is organizational alignment of social, materialism and political.

The difficulty with the idealism side of the equation is that people’s idealism tends to translate into, well, it doesn’t necessarily live in the real world. In our idealism, our hope to be the best of the best, we seek some things that aren’t feasible in a practical sense <and, yeah, someone is gonna throw out that practicality is just another word for “too hard”>. My response? It’s not too hard, sometimes it just isn’t feasible. That is because unfortunately ideas are reliant on two things: the power of the idea and access to an infrastructure to embrace & implement the idea. If either side fails to meet the challenge it all fails.

It is irresponsible to offer up ideas for consumption without an infrastructure in place <or a foreseeable path to a rebuilt infrastructure> to, at minimum, accept the idea and, at maximum, implement the idea.

And that is where alignment on fairness tends to fall apart.

What is maybe worse is that not only is it extremely difficult to effectively communicate what I just said but also many people don’t care when they are dominated by anger. They just want solutions – they just want it done.

And if that anger is tied to a real & tangible & personal ‘unfairness’ … well … gradualism never sounds compelling and, frankly, isn’t compelling. Revolution appears much more attractive.

Here is a realistic truth. In 1990 Peter Drucker discussed Salvation by Society <his version of society of fairness> and how a transforming business world was killing it. We now see in the late 2010’s the full repercussions of that transformation. I say that because while ‘fairness’ may begin today its positive transformation will take decades to become re-embedded in our business, and societal, structure and institutions.

Anyway.

I love the idea of a society of fairness. Unfortunately, in today’s world, fair means different things to different people. And demonizing any group of people, even despite their inordinate wealth, doesn’t really seem fair. Good people reside at every wealth level. Good people reside in every skin color. Good people reside, well, let’s just say that 98.5% of the time 98.5% of the people are good <I made up the 98.5% and thought it looked smarter than simply putting 99%>. And the 1.5% bad are not solely in the purview of the mega wealthy.

And therein lies the hope for a Society of fairness. Good resides in the significant majority. It simply lies dormant and needs to be reawakened.

With that I return to Otto Sharmer. What I like about his thoughts aren’t all the specific thoughts (which I could haggle with aspects), but rather the holistic integrated view of creating a society of fairness. It is complex, & I am not sure we are aligned with what ‘fair’ really is, but if we can envision what the totality could look like, well, it can be built.

=====

originally posted February 2016

———————-

“Some infinities are bigger than other infinities.”

===

John Green

—–

False hope may be one of the worst things in the world and nowhere do we abuse hope more than with the discussion of possibility, i.e., “there are infinite possibilities.”

Wow. What bullshit.

Go online and you will see a gazillion articles, posts and general bullshit ramblings unequivocally stating:

“You are a being, full of infinite possibilities!”

“You are born with infinite possibilities.”

I will point out that by saying all this bullshit we are screwing the whole damn concept of possibilities let alone fucking up the truth of possibilities itself.

Your future is not filled by infinite possibilities.

Shit.

Your present is not filled by infinite possibilities.

Now. To be fair. We may have more possibilities than we think we do at any given point in time, but they are certainly not infinite. In fact, possibilities — your own possibilities in any given time and situation — are quite finite. And finite in a variety of ways:

Time inevitably squeezes your possibilities quite often into an almost suffocating finite space.

Ability inevitably squeezes your possibilities quite often into a fairly pragmatic sphere of finite space.

Context, or the situation itself, squeezes your possibilities quite often into a less than infinite, or maybe better said “a variety of different sized infinities,” choice space.

We do possibilities a huge disservice by suggesting ‘infinite.’

Shit.

We do ourselves a huge disservice by suggesting ‘infinite possibilities.’

Simplistically possibilities would be much better served if we suggested the depth & breadth available within the finite space available to us rather than some nebulous infinity.

Why? Because while finite may sound constricting it actually can help us keep our head in the game that is being played in the here & now. And finite actually helps maybe 80% of the people <I made that % up> in that the majority of people just do not feel comfortable answering the ‘call of the void’ <the unknown and uncertain>.

Regardless. Let me discuss possibilities for a minute in the context of multiple sized infinities.

