What if, when you move into a new city or town, it inclined itself towards you, making all you require to thrive?

This really would be a city that listens.

It isn’t the bricks and concrete of the city, of course, but the people of a city that make themselves available as deep listeners and co-conspirators for creating the future.

‘Group membership makes people feel closer and brings a significant boost in personal confidence and happiness.’*

‘Robotic companionship may seem a sweet deal, but it consigns us to a closed world – the loveable as safe and made to measure.’**

When we retreat into our own worlds, when we guard our borders, we can’t fully know others and we cannot know ourselves^ – the city does not lean toward us.

Yesterday, I was reflecting on the experience of co-creating a space of possibility, a city that listens, in which everyone who enters is able to flourish.  When we know our Self and we meet with others, things get interesting.^^

‘That, right there, is a beautiful question for the ages: what do you want to say?  Why does it need to be said?  What if you could say it in a way that has never before been done?  How might you do that?’*^

(*From Gretchen Rubin’s The Happiness Project.`)
(**From Sherry Turkle’s Alone Together.  Looking ahead at the content of her book, Turkle remarks, ‘Later, we will hear teenagers talk about their dread of conversation as they explain why “texting is always better than talking.”  Some comment that “sometime, but not now,” it would be good to learn how to have a conversation.’)
(^Neither our present self or future Self.)
(^^Get in touch if you want to find out more about creating spaces of possibility.)
(*^From Warren Berger’s A More Beautiful Question.)

“All artists are willing to suffer for their work.  But why are so few prepared to learn to draw?”*

‘Skill development depends on how repetition is organised.  As skill expands , the capacity to sustain repetition increases.’**

We are born seekers.

As we grow older, though, we tend to seek less and less.  Maybe it’s because we’ve already found what we’re seeking.  Maybe it’s because we’ve been disappointed by not finding what we seek, and we’ve settled on Plan B.  Maybe Plan A is just too demanding.

It’s really important to remember that every human is capable of loving some creativity as though its the best thing in the world – this is our art.  Yet after the exciting idea, there’s all the learning and routine and slog to go through.

Richard Sennett points out how skill can expand exponentially in open-ended practices, but not if the end pint is fixed.  Then the affect is to stop people seeking.  The industrial revolution did this, by taking many hand skills away from people; the smart revolution looks set set to take over people’s mental skills – when a machine can produce something faster, the repetition of skills is taken over.

This isn’t about demonising technology, but to use it smarter.  I also read these two views today, and they’re more hopeful.

Chris Anderson reminds us we are all makers, and many will be able to step outside of the more traditional business places to invent, innovate, and make their art.

The other view comes from Roz and Ben Zander, who write about ‘restructuring meanings, creating visions, and establishing environments where possibility is spoken – where the buoyant force of possibility overcomes the pull of the downward spiral.’^

I’ve just been co-designing such a space with others this morning – somewhere for people to become seekers once again, the opportunity to reconnect their hands and minds to their work.

Seeking is never ending – seeking stimulates more seeking:

‘How do we continually find inspiration, so that we can inspire others?’^^

The future will increasingly find us “building” spaces that are living questions for those who enter them.

(*Banksy, quoted in Chris Guillebeau’s The Happiness of Pursuit.)
(**From Richard Sennett’s The Craftsman.)
(^From Rosamund and Benjamin Zander’s The Art of Possibility.)
(^^From Warren Berger’s A More Beautiful Question.)
(Check this on work from Hugh Macleod.)

‘When you are being the board, you present no obstacles to others.’*

We don’t tend to pay much attention to the board the game is played on.  And who notices the foundations of a building, yet both are critical to what takes place upon them.

On the other hand, we find it hard to be in the background.

We all want to be noticed somehow, whether it be on a stage, a mention in the acknowledgements for a piece of work, or a text from someone in the family (my mum once sent me a cross-stitch picture with the words, “Phone your mother – she cares!”).

