The Take Away

I’ve been critical of my own tendency to put technology first. I’m as much of a knuckle dragging gadget grabber as most guys are, but lately I’ve started to take note of the cost this has had on my relationships, my focus and how I manage my time. Obviously, I use my laptop and smartphone to help keep me on task and organized, fine, but there is also this image in my mind, one in which I’m sitting on the shore of an ocean of information, constantly casting out and reeling in a hook load of useless, every day, more useless and more lost time infobating.

Last night after my wife came home after being gone all day long, I was on the computer scanning the seas for another catch of some mud sucking bottom dweller. In an attempt to put her face into my line of focus, gently pulling my laptop off of my lap top, I heard myself say “NO! I’m done yet…!” She went to bed.

The world is already full of enough distractions to lead us out to pasture like grazing cows, I don’t want to awaken to find that my life is over and all I have is a TiVo full unwatched show, and a smart phone that made me stupid. I also don’t want to relationships, particularly with my wife, to become less important than internet cud I’ve been chewing (My metaphors are on fire!).

So, I’ve decided to give up my internet surf board in the evenings, to walk away from it during the weekends, and to start maximizing my time with the people I love and admire, as well as to give myself more time to create, tinker, and reflect.

Before I do that though…I’ve got to check my emails.

I read James Carse interesting little book, “Finite and Infinite Games: A Vision of Life as Play and Possibility”, and was struck by his provocative notion that we are either playing our life as a finite game, where we are committed to winning and there are winners and losers, or we’re playing the infinite game, where it isn’t about winning a game, but about continuing to play. 

The corporate world is, with few exceptions, deeply embedded in the finite world of creating winners and losers.  It is a game where domination and capture is the goal, and “crushing” the competition is the triple home run.  It’s the world of big job titles and corner offices, and pricey status icons that imply winners and losers.

The infinite approach, however, is about focusing energies on building sustainable relationships with our customers and coworkers. In this frame there isn’t the emphasis on job titles and corner office politics, instead it’s focused on ensemble, and recognizing our capacity to keep the game going by creating options and open relationships, and forgoing our quest for conquering.

The Top Performer recognizes that while gags, gimmicks, and tightly written scripts can be useful for entertaining and delighting audiences, it can also force a perspective that minimizes the audiences involvement and interaction. This is a fine model, and it’s what the best theater and many service encounters are built around. But it’s when things go wrong, or another possibility emerges that challenges our direction, or there is a complaint or contrasting opinion, that we might consider using the infinite model. Rather than “solve the problem” or “resolve the issue” we can see problems, diversions and breakdowns as gifts, or “offers”. In this sense, we see the “heckler” in any situation as an expansive offering, an invitation to embrace our mutual creative capacity and innovation.

Many years ago I remember performing for a large group of people at a renaissance festival in Arizona. I was in the midst of interacting with a woman, who had a stroller with a young baby. I had taken her camera and was about to take her picture when a heckler approached the crowd and changed the focus. Rather than play the finite game by closing him down, or letting him defeat my performance, I embraced his offer. I pulled him into my performance, stood him next to this woman and her child, and then assembled a dozen other people to also be in the picture I was going to take. Instead of being a heckler, he became a willing member of the performance, he had fun and played along with the portrait, and as a result of his involvement he made the moment better for all.

You see, we have so many choices available to us in almost any encounter. The finite game is about minimizing others, narrowing the choices, assessing blame, or demonstrating strength. Finite, is about amplification, infinite is resonance and ensemble.

As you go about your day today, think about what game you are playing when you interact with others. Think about the ways in which you seek to bring an end of the game, mostly so you can win. Think about how you might turn that game around, and examine how you to interact in a manner that keeps the game going, that expands the great creative potential, not just in ourselves, but for everyone we meet with, work with, live with and serve. Expansion provides everyone with greater freedom, and allows more offers to be made.

I’m not prone to writing movie reviews, nor am I a cinephile with a great depth of the history of film. I reviewed movies on the radio for a couple of years, and have spent quite a bit of time working on the fringe of the movie business, but have no other qualities that make my opinion special. None the less, with the latest revamp of Titanic, now a 3-D big deal spectacular that will have audiences once again going “oh-ahh” I feel compelled to complain a bit.