At any given time in your Life you are absolutely surrounded by possibilities. But possibilities do not always lie directly ahead of you or in the direction you face. Possibilities swirl around you in a multi-dimensional fashion.

Therefore, possibilities can reside in any direction.

Therefore, in order to see all possibilities you may not be able to rely solely on peripheral vision but to turn around and view in a 360degree fashion <and, yes, if you turn around I would note you are then looking forward just in a different direction>.

Therefore, progress can reside in any direction.

But this is not infinite. It just may feel like it is infinite simply because of the complexity associated with context and what your mind can realistically grasp.

Our minds can only stuff so much crap and stimulus in at any given time and anything over that capacity starts to edge into “infinity” frame of mind. And it is not. It is simply the shit that is beyond our current capacity. But, suffice it to say, if you remain committed to restless movement and possibly some strategic side to side steps, and even thoughtful steps back, it is all part of progress in pursuit of what is possible.

All that said.

We would be much better served if we admitted that not all infinities are same sized. I also believe we would be much better served to admit that possibilities are finite to any given individual.

—

Side note.

To be clear.

If you progress to a new and different time & space your existing range of possibilities will change <so you can certainly change what is possible for you>, but this simply means, thru environment context chnage, you have changed the finite scope of possibilities.

—-

Anyway. Here is why I loved the quote I opened with.

I love the idea of infiniteness. I love its expansiveness and I love it embracing of ‘hope for what could be’ and I love the fact it suggests possibilities. But I have always felt like suggesting possibilities being infinite as false. It had the unintended consequence of falsely suggesting that anyone could do anything at almost any time if they elected to do so. I felt like it had the unintended consequence of almost ‘freezing’ people into indecision in its vastness. It created such a vast sense of false hope that many people squandered the true possibilities within grasp.

And the quote suggests the best of all. You do have an infinite universe of possibilities circling and swirling you at any given moment, but not all infinities are created equal <basically suggesting there is a finiteness to many infinities>.

What an awesome thought.

Owning infinity and finite at exactly the same time.

And you know what? It actually reflects a Life truth.

You do have a shitload of possibilities swirling around you in a 360degree view of things.

And it may all appear overwhelmingly infinite in its pragmatic possibility view.

But that is just because, well, within your finite world and your finite choices and your finite ability to view & assess the choices you have, you have the ability to explore the infiniteness of who and what you are and who and what you could be.

====

“Don’t dwell on things. Don’t stay in one place too long.

It was the only way to stay ahead of sadness.”

—

Rick Riordan

============== 

“That’s the thing about pain. It demands to be felt” 

—-

John Green

=============

Well. Let’s just say Life is best lived moving. Moving forward, sideways and even stepping back on occasion.

Why? Because trailing behind you almost every step in Life is sadness, pain and maybe regret. Suffice it to say that wherever you go there are a bunch of less than desirable things that keep close behind you awaiting you to stop.

The good news is that they just aren’t really fast enough to catch you.

The bad news is that they just relentlessly pursue until they have the opportunity to step up beside you.

And when you do stop moving?

They all have a nasty habit of demanding attention by tapping you on the shoulder and say “remember me?”

And, more often than not, as we stare back at them all we can see is all the shit we didn’t really see when we were moving and all the shit we didn’t really feel because we were doing something else.

I am not suggesting up to this point most people ignore this shit, just that we are busy getting on with getting on.

It is only when you stop <mentally or physically> that we are faced with all the ‘less thans’ and all the ‘imperfections’ and all the pain and all the sadness which you had left trailing behind you as you encountered the ‘more thans’ in Life and the ‘improvements’ and the good feelings and the happiness most often associated with ‘getting on’ with Life … ‘being actively engaged with Life’ may be another way to say it .

Sigh.

But here is the unfortunate Life truth. Life demands you stop at some point. You have to <unless you are a robot>.

And when you do all that stuff that has been shadowing you wherever you have gone, well, they all demand to be felt. I would be remiss if I didn’t point out here that Life is strewn with things which demand to be felt. So many it can create some sensory overload. So many that in the overload it becomes difficult to discern what is actually being felt and from what the ‘felt’ is coming from.

