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“Besides, it doesn’t matter if it’s real.  It never does with dreams.

They aren’t anything anyway but lifesavers to cling to so you don’t drown.  Life is an ocean, and most everyone’s hanging on to some kind of dream to keep afloat.”

Tim Tharp

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Well. Today is for the dreamers.

Let me begin by saying it’s kind of a tough world out there today for dreamers and dreaming living in a world where pragmatism, outcomes and measurement are put on the pedestal of Life.

In fact.

I could argue that today’s world not only discourages thinking about dreams, but it screws up how we do think about dreams when we actually think about them. Dreams used to be … well … dreams. Ok. Bear with me because sometimes it is difficult for me to find the right words on this.

Dreams, in the past, seemed to be more about wishes and desires and imagining what could be in some intangible sense. I don’t mean unicorns or rainbows type stuff and it also wasn’t always pot of gold at the end of some rainbow, but it had a sense of something better.

Today?

In today’s world dreams are more often about something tangible.

I dream of winning something.

I dream about having gobs of money.

I dream about some outcome or something received.

I dream of an award.

I dream of achieving something (specific).

It is no longer dreaming something intangible.

Like.

I dream of being an Olympian <not winning something>.

I dream of being on the front cover of Time magazine <not gobs of money>.

I dream about being the best I can be <no reward or award attached>.

Look. I actually believe I am on to something <for once>. I believe this is a “thing”. That said I started thinking about dreams and dreaming and went out and I researched exactly what a dream is:

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Dreams (imaginings, desires) are the potentials that are too intense to be imperceptible. Having intensified to the objective reduction threshold, a desire collapses into an action.

The nobler an individual, the higher the objective reduction threshold and the more organizedly complex the imagination.

Wikiquotes

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Step one:

‘potentials too intense to be imperceptible.’

Step two:

‘a desire collapses into an action.”

I point that out because in our outcome driven world inevitably a dream is pushed into a corner being bludgeoned with “what are you going to do to attain that dream !!??!!”

Look. I am all for taking steps to attain your dream, but the definition suggests that the intense dreams <think the ones that are truly worth paying attention to> inevitably collapse into an action.

In other words.

I don’t make a plan, the dream begets a plan.

In other words.

Reality is shaped by a dream <we don’t shape reality to ‘force’ a dream into being>.

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“That’s the problem with dreams” he said, “Reality just can’t compete.”

e.m.b

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Life, and reality, pushes and pulls us in many directions.

And, more often than not, Life, and reality, places more stop signs in front of us then ‘this way to your dream’ signs. That means to have a dream that is big enough to reshape reality is … well … uhm … means that the potentials that are too intense to be imperceptible.

It isn’t about money.

It isn’t about some sating some ego driven idea.

It is about having intensified to the objective reduction threshold, a desire collapses into an action.

And that is where dreamers know something that non dreamers do <part 1> … nowhere in this definition or Life equation is ‘fear.’

Far too many times dreams get attached to thoughts like ‘not pursued due to fear …”

And that is where dreamers know something that non dreamers do <part 2> … nowhere in this definition or Life equation is ‘courage.’

Far too many times dreams get attached to “people who had the courage to pursue …”

Dreams have nothing to do with fear or courage. In fact dreams, the real meaningful ones, are out of our conscious control. They are a force in and of themselves. They beget the action by sheer force of intensity. Big, small or in between dreams, the meaningful ones, may have more power than anything else in the world. And while much of the world looks at dreamers as wistfully delusional … it is more likely than not purposeful willfully delusional.

We dreamers dream with purpose. Not for outcome, but of what can be. And when we get a dream right, or maybe better said, when the dream is right for us … well … there is no obstacle too big, no fear too great and no courage is needed, because the dream itself is the energy forward.

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“Well, maybe it started that way. As a dream, but doesn’t everything. Those buildings. These lights. This whole city.

Somebody had to dream about it first. And maybe that is what I did. I dreamed about coming here, but then I did it.”

James and the Giant Peach

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This is really hard to explain to non-dreamers. But. It doesn’t really matter <it never really does with dreams>.

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The dreamer dies, but never dies the dream,

Though Death shall call the whirlwind to his aid,

Enlist men’s passions, trick their hearts with hate,

Still shall the Vision live! Say never more

That dreams are fragile things. What else endures

Of all this broken world save only dreams!

Dana Burnet

—

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“The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in time of moral crisis preserve their neutrality.”

John F Kennedy

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“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”

Edmund Burke

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Well.

I admit.

I get in a shitload of discussions and debates with regard to athletes using the playing field to make a statement, actors & actresses using their celebrity status to make a statement and whether a business should mix business with social issues <which invariably seems to get all mixed up with politics for some reason>.

It is an odd discussion with regard to ‘staying in your lane’ in combination with ‘does your career choice, or specific talent, preclude you from having a valid rational point of view on something else.’ What is less odd is, more often than not, this discussion is facilitated by someone (a) older, (b) white and (c) male.

Anyway.

First of all. I am a nothing. I am not a celebrity, a semi celebrity, an athlete or have access to any expertology platform.

Second of all. If I did ever have an opportunity to be in the spotlight you better fucking believe I would use the opportunity to say something meaningful.

I believe businesses do have a social obligation to society to be, and say, more than just a business <WTF … their employees spend more time there than in society itself so maybe they could foster some good societal norms in the business?>.

I believe people, in general, should speak up and out, regardless of their career, profession or social status if they have a valid point of view that they believe should be noted.

I believe people shouldn’t waste their opportunities to speak up and out and, therefore, should be less stupid if given the opportunity and as enlightened and articulate as possible if given the opportunity <use the opportunity well>.

I believe sometimes America is disappointing and sometimes it disappoints us and how you elect to point out that disappointment is up to you. But suggesting how you may elect to point it out <kneeling during an anthem, raising a fist, holding up a sign at some event, actually speaking out at an event or a show> is disrespectful to others is simplistic tripe <bullshit>.

Regardless.

I don’t give a shit if I am the only one who believes this.

And, frankly, it really doesn’t matter what other people think <the amorphous ‘general public’>, it’s what the person who makes the statement thinks <I recommend everyone listen to Michael Bennet’s interview on why he kneeled during a national anthem before an NFL game… good stuff>.

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“Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless.

Not to speak is to speak.

Not to act is to act.”

attributed to Dietrich Bonhoeffer but actually not his words

<but I bet he would have liked them>

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I think its stupid to suggest someone be silent simply because of what they do for a living. I think its even stupider to think that in a world in which the stupid seem to have little hesitancy to speak out.

It is important people speak up, and out, because the world has turned upside down with regard to reality where there is a small group of loud voices trying to convince us reality isn’t reality.

There is this weird alternative universe where up is down, bad is good and lies are truth. The weirdness extends to wrap a group of very loud opinionated people in a world in which they are the heroes and everyone else is a villain. It all creates a false binary world in which this batshit crazy group fights shadows and the non-batshit crazy people are forced to expend gobs of energy simply trying to communicate they are simply shadows; not real.

It is all weird. But … it is a war. And in war you don’t ‘stay in your lane’, you stand up and fight in anyone’s lane at any time.

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Qui tacet consentire videtur, ubi loqui debuit ac potuit

(He who is silent, when he ought to have spoken and was able to, is taken to agree)

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Regardless.

This isn’t the time to ‘stay in your lane.’ This is the time to speak out. Speak clearly and speak well.

Society always has a curious mix of talents and skills and potentials, but many of those things get wasted if not led “out” from apathy, ignorance or simply fear to become involved. I want to be careful here in the word ‘led’ because I am not talking specifically about leadership. Sometimes words and voices serve as keys to cages. Sometimes the system, empowered by few loud voices, cages the good so their potential never gets optimized. The corollary to that is sometimes a well-articulated view vocalized by someone ‘not staying in their lane’ opens the cages so that the good can gather and optimize “good’s potential.”

