What is new is that everyone is forced to accept it, deal with it, build on it and make it our business to bring people’s heads and hearts around it – so that one day we could get there, fair and square.
A hyper connected world with cracks coming from different worldviews could very well look like hell’s kitchen. And I wonder if ‘agreeability’ is really a virtue or even a way to a common, peaceful and progressive future. Let’s first begin by appreciating that complexity is not ‘the new’.
What has impacted us as a world-stitched together into the COVID-19 crisis could be understood easily if we borrow some experiences of wearing knitted garments. If you recall, as I do, woolen garments hand-knitted by our mothers and grandmothers had a typical limitation – if somehow you developed one small hole anywhere, it only grew bigger and bigger, until the whole thing loosened into a lump. And then you have to undo the whole thing before you could put it together again. Complexity for me was in making sure that every movement must be mindful of a scratch or a burn or any other casualty which could lead to that small hole. Imagine. Even leaning on a wall which had a harmless protruding nail could have brought down my favorite sweater into a state of non-existence. Now apply that to the void, a mere piece of your whole existence holding that power to dismantle everything you’ve put together over time which cannot be reclaimed, resources which have to be engaged, invested into and repaid again with interest.
Speaking with a client the other day just reinforced this realization all over again. His situation was simple enough but became so messy because it had impact from things way beyond his consideration set or even influence. Thanks to the dynamic situation with COVID-19 containment policies, port rules, levies, deliveries came out-of-nowhere and put his marketing & sales plans on hold, as the sales season keeps ticking away, eating into his ability to plan and prepare for the future. By now, we are all well acquainted with this ‘unknown’ future situation viewing from a place of ‘uncertainty’ in the present. But this one small piece coming at the whole from any corner like an avalanche and leaving with no choice but to start again, is nightmarish.
Now this complexity existed. In fact, this complexity is what made our lives simple and seamless – until, it became our business to get our head around it so that we can bypass the dependence on what we assumed to be a working, well-oiled machine – which would keep going – all we had to do was adjust our speed on it. This road came to a dead-end. And now it is time to find our own path. Or just wait until someone appears with a map and you could follow. Painful. Frustrating. Restless. But it was always complex, wasn’t it?