One of the dynamic pieces of personal work for anyone in our age is to figure out how to turn our passion into something that can be foundational for others.

Pioneers wanted:

‘Do the emotional labour of working on things that others fear.’**

‘People who are good at questioning are comfortable with uncertainty.’^

This is deeper human work.  It’s about living in the high energy and skills of our passion and making a difference for others.  It’s not worrying about someone else providing the board or foundations are stage because we are the foundations.

Which brings us to the moment.

The moment when we make the switch:

“[B]reaking your programming requires a single moment of strength.”^^

(*From Rosamund and Benjamin Zander’s The Art of Possibility.)
(**From Seth Godin’s Whatcha Gonna Do With That Duck?)
(^From Warren Berger’s A More Beautiful Question.)
(^^Julien Smith, quoted in Chris Guillebeau’s The Happiness of Pursuit.)

I love ingenuity, how it makes adventures of possibility available to everyone.

Now, right where we are, we can identify an adventure.

It doesn’t matter that we’re not somewhere else, that our education is what it is, that we own various have limitations and responsibilities.  We can innovate for ourselves and for each other.

The adventure or quest, Chris Guillebeau suggests, has the following marks which set it apart from a project: there’s a clear goal, it’s measurable, it has a sense of calling to it, and it involves great effort.*

At the end of 2013, I had an idea to blog every day in 2014 because I was already journalling every day – a 365 day adventure.  To add more of a challenge, and being inspired by Hugh Macleod, I decided to post only if I could add a doodle – the challenge being, I’d never doodled before.  With this, a project turned into a quest.  I bought the same pen as Hugh Macleod – a 0.2 drawing pen – and began to doodle on the back of business cards, as he had done.**

What is your “right where I am” adventure?

This is the practising part I engage in everyday.

I’m so glad that I didn’t stop on the 31st December 2014, though.  When I set out, I’d no idea where it would lead to, which is the unpredictability part of this.  There’s a randomness to where doodling has taken me.  Which means there are other things that haven’t happened, but I’m oblivious too.

I’ve mentioned that Malcolm Gladwell identified how 10,000 hours of deep practice develops remarkable skills in the world of measurement.  Practising unpredictability, however, is about exploring how hours of questioning and openness can lead to remarkable skills in the universe of possibility.

I realise now, answers haven’t led me here – questions have.  Questions and openness have allowed life to become what it is, which, to connect this with my opening thoughts, is a lot more than we often think.

Questions are like a long lever to pry open what remains closed to short answers.

‘In most situations, the rules of the game change all the time.’^

Each of us has an adventure waiting to be started:

‘Obsessively specialise.  No niche is too small if it’s yours.’^^

(*See Chris Guillebeau’s The Happiness of Pursuit.)
(**Enjoy Hugh Macleod’s Ignore Everybody.)
(^From Frans Johansson’s The Click Moment.)
(^^From Seth Godin’s Whatcha Gonna Do With That Duck?)

‘[Y]ou define yourself not as a piece, nor as the strategist, but as the board itself, the framework for the game of life around you.’*

Beyond reacting, beyond even responding, we’re able to have a perspective on life which opens up the possibility of initiating.  This is the infinite game** – a game we play for others.

The infinite game includes as many players for as long as possible and if these dynamics are threatened then the rules are changed.  The infinite game player is content to dissolve into the background, knowing the infinite game makes it possible to do everything they love, making the game more open and inclusive.

The infinite player knows that in any game there’re multiple games being played.  Peter Senge talks about how in any system there’s more than one loop at play.  Most will see the reinforcing loop – the thing the business is about, but will fail to see the balancing loop – where the real problems are to be found, and also where the unseen or undervalued rules are found.^

Imagine these thoughts for the individual:

‘Before you can disrupt your product you have to disrupt your process.’^^

‘This is the essence of intuitive heuristics: when faced with a difficult question, we often answer an easier one instead, usually without noticing the substitution.’*^

‘Finding the time and the space to question, in a cultural landscape that doesn’t encourage it, is challenging.’^*

A synopsis of these might be: we need to look behind the scenes of our lives at our values, curiosities, talents, experiences, and passions; but we have a tendency to focus on the things we’re doing on the surface and resist going deeper; and, this is often reinforced by a culture that doesn’t value deep reflection, often being sceptical or reasoning that it’s too busy.