In the end.

I don’t want anyone to stay in ‘their lane.’ I want good people to articulate good thoughts if they have a good platform from which to do so.

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“You can’t alter the past. The only thing you can alter is the future. People write stories pretending you can alter the past, but it can’t be done. All you can do to the past is remember it wrong or interpret it differently, and that’s no good to us.”
Diana Wynne Jones

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“Undoing history is a waste of time. Ignoring it is even worse. However, repairing the injustices of the past in time, now that is plausible.”
Joshua Isbell

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One of the topics that seems to bridge strategic thinking in business and thinking about life is our relationship with the past and the future. On both we consistently rummage thru the past seeking some answers for the future, consistently wonder if our future is fate or ‘fit’ <whether it is of value to utilize what we learned from the past> and all the while, for the most part, we avoid the present until it can no longer be ignored.

What that means is fate, and the future, will always appear to rush upon us. In other words, it doesn’t happen, until it does.

As we wander through the wretched in-between, between past and future, for the most part the present plods along day after day, lulling us into thinking that any future we may fear <uncertainty falls within this realm> will always be somewhere in a distant future. Uh oh. Until, all of a sudden, the fated doom we predicted is upon us and all the time and days we could have turned that particular fate aside or bent our path toward a different fate, well, has passed. The truth is within every plodding day is actually a day in which you could impact your fate, in other words, fit your future to you. Tomorrow, in terms of our ‘doom fate’ thinking and scenarios, may never come, but that doesn’t mean all the todays are inevitably linked in a chain toward SOME fate. It may sound banal, but it will always be a ‘today’ which will be the time we have to divert less-than-desired fates – in other words, we ‘fit’ our future if we use the present well and choose our ‘todays’ wisely.

So how do you discern the right “today to do something” <because it is absurd to suggest investing 100% of your energy and focus 100% of each day>? Well. Simplistically, there is always a chance in something happening by doing something. When someone, anyone, takes action to attempt to make something happen, that something becomes more likely. So doing something is better than doing nothing. That doesn’t mean you should just ‘do something’ <I would also note doing nothing, choicefully, is doing something>. But what I would suggest is that ‘day to do something’ should be judged by how you can create your fate, not recreate your past. I say that because we’ve all seen our situations change and whether we like it or not we will see it change again. But, let’s be clear, life is never a race to restore a past situation nor does one have to hurry to meet the future. Sometimes simply watching offers the most productive opportunities. Ponder that last thought as I would suggest most of us have zero interest in attempting impossible tasks. Investing energy in a task which time has passed or is not possible within the existing context is wasted, or less-than-optimal, energy. I would also suggest attempting to go back to a past state is simply to accept defeat. We must always progress, create something new. It will never the same as it was and trying to recreate the past are the actions of fools and foolish desires. I will suggest this attitude is freeing – in business or in life <strategy>.

The trick is to take what has happened to you and learn from it instead of being trapped by it.

Which leads me to horrible events.

Discerning truly horrible events is a topic in and itself. Suffice it to say not everything is a crisis nor is everything horrible if it goes bad. I would suggest almost 97.5% of mistakes <I made up that number> in business and life are survivable, hence, horrible is relative.

With that as context, no event in life is so terrible that one cannot rise above it. Now. Some people think some events are insurmountable and some experiences change you forever. That could be true, but I tend to believe it is only true if you deem it to be true. The terrible events and experiences reside in that past – they are over and done. What that means is if you cling to it and let it shape you, you are doomed to live it forever. In other words, you are granting it power over you. What you should do is accept it, set it aside, learn from it, and shape your future as you wish it to be in spite of what happened. This taking your fate in your own hands rather than having your past dictate your fate. Look. I am not guaranteeing this will insure success, but, well, if you do something, something is more likely to happen. That’s it. No guarantees, but increases probabilities.

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“Remember the past, plan for the future, but live for today, because yesterday is gone and tomorrow may never come.”

Luke the Evangelist

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Which leads me to engineering, or re-engineering, our fate.

The present is never neutral and in order to grasp fate, and the world, we have to engineer and shape some concepts which nudge the world. This means we are ‘of’ our environment and still can ‘to’ our environment. That’s kind of important because if we perceive the present as something that can be engineered, we go about shaping it. I would also argue that if you use conceptual thinking to navigate reality you are more likely to gain better understanding not only of the environment, but have one foot in some understanding, or at minimum ‘sense’, of the future. This does not mean you need answers before doing anything only that the ability to conceptually get some grip of reality before acting is useful. I cannot remember which philosopher said this, but knowledge actually aggregates around concepts and conceptual thinking means that concepts get redesigned, and reengineered, as knowledge aggregates. This means concepts naturally shift to meet emerging environments (the future) – and knowledge has a new basis for new learning. I would be remiss if I didn’t point out the “re” part of the re-engineering. The entire point of the piece today is the future is always some version of the past yet your fate will be indifferent to your past. So the “re” is how someone uses the past as a launching pad, not an anchor. The past doesn’t dominate your view, or bias, of the future but rather it should fuel alternative paths and concepts. You have to disassociate yourself from the idea the future will look like the past, yet, find the aspects within the future which the past lingers.  There are always lesson which can be drawn from similar past experiences but they will be lessons of analogies, not parallelisms.

In the end.

Everyone, and every business, faces horrible events, all have opportunities to reengineer one’s fate and fate will ignore your past – if you do. But ignoring the past doesn’t mean being untethered from it, just not completely tethered to it. Look. The present will never really demand heroism, just engagement with the present. So, the only trouble you can run into is to keep standing back from it or turning aside from it when given an opportunity. The truth is the horrible mess of life is your life. No more, no less. There is no sense in waiting for it, or anything, to get better, it’s better to just stop putting off things, live it and engage. Yeah. There will be horrible events ,but I will remind you that everyone thinks courage is about facing death without flinching. But almost anyone can do that. True courage is facing the horrible messes, and messiness and uncertainty and ambiguity, of the Present without flinching. Enduring the boredom, the grind, the messiness, and the inconvenience found in doing what is right, not easy. And through the un-flinchingness and endurance you ‘future fit’ what you have in the present and, well, go on. For the future is always a version of the past, but fate, in the end, ignores the past. Ponder.

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“Sometimes one just gets tired of fleeing.

The world’s very small when you don’t have anywhere to go.”

Carlos Ruiz Zafon

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Fujhi, poudes; escapa, non.

<flee, you may; escape, you cannot.>

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So. Meta and the metaverse is now upon us.
Let’s be clear. The main lure of the ‘metaverse’ will be escapism – escape from decisions, reality, uncertainty. People seem to increasingly seek to throw up their hands and step back as they increasingly feel like the world is in more turmoil than ever (it’s not, that’s perception, not reality). And in doing so more people will increasingly seek escapism – from accountability in business decision-making as well as accountability for dealing with Life. So let’s maybe call the Metaverse a fleeing destination.

But. “Fujhi, poudes; escapa, non <flee, you may; escape, you cannot>.” I say that because in today’s world fleeing anything, in life or business, is tough. While it may seem like a great big expansive world, the shit that we have a tendency to flee either has some special ray gun that shrinks the world or it is so much faster than we are that it can appear before us no matter where we flee.

Which leads me to fleeing the stuff that matters.

