The math is compelling. You’re going to lose most of the competitions you enter. […] Which means that you’re going to be seen and measured by how you lose, not how you win. The way to win is usually to fit in all the way, to give the judges precisely what they want, to train just like everyone else, but harder. But the way to lose with style is to create possibility. To be creative. To do generous work that’s worth talking about.*
(Seth Godin

There are two kinds of competition. One makes the world smaller for most of us, the other makes the world bigger for everyone. One works with limitation, the other with infinity.

I latched on to some words relating to competition in what I was reading this morning, this because of a larger conversation I’m involved in that is exploring the place of compassion in institutions such as government, businesses and universities. There’s no getting away from the cultures of competition in any of these.

I find myself playing with ideas as I seek to understand the significance of competition for humans.

The outcome of competition is a title, a trophy, funding, notoriety – that is, property:

What is at stake here for owners is not the amount of property as such, but its ability to draw an audience for whom it will be appropriately emblematic; that is, an audience who will see it as just compensation for the effort and skill used in acquiring it.**

One kind of competition appears to take place within a finite game (a set number of players, a deadline and play by the rules), the other within an infinite game (everyone one welcome to play for as long as possible and if the rules threaten to exclude or end the game, the rules are changed) – one is a world of scarcity, the other a universe of possibility.

Seth Godin’s opening words consider the paradox for those who win actually narrow their possibilities, while those who lose with style increase theirs.

I’m not saying it always works this way, but it’s worth taking a closer look.

These words from Richard Rohr also caught my attention. You don’t need to be religious to appreciate what he’s saying:

I would name salvation as simply the readiness, the capacity, and the willingness to stay in relationship.^

(*From Seth Godin’s blog: Losing with style.)
(**From James Carse’s Finite and Infinite Games.)
(^From Richard Rohr’s The Divine Dance.)

At first glance nothing seems to be more contradictory than the tendencies of these two impulses, the one striving for change, and the other for immutability.*
(Friedrich Schiller)

Our conversations invent us. Through our speech and our silence, we become smaller or larger selves. Through our speech and our silence, we diminish or enhance the other person, and we narrow or expand the possibilities between us.**
(Harriet Lerner)

If we have something to offer, the temptation is to shout louder, to get more glitzy, to gain more attention, but I know that what I do is not for everyone.

Before I seek the attention of others, Seth Godin reminds me to:

Do the emotional work of working on things that others fear.^

Where are you prepared to go and others will not?

When I think about my work, I try hard not to make it a programme or course or process. I call it a journey of conversations for a reason. It’s about living with the risk of not knowing where the next question or idea will come from and yet things happen in the conversation. More story than answers because a quick answer or simple solution will prevent us searching for something more significant – and life seems to be set up for deep significance:

Following your bliss just seems to me to be the clue to believing what might be called the mythologically inspired life.^^

When we’re doing what we must do, it won’t be for everyone. (I know, if I go after everyone, I’ll have to create that course and lose the conversation.)

Here are two thoughts on this I came across this morning. Instead of trying to get everyone’s attention, Seth Godin proffers:

most of us are better off serving the smallest viable audience;*^

and Bernadette Jiwa reflects on why a non-glitzy vegan taco restaurant in her city outlives many that come and go:

it comes down to the fact they know who they’re for.^*

This thing I do – who is it for?

Friedrich Schiller’s opening words help me identify my “audience.” In speaking of the change impulse, it seems to me he is identifying with Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s exploring instruction and Christian Schwarz’s dynamic pole. His immutable impulse then accords with Csikszentmihalyi’s conservative instruction and Schwarz’s static pole. All three agree that both are needed for someone to develop their deepest potential.

Schiller ponders the outcomes of firstly giving the powers of the immutable to the change impulse and then transferring power in the other direction:

In the first case he never becomes he himself; in the second he never becomes something other; and so in each case he is neither the one nor the other, and consequently a nonentity.*

My audience, then, comprises those who know there’s something missing in the vital relationship between their being and becoming. They probably don’t use these words but do know there is more to who they are and what they can do, at least, they hope there is. So we work with the questions Who am I? and What is my contribution?

And the best place for this to happen is in the journey of conversations.

(*From Friedrich Schiller’s On the Aesthetic Education of Man.)
(**From Harriet Lerner’s The Dance of Connection.)
(^From Seth Godin’s Whatcha Gonna Do With That Duck?)
(^^From Joseph Campbell’s The Hero’s Journey.)
(*^From Seth Godin’s blog: Attention vs. the chasm.)
(^*From Bernadette Jiwa’s The Story of Telling blog: Exactly Who Do You Serve?)