Sure. Some things stand out and you can clearly see the cause of what you are feeling, but most times everything, the less thans & imperfections & pain & sadness, all stand around you bludgeoning you with whatever they have at hand to a fairly numbing degree. And maybe it is because of that we numb ourselves to as many things as possible figuring it is the only way to manage our way thru the onslaught of things demanding and demanding and demanding.

The clamor of their cries for attention seems deafening if you listen too closely.

For all the happy horse shit ‘think positive’ crap around us in general Life, while Life certainly isn’t always despair & disappointment, it is more often than not involves a series of fairly gymnastic bobbing & weaving on our part in the attempt to avoid less than moments and disappointments and sadness and some pain.

For some reason <and I am sure there is some research somewhere on this>, but we remember the tears more than the laughter, the unhappiness stronger than the happiness and the failures more than the successes.

Maybe it is Life’s way of insuring we don’t get too confident.

Maybe it is Life’s way of insuring we pay attention to Life.

Maybe it is Life’s way of insuring we don’t get complacent.

I don’t know.

What I do know is that you have to work a little and have to work seemingly too hard sometimes, to stay ahead of the shit that inevitably dogs our steps – the sadness in other words.

Look.

Everyone reflects.

Everyone stops at some point.

And everyone will be faced by a number of uncomfortable things which will demand to be felt.

But, in the end, regardless of what demands to be felt it really comes down to one, and only one, thing.

“We either make ourselves miserable, or we make ourselves happy. The amount of work is the same.” 

=======

“The trick is in what one emphasizes.  

We either make ourselves miserable, or we make ourselves happy.

The amount of work is the same.”

Carlos Castaneda

===========================

==

“Your greatest need is to clean out the enormous mass of mental and emotional rubbish that clutters your mind.

You need to learn how to select your thoughts just the same way you select your clothes every day.

This is a power you can cultivate.

If you want to control things in your life, work on controlling your mind. In most cases, that’s the only thing you should be trying to control.”

–

Marc Hack

=================

So. Controlling things <shit>, in general, in Life, in business and, well, in everywhere I imagine, is possibly the least possible objective of all.

Yet. In some form or fashion we attempt again and again to gain & maintain some control over all the shit we are faced with day in & day out. Pragmatically this is our attempt to offer some sanity to what can seem like a fairly insanely chaotic life.

All that said. Control, for the most part, is an illusion. It is an attractive illusion, but an illusion nonetheless.

But. As the world swirls around you like a hurricane I would suggest the one thing you can control is your mind and what you think. It ain’t easy, but it is doable.

Control when you think.

Not everything takes a shitload of thinking. This is my way of suggesting overthinking is a bad thing. Uhm. So is underthinking. Controlling when you think is about “thinking just enough” – not over or under – when faced with something.  Some would call this ‘maximizing efficient thinking.’ I would simply call it learning how to not overthink or underthink something. This comes naturally to an incredibly small % of people, let’s make up a number, less than 5% of people. Haggle with that number of you would like but I offer it to make the point that the majority of people who say “I am a good thinker” <with regard to over & underthinking> are probably not.

You have to learn how to do this. My guess is even if you are a great learner no one truly becomes an expert at this.

Control how you think.

Our minds are often like people viewing an all-you-can-eat buffet table … we will inevitably gravitate to either the desserts or the prime rib. We don’t focus on the most healthy and less glamorous stuff on the table. This means you have to control not only your thoughts, but also how you think.

You have to sift through what appears attractive versus what may actually be more healthy <the ‘non-rubbish’ as it were> in order to most effectively meet the needs of the thought moment. By the way. Please note I purposefully chose effective and not efficient.  ‘When you think’ is about efficiency and ‘how you think’ is about effectiveness. This is a focus aspect of thinking. Shiny objects are shiny objects and tasty indulgent desserts are tasty indulgent desserts.

You have to learn to do this. Some people are actually very good at this. They have a knack for viewing everything all at once and have an ability to discern the less important from the most important without being distracted by shiny and tasty things. please note “some.” Not a lot. Not many. Some. You can learn to be better at this but unless you have the innate instincts you will just be good at it and not great at it.

Control how you select your thoughts.

Ah. Once you have focused you have to select some thoughts to craft your decision, choice & conclusion. This point kind of circles back to underthinking & overthinking.  If you suck at controlling how you select thoughts, you will invariably end up mired in overthinking shit <because you chose the wrong things and got bogged down in a less-than-conclusive spot> or underthinking shit <because you found an attractive thought which seemingly, in some linear way, suggested “that’s it!”>.