There’s a lot of navel-gazing these days. I mention navel gazing because I often think navel gazing is simply a version of fleeing. It often constitutes too many conversations about things that don’t matter and not enough about things that do, in other words, fleeing the shit that matters. The metaverse now offers us an opportunity to step into some alternative universe where the stuff that really matters just doesn’t exist. Id be remiss if I didn’t point out that isn’t reality – it’s a metaverse; a fake reality.

What the metaverse, at its worst, offers is an escape when time should be spent spending precious attention, energy, and innovative idea skills solving meaningful problems in the reality.

I’m not saying we shouldn’t engage in thoughtful circumspective dialogue about shit, but the shit we discuss should be the shit that matters.

It often feels like we flee the stuff that matters only to run toward the shit that doesn’t. I get frustrated because it often feels like we flee the hard stuff and use the easy stuff as an easy target. I mostly get frustrated because even if someone does this … well … escapa, non.  You cannot flee. You cannot escape the stuff that matters. The metaverse does not slow down stuff that matters while you escape, in fact, I would imagine it keeps going so when you come back from the metaverse it has all just gained more velocity or more power.

I imagine the next aspect of stuff that matters is decision-making. Its not a big stretch to think that people will use the metaverse to pose questions and seek answers. Kind of like a high technology version of dashboard decision-making. What I mean by this is that business, and life, will only get more complex therefore decisions will become a bit more elusive AND businesses will be most likely encouraging more autonomy. In order to flee increased personal decision making responsibilities within seemingly unsolvable situations, we will use the metaverse to play out scenarios and use it to make decisions. To be clear. Scenario thinking or contextual thinking is good – to inform decisions and choices, not make them. What will happen is far too many people in escaping the work of choicemaking will use metaverse to make sense of things only to find that Reality is a different version of Metaverse and the decision will always be slightly off or misguided. I imagine I am suggesting the stuff that matters in the metaverse will never be exactly what the stuff that matters in reality is.

Ponder.

Which leads me to perception versus reality.

Well. If you are on Facebook or watch any of the 24/7 news channels, you would be relatively sure Armageddon was upon us. Apparently, everyone you have a different opinion with is evil and intent on destroying the world. Algorithms purposefully drive us to the extreme messaging and every headline suggests we are more stressed, more overwhelmed, more depressed, and, well, more of everything bad.

Its not that people become imprisoned by fear, but rather people just decide they cannot cope with all the forces swirling around the world. Reality becomes not just a bummer, but un-navigable.

Let me be clear on this one, fleeing something or ‘things’ <in today’s world> or even ‘reality’ is a common thought for the common person. Its not that we seek to avoid accountability or responsibility, but rather we seek to avoid the, well, lack of boundaries. What I mean by that is reality used to have some boundaries, not so much these days. Raise your hand if you have a smartphone <about 80% of you between 12 and 54 just raised your hand>. Over 90% of us have some handheld technology which permits texting, calling, scrolling, or emailing on a whim. Huge changes in technology and in society in recent years have blurred many of the old, familiar, reassuring boundaries.

Uhm.

Without boundaries where does one flee?

Where does work stop and life begin?

Where does my time stop and your time begin?

In less turbulent times the boundaries were very clear. And this is where the “metaverse” enters into the discussion. In the metaverse I can not only avoid reality, but I can actually craft the boundaries in my imaginary universe.  This is dangerous. These boundaries are actually some aura shell around “metaself”. By the way, no one can see this boundary but yourself – this means you are screwed.

You may think with this invisible force field around you that you may be able to flee the things swirling around you … uhm … escapa, non.  “The things” are better and faster and more resilient and, well, more <as in sheer quantity> than you. Fleeing simply means you will get smothered from behind. You may as well stand there and face ‘things’ and strengthen your own personal boundaries. You can never escape things, but you certainly can deflect things if you stand there and see them coming.

Which leads me to fleeing yourself.

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“People are running, running, but there is no place in the world to which they can flee to escape themselves. Ultimately, each one must face himself. “

Paramahansa Yogananda

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While I do worry that this metaverse will encourage people to flee reality, I worry a bit more that it will become some false haven to flee yourself. What I mean by that is in the metaverse you can, conceptually, create the “perfect version you seek” in yourself – as a person and in some context. It is not difficult to see people running to the metaverse as it almost seems like today’s world, reality as it were, the self help people and the advertising and the futuristic blowhards, encourages us to think there is something wrong with us. That we aren’t ‘enough’ or passionate or focused or … well … we are lacking in some form or fashion.

Add in the fact that today’s complex issues facing us have no clear right or wrong answers and Life has become a contentious blend of flexible and inflexible boundaries.  Because of that individuals and societies will try to organize all their own personal chaos with boundaries with some intent to keep out all the external chaos. Here is where the Metaverse gets tricky. Whatever ‘metaself’ you create within this Meta universe actually means you will inevitably have to face yourself … uhm … the same self that society & all the expert shit is suggesting doesn’t have its shit together. I imagine what I am suggesting is in Reality or in Metaverse at some point you will create a boundary and reflect upon what is “inside” that boundary. In other words, escapa, non. Whether inside some finite space boundary or wandering aimlessly outside the boundary in some seemingly infinite space, fleeing yourself just doesn’t work. Mostly because where you are, well, you are there. Now. This is what the metaverse promises you – a different place to be where you are. This is a Faustian bargain with reality.

We may not always like what we see when we look in the mirror, but I can guarantee one thing – external critics will ALWAYS find something they don’t like. Fuck ‘em. Don’t flee them just ignore them. And don’t flee yourself, just remember that perfection is mostly found in glorious imperfections.

Don’t flee your imperfections, they make you who you are. And don’t flee to the Metaverse to flee yourself because, inevitably, reality holds all the mirrors.

Look.

I see the potential for good with the metaverse – conceptual thinking, spatial thinking, contextual thinking – opportunities abound to help hone thinking – for Life as well in business. Where my concern resides is most likely with Meta, itself, and how the world is currently arcing – increased ambiguity with perceptions skewed by loud voices suggesting Armageddon. That combination creates a scenario in which even if the metaverse were Utopia, there would be a bunch of doors available for escapism and a bunch of asshats writing algorithms and such encouraging you to go thru those doors.

As Jaron Lanier said: “no matter how petty a flaw might be in utopia, that flaw will be where the full fury of the power seeking will be focused.”

In the end. You cannot escape whatever you are fleeing.

Period.

No debate.

Doesn’t matter what it is or where you are.

Mainly because whatever you think you are fleeing doesn’t reside only in the place you are running from. Those things you elect to flee are the things that most often live in a variety of different places and spaces.

In other words, the world is a very small place when you have no place to go. I say that to suggest even by building an alternative universe, a Metaverse, doesn’t make reality go away. It is there. It exists. And it awaits your return. And, for the most part, it will do anything in its power to remind you reality is reality and the Metaverse is the Metaverse. Ponder, but, escapa non.

“Anyone could see that the wind was a special wind this night, and the darkness took on a special feel because it was All Hallows’ Eve.”

Ray Bradbury

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Happy Halloween.

I have a love – hate relationship with Halloween.

Love. Love the chocolate and the ‘pomp and circumstance’ of one of the goofiest nights in the world as ghosts and spirits of loved ones <and I assume some not-so-loved ones> wander the world being as persnickety <I just wanted to type that word> and aggravating as they were when they stood near you in their flesh & blood, and children can wander the neighborhood unattended dressed up as whatever they want trick-or-treating <begging/demanding as much sugar as they can possibly consume> or, in general, simply wreaking havoc as young people do <just not in cars – that comes later in the teen years>.

Hate? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm … the cats.

Cats are probably the most useless animals and pets in the world. I am sure they have some redeeming value it is just that I have yet to find any <if but one>.

Oh. Please note here … I am a dog guy.

Anyway.