We become what we measure. We are who we take with us on the journey and who we leave behind.*
(Bernadette Jiwa)

Eternally shackled to one small fragment of the whole, man imagined himself to be a fragment, in his ear the constant and monotonous noise of the wheel that he turned; never capable of developing the harmony of his being, and instead of, asking the humanity in his nature, he simply became the impress of his occupation, his particular knowledge.**
(Friedrich Schiller)

Just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it isn’t there but it does mean that we won’t be able to measure it.

I’m talking about your talents and abilities that make both function and beauty possible.

In the industrial workplace, we tend not to measure what we cannot see, but in noticing and articulating what lies within every human being – though different in each of us – we identify ways of measuring the success of our lives in a non-industrial way.

(*From Bernadette Jiwa’s The Story of Telling blog: Immeasurable Success.)
(**From Friedrich Schiller’s On the Aesthetic Education of Man.)

What is it we are questing for? It is the fulfilment of that which is potential in each of us. Questing for it is not an ego trip; it is an adventure to bring into fulfilment your gift to the world, which is yourself.*
(Joseph Campbell)

Everybody needs to stand for something. Something that matters. That’s what real leadership means. Not a rank, not a job title, not a diploma.  But a decision inside us.**
(Hugh Macleod)

There are as many different kinds of leaders as there are people. When we lead ourselves well then we’ll make a difference when we get to lead something or someone beyond the self.

(*From Joseph Campbell’s The Hero’s Journey.)
(**From gapingvoid’s blog: What does real leadership mean?)

Compassion salon?
Where imagination and … ?
Reality meet.
(Haiku)

My post Marketing compassion is a first reflection following Edinburgh’s first Compassion Salon – the heart-child of Marti Balaam, Fellow in Medical Teaching at the University of Edinburgh.

Two things captured my attention: the power of co-created compassionate spaces setting our imaginations free.

A salon may refer to both a meeting space and the people inhabiting a space, e.g., writers or painters. Both feel right when describing the salon’s co-created space, first of all carefully prepared by Marti and Steel Coulson Tap owner Glen Dawkins to welcome and evoke a positive response from us, in turn providing a listening space for Mary Gunn to tell her story about twice facing cancer and being rescued by compassion,** who, together with her interview host Harriet Harris, then drew us into the space of her story.

Mary shared how, on the return of her cancer, she met with Choje Lama Yeshe Losal Rinpoche. His response to Mary’s fear at her cancer’s return at first sight appears uncompassionate, as he told her about his encounter with western desserts and the diabetes that followed: “Body falling apart,” he said, “bad time to identify with body.”

To tame ourselves is the only way
we can change and improve the world.*
(Choje Lama Yeshe Losal Rinpoche)

Mary understood Lama Yeshe was providing her with a different way of looking at her life, one that made it possible to live in the world as it is, to be her true, most honest self, and she reflected “the fear went and the laughter came.” It felt as though they had created a space together for compassion to be present, reminding me of how imagination can be one of the first casualties of fear.

It put me in mind of the poet Wallace Stevens’ reflections on the relationship between the pressure of reality and the power of imagination. Writing not long after the conclusion of the Second World War, Stevens is only too aware of the pressure of reality on societies around the globe and sees the need for this to be met with imagination. Imagination does not hide reality, nor does reality overpower imagination, but in their interaction a new reality is created.^

The salon was inviting me to be open in mind to the other, in heart to the other and in action to the other.

These three basic attitudes of compassion exist in each of us and it is in the individual that we find the first space for compassion and imagination to be held and to be given.

May I invite you to the next salon on the 4th February.

(*”The purpose of this literary salon/speakeasy is to create a community around new and established authors and poets whose work relates to compassion and wellbeing. The intention is that it will be a place for people to connect, inspire and support using books and prose as a means through which to consider the various aspects of human existence in an increasingly fragmented and challenging global community. This is a compassionate initiative to facilitate and strengthen community and belonging. The salon I hope will celebrate, inspire and cultivate creativity, innovation, self-compassion and individual and societal wellness.” (Marti Balaam)
(**See Mary Gunn’s Well.)
(^See Wallace Stevens’ The Necessary Angel.)

These days the social system and the social ideals and also the physical environment is changing so fast that there is no opportunity for a constellation, for a crystalisation, to develop.*
(Joseph Campbell)

I’ve mentioned before Joseph Campbell’s thinking about how the speed of modern life is making it difficult to create our myths for today – the main two being a personal and a social myth.

We need some tools.

These are Alex McManus‘ future protocols with some colouring in from me. They help us to slow down because we can’t create our stories and make our contributions in a hurry.