Malcolm Gladwell highlighted the critical element of 10,000 hours of deep practice for living a remarkable life.***  However, when we look closer what we see is how these 10,000 hours of practice are in relation to the obvious rules – Frans Johansson points out that the more rule-bound the game the more visible the benefits of the 10,000 hours are.^^^

When we’re prepared to focus on the balancing loop of our lives, we begin to see the invisible rules, that is, the interplay of deep practice around the things which make us essentially who we are – and the universe of possibility which emerges.

“I must listen to my life telling me who I am.”**^^

(*From Rosamund and Benjamin Zander’s The Art of Possibility.)
(**See James case’s Finite and Infinite Games.)
(^See Peter Senge’s The Necessary Revolution.)
(^^From James McQuivey’s Digital Disruption.)
(*^From Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast and Slow.)
(^*From Warren Berger’s A More Beautiful Question.)
(***See Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers.)
(^^^See Frans Johansson’s The Click Moment.)
(**^^Parker Palmer, quoted in Henri Nouwen’s Discernment.)

“It’s important to think about that time and place and activity where you shine, where you feel most alive.”*

Glory is such a short word for something so full of magnificence and beauty.

It was a year ago when I first reflected on the quote, above.  It reminded me of what I love to do.  One year later, I find them to be more true one year later – the point they are making.  We must focus on the things we most love to do.

I juxtapose this idea from Roz and Ben Zander:

‘Gracing yourself responsibility that happens in your life leaves your spirit whole, and leaves you free to choose again.’**

I found myself thinking back to a moment when I decided to blame no-one and no thing for being close to burning out; instead, I took responsibility for what I had and hadn’t done.  It turned out to be the beginning of an incredible journey which continues today, which finds me journeying from the general to the specific, and sometimes the only word to describe this is glory.^

‘Obsessively socialise.  No niche is too small if it’s yours.’^^

(*Jacqueline Novogratz, quoted by Warren Berger’s A More Beautiful Question.)
(**From Rosamund and Benjamin Zander’s The Art of Possibility.)
(^Scott Peck uses the word glory when describing the fourth stage of community,I his book The Different Drum.)
(^^From Seth Godin’s Whatcha Gonna Do With That Duck?)

‘Finding the time and the space to question, in a cultural landscape that doesn’t encourage it, is challenging.’*

“So many people live within unhappy circumstances and yet will not take the initiative to change their situation because they are conditioned to a life of security, conformity, and conservatism, all of which may appear to give one peace of mind, but in reality nothing is more dangerous to the adventurous spirit within a man than a secure future.  The very core of a man’s living spirit is his passion for adventure.”**

A year ago, I’d found myself pondering something I called concentredness, describing a state of being where our lives are most centred and connected – being joined up at the centre, rather than the edges.

Concentredness is about everything we are and have and our day-to-day practices and expressions all lining up.  It’s about per connectedness (with others, our world, our spirituality, and our Self) and our enoughness and our perseverance all lining up.  And it’s about what we do at our most selfless and our generosity and the way we live what we know all lining up.

All of these elements combine into what we MUST do with our lives.

Must is always risky, but we can mitigate the risk; what we don’t get is get a second life to live out our dream.