Cats. Halloween has too strong an association with cats for my liking.

We seem to be able to blame this association on European pagan religions which were tightly associated with the animals of nature, including the cat, in the good ole <dark ages> days.

Then Christianity put the kibosh on all that pagan stuff — kind of decided that witchcraft was a bad thing — and since everyone associated cats with witches, well, there you go. Cats were deemed evil by association.

Aside from the old Popes <who apparently were dog lovers too> there are a bunch of old myths that attribute bad luck to cats:

–          King Charles I of England owned a black cat and the day it died he was arrested.

–          An old sailor’s legend said that meeting cats in the shipyard meant an unpleasant voyage of storms or other bad luck.

–          In Babylonian folklore a curled up cat on the hearth is seen as similar to evil serpent.

There you go.

Hopefully I have covered my butt with all the crazy cat ladies who want to throw used kitty litter at me for saying I hate cats by noting that my cat concerns are rooted in some historical, if not mythical, thoughts.

Regardless.

Some things you should be aware of that you may not know <albeit I doubt is very useful> about Halloween:

–          There’s a $1,000 fine for using or selling Silly String in Hollywood on Halloween.

The prank product has been banned in Hollywood since 2004 after thousands of bored people would buy it on the streets of Hollywood from illegal vendors and “vandalize” the streets. The city ordinance calls for a maximum $1,000 fine and/or six months in jail for “use, possession, sale or distribution of Silly String in Hollywood from 12:01 AM on October 31 to 12:00 PM on November 1.”

–          Dressing up on Halloween comes from the Celts <no, not the Boston Celtics, the Celts in great Britain history>.

Celts believed their version of a Halloween date was a time when the wall between our world and the paranormal world was porous and spirits could get through. Because of this belief, it was common for the Celts to wear costumes and masks during the festival to ward off or befuddle any evil spirits.

–          Ah. Celts were pagans, but the name “Halloween” comes from the Catholics.

Hallowmas is a three-day Catholic holiday where saints are honored and people pray for the recently deceased. At the start of the 11th century, it was decreed by the pope that it would last from Oct. 31 (All Hallow’s Eve) until Nov. 2,

<speculation on my part: we should note that the dog loving Popes were smart enough to place this holiday at this time most likely because that was when the cat loving pagans celebrated and the church was trying to convert them – into dog lovers>.

“All Hallow’s Eve” then evolved into “All Hallow’s Even” and by the 18th century it was commonly referred to as “Hallowe’en.”

–          Turnips

Pumpkins are a fraud. We should probably blame Hallmark, but instead we can just blame America for this too. Halloween originally had nothing to do with pumpkins … it was turnips.

The origin of Jack-O-Lanterns comes from a Celtic folk tale of a stingy farmer named Jack who would constantly play tricks on the devil. The devil responded by forcing him to wander purgatory with only a burning lump of coal from hell. Jack took the coal and made a lantern from a turnip using it to guide his lost soul. The myth was brought over by Irish families fleeing the potato famine in the 1800s, and since turnips were hard to come by in the U.S., America’s pumpkins were used as a substitute to guide lost souls and keep evil spirits like “Jack of the Lantern” away.

–          Media is part of the horror story of Halloween.

Media is made up of witches and warlocks. Well. They must be. Because fears of poisoned Halloween candy are unfounded but a constant story on media.

One of our biggest fears is a child’s Halloween candy is poisoned or contains razor blades.

The truth?

This fear is almost entirely unfounded.

There are only two known cases of poisoning, and both involved relatives, according to LiveScience. In 1970, a boy died of a heroin overdose. The investigators found it on his candy, but in a twist they later discovered the boy had accidentally consumed some of his uncle’s heroin stash, and the family had sprinkled some on the candy to cover up the incident. Even worse, in 1974 Timothy O’Bryan died after eating a Pixy Stix his father had laced with cyanide to collect on the insurance money <according to Smithsonian Magazine>.

Besides that the razor blade in apple story is a myth <unproven or simply staged>.

The real point of sharing this is that your kid has less to fear from some unknown random neighbor than he/she does from someone they already know <that is an extremely unfortunate  Life truth in general … sigh>.

–          I hate Candy Corn. Oh. And it was originally known as chicken feed.

Invented by some guy at the Wunderle Candy Company in Philadelphia in the 1880s, Candy Corn was originally called “butter cream candies” and “chicken feed.” Ah. There was a reason. Back then corn was commonly used as food for livestock <they even had a rooster on the candy boxes>.

At that time candy corn had no association with Halloween or fall and was sold seasonally from March to November.

After World War II, advertisers began marketing it as a special Halloween treat due to its colors and ties to the fall harvest <the bastards … who the heck actually eats that stuff?>.

–          A full moon on Halloween is extremely rare.

Although almost every Halloween decoration seen is with witches flying across the full moon … just another marketing lie. The next full moon on Halloween won’t occur until 2020. The last was in 2001. Before that it was in 1955. Brilliant marketing … but it is just another lie <sigh>.

–          Trick-or-treating has been around for a long time <so America or capitalism cannot be blamed for this greedy little maneuver>.

Versions of trick-or-treating have existed since medieval times.

It was known as ‘guising’ where children and poor adults went around in costumes during this time begging for food and money in exchange for songs or prayers. It was also called “souling.”

–          thank you Great Pumpkin and Charlie Brown.

Trick-or-treating as we know it was re-popularized by cartoons.

Trick-or-treating was brought to America by the Irish and became popular during the early 20th century, but died out during WWII when sugar was rationed. After the rationing ended in 1947, children’s magazine “Jack and Jill,” radio program “The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet,” and the “Peanuts” comic strip all helped to re-popularize the tradition of dressing up in costumes and asking for candy from door-to-door. By 1952, trick-or-treating was hugely popular again <thank you Charlie Brown and Linus and the Great Pumpkin>.

There you go.

Today in America we will share or consume something like 90 million pounds of chocolate.

Awesome <and we wonder about a national obesity issue … sorry … different post, by the way, I blame cats for that too by the way>.

Americans will also spend about $6 billion on Halloween including candy, costumes, and decorations <note: that does not include the wacky cat costumes crazy cat people make their cats wear>.

Happy Halloween.

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“Life here is so elemental. So real. Without the interference of civilization you can really experience things like… silence. Silence and darkness in its purity. Right now, right outside my window all I can see is a black void. Endless darkness. It’s totally exhilarating, and I feel very lucky to be here. Very, very lucky.”

Dr. Joel Fleischman, Northern Exposure

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So. It seems like we are going to be able to enjoy the Northern Lights this evening. A night where everyone should be looking up at the stars. And because of the Northern Lights I was reminded of what I would consider one of the best moments on television. You know what I mean. One of those moments which captures whatever sense or emotion you know the writers were trying to create.  Now. It doesn’t happen often (and it seems less and less on tv these days), but when it does it is awesome.

This moment comes from an old tv show called Northern Exposure.  A delightfully quirky 5 season comedy set in Cicely Alaska. I have plucked just one scene from a show with many to pluck.

John Corbett (who has a great voice) plays a philosophical local radio DJ in Cicely during the show.  This episode focuses on the fact he builds a sculpture every year to commemorate the appearance of the 24 hour night and the winter solstice.  After struggling to create his sculpture throughout the episode he unveils his creation at the end of this episode.

The scene is incredible for a number of reasons.

First. The speech.

John Corbett (Chris) strings together the “best of the best” light poetry references in his speech (he quotes the following: Thy word…feet, Psalm 119:105; Rage…light, Dylan Thomas, Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night; Lead kindly…home, John Henry Newman, The Pillar of the Cloud; Arise..come, Isaiah 60:1).