There is no question that James Cameron’s Titanic is an epic film. It’s a classic big screen movie with all the requisite details. The production values are dialed up to near perfection, and the acting, though bordering on melodramatic and maudlin, is admirable. And now, in 3-D, we get the thrill of watching that one guy fall, hit his head on a metal railing and spin into the water as the ship sinks in specular depth. You know, THAT guy. This is death as entertainment, a real life nightmare reanimated for our popcorn and soda pop pleasure. Cool!

But the whole effort strains as Cameron indulges his usual dim view of those characters who have aristocratic blood, the wealthy and privileged who are portrayed with a less than even hand. Cameron sneers at those born into money, makes them murderous, greedy, arrogant and (GASP) conservative.  The most redeemed of them is Rose DeWitt Bukater played by Kate Winslet, who falls in love with Leonardo as Jack Dawson, who is man of character, a quality kid who is mostly poor and therefore he’s a good guy.  We like Rose, she’s attractive, she’s fun, non-judgmental, and unlike those other uppity rich bastards, she is willing to get naked for Leo…and that is just so neat.

After the ship plows into the big ice cube and the boat starts to fall apart, we get to witness, now in 3-D, the mayhem, chaos and horrible death screams of the many extras falling in front of a green screen, all the while the rich are shown pushing and shoving their way past them poor folk, to make it to one of the far-too-few life boats, leaving the working stiffs to drown in dramatic and entertaining ways.

Cameron skips any subtly and he’d like us all to believe that most wealthy people, or those born into wealth, will have little or no concern for you, or I or (gasp) Leo. Cameron skips any nuanced narrative that would suggest being privileged had no burdens of its own. But for many, including some of those on board the unsinkable tub, being born into aristocracy was no picnic and was a sort prison on its own. Sure, more of them made it into lifeboats but many wrote about a life of guilt and shame that accompanied their survival.  But in Cameron’s view, being wealthy is a moral corruption and a weakness.

Like Avatar, Titanic is a beautiful spectacle of a movie, its stunning visuals and musical score make it difficult to resist. But at its core, Titanic is a twisted and cynical view of humankind. In it, the corporate, the successful and the well-to-do are corrupt and we should be suspicious of them all, because in times of trouble they’ll certainly step over our bodies and let us fall into the frozen abyss, they’ll find a way to profit from our demise, and of course they’ll ignore the screaming of underpaid stunt doubles about to be dashed against some CGI smoke stacks in horrific, gut wrenching 3-D…more popcorn, please.

It’ll be another sunny weekend here in the midwest, so rather than put myself through the horrors of having to watch that one guy hit his head, and another Cameron commentary on the evils of wealth, I’ll take a walk through a neighborhood full of very successful, moderately wealthy people who will be mowing their lawns, walking their dogs and enjoying their lives, just like me.

At what point in history did we endow “Yes!” with such value while considering the lowly “no” with such trepidation?  It was Viola Spolin, the legendary goddess of improvisation theater who coined the term “Yes and…” some 40 years ago as a methodology for creating and building “scenes” in improvised theater performances. While there is value in learning to “let go” and suspend judgement, there is something naive and even counterproductive in being so prejudiced against the “no”.  No is necessary.

Judgement is important, obviously, and if we’re thinking through our approach to anything, we cultivate judgement, we engage in thinking that builds a kind of personal trust in our own ability to decide what is a yes, and what is a no, thank you.

It’s time to tell the purveyors of “YES!” to sit down and take a number, let us think about it, so we can use our own judgement to decide whether or not that “Yes!” is worthy of our confidence.

In the Take Away, we talk about how important it is to create a personal “white space”, one focused on “connection over collection”, and recognize our tendency to say “Yes!” to everything the corporate juggernaut dispatches in our direction. 

Try this..

More Connection. Less Collection.  Connecting with others is where the energy is, so raise the bar of useless effluvium and just say “no” to nonsense that we tend to collect.

Write down a list of those things you are inclined to say no to. When things come to you that don’t lead in the direction of energy and engagement, you can check in and check off the crap you don’t need.

