Mike Bolan
There’s an old saying “Argue for your limitations, and they’re yours!” If we tell ourselves that we can’t think, work or act on some matter because it’s someone else’s responsibility, we close the doors of possibility to ourselves, and we make our thoughts come true. We learn to be weak and submissive, which suits the powerful.
A LOT OF people seem to believe that the world is, or should be, a pretty predictable place. Business people should wear ties, we should fill out the forms accurately and respect the authorities.
Such outmoded ideas also seem to lead some to hold that ‘X is nothing to do with me” or similar, which often translates out to…it’s not my job/responsibility…meaning ‘I’m not going to do anything’.
At a recent meeting with a senior local politician in the North for example, when it was pointed out that Tasmanian agriculture could lose up to $1 billion a year in medium case scenarios created by federal MIS schemes, the person stated…”but that’s a State responsibility.”
I couldn’t help but think that if our houses were being shelled and bombed, that same person might respond…”but that’s a Department of Defence responsibility!”
These learned attitudes are severely limiting. They slash our choices and weaken us, frequently standing in the way of our achieving our goals.
There’s an old saying “Argue for your limitations, and they’re yours!”
If we tell ourselves that we can’t think, work or act on some matter because it’s someone else’s responsibility, we close the doors of possibility to ourselves, and we make our thoughts come true. We learn to be weak and submissive, which suits the powerful.
For many of life’s challenges we need to retain the maximum number of options, particularly when the official doors are nailed shut or lead only into halls of mirrors.
We need to stand up for ourselves.
To prevail against big odds we need the maximum number of choices and the best thinking available so that we can continuously surprise our adversaries. It was the highly disruptive and effective G Gordon Liddy who said “Take control with a bewildering series of initiatives.”
It works, but you can’t do it if you stay within rules made by your adversaries. You don’t have to break laws, just engage in actions that are outside your adversary’s rules, expectations and capacities.
When we allow our thinking to become rigidified, we abandon the ability to surprise, to catch our enemies off guard, or to take an unusual route to our destination.
The problems facing us today are diverse, complex and threatening. When the authorities do nothing, or act as though they’re stuck in freezing treacle, we get nowhere by waiting for them, asking their permission or jumping into the treacle. We need to stay out of the mess they’re in, we need to stay flexible, aware and ready to seize the moment from whatever angle presents itself.
You have to go along to get along?
I hear that kind of thing a lot. It always means accepting something we don’t want. Usually the thing we are asked to accept is the supremacy of someone else’s desires over our own. A bit of practice at that can soon leave us depressed and without much hope of achieving what we want, but well trained at least. And no longer any threat to the authorities – we’re submissive and compliant.
It’s said that the boss is after all, the boss, and therefore we have to do what the boss wants. A different viewpoint is that if no-one did what the boss wanted, he’d have no power whatsoever.
Somewhere between these two positions lie an awful lot of interesting possibilities that can help us to break out of our self-created cocoon and begin experiencing the rich possibilities of life again.
We must build our abilities as both individuals, and as a group, so that we are not dependent on our governments. If we leave our futures entirely to our governments, then we deserve what we get…and it looks like we might get extinction.
Our future is our responsibility. The right to define our future is not held by two political parties, it is held by each one of us, and each one of us is capable of higher levels of success and enjoyment.
We do not need governments to improve our country, we can do it ourselves because we are the country. Success is creating more desirable futures, and the enjoyment that comes from dancing with the complex systems in which we live, and influencing them with our energy in ways that are conducive to our survival and personal enjoyment.
There is only frustration in humbly waiting for governments to work out, and deliver, the diverse futures that each of us dares to hope and dream about.
There is a lot of joy in devising our own futures and bringing them to fruition.
The language of success
To increase our chances of success, we need to know whether we have the ability to do what’s necessary. This may involve learning new skills, making new friends that already have the skills, or shifting our goals. It is usually a mistake to take on an important task without having adequate skills on your side to complete the job,
When we tell ourselves ‘I can’t do it’ we’ll turn out to be correct. Our body will go along with our mental instructions. By changing our mental script, perhaps just by adding …’yet’ we show ourselves new possibilities. Or we can try saying to ourselves ‘I can do this if I…’ or ‘Ed could do this, if I was Ed I’d do this…’
While there are always people with exceptional abilities (e.g. Ian Thorpe’s big feet), in most cases if one person can do something, then probably lots of us can. If it’s possible for you, then it’s possible for me, it’s really question of how and when.
Rewriting our own script involves dumping dysfunctional learned mental scripts such as constant internal criticisms from our internal dialogue…”God I’m useless” and “I can’t speak in public.”
These scripts are not genetic, they are learned and can be replaced with more useful scripts like…”I can learn this” or “If I started this, what would be the first thing I’d do?”
While the idea of empowering ourselves this way may seem trite, it works and is a part of what the SAS might call “sorting ourselves out.”
If you believe that you can stick to what you are doing until you get what you want, then you can accomplish pretty much anything. That knowledge leads to happiness.
If you do not believe that then you are likely to feel stuck – this leads to depression.
Happily, the choice of belief is entirely yours.
Back to the world
We are facing a world in which our own activities and the size of our population are themselves a threat to our continued existence.
If we want to survive, we have to change and we have to do it ourselves. Waiting for permission, or the government, is simply asking for more of the same at a time when that’s the last thing that we can afford.
The best place to practice change is on ourselves. We don’t need to ask permission, we can do it at any time and we can quickly see if it’s working.
We must learn to act and think differently and do it consistently.
‘If you want to make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make a change’ – popular song lyric.
If we cannot change ourselves, then we’re in very serious trouble indeed. We will be the new dinosaurs.
If we can reshape ourselves then we can have hope and the potential to change.
We need to have a self-perception that is consistent with our survival – that will have us using a lot less, demanding a lot less and working with others and our planet. For this, we’ll need a self perception more like Peter Cundall than Paris Hilton.
Either that or our societies will dissolve into some Mad Max simulacrum with who knows what set of outcomes – but it won’t be pretty.
One thing we can be pretty sure of, we won’t defeat the planet, or nature and we won’t defeat our lemming like rush to self destruction until, and unless, we can begin to change our own demands on our selves and on our environment.
If we cannot do that, then not only will we not survive, we will not deserve to survive. Mankind’s passing will be a blessing to the other stressed species who try to share the planet.
We must either reset our personal desires and ambitions to meet the needs of an overloaded planet and learn to live within its limitations, or continue as we are and await some undefined final catastrophe. Not only does this sound dire, it’s nothing to look forward to either! If you ask me – there’s no joy in it anywhere – reject this one!
Mankind is hugely adaptable, but not when our brains are set in moulds made by our ‘betters’ and our ancestors. Their time is past, our time is now, our childrens’ time is still to come. We need to live for that reality rather than for past precedent.
We can work on ourselves to deliver a better future to ourselves and our young, instead of an epitaph. We must create our own hope, produce our own joy and look after our own survival.
Let’s do it!
Mike Bolan
abetteraustralia.com
Mike is a complex systems consultant, change facilitator and executive & management coach.