Reflection: to slow down and notice more;
Apprehension to become one to the possible;
Imagination to begin playing with possibility;
Synchronisation to make the possibility personal to us and allow it to change us;
Design to begin making the future tangible, including prototypes;
Creation to bring the future into being.

(*From Joseph Campbell’s The Hero’s Journey.)

All work, and all life exist within an imperfect space. […] So – you get to where you can, as best you can, with less than you need. […] Too much choice makes you lazy. Too many options freeze the brain. […] Imperfect is a superpower if you know how to use it.*
(David Wolstencroft)

Perhaps you’re waiting until you have enough of something before you begin. Enough time, enough talent, enough permission, enough resources.

There’ll never be enough for perfect, but you already have enough to begin. Then the magic happens.

Identify your talents and begin.

(*David Wolstencroft, from gapingvoid’s Imperfect is a superpower.)

The intrinsic self is not a genetically programmed entity that simply unfolds with time. […] It is instead a set of potentials, interests, capabilities that interact with the world, each affecting the other.*
(Edward Deci)

When you grow up and have children of your own do please remember something important: a stodgy parent is no fun at all. What a child wants and desires is a parent who is SPARKY.**
(Roald Dahl)

Yesterday, Christine and I became grandparents with the birth of our grandson Archie. So I particularly noticed the opening two quotes from past journaling this morning.

The first reminds me that we are not a zip file to be opened, we are Human Becomings capable of growing through our interactions with our environments and changing those environments through our preferred superpowers.

The second is Roald Dahl’s wonderful way of saying it (I waited until I was 58 years old before reading Danny the Champion of the World – you don’t have to): live a SPARKY life. I’m trying to be a sparkier parent; now I get the chance to be a sparky grandparent.

I offer a simple blessing for Archie:

May you discover the millions
Of years of memories within you,
Making your new life possible,
Filling you with awe and wonder.

And may you be awake to
Your curiosity, becoming an explorer,
Your passion, becoming a lover,
Your goodness, becoming one who gives.

(*From Edward Deci’s Why We Do What We Do.)
(**From Roald Dahl’s Danny the Champion of the World.)

The self is always under construction.*
(Harriet Lerner)

Define the problem, not the solution.**
(Peter Diamandis and Steve Kotler)

There’s a gap between who you are and who you can be. You often sense this. This is to be human; you cannot undo it:

And the mythological images always pointing toward transcendence and giving you the sense of riding on this mystery.^

We want to fill the gap but often do some more off-the-shelf solution, covering up the problem for a while, but eventually the gap reappears.

Edgar Schein, in considering his work with different organisations, adds detail to why we need to first define the problem:

I had to develop two kinds of empathy. Empathy One is to listen for and be curious about the actual situation or problem that the client is describing. Empathy Two is to listen for and be curious about what is really bothering the speaker as she is explaining the problem or situation.^^

This is also true for the individual. What we think is the issue is not necessarily the prime one:

The protagonist looks for every comfortable way to solve the problem. By the climax, he learns what it’s really going to take to solve the problem.*^

There will always be this gap in your life.

You need to know this, but it is good news. As you get to grips with the problems of being you, then finding the best rather than the handiest solutions, you will find the horizon has also shifted because who you can be is not fixed unless you choose it to be. We are, as Joseph Campbell reminds us, ‘riding on this mystery.’

I was going to write about six protocols for moving towards your future, but that would not be recognising what Schein, Diamandis and Kotler say: problem first.

(*From Harriet Lerner’s The Dance of Connection.)
(**From Peter Diamandis and Steven Kotler’s Bold.)
(^From Joseph Campbell’s The Hero’s Journey.)
(^^From Edgar Schein’s Humble Consulting.)
(*^From Brené Brown’s Rising Strong.)

[Karlfried Graf Durkheim] said the whole problem of life is to become “transparent to transcendence”: so that you realise that you are yourself a manifestation of this. That you live the myth. That you live the divine life within you. Yourself as a vehicle; not as a final term but as a vehicle of consciousness and life.*
(Joseph Campbell)

The sucker’s trap is when you focus on what you know and others don’t, rather than the reverse.**
(Nassim Taleb)

We might think of qualities such as compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, patience, forgiveness, love and peace as being the destination, but what if they are first of all the means of our seeking, our exploring?

Are they our best means to becoming “transparent?”

Then it is not about us.

Transparency will always allow others to see their “unexpected possibility” through us.

(*From Joseph Campbell’s The Hero’s Journey.)
(**From Nassim Taleb’s The Bed of Procrustes.)