‘Gifts are the essence of art.  Art isn’t made as part of an even exchange, it is your chance to create imbalance, which leads to connection.’^

“Go, my child, find your way, make mistakes, learn, suffer, grow, and become whom you need to be.  Don’t be afraid.  You are free and I am always near.”^^

(*From Warren Berger’s A More Beautiful Question.)
(**Chris McCandless, quote in Chris Guillebeau’s The Happiness of Pursuit.  McCandless died in his attempt to live off the land in Alaska; it turned out to be a mistake – potato seeds, which normally would have been okay to eat, were toxic to his emaciated body.)
(^From Seth Godin’s V is for Vulnerable.)
(^^From Henri Nouwen’s Discernment.)

“We are small creatures.
Our lives are not long, but long
enough to learn.”*

“He made me realise that
Education was so important
to everyone, not just the
Intelligent, it’s as simple as that!”**

Creativity is for everyone.

Some hold that only some are creative, that it’s a nonsense to say everyone is, but people can be innovative in ways these people can’t begin to imagine.

Everyone deserves opportunities to imagine and bring something beautiful into the world.  Some discover this early on in life, others later (I count myself amongst the latter), but it would be the most terrible thing to leave this world without making an attempt.

This is about asking what creativity lies at the centre of our lives (ways of thinking, relating, and behaving/acting), the thing which makes us feel at one with the universe, and, if we have one, our god.

It’s from this place that we ask our best questions.  It’s as though questions, the kind of questions which lead us out from our creativity into more – a journey of open and difficult questions, with every one of us asking something different.

The saddest question in the world, then, would be, “What could have been if I’d taken that path?

(*Stephen Lawhead, quoted in the Northumbria Community‘s Morning Prayer for 30/4/16.)
(**From student Karl Kripps’s poem following Ben Zander’s visit to Kripps’s London school, quoted in Rosamund and Benjamin Zander’s The Art of Possibility.)

I love this.  A troubadour wrote and performed their own songs.

You are a troubadour – you must compose and perform your song.  I want to heart it.

Relying on others to write your song, or only singing a “cover version” of someone else’s song, is akin to what Martin Seligman has termed “learned helplessness.”  We all have a song:

‘Could the psychological state of mastery – the opposite of helplessness – somehow reach inside and strengthen the body?’

“I have no song,” or, “I cannot sing.” is not good for our health and wellbeing.

The following line caught my attention because of my one-with-one dreamwhispering work with people:

“Certain things in life are better done in person.”**

This line is Ben Zander’s father’s response to Ben’s question about why he took a train from London to Glasgow (and back, in a day) to speak to someone, rather than speaking on the phone.

There’s nothing like face to face.  And face to face – which is about our future – is a wonderful thing when we turn up with our original and authentic song.

The universe has produced troubadours and they will sing in the future.

(*From Martin Seligman’s Flourish.)
(**Walter Zander, quoted in Rosamund and Benjamin Zander’s The Art of Possibility.)

“We all have but a short time on this earth.  As slow as time can be it is also fast, swift, furious and might, and then it’s over.”*

“If I were to wish for anything I should not wish for wealth and power, but for the passionate sense of what can be, for the eye, which, ever young and ardent, see the possible.”**

We can live out our days, or …

We can live out our days with passion.

Pursuing the thing we feel MUST do with out lives is easier than we think, and that’s the scary thing about it.

In Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Alice is intrigued to see a talking and clothed white rabbit, and follows him down a rabbit hole.  She suspends her disbelief in order to follow what she is seeing.  She doesn’t know how deep the rabbit hole is but once inside there’s no going back.  Lewis Carroll must have written this story just for us.

Living with passion is about noticing our curiosity and pursuing it.  At first this will mean we have to suspend our belief and disbelief to find ourselves “falling slowly” enabling us to notice more and more about what is all around us.  We’re falling and full of questions, and we have just begun.

Alice’s curiosity focused on a white rabbit.  My curiosity focuses on the potential people have to live amazing stories.  What’s yours?

We can live out our days, or we can choose the second way.

(*Photographer Thomas Hawk, quoted in Chris Guillebeau’s The Happiness of Pursuit.)
(**Soren Kierkegaard, quoted in Rosamund and Benjamin Zander’s The Art of Possibility.)