It is a great speech and scene:

(on the winter solstice, during 24 hours of total darkness)

Goethe’s final words: more light. Ever since we crawled out of that primordial slime, that’s been our unifying cry: more light. Sunlight, torchlight, candlelight, neon, incandescent, light to banish the darkness from our caves, to illuminate our roads, the insides of our refrigerators. Big floods for the night games at Soldier’s Field, little tiny flashlight for those books we read under the covers when we’re supposed to be asleep. Light is more than watts and foot candles, light is metaphor. Thy word is a lamp unto my feet. Rage, rage against the dying of the light! Lead, kindly light, amid the encircling gloom, lead thou me on. The night is dark and I am far from home, lead thou me on. Arise, shine, for thy light has come. Light is knowledge, light is life, light is light.

Second. The sculpture creation is cool.  It is a random collection of lights of all sizes and colors seemingly haphazardly put together and it is … well .. oddly perfect. It looks awesome. It is northern lights man-made. It is a reminder that creative perfection is more often than not a quirky combination of some imperfect thoughts and things.

Third. The music.  Goosebumps.  Absolutelyfrickinperfect song selection for the scene. While it is an Enya song, you have the feeling that the Eskimos (the Inuits) would have loved it. Enya. Ebudae from the Shepherd Moons cd.

Just wanted to share as I hope everyone takes a moment tonight and look at the Northern Lights.

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“There is no happiness for people at the expense of other people.”

Anwar Sadat

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We talk a lot about winning these days. The most used is that horrible mis-quoted Vince Lombardi quote “Winning isn’t everything, it is the only thing” <he actually said “the will to win is everything”>.

I would suggest all the talk is simply a bastardized version of a focus on ‘outcomes’ which is the bane of the business world today.

I would suggest happiness is being tied so tightly to ‘winning’ that its cost, the expense as it were, is suffocating the larger perspective.

This expense can come in a variety of larger perspective forms — character, self-limitation and time.

While this seems like it should be simple, it is not. In fact it is a tricky balance for anyone.

This is actually a discussion on the balance, or proportional, between me <as in the individual> and we <the business, or, how we earn our living>.

Look. I talk a lot about balance in Life and in business.

To be clear. Not “work/life” balance but balance as in good & bad or pragmatic & hopeful or pessimism & optimism. These are the quandaries that seeking success creates from a moral, organizational culture/political and even spiritual perspective. Stuff like that.

Here is a truth not maybe people discuss.

Success should demand some sacrifice.

Uh oh.

If that is true, have you noticed how rare it is that when someone is focused on winning they rarely talk about ‘at what expense’ other than effort?

The fact it is not discussed is a reflection of some decision that ‘the win’ is the only thing that matters and the expense is always worth it <to win>.

This is an incredibly easy trap to fall into.

Why?

I believe it is because most of us really have no clue what we want to do in our lives and with our lives. Yeah. We may have some ‘short horizon priorities’, but anything that resembles a ‘more than minor Life’ is more often than not simply out of our mental framing. This means that it is pretty natural that in a world where pretty much everything seems in flux that we want to have some things that are tangible to measure progress and ‘what is.

And that means ‘winning’ all of a sudden assumes a fairly high priority in one’s Life and in business.

And that means ‘at what expense’ is more often than not relegated to the trashcan because ‘the win’ is all that matters.

It is a downward spiral, or doom loop, to ‘just win.’

Let me be clear.

While I just rationalized how and why this happens … this is fucked up.

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“People do things to survive, and then after they survive, they can’t live with what they’ve done.”

Adam Johnson

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It is fucked up because all of a sudden this ‘winning’ thing we are focused on begins to infringe upon our Life purpose or maybe instead of saying purpose – the soul of who and what we are.

You may look at winning as a means to survive, but afterwards – maybe not immediately but at some point – you realize you have to be accountable for what you have done under the guise of ‘surviving.’

I don’t really care how you define ‘life purpose’, but, simplistically, most of us want to reflect upon our lives not only looking at some version of success, but, more importantly, at the quality of the success.

*** note: ‘success’ can be ‘doing something meaningful’ or ‘doing something that meant something to someone else (impact)’

And by ‘quality’ I mean “at what expense did I achieve that success?”

Here’s the truth.

We exist for some finite period of time.

During that time we do things. Some of these things are important. Some of them are unimportant. The important things are supposed to give our lives meaning and happiness.

Which means, well, what if you get them wrong? what if you fuck up the big important things?

Shit.

What happens if you fuck up the unimportant things?

I say that to make the point this is why moments matter. Uhm. This is why all moments matter.

I say that to make the point this is why ‘how you win’ matters.

I say that to make the point this is why ‘at what expense’ becomes maybe the most important question someone can ask when pursuing winning.

Look. Almost everyone asks “what do we need to do to win?, but ‘expense?’ … not so much.

I imagine my real point is that with such a huge emphasis on winning we need to recognize that everything involves sacrifice.

Everything includes some expense.

So despite the fact the answer in today’s world almost always seems to be “win” <at any cost>, the question everyone should actually be asking is ‘at what expense is tolerable?”

And therein lies the issue.

When someone does actually ask that question money, energy & time are the three easiest expenses. Everyone focuses on these because, frankly, to avoid the bigger potential expenses. They are real, but, a lazy expense discussion.

Self-limitation is the next expense that steps up. This one is fraught with peril. Peril in that if you admit you are not capable of doing what must be done you become a, well, loser. We have set some absurd expectations with regard to ‘the sky is the limit’ and ‘if you want to win you need to do whatever it takes.’ The latter avoids a possible truth that ‘whatever it takes’ may actually be beyond your own self limitations/abilities. But nonetheless, in today’s world, limits are for losers. That is absurd.

The last expense is character. Throw in maybe integrity, compassion and possibly dignity <yours and others>.

This is the expense that ‘winners’ tend to avoid discussing because it dangerously nears “nice guys don’t win’ territory. And as we eye this ‘nice guy’ <or ‘play by the rules’> expense we suddenly step onto the slippery slope of moral relativism. We begin justifying our behavior based on other’s behavior. If someone is cheating, or stretching the rules, or … god forbid … simply being slimy soulless cutthroat competitors … well … then we begin to morph into their behavior because they have established the rules to win.

This is just a race to the bottom.

Anyway. This is the expense that almost everyone avoids discussing because it dangerously nears ‘ethics’ or “what is right versus what is wrong’ <which, when it comes to winning, becomes an incredibly uncomfortable discussion>.

And all of this last expense circles how we, each of us, would answer ‘what does it mean to live a good life?’

This is really all about living ethically and conducting business ethically. This is about what you do and how the objectives need to align with a certain moral code <this can get even trickier because not everyone’s moral code is the same>.

It is certainly ethical to pursue money, status and ‘the win.’ But do we have a moral obligation to pursue those things not at the expense of others or by ‘doing the right thing’?

You actions matter.

How you achieve a win matters.

Winning, or achieving outcomes, is desirable, but you should always seek to identify ‘at what expense?” If you do not do this, while you may be able to count a shitload of wins, they may end up looking a little hollower in the end – the expense may be too high.

For, in the end, the expense is that of character. And that is an expense that no win, no number of wins, can ever generate enough to pay the cost. Choose wisely.

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“If I’m sincere today, what does it matter if I regret it tomorrow?”

José Saramago

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“There is never a wrong time to do the right thing.”

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“It is not that a person makes meaning, as much as that the activity of being a person is the activity of meaning-making … the most fundamental thing we do with what happens to us is organize it. We literally make sense.”

