We tend to think we know what the good life
is.
So we tend to think basically to lead a good
life you should look within, try to find yourself,
find your true self and then spend your life
being as sincere and authentic to that true
self as you can.
And if you do that the idea is you’ll live
life on your own terms and sure you can’t
control what will happen to you but at least
you’ve lived your life as you were meant
to live it and you’ll be true to yourself.
Now that sounds great except suppose that
all of it is wrong.
Suppose as our philosophers here would say
we’re a very, very messy selves.
And we’re messy selves that fall into these
patterns of responses in the world.
And therefore what you’re finding when you
look within are just these sets of patterned
responses that you’ve fallen into.
Now if that’s the problem that we face as
humans then the notion of flourishing is very
different.
The way to live a flourishing good life is
by breaking these patterns and creating worlds
within which you and those around you can
flourish.
That’s a good life.
And you’re not going to do it by looking
within and finding yourself because again
you’re probably just going to hit a bunch
of patterns you’ve fallen into.
And you’re focusing also on yourself whereas
if we are patterned creatures much of what
we are depends on these patterns we’re falling
into with those around us.
So the good life for these philosophers would
mean you’re trying to create worlds within
which you and those around you can flourish
at a mundane level.
So immediate friendships, family at a larger
societal level too.
And that’s constant work.
The idea is it’s constant work, working
through these patterns we’re falling into,
altering these patterns, breaking these patterns,
creating different patterns and it’s an
endless work of every situation from the very
mundane to the very, very large scale of constantly
trying to shift these patterns for the better.
And the vision is that and really only that
is what the good life is.
The good life is a world in which as many
of us as possible, ideally everyone is flourishing.
And you’ll never get there but it’s a
lifelong process of ever trying to create
worlds within which we can flourish.
One of the ideas these philosophers will talk
a lot about is to train spontaneity.
This may seem like a total oxymoron.
I mean we tend to think spontaneity means
simply breaking from convention and doing
whatever you want to do.
But they would say even if you do that that
will always be momentary and then you have
to return to the conventions and the conventions
are unchanged.
So what they will rather say is think of spontaneity
something like learning a musical instrument
or learning a sport.
Something that takes incredible amounts of
training but the goal at the end of the training,
let’s say playing a piano, the goal at the
end of that is to reach a point where you
can play as they would say spontaneously.
Sensing the music, sensing the mood of the
room, sensing how to shift how you’re playing
a piano to shift the atmosphere around you.
Something you can only achieve by years and
years of training.
Now we know that sort of thing works for piano
playing or sports but what if we actually
thought of our lives or our organizations
we’re working in in the exact same way.
So what you’re trying to do is train yourself
as an individual or in an organization to
create an atmosphere in which you’re training
people to spontaneously be able to connect
in ways that they otherwise couldn’t.
And that’s putting it very abstractly so
now let me get extremely concrete.
So what would this mean?
Let’s imagine you have an atmosphere in
the workplace where you feel the problem is
– and again the key is you’re always trying
to see what are the dangerous patterns that
are setting in.
So one common one is people aren’t talking
enough to each other.
They’re not connecting enough.
They connect if they’re in a meeting even
if the meetings are well run it’s only going
to be for a brief moment.
So how do you get people to connect more?
Well you start doing little things to create
those connections.
A common one that’s been done in the past
few years is to tear down walls.
So you tear down walls, put glass in where
there used to be a wall so even if there is
a wall you can at least see through.
That physically gets people connecting more.
But even there of course dangerous patterns
can set in.
I mean if people feel that they actually are
too connected, sort of don’t have places
where they can work together without others
constantly around them that can create problems
too.
And so what you’re constantly trying to
do is to look at what sorts of patterns are
developing.
Assume that most patterns are going to have
potentially dangerous consequences, side effects,
usually unintended.
And so you’re constantly trying to create
the conditions within which people are really
able to flourish.
And it’s constant work so you’ll do something,
you’ll tear down those walls, that’ll
work perfectly.
But then again dangerous patterns begin to
set in so you’ll say okay, let’s have
a few meeting spaces that aren’t open.
Then that may work wonderfully but that’ll
create some other problems.
And so you’re thinking of yourself as kind
of the equivalent of and it’s pushing the
metaphor but you’re sort of the piano player
except what the world you’re creating isn’t
simply the atmosphere through your music.
You’re actually creating a much larger atmosphere
in the entire world around you by the ways
you’re talking to people, the ways you’re
connecting with people, where you have walls,
where you don’t have walls.
And all of these things have an incredible
impact on the entire atmosphere of an organization.
These are the little things we tend not to
focus a lot on.
Our philosophers would say it’s those little
things that have huge repercussions in terms
of the entire feeling of an area, entire ways
that people can connect and the kinds of ideas
that can come out of that workforce.