We all have a rolodex of thoughts in our minds that we have accumulated over time through whatever experiences we have had. Inevitably the mind, in its wily way, flips through it for you and shoves a thought or two to the forefront – immediately. Some people call this ‘instincts.’ I call it dangerous.

The subconscious can be wrong as often as it is right. Unfortunately you have to force thinking at this stage. Dive a little deeper than your initial “oh, that’s it.” This is absolutely learnable. Unfortunately today’s world doesn’t exactly encourage us to force thinking and learn to do this. We encourage instincts & speed above all.

That is unfortunate.

That is dangerous.

That is unlearnable <you can unlearn this> … and controlling how you select your thoughts IS learnable.

Lastly.

Disconnecting. It would seem fairly obvious that if you want to increase control you would decrease distractions. And, in general, that is a fairly safe formula.

But, I admit, I am not a disconnecting <from twitter, facebook, social media, internet … any escapism > fan. I am not because, if you buy into what I shared above, that is simply avoiding some possibly valuable inputs into your thinking for the sake of, well, thinking. It seems to me that controlling my own mind has less to do with managing external stimuli and more to do with HOW I manage incoming external stimuli.

Just to finish this whole thought. I do believe we spend far too much time talking about distractions and how smartphones are decreasing attention spans and how the external world is killing true thinking. The only thing killing true thinking is us … people … the individual and how the individual decides, or doesn’t decide, how to think.

I imagine I am talking about personal responsibility in some form or fashion. In a world in which we do seem to spend an inordinate amount of time blaming a whole bunch of shit on someone other than ourselves it really does seem like we should spend more time talking about how we can assume more responsibility for how we think, what we think and learning to think.

But that’s me.

————

“I’ve seen plenty of your kind … you Americans.

Refugees from that brave new world you have over there.  Pilgrims in search of your Mecca … only you have no Mecca.

You’ve rejected one world and can’t quite smuggle your way into another so you wander like lost souls among all the libraries, museums, palaces and cathedrals of Europe … never quite seeing or catching hold of anything that lies outside those musty, but god knows elegant, interiors. It’s called ‘finding oneself’ I believe … as if a self can exist at the end of some tourist’s itinerary like a pot of gold.

Yet it’s kind of a fear isn’t it? A fear of Life.”

=

Celestial chess

—

“I have a deep fear of being too much.

That one day I will find my someone, and they will realize that I am
a hurricane.

That they will step back and be intimidated by my muchness. “

=

Michelle K.

———

So. Muchness. Muchness is what resides within each one of us. The problem is Life, in general, encourage us to exhibit, well, much less. Therefore we seem to spend a lot of time in the wretched hollow between our muchness and what we believe the world can accept of our muchness. In other words, we are always seek to constrict not expand.

Oddly this creates a lot of self reflection. A lot of “who am I”, finding onself and defining what is the right level of public muchness. We search as in “as if a self can exist at the end of some tourist’s itinerary like a pot of gold.” Far too often finding one’s muchness, paradoxically, seems a lot like stagnancy. There may seem like a lot of movement in that you may be moving around a lot <going places, visiting libraries, museums, palaces and cathedrals of Europe>, but in actuality, you are stagnant … personally.

All the movement appears to be some kind of search within oneself, but you are doing it by seeking ‘out-of-self’ things. Worse? Your self search often gets judged by what cues the ‘out-of-self- things provide you. Its almost like the search makes you a refugee from yourself. You invest energy not on progress but rather in searching backwards or ‘within’ <by viewing within the past for insights> to find ‘something.’

Well. This all seems crazy to me. Seems like maybe by the time you finish your search the rest of the world has moved on by. I would suggest time may be better served by something in which typical ‘finding oneself’ discussions do not appear to encompass — the word ‘disturbing.’ As in maybe ‘disturbing oneself.’ As in disturbing the universe. Kind of like shaking the personal etch a sketch a bit and in doing so be willing to shake the societal status quo of “what you should expect” etch a sketch..