Developmental psychologist Robert Kegan

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ideas that are the most difficult to validate can feel like the most important ones

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Complexity, in business, is in the midst of a weird time. In the attempt to translate complexity-in-theory to complexity-in-practice, a whole bunch of people are turning themselves into pretzels to simplify, uhm, complexity. The intent is to make it understandable and manageable (ability to navigate or as Donella Meadows suggests “dance with the system”), but in doing so there have been a variety of quadrants, some delightful descriptors (see: ‘wicked problems’) and, in general, a bunch of things which actually make complexity even more complex in the minds of people in business as well as in practice.

I continue to believe the rough-ish diagram Stacey placed in “Managing the Unknown” is one of the more practical views of complexity for business.

One of the things I like about it, and have liked, is that it has its own version of an OODA loop. This seems important to me because navigating complexity is less about the decision and more about observing decisions and decide what to do with the effect, or effects, which exist as a consequence of the initial stimulus <other past decisions>. In the past I have called this ‘situational awareness.’ That said. OODA loops WITHIN complex dynamics is how to iteratively navigate complexity without simply reacting. You do something and then manage against that decision because it is not a linear directional world in which a problem leads to an action that leads to a solution. Instead, we live in an infinite looped dynamic world. Each action is based on current conditions, such actions affect future conditions, and changed conditions become the basis for later action.  The system, and systems nested within, are reflections of ceaseless connections and feedback loops (even if they are nonlinear). This makes complexity tricky because you can do something with good intentions, say to resolve a problem, and actually alleviate that problem and, yet, be causing another unseen snowballing problem. By applying pressure <or a resolution> in one place tends to create some equal opposing pressure (or pressures) in another place.

Regardless. While that, generally, sounds complex – because it is – the simple truth is everything is connected and nothing is ever really stagnant. But the complexity folk just don’t seem satisfied with that. We need labels and words and definitions. To that I say we don’t need to be brilliant; we need to find ways of doing useful things.

“If you keep certain creative people in too tight a box, they blow up the box.”

Liz Phair

Anyway.

One of the most interesting books I have read about complexity was not actually about complexity. it was about people and society – The Listening Society by Hanzi Freinacht. Ok. Hanzi Freinacht is a complex guy, complex thinker, and talks about the future of society and humankind (kind of a complex topic).  The reason why I believe Listening Society is about complexity and business is because it is about people. And while we like to talk about systems, algorithms, digital infrastructure, culture, and, well, anything but people, inevitably if you want to navigate complexity you need to get people’s heads screwed on right and get everyone thinking about the right things.  I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out, pragmatically, business is a lot like living life in that for the most part you are just trying to get shit done the best you possibly can. It sounds like a grind and aspects of it really are – but can be a thinking grind. So, despite the fact we speak of the rise of the ‘knowledge worker’ the truth is if a business wants to have some agility it needs thinker/doers (or doer/thinkers) or at least have teams in which there is some equilibrium between needed thinking and needed doing and the grind it out mentality needed to navigate complexity and a complex world.

Which leads me back to Hanzi.

He suggests that each person is a cross section of the self – the depths & dimensions – and the conflict and potential inherent in the interactions with social, economic and cultural fabric – all amped up in a technological world. Freinacht calls this ‘a transpersonal perspective.’ Its not just that we are each a billiard ball that interacts with other people. We co-emerge or ‘intra-act.’  He suggests we have a lived experience as well as a creational experience. We experience and absorb from all experiences and in doing so we, systemically, change. What this means is that society is present within each individual as well as within the relationships one forges with what we call ‘self.’ Here is the uncomfortable suggestion — there is no true individual nor is there any true collective there is simply an evolving interlinked emergent set of ‘transviduals.’ This makes each of us inseparable, in a complete sense, rather than some simplistic unique separate life story. This means each person should be viewed as an open and social process, a “whirlwind of participation and cocreation of society.” Society, or social dynamics (which is relevant to the business world), as a whole is then viewed as a self organizing system which creates each of us (transviduals) who, in turn, recreate society. We are all social constructions. We are all, in fact, parts & pieces of one another and affect one another. We consist of many different influences (which makes the idea of individual a constraining idea), roles and perspectives WITHIN a multitude of contexts. In other words, we are complex.

Which leads me to what Ralph Stacy called “bounded instability.” People are inherently unstable <I call them uneven> and forcing consistency, rather than coherence, actually limits possibilities (stability comes at a cost). His thought is to relax the inhibitors and optimize (in a situational equilibrium, not balance) what he calls ‘fit & split’ and what I call coherence.

But lurking within what I just shared is that people systems inherently are driven by stable laws of behavior (boundaries) which actually CREATE specific kinds of instability, yet, this creates some aspect of patterns. It sounds crazy but stick with me here. The tighter the boundaries the broader the instability (fragility). But stable, not constrictive, boundaries create patterns.

“Companions the creator seeks, not corpses, not herds, not believers. Fellow creators the creator seeks – those who write new values on new tablets. Companions the creator seeks, and fellow harvesters; for everything about him is ripe for the harvest.”

Zarathustra (Hanzi Freinacht)

Patterns? Reality is made up of inner landscapes rubbing up against each other. This means reality is emergent and we are not successful by slavishly following ‘laws of’ protocol, but rather our ability to sense make reality and navigate emergent patterns. What this means from a complexity standpoint is that Life, business, any environment, is best felt, not organized (or controlled).

That thought is kinda important because complexity, to the everyday worker, isn’t about chaos or stability or any management guru word, its about competing demands and the tension between meeting status quo demands and opportunistic demands WITHIN time demands.  Reconciling this is tough because most people make it a binary choice and the natural arc of business behavior is status quo because of a pressure to produce consistent and reliable outcomes. I believe it was Dewey who suggested people, in general, tend to formulate our beliefs in terms of “either–or”, between which alternatives we recognize no intermediate possibilities. Just like algorithms, which choose only in X or Y choicemaking, we tend to strive for clarity to such an extent we will make things simplistic, i.e., a highly probable assessment becomes a 100% choice and 100% invested <when probability and choice or not equal in truth>. Circling back to sensing or feeling patterns, this means we need to avoid either/or binary choicemaking so that we can ride patterns rather than control patterns.

 

structure influences behavior is a central principle underlying systems thinking

complex systems resist behavior change

the active energy in an organization is people

a process is only good, and efficient, as the market is built to serve. if the market changes, the process may still generate positive results, but it will no longer be efficient and will continue to decay in its effectiveness.

Anyway. I am not a big believer in social system design, more in trying to understand systems dynamics, but ignoring the fact that all systems, including social, HAVE a design and therefore can be ‘re-designed’ (in some form or fashion) would be naïve. Systems exist everywhere. Systems influence everything we do.  The idea of a social system implies that relationships between its parts strongly influence human behavior. To put the matter more bluntly, a social system implies that people act partially as cogs in a social and economic machine. In other words, people play roles demanded by pressures of the whole system. This idea is a bit uncomfortable because at its core it suggests people aren’t totally free to make their own decisions. That said. Suffice it to say all social systems have some ‘design’ features (or have actually been designed) which, tying back to Hanzi, means people, as social constructs, are designed by social systems.

Yup. The structure of the system will define behaviors. I say that because one cannot blame individuals for most failures, but rather the system itself. Yet. We tend to highlight the accountability of ‘the individual’ in some fairly unhealthy ways within business. Circling back to Freinacht, the entire idea of individual or collective is outdated in today’s world. Cluetrain Manifesto called it ‘the hyperlinked organization’ and the reality is “I am parts of you, you are parts of me, and the whole is a malleable mix of parts of all of us – even those we interact with outside the internal system within the business.” Business and our little personal circles of existence are simply a system within a system, or of the system, and people are systems in and of themselves. That’s today’s world. I imagine I make that point to suggest gamification (which I dislike anyway) of business tends to seek out ‘individual motivations’ when in reality all gamification does is create less than unifying aspects within an organization (when business, in general, while not seeking unity, should seek unifying systems). Gamification, or many of the silly leadership tactics, are attempts to untangle complexity into manageable units. That’s a less-than-useful approach. The intertwined nature of complexity means one shouldn’t be seeking untangle anything, but rather seek to get them to develop TOGETHER to create new evolutions of the system. It isn’t about shedding things, but rather creating things. My point, I imagine, is complexity does not exist to be solved, but rather developed. That thought, in particular, is counter to what society encourages us to do.