Maintain skepticism. When someone is promoting “Yes and” outside of brainstorming and improvisational theater exercises, there is often a reason they want you to suspend your judgement. Make your yeses matter.

Be proud of no. While it has fallen out of fashion in certain parts of the corporate and personal landscape, it’s a valued component in our arsenal of critical thinking tools.

I don’t watch much television, and certainly ignore nearly any network news program. I don’t believe news directors have bad intentions, they need to deliver ratings, and in order to do that they have to polish up the poop to have the scoop. Still, my monkey brain feeds on the salacious and tawdry bananas that the mainstream broadcast media peels and throws at us. I can’t watch it now, I can’t hear myself thinking with so many people screaming at one another.

This ugly business of Travyon Martin, a tragedy from every angle it seems to me, and doubtful any of the shouting, tweeting and protesting, hand wringing and wailing will lead us to reconcile the events of that night, or give any of us a perfect glimpse into what happened in the shadows, what lead to the death of a good kid who had his whole life still in front of him, what happened to a family man who is now exiled to the gallows without his day in court?

The shouting, threats and cheap histrionics of the hysterical once again heave our national discourse further into the roiling seas of discontent.  It seems we’ve become a nation deaf to our own voice, the soto vocce of reasoned debate and dialogue is lost in the fortissimo of an indignant chorus.

I believed we all wanted a world that is safe, where we’re free to create, emboldened to build and launch our ideas into the clear blue and to live without fear of being shot or accused without due process. But the madness of crowds can keep us stupid and deaf, turning nuance into nonsense, and here we are, again…

Shouting.

Indignant.

Angry…and still deaf.

The world continues its accelerated descent into the abyss of chaos and unrest, the Arab countries are burning with riots, Christchurch, New Zealand is in ruins, gas prices are inching towards $5 a gallon, inflation is on the rise, unions are getting the boot, unemployment remains high and mighty,the economy is still emaciated and Bieber cut his damned hair..oh my.

Things are horrible, people are miserable, the world is coming undone, and no one seems to have a real answer for any of it. But, not surprising, the world of smile merchants and happy dancers is alive and well and ready to paste a patsy smile on your face. If that doesn’t work, we can meditate, chant, take drugs, drink and get our chakras open and flowing. If all of that fails, we can spend hours on our knees praying and pleading to whatever deity is listening and hope, of course, that our prayers will receive a response.

At the risk of sounding cynical, I don’t think much of these pop culture responses to the world’s messy breakup.In face, I don’t think the world is breaking up anyway, and for most of the world things are not all bad, or they’re not all bad all of the time.  It’s not that I don’t want to smile or enjoy my life, or that I’m not worried about the general well being of the world around me, but the denial of complexity and the chosen bliss of ignorance doesn’t really help with well being at all. Certainly everyone has their own way to respond to crisis and change, but are we truly better off dancing about with smiles on our faces, thinking happy thoughts while the world rumbles under our feet, then we are if we embrace these complexities as an opportunity to connect, as a chance to reach out.

I believe in joy. I believe in being happy. I advocate for the energy that erupts when two or more people share a common connection, idea or goal. But I also have learned that true joy is more elusive when I cover my dark thoughts with gooey sweetness and artificial mumbo. When I accept that life in this nutty world is unstable and chaotic, that darkness and melancholy, failure and misfortune are a seemingly necessary counterbalance to the joy, then I feel grounded to the trembling earth I’m walking on, and happy to do so.

I say embrace joy, embrace a fecund happiness when possible, but accept that no amount of happy thinking or choosing ones attitude can relieve you of the burdens and foibles of being a human being. In fact, connecting and being with others, and giving ourselves over to frienship and companionship might just be the answer to regaining our energy and sense of well being. I might be feeling down today, and worried about the future tomorrow, but I can navigate towards friends who believe in me, engage with those who are vital and circumspect about the slings and arrows flying around me, and I start  to feel better about the moment I’m in. After all, being sad can sometimes be an invitation to be with others even as we’re bumming.

