Why You Should Embrace The Chaos
change
is the only constant in the world
and yet it’s the thing we fear the most
minister fuller said you never change
things by
fighting the existing reality to change
something you build a new model
that makes the old model obsolete
we can see this all throughout history
whenever we have embraced
a new idea we have to let go of the old
idea
but what bucky doesn’t talk about is
that in between these two
models there’s an element of chaos
see systems are designed to create order
out of chaos when a system can no longer
contain the chaos it was designed for we
get what i like to call
a chaos overspell
we look at the systems all throughout
our world today
political healthcare financial education
the list
goes on and on these systems have
brought us to where
we are however the signs of chaos always
feel
self-evident all experiencing them
in one format or another
it’s my intention to share with you a
fresh
perspective of the chaos that you see
all around you
and i want to leave you with a newfound
sense of positivity not just about
what’s being done
but about what we can do as well
to begin with i just need to take us
back to 1900.
food was scarce or limited sometimes
even rationed
life expectancy and education was low
and unless
you were a white male don’t expect too
many rights
is why i can say quite comfortably that
we have never
had it so good
being born today and getting to 30 so
darn sight easier than our ancestors
ever had it and let’s just look at our
achievements over the last
50 years we have been to the moon we’ve
been to mars
we’ve mapped the human genome
but nearly a billion people still live
in extreme poverty
just so we’re clear extreme quality is a
dollar
ninety a day how many are living at 195
or two dollars
what we call hardship is a world away
from extreme poverty ten percent of the
planets still drink water
contaminating with waste 30 of the
planet
don’t even have access to basic
sanitation
but okay that’s our developing world
it’s developing and i’ll tell you what
in 50 years it has developed a lot
what about our first world
homelessness is on the rise around the
world in every single country in europe
except finland well done finland
and seven years in a row in the uk
40 to 50 of americans are one paycheck
away
from potential homelessness and some
families have to choose between
food healthcare and in the uk
sanitary towels
how can our systems that have brought us
so much greatness causes so much pain
it’s all about stress tim mentioned
earlier
these are the statistics for suicide
65 increase in 45 years in suicide every
40 seconds predicted to double
to 20 seconds by next year
this pain seems to be increasing it’s no
wonder
that our millennials and seniors of our
time or our kids becoming adults
are looking around at the chaos over
spill that these systems are no longer
addressing and asking ourselves a
question
is this really the best we’ve got are we
really a truly
global civilized society
so we know that chaos is part of the
process
a good example i’d like to use to talk
about systems and to talk about
chaos is cymatics now cymatics is a
greek word and it means
where it’s the study of sound and
vibration
made visible we do have sound
we take a plate straight a little bit we
take a plate
sprinkle some sand over it we
the sand on the top represents the chaos
when energy is applied order is created
the sound coming from the tone generator
is a frequency
the frequencies are energy the greater
the amount of energy
the greater the complexity of the shape
now the shape holds itself as long as it
can contain
the energy until the final moment where
it switches to a more complex structure
they say it’s the space between the
nodes
that makes the music but it’s the moment
between the
shapes did you find the chaos
[Music]
how much chaos well it depends on how
much pain
problems and mistakes we made in the
past
and how much we’re willing to let that
go case in point let’s look at the
abolishment of slavery
how much chaos was caused in america
when they abolished slavery they fought
a whole war
half a million people died let alone how
many people died
as part of slavery and we’re still
dealing with that today
if we weren’t we wouldn’t have movements
like black lives matter
so if we know we have to let go of the
past to move
forward but we struggle
so a good example to look at how we let
go of something is the changing gears of
a car
to come with me on this you’re on a
motorway driving at 60 miles an hour
you’re in fourth gear and your rev
counter
is a 4 000 revs you’re nearly in the red
now you could continue on your journey
but you know if you did that it would
cause damage to the engine
why would you damage the vehicle with
which you’re traveling it doesn’t make
sense
so you know you need to change gear so
what do we do we put our foot on the
clutch
now at this point we just disengage our
engine from our wheels
we’re going to hold the gear stick we
take it on a fourth we’re going to fifth
but you’re still not in fifth gear
because your engine’s disengaged
you’ve got no power being applied to the
to the engine to the wheels
technically speaking you’re costing you
haven’t got control of the vehicle
you’re slowing down
but you knew what you were doing you’re
changing gear
so you take your foot off the clutch
anyone ever been in a passenger
when someone’s done that too fast will
know that it is the worst time to be
drinking
out of an open coffee cup
an observer could look at any point and
said
this isn’t working we’re slowing down
you’ve not got control of the vehicle
it’s bumping let’s go back to fourth
gear we knew what we were doing in
fourth gear
it was safe it’s comfortable
but you knew your rev counter was a 4
000 revs you knew
that if you carried on that would cause
damage that’s why you changed gear
see i don’t believe that society is
breaking down
i believe society is gearing up
so why do we struggle letting go
or why do we attack so much to holding
on
the buddhists consider attachment a form
of suffering
the more you attach to something the
more potential suffering you could have
if someone or something
takes that away from you to
illuminate this a little bit further i
want to go back to 1846
a gentleman called ignaz semovice just
starting out
at the vienna general hospital in the
maternity ward
child bed fever was the big killer of
the time
killing new mothers within a week of
giving birth a terrible death
seminole virus was a man of science
he wanted to understand what the root
cause was so we started recording all
the fatalities