By the way, to me, the fact ‘disturbing’ rarely is included in any ‘finding oneself’ discussion is crazy. Mostly because emotion is the energy for change and I would argue emotion is the engine for muchness.

Ok. What the hell am I talking about? The roots of disturb is the latin word – Emovere.

===

<latin> emovere: to disturb

===

Emotion literally means disturbance. The word emotion comes from the Latin emovere meaning “to disturb.” Therefore, emovere can be seen as a version of how we find ourselves. A combination of emotion & disturb is the creation of one’s muchness.

Look. Disturb may sound, well, disturbing or maybe a little extreme but, what the hell, you spend gobs of energy going out and about having rejected one world and can’t quite smuggle your way into another so you wander like lost souls.

The whole idea of ‘finding oneself’ all with the overall intent to seek opportunities to find out about ourselves and discover your muchness, i.e., what we are made up of and what we can be.

Disturbing, at its core, is about shifting shit so that opportunities can be uncovered.

This leads me to a guy named Pittacus … one of the Seven Sages of Greece. While each of the seven sages was supposed to represent an edict of worldly knowledge <Solon of Athens was actually “know thyself”> it was Pittacus who proposed ‘you should know which opportunities to choose.’

—

Other Pittacus Quotes

“It is hard to be good”

“Know when to act”

“Seize Time by the forelock.”

–

Disturbing is the energy which creates opportunities <not wandering the world of libraries and museums> and then … well … you gotta know which opportunities to choose.

Shit. No wonder we decide to try and find oneself by wandering the world, it sounds a shitload easier than disturbing, recognizing opportunities, than actually knowing which opportunities to choose. In fact all that sure sounds like there is lots of room for errors or missed opportunities are even a lot of bad choices.

Well. That’s the deal if you want to find yourself and let the world see your muchness.

It ain’t easy. And there is a lot of room for mistakes and bad choices. You gotta keep your eye on the prize.

Oh shit. The prize. The prize is actually finding being oneself – being your muchness.

Now. ‘Muchness’ is a great thing for you … uhm … but can be scary for others around you.

However. Not everyone, in fact, I would suggest the majority of us never discover our maximum muchness. Most of us just find crumbs of our muchness <and are quite satisfied>.

Some of us just get a bite or two of our muchness <and that is even more satisfying>. And then there are the few who actually find ‘oneself’ and all their muchness. Which leads me back to where I opended today:

————

“I have a deep fear of being too much.

That one day I will find my someone, and they will realize that I am
a hurricane. That they will step back and be intimidated
by my muchness. “

—————–

Well. This makes me think that maybe the reason most of us go about finding ourselves the wrong way is because most of us fear becoming the hurricane we could be. Muchness is scary. Muchness is not only a little scary to ourselves but absolutely can be intimidating to others. Hence … “you can be a little too much on occasion.” Frankly, this is where it gets tricky. When you hear that you naturally pull in your muchness. Which is a little nuts. Nuts because YOU can handle your muchness its OTHERS who cannot – its their issue and not yours.

Anyway.

I imagine my real point in all of this is that while finding oneself is not easy once you embrace your muchness it gets difficult.Here’s what I do know.

—

disturb + recognize opportunities + choose the right opportunities = muchness

—

Let’s be honest. Most of us, even if we are really lucky, will only find crumbs of our muchness. Yup, even if we do most of the formula right … just crumbs. And that is manageable. And while crumbs sounds … well … crummy. It’s not. They represent glimpses of our greatness. The muchness inside us is the best of our best … the best version of I … the greatness within.

And even if we only get a glimpse of it? Well. In the immortal words of the coach in the movie The Replacements:

==

“Greatness, no matter how brief, stays with you forever.”

Gene Hackman <the replacements>

==

Finding oneself truly has to be done with some intent of finding some greatness <I mean, c’mon, why else would we invest energy doing it?>. It’s all about finding whatever glimpse of greatness, of muchness, we have within us <and most everyone has at least a glimpse>. And why wouldn’t we seek to find ‘oneself’ the right way?

Fear.

The opening quote suggested ‘a fear of Life.’ Well. I would suggest it would be more ‘a fear of Muchness’.

Regardless.