If you’d tried the happy dance and you don’t have any more room on your “vision board” for pictures of happily ever, try calling a friend to talk, take a walk through a mall where others are engaged in ordinary activities, get together with somone you’d like to know and have a conversation. You don’t need to swallow happy pills, or post smile face bumper stickers across your frown; just hang with it, feel it, write about it, share it, walk with it, let it reveal something in yourself, turn to it, get inside it…and then…if you run out of things to do, just sit, calm down and make yourself a nice, hot, cup of tea. All will be well again, I know.

Hmmmm…that sounds good.

I’ve been around this leadership and management business one too many years. I’ve always felt that the reason I’ve managed to do so well in this line of work, is because I don’t know what I don’t know. That used to be true, but I’m autodidactic, and I’ve been reading literature on leadership, engagement, management and culture for the past 12 years and now I really know that I don’t know!

There is an idea that leadership folks should hold their people accountable. Enlightened thinkers will add that “…leaders must first hold themselves accountable.”  This is true, I guess, but does it really motivate and inspire anyone to action?  Are there leaders thinking to themselves “I must hold myself accountable, first and foremost.” I diverge from the enlightened set at this point, because for the most part, the whole notion of holding anyone accountable is rather a dead end. We know what it means, but it doesn’t embolden anyone to be more responsible for their word. It’s just accountant speak applied to the rest of us.

It all seems so bloody simple because you either do, or you don’t do. Any questions?

“Accountability” is old management speak, a derivation from bean counters and spreadsheets. We can make a commitment and then do or don’t, and suffer or enjoy the outcome of our work. People understand that language, we all know what it means to do or don’t do, and how it feels to commit to something get it done, or to drop the ball. 

Anytime we want to use the language of leadership and accountability, we can pause and ask ourselves if there is a way of talking that doesn’t involve the often unnatural lexicon of management speak. What can we take away from how we are talking that leaves more connection, clarity and purpose?  Rather than talk about accountability, let’s talk about our promises made and kept, let’s talk about do or not do, done or didn’t do.

We all want to be real, to be heard, to make a difference and to have good lives and to do good work. Language matters in describing and transcribing who we are, what we want, and where we want to go. When we have a choice, we can use language that means something to us, we can embrace words the put us into the adventure of our commitments, words that flower and bloom in our imaginations and reminds us that we’re three dimensional, dynamic, and vibrant human beings. Any language that makes us smaller and more “manageable” simply isn’t big enough for any of us to use.

One of the challenges of writing, at least it is for me, is keeping track of the ideas and inspirations that appear in the course of the day. The moment I actually begin putting something together on a page, I have to calibrate my awareness, and I start to notice more in the landscape around me, I hear things in conversations I didn’t before. I often find the best new thinking when I’m stumbling around in the ordinary. New ideas. New thinking. Listen. Capture.

To advance my creative capabilities of writing, I’ve made a more serious commitment to photography. As part of my practice, though not always as consistent as I’d like, I make it a ritual to grab my camera (Canon EOS Mark 5D II) nearly every day, and drive about looking for something interesting to shoot, some kind of subject. There are days when I can drive, and drive, and it doesn’t seem like there is anything inspiring or interesting, where everything looks flat and lifeless and having a camera seems pointless. But there are other moments where everything I see seems to be auditioning for my eye. In either case, the difference isn’t really the landscape, rather it is how I see the landscape.

Inspiration has much to do with how we feel about who we are, about the possibilities we have in life, our sense of control over some things and our general well being. Misery can inspire us to create works that share the narrative of our pain, but pain and misery are overrated as source material. Instead, part of manifesting creative expressions is to configure our lives towards the good, to turn towards those who believe in us, or who somehow call us out and believe in our work.  When I feel a level of good cheer, deeply reflective or feeling a sense of connection with the world in a meaning-filled way, I notice that inspiration is something I bring with me, and that when I do the world seems more willing to reveal, and beauty becomes more apparent.

So look, look well, and listen. We don’t need the world to give us anything, and we don’t need more stuff to take away. Instead, look at what you bring to the picture, look at what you add to the scene, listen to your voice in the chorus of the living landscape, and perhaps you’ll begin to see new shapes in the world around you, perhaps you will see that what you bring makes all the difference in what you might find.