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The Future is Human and Connected
When we truly have shared purpose and an understanding of why we are here, we see our humanity in each other. And the future is human when we have trusted relationships with all people:
- the people we work with,
- the people who buy our products and services,
- the people who help us get our products and services to the market,
- the people who live in the communities we serve, and
- the people who care about what we create in the world.
When our customers and employees are treated as co-creators of our business, together, we manifest our mission and create something incredible in the world. Isn’t that what community is all about???
Letting Go of Safety
Resistance to change is alive and well in all corners of the world as it is easier to feel safe than try something unknown. But that notion of safety begins to unravel when we realize that often being safe is very risky. And this is the time of change. There is not one spot that is safe any longer or normal, and that’s a beautiful shift in our world.
As Alan Watts reminds us, “To put it still more plainly: the desire for security and the feeling of insecurity are the same thing. To hold your breath is to lose your breath. A society based on the quest for security is nothing but a breath-retention contest in which everyone is as taut as a drum and as purple as a beet.”
Many of us have been conditioned to live in mental boxes, and we were meant to feel safe in them. But these so-called “safe boxes” have actually trapped us in harmful patterns and beliefs, and so they are not so safe after all. When we look out in the world, the vast majority of people and organizations are holding onto a false sense of safety today.
But anyone who is connected with the flow of nature, and understands that we are not separate from nature, is no longer fearful. Because we understand that change is natural and requires flow. Sometimes we fall down but often, we get up and get reminded how strong we truly are. And, we then rewire what being safe means to us.
The Tides Are Shifting
As more of us value ourselves and the quality of our lives, the ability to create community will become much more important, and integration will move us away from our purely transactional work to having a compass that navigates us to co-create our work together.
Our new metrics will be more focused on the depth of our relationships and wholeness, and how close or far we are from the heartbeat of the purpose of our business. It will be a question of impact and meaning.
In this new timeline, work is organized around small autonomous teams that come together as needed. As we have greater access to people across the globe, we are better able to build a team that will help achieve our purpose. An increasing number of us are choosing ourselves and see our working life structured around short-term, project-based teams rather than long-term jobs or careers. There is greater demand for questions and open, two-way conversations in lieu of dogmatism.
The Future is Human When We Create Meaning
I met a woman who told me she had spent six months defining her company’s mission and vision statements, but when I asked her what their purpose was, she could not tell me. She had to open a bunch of stuff and read it to me. And her branding was beautiful but it was an empty wrapper.
What if purpose is the fire inside every person and organization? What if it sparks something meaningful for people and the planet?
And as we step into our own power, we each become increasingly aware that our future is human and filled with natural kindness, gratitude and trust. It starts with us. There is no else apart from each of us.