Suffice it to say that Self, or our’ muchness’, does not exist at the end of some tourist’s itinerary like a pot of gold. And that said … remember … if you truly desire to ‘find yourself’ don’t head out like a pilgrim in search of your mecca just think one word – emovere.

In other words … Disturb.

Disturb your world and your universe and watch for the opportunities and don’t fear your muchness and, mos importantly, don’t let the outside world’s fear of your muchmness make you make your much a lesser version of what it can be.

Embrace your muchness and disturb the universe. I could think of worse advice.

===============

“You are a worm who thought himself a serpent just because you slither.

But your power was not real, Pliny.

It was all a dream. Time now to wake.”

—–

Pierce Brown

=============

So. I would guess that most of us have run across a slitherer in business <let alone Life>.

A business slitherer?

Yeah.

One of those people who seem to slither in and around and as close to the edge of what is legal, ethical or right but never seems to cross any particular line far enough that someone can say unequivocally they have done something criminally wrong.

A slitherer slithers through all the same things most of us in business and in life do, but does it in a way that seems corrupt <although it may not be>, seems illegal <although it may not be>, seems unethical <although it may not be> and seems inappropriate <although it may not be too everyone>.

That is the characteristic of one who slithers through Life.

—–

“seems.”

——-

“Seems” taints everything they do and, well, everything we do. A slitherer figures out a way to be held to a slightly different standard which ‘seems’ wrong, but no one can point to any real specific, provable, criminally wrong behavior.

Now. It always helps everyone to have someone defend you and, somehow, the one who slithers through business almost always has supporters. Those supporters mostly rally around the quasi-indefensible behavior because a slitherer is a proven survivor. And, yes, in a world in which surviving attrition may actually be a key to success … a persistent survivor can be viewed as an attractive ship to tie your line to <even if it is a ship of dubious lineage>.

But maybe the worst thing about someone who slithers their way to whatever success they gain is the team that ends up surrounding them.

Although I am no real prize for any boss, I would never work for a slitherer – my ethical and moral compass steers me too far away from any “seems wrong” behavior to make a position like that viable for me — or, I imagine, for a slitherer boss.

=============

“Round and round they went with their snakes, snakily…”

Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

============================

My point on that is slitherers seek slitherers. It is a weird type of loyalty. It isn’t really loyalty to the person it is more loyalty to the fact you can behave in a way that ‘seems’ inappropriate on occasion but ‘seems’ okay to your boss <if not even applauded>.

Sigh.

That said.

We do not fire people for being seemingly unethical behavior or seemingly clueless behavior or seemingly inappropriate behavior. Appearance of behavior just makes people feel uncomfortable but it is typically not a fireable offense … it is just offensive.

And, yet, a slitherer thrives in the seemingly offensive behavior. They thrive because as their heinous behavior shrinks them, in some ways, it also grows their ability to slither around the edges of true illegal, true criminal, true unethical to do what they want to do the way they want to do it.

To be clear. A good day for a slitherer is different than a good day for most of the rest of us.

Good to them is a “win”, or some version of successful outcome, done ‘their way’ of which no one can point to any specific wrong doing or completely unethical behavior <which, by the way, to them, is a type of success in and of itself>. Their ‘good win’ doesn’t have to actually contain any of what most of us would consider ‘good’ to be considered success.

To be clear. Most good organizations foster a culture which tends to expel slitherers. Good cultures which foster moral & ethical behavior tend to avoid slithering close to any lines and therefore tend to treat slitherers as a virus to the organization itself.

I do worry, on occasion, that the good slitherers <which is actually an oxymoron> survive in any organization and are constantly trying to infect the organization itself <and, given the right circumstances, actually can take over an organization>.

I wrote this today because it has been sitting in my draft folder for a long time as an organizational behavior  business piece and now I can point out that our president is a slitherer.

He slithers through all the same things most of us in business and in life do but he does it in a way that seems corrupt <although it may not be>, seems illegal <although it may not be>, seems unethical <although it may not be> and seems inappropriate <although it may not be too everyone>.

Just watch. Trump will slither his way in and out of any seemingly illegal, corrupt, unethical event he places himself in. That is what a good slitherer does. And, yes, good slitherer is an oxymoron, but, in a way, President Trump is also.

Just know that we have a slitherer as a President.

===========================

originally posted June 2017