and he found out that when women give
birth to doctors
did a five times higher chance of death
than when they gave birth under midwives
it was common back then for doctors to
go from autopsy
to delivering in the va delivering in
the maternity ward
but it wasn’t until someone vice’s
colleague pricked his finger
and he died after performing an autopsy
on a woman who had childbed fever
that semivirus made his big connection
and he thought
there must be some way that matthew is
transferring from the
autopsy to the maternity ward and if i
can remove that then i can solve the
problem
he got all the doctors to wash their
hands in a chlorine solution
which is a bit like an antiseptic we
might think that’s normal but this is
revolutionary for the time
the death rate felt dramatically several
wires had stumbled onto the greatest
advancement in discovering medical
history
or so he thought because the doctors
did not take kindly to it looking like
they were to blame
they called samurais out for being
unscientific for lacking basic reason
because the model the existing model at
that time was my asthma theory
which is the theory that bad air moves
around and causes disease
they ridiculed several wires and they
lost his position
at 47 years old he got taken into a
mental asylum and he died
it took 50 years for his work
to become accepted when germ theory
became more studied
i just want to take a moment to just
think about that
because at that time they were our
greatest thinkers
how many times are we the doctors
holding on to our ideas and how many
times do we ridicule people like
symbolize
publicly and privately for bringing
forth a new
model of reality i invite all of us
to step out of our doctor’s shoes and
into some advices
and see the world with a fresh pair of
eyes the same pair of eyes that our
youth of today see the world
we are a globalized society right now
global citizenship requires global
responsibility
margaret mead said never doubt that a
small group of committed individuals can
change the world
for indeed that is all that ever has
and as i look around the world and i see
the courage and the compassion and the
creativity
that human beings have today to step
into
all of the chaos that we’re seeing warms
my heart
the number of marches around the world
for climate change for peace for
equality for justice are on the rise
month
after month after month the number of
citizens making a stance for something
greta thomberg 15 years old instead of
walking to school to start term and
taking a seat
she walked into town and found the
busiest parliament building and stood
for climate change nine months later
a hundred countries seventeen hundred
marches
and hundreds upon thousands of people
all with one united voice i’ll take my
exams when you start taking care and
responsibility for this planet
that’s our future generation talking now
i’m talking about planets
50 years ago plastic was a savior
we’ve all seen in the last 12 months the
galvanization
of the world and how countries now are
either banning
or looking to ban single-use plastics
and the earth responds beautifully in
all the instances where human beings
have removed themselves from
deforestation and destruction
the earth bounds back with beautiful
glory
this isn’t a fairytale feature for us
all this is perfectly achievable
but it requires this globalized
civilized society to begin to actually
work together now as consumers
we have always had power but not like we
have today
the event of social media has allowed
has allowed us
as consumers to galvanize around ideas
regardless of greed
creed race geography we have the power
to be able to
boycott a brand tomorrow for what it
doesn’t stand for
and raise a company to the stratosphere
because of what it does stand for and
the businesses know this
this is larry fink ceo
of the world’s largest asset management
firm to give you an idea of
size every day five trillion dollars
moves around the world he manages six
trillion
when he speaks wall street listens
his message to businesses was simple if
you want to work with blackrock you need
to be solving a social problem and stand
for a social cause
big words coming from the big side of
business
but they’re not new words b corp we’ve
been talking about embedding purpose
into people’s organizations for years
patagonia have had purpose in their
organization since dear dog
and companies like buy one give one
exist for the sole purpose to help
companies give
and stand for something beyond their
product or their service
see our old models represented the
common good
they served common interests groups
companies things like that
and new models represent the greatest
good they serve our global
society that we all live in will exist
in
if our models are changing and our past
is our past has been made
then the chaos that sits between the two
is inevitable
so embrace the chaos forgive our
mistakes
else resentment it’s like putting an
anchor in the old model
as we as we try and move forward
our greatest two assets are our voices
and the money in our pocket
used correctly they’re greater than the
sum of their parts
we spend a long time cultivating both of
them so use them
wisely use them consciously because
every day you cast a vault
with what you say with what you buy
where you buy it from
whom you buy it from the business you do
what you stand for
what you don’t stand for because in the
words of b
court every day is election day
it’s a cashier vote wisely
if the old model represented products
that took from the earth didn’t pay back
didn’t pay
people fairly maybe they used children
in their production
then the new model invest our time our
money our energy into things
which have got clear supply chains that
are sustainable to give back
that look after our people because some
people live
on 1.90 a day
if our old systems represented
inequality
injustice racism prejudice
they put our money into systems that
equality embedded into the dna of what
they are
if you don’t know how to do those things
ask questions the better the quality of
the question the better the quality of
the answer
the path forward doesn’t need to be a
bumpy road
into a fifth gear society with a coffee
stained cut
top it could be with grace
and ease like you saw the videos from
cyanotics
we know that change is the only constant
so embrace the change
embrace the chaos step forth
through the fear and through the chaos
with creativity with courage
compassion like symbolized it regardless
of the words because the only thing
that we should be in competition with
is what’s possible not each other
thank you
you