Lastly.

We need to deal with this. Remember earlier I suggested we are social constructs. If we do not deal with it, we, well, stop constructing <and that is bad>. This isn’t some theoretical mumbo jumbo issue I am sharing. We need to deal with it because people will be increasingly squeezed in a complex world. Squeezed? What I mean by that is the world is not going to become any less demanding with regard to ‘results’ or outcomes and the world is not going to become any less complex and overwhelming. In fact. They will both likely become more. Under the pressure of time and demand for ‘do something/decide something’ our behaviors will inevitably arc toward the simplistic on our bad, most overwhelmed, days (and simplicity on a good day). In our inability to navigate the multidimensional abstraction of each moment/situation/event/decision/etc., we will lean in on what we believe is our true ability – intuitive behavior. Uh oh. “Believe” as an ability is a misnomer. In a complex world 99% of us suck at intuitive behavior <heck, most of the time all of our intuition is dubious at best> and actually simply grasp the closest key we can find to unlock the door to get the hell out of the complex hallway we seem stuck in. The truth, the reality, is that even the most time-constrained decisions demand some mental grind. If we don’t, then even at our best, we will always remain a step or two behind not only the world but behind any semblance of a sane world. But here is where it gets, well, bad. As the world becomes increasingly complex and we become increasingly overwhelmed and under increasing pressure to ‘do something’, there will always be someone peddling ‘simplicity’ or some tool/tactic to ease us through that situation. Uhm. Easy does not equal what is best for us <see the endless apps claiming to streamline our interactions with the world only to divert our attention from some pretty important things>. Streamlining is more likely to strip away the important than to strip away the unimportant. We need to expand our abilities in order to expand the space we need to navigate as well as to simply expand space so we stop getting squeezed. And maybe that is the most important point. Look. Complexity has a nasty habit of making us feel like we are being squeezed – even when we are not. Gaining the ability to expand space is actually improving reality and, well, an improved reality is a reality more readily navigated. This can be done and we need to shed the defeatist attitude which arcs our mindsets into the space of being ‘overwhelmed’ versus ‘whelmed’. It is within that space in which we may not completely shed the constraints of complexity, but we can certainly push out on the boundaries to give us some space to breathe a bit. And, well, I imagine that’s the key to navigating complexity – space to breathe. No quadrant, no theory, no management guru, will give you any tool better than space to breathe. Complexity CAN be suffocating so the simple action of breathing is the path to navigation. Ponder.

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Sometimes I wish I could fly

Like a bird up in the sky

Closer to my home

 

Sometimes I feel like freedom is near

Sometimes I feel like freedom is here

Sometimes I feel like freedom is so near

But we’re so far from home

Van Morrison< Sometimes I feel like a motherless child>

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Both home and freedom are tricky topics to discuss even though they seem like they should be relatively simple. Freedom to one person is an infringement on another’s and home is where I say it is, not what you may suggest it is. That said. Let me try this. Home is where you find true freedom. It is where you can be free to be you and do what you want. I have stated in the past (a) the world is thy ship and not thy home and (b) I am a nomad and ‘home’ to me is wherever I have my books (I did so under the guise of this is what offers me stability). But that was a bit shallow of me to suggest because the truth is home is where your genuine self resides. The ‘you’ that exists without any veneer that the external world demands. My books are, at its shallowest, escapism. It permits me to escape the external world’s demands and maybe, at its best, lets me navigate who I am and who I want to be. But this isn’t about me, this is about self, home and freedom.

In my mind, here is where home and freedom has become a trickier proposition for us – the disparity between who we really like to be and who we are in some situations has widened and increased. Here is what I mean. If we are honest, work (business) has always encouraged some specific characteristics whether they be genuine to who we are at our core or not. Tt encourages some ruthless competitiveness (on occasion at minimum) and identifiable confidence (discernable to others) and certainly a large emphasis, continuously, on results and even each business ‘culture’ demands some aspects just in how they suggest going about the business of doing business (and this varies by business). Its kind of the game, and games, one plays to fit in within a business. They are not always the things we naturally would be, or do, when we have the freedom to relax at home. But then, in addition, there is social media. Social media, for most people, is an asymmetrical ‘non relax’ game. What I mean by that is while someone certainly will have some consistency between a Facebook, Instagram, tiktok, whatever, the truth is that the ‘public game’ is played a bit differently on each platform. Each platform, and each ‘tribe’ you interact with on social media tugs at, and out, a specific part of you. It makes who you are when you are free to relax uneven. And this is where I go back to ‘trickier proposition’ thought. Who we are is being constantly pulled at by the environments within which we reside. And I mean constantly. Work is discussing bringing ‘your whole self’ (which is ludicrous), social media discusses things in a brutally one-dimensional context and even social community discusses community cohesiveness in some very ‘us versus them’ narratives. I would suggest before social media having a ‘self-narrative’ that was a bit easier to narrate was, well, a bit easier and home, as I am discussing it, was a bit easier to have.

In part I think I am discussing a bastardized psychological version of “the mirroring hypothesis.” The mirroring hypothesis is that an organization will correspond to the technical patterns of dependency in the work being performed. In other words, for today’s piece, you will begin to mirror the patterns of dependency your ‘self’ is delivering here, there and everywhere. This is also a derivative of McLuhan’s “we shape the tools and the tools shape us.” Let me be clearer. Your home becomes unrecognizable as you are being reshaped by mirroring everything you are doing everywhere.

All of this to circle back to home is where you can be free to be you and do what you want. Given everything I have just written I imagine I would have to suggest home is not a place, but a space in time. What I mean by that is there are moments (or spaces) in time – they can be shorter or longer – in which you are at home with yourself and you have the freedom to be who you are. This is kind of an important thought (I think) because home can be fleeting and in today’s world it can seem incredibly far away sometimes. The world can make our ‘home’, well, less identifiable if we are not careful. We can even kind of forget what that freedom really is and lose sight of what our home truly is. That is, if we are not careful. And I believe having a home, in some sense, is really really important.

Look. Go online and you will have access to, simultaneously, gobs of pieces on personal branding and exactly at the same time gobs of pieces on loss of sense of self (depression, esteem, purpose, etc.). It is like the former is being offered as a solution to the latter. And its not. Home is the solution. We all need a home. A home in which we know who we are, what we are, and can relax and bit all of it and, at its best, with someone who accepts it all. People will suggest authenticity of self, others will speak of being genuine, heck, Shakespeare suggests “be true to thineself”, all I suggest is home. Find your moments of home and visit home as often as you can. The world demands you leave home and even encourages you to stay away from home, I will not suggest you can never leave your home, the world doesn’t work that way, all I suggest is make sure you have a home and know it is your home. Because, in the end, that is where your truest freedom not only resides but offers your touchstone to freedom when you are away. Ponder.

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“Authenticity will be the buzzword of the twenty-first century. And what is authentic? Anything that is not devised and structured to make a profit. Anything that is not controlled by corporations. Anything that exists for its own sake, that assumes its own shape. But of course nothing in the modern world is allowed to assume its own shape. The modern world is the corporate equivalent of a formal garden, where everything is planted and arranged for effect. Where nothing is untouched, where nothing is authentic. 

“Where, then, will people turn for the rare and desirable experience of authenticity? They will turn to the past.

“The past is unarguably authentic. The past is a world that already existed before all the other shapers of the present day shaped today’s world. The past was here before they were. The past rose and fell before their intrusion and molding and selling. The past is real. It’s authentic. And this will make the past unbelievably attractive.”

Michael Crichton

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Well.

I am not a past guy and I believe “authentic” is one of those words that is currently being abused in a variety of definition-type ways, but, I would offer a reminder to everyone that if you want something authentic it is actually the past <I will expound on that in a minute>.

Let’s just say that it always surprises me a little when people start bitching about the other people who seem to be yearning for the past. While I am certainly not a past-yearner lets’ see what a past yearner sees:

Everything is uncertain in today’s world.

You have no idea who to trust.

There is a struggle to trust anything.

Facts seem to no longer be black & white

Truth now has an alternative version.

Common sense doesn’t seem common.

Opinions look much like facts & facts get confused with opinions.

Simple, or simplification, doesn’t seem that simple anymore.

Add in that all of those things are occurring in a world in which we are increasingly encouraging people to think of everything as “all or nothing” <a zero-sum world>.

This all drives a lot of people to find any fucking semi-solid lily pad to stand on that they can find. And what seems solid, seems certain, and seems authentic, well, is the past.

Ok. That said. On to my ‘expounding’ comment.

No. We may not remember the past well or correctly. In fact <research> we typically do not remember it correctly <choosing to remember the things we like & discarding the things we don’t want to remember>. Yet, in our minds, how we do remember it is as certain as anything can be in this world.

*** note: Daniel Kahneman discusses this in “the riddle of experience versus memory.”

And, yeah, aspects of this can be skewed into a generational/age thing if you wanted. In a world of increasing uncertainty the young, who have less to hold on to with ragged claws & look forward to ditching a lot of the existing shit so they can develop their own shit, leave the past behind <sometimes flippantly> .

In a world of increasing uncertainty the old, well, they hang on with ragged claws to the only thing they know to be true, certain & authentic. i.e., the past.

But, suffice it to say, how we view the past goes beyond age <although age can exacerbate the issue>.

There is seeing and … well … seeing. And there is a vast difference between the two. Frederick Franck in “Zen Seeing/Zen Drawing” argues:

“The glaring contrast between seeing and looking-at the world around us is immense; it is fateful. Everything in our society seems to conspire against our inborn human gift of seeing. We have become addicted to merely looking-at things and beings. The more we regress from seeing to looking at the world — through the ever-more-perfected machinery of viewfinders, TV tubes, VCRs, microscopes, spectroscopes — the less we see. The less we see, the more numbed we become to the joy and the pain of being alive, and the further estranged we become from ourselves and all others.”

Well.

That is a discouraging thought. He is basically suggesting that once we get on the slippery slope of ‘not seeing’ we very quickly enter, and stay, in this miserable abyss of blindness.

He may be right. But I would rather believe he is not. I would prefer to believe seeing, really seeing, is a discriminating decision made by you and not the world around you. I would like to believe if we chose we could see the past with open eyes, open mind, open heart, with open to unapologetic attention.

This is about not really looking for something in particular just being ready and receptive to whatever happens around you and in front of you. And by not seeking anything in particular <because that inhibits true seeing> you end up, as someone wrote somewhere ‘… by your own eyes you will see, and there will be a conclusion.’ What that means is you don’t see based on your own ideas <or belief system>, but rather you see based on … well … what you see.

Hey. I am not suggesting this is easy. I am simply suggesting that you can do it if you elect to. If it helps, we partially have evolution to blame on why I can say what I am saying to you:

…. evolution’s problem-solving left us modern humans with two kinds of attention: vigilance, which allows us to have a quick and life-saving fight-or-flight response to an immediate threat, be it a leaping lion or a deranged boss, and selective attention, which unconsciously curates the few stimuli to attend to amidst the flurry bombarding us, enabling us to block out everything except what we’re interested in ingesting. (Selective attention, of course, can mutate to dangerous degrees, producing such cultural atrocities as the filter bubble.)

Ah. The ‘filter bubble.’

the filter bubble — by definition, it’s populated by the things that most compel you to click. But it’s also a real problem: the set of things we’re likely to click on (sex, gossip, things that are highly personally relevant) isn’t the same as the set of things we need to know. – Eli Pariser

Evolution and Life experience has created this filter bubble for each of us. And, by the way, each of our filter bubbles are different <because our Life experiences have been different in creating it>.

This filter bubble idea also suggests that you can manage, if not actually change your filter bubble.

Yup. You can change the way you see things.

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“To learn to see- to accustom the eye to calmness, to patience, and to allow things to come up to it; to defer judgment, and to acquire the habit of approaching and grasping an individual case from all sides. This is the first preparatory schooling of intellectuality. One must not respond immediately to a stimulus; one must acquire a command of the obstructing and isolating instincts.”

Friedrich Nietzsche

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I love that one thought: ‘allow things to come to it.’ Allow what you see to come to your eye and ultimately your mind. In other words, seeing is in the mind; not in the eyes. Mentally we need to stop focusing on a specific destination, but rather watch during the journey.

All that said.

While the past may be authentic it may not be truthful <or a reflection of truth>. There are certainly some problems with the past ‘truth.’  We are really sure about how we remember the past “… to some extent he is saying all the correct things. But he is not correct.”

 And maybe that is the most important is lesson that lies within.

We say all the correct things … but aren’t really correct. Context and perspective is needed to share “real & absolute truth” and Truth, with regard to the past, is the sum of accurate information; not just some of the accurate information.

Now.

More research.

Just to make everyone feel better, beyond evolution, there is a real reason we do this. It is called ‘adaptive ignorance.’ This is no excuse and this ‘adaptive ignorance’ gets driven by an out of whack barometer of what is important <kind of> to us crazy people, but at least there is a psychological reason:

This adaptive ignorance is there for a reason — we celebrate it as “concentration” and welcome its way of easing our cognitive overload by allowing us to conserve our precious mental resources only for the stimuli of immediate and vital importance, and to dismiss or entirely miss all else.

Attention is an intentional, unapologetic discriminator. It asks what is relevant right now, and gears us up to notice only that. But while this might make us more efficient in our goal-oriented day-to-day, it also makes us inhabit a largely unlived — and unremembered — life, day in and day out.

Not only does Life make ‘seeing’ difficult, our minds do. Our minds adapt more and more <which ultimately constrains seeing> because of a couple of things:

• • productivity <just getting shit done or out of the way or solved>

  • the ways we learn to see the world

All this adaptation <or I imagine we can call it ‘coping’> creates something researchers call ‘search images.’ These are things all of us employ when we need to narrow our attention in a goal-oriented task. Unfortunately, this is only helpful or even possible if we know what to look for.

And that, my friends, is ultimately the point about seeing — and really seeing.

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“… more is missed by not looking than not knowing.”

Thomas McCrae

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We don’t see because we don’t “look.” What a shame. Because by not looking … really looking … we miss seeing some really valuable things, like, what is authentic.

We all need truth goggles. Because we all want to hear what we all want to hear & see what we want to see & remember what we want to remember.

But all truth, even “the past,” takes a discerning mind.

Because what happens when the past says all the correct things, but is not correct? <i.e., you have a misguided view of what is true>

Truth takes work.

Shit.

Seeing things as they truly are takes work.

And that which appears authentic is often not what it appears to be. Just think about this whenever someone seems to be longing for the past. They are partially correct and partially not correct. Be careful with what you believe you see.