AI as a Reflection of Our Inner Systems: Navigating the Challenges of the Future

Posted on by Martin Murphy

Introduction:

In today’s rapidly evolving world, the transformative power of artificial intelligence (AI) cannot be overstated. AI has the potential to revolutionize industries, improve efficiency, and enhance our lives in countless ways. However, it is essential to recognize that AI is not a panacea for all our problems. Rather, it is a reflection of our inner world, reflecting the systems and values that govern our society. As the famous quote goes, “Our outer world is a merciless reflection of our inner world.” In this article, we will explore how AI can both amplify and exacerbate the challenges facing humanity unless we proactively address the issues of meaning, economics, inequality, ecology, and collaboration. Additionally, we will introduce the Stoic Pilgrim Leadership development, a new journey of exploration into leadership development that focuses on ethics, regenerative principles, and social justice issues rather than the mere management of the status quo.

The Collapse of Meaning:

In our relentless pursuit of technological progress, we risk losing sight of what truly matters. As AI continues to advance, it becomes crucial to infuse it with purpose and meaning. Without conscious efforts to align AI with human values and ethical principles, we risk amplifying the disconnect between our inner aspirations and the outer reality. Therefore, it is imperative that we take a proactive role in defining the values and goals that guide AI development. The Stoic Pilgrim Leadership Development training offers a unique approach by emphasizing the cultivation of ethical leadership, ensuring that AI aligns with our shared values and serves the greater good.

Economic Implications:

The advent of AI brings with it the promise of increased efficiency and productivity. However, without careful consideration, it can also exacerbate economic disparities. AI has the potential to automate jobs, leading to significant changes in the workforce and widening the wealth gap. It is essential to create inclusive economic systems that ensure the benefits of AI are distributed equitably, fostering a society that thrives on collaboration and opportunity. Stoic Pilgrim training recognizes the importance of economic equity, equipping leaders with the knowledge and skills to navigate these economic implications and champion fairness in the age of AI.

Inequality and Social Challenges:

AI’s impact on society is not limited to the economy. It also has the potential to magnify existing social inequalities. As AI algorithms learn from historical data, they can perpetuate biases and discriminatory practices. If we fail to address these issues, AI will only reinforce and deepen societal divisions. To harness the full potential of AI, we must prioritize fairness, diversity, and inclusion, ensuring that the technology works for the benefit of all. The Stoic Pilgrim training addresses these social challenges by fostering leaders who are mindful of the ethical and social implications of AI, empowering them to create inclusive and just environments.

Ecological and Environmental Considerations:

The ecological and environmental challenges facing humanity are among the most pressing issues of our time. AI can play a significant role in addressing these challenges, from optimizing energy consumption to analysing vast amounts of data for climate research. However, without a conscious effort to prioritize sustainability, AI could contribute to further environmental degradation. We must integrate ecological decision-making into AI development, encouraging innovations that not only optimize efficiency but also preserve our planet for future generations. Stoic Pilgrim training advocates for regenerative principles, training leaders to make ecological decisions that prioritize the health of our planet and promote sustainable practices alongside AI advancements.

The Power of Collaboration:

To navigate the complexities of an AI-driven future, collaboration is key. AI has the potential to connect people, organizations, and nations, enabling us to tackle global challenges collectively. By fostering cross-sector partnerships, knowledge sharing, and collaborative decision-making, we can harness the power of AI to address the urgent issues we face. Together, we can shape an AI-driven future that reflects our collective values and aspirations. The Stoic Pilgrim Journey highlights the significance of collaboration as a crucial aspect of effective leadership in the age of AI. It encourages leaders to build networks, forge alliances, and work together to find innovative solutions to complex problems. By promoting collaboration, this training equips leaders with the skills necessary to leverage the power of AI in service of a better world.

Conclusion:

As AI becomes increasingly intertwined with our lives, it is essential to recognize its potential to reflect and amplify the challenges we currently face. By embracing creativity, infusing AI with meaning, and making ecological decisions, we can shape a future in which AI becomes a powerful tool for positive change. Moreover, the Stoic Pilgrim Leadership Development training introduces a transformative approach to leadership development that prioritizes ethics, regenerative principles, and social justice issues over the mere management of the status quo. By fostering leaders who are mindful of the ethical, economic, and social implications of AI, this training empowers them to navigate the challenges of the future with integrity and compassion.

To ensure that AI enhances rather than exacerbates existing problems, we must foster collaboration, prioritize equitable and sustainable practices, and actively shape AI’s development. By doing so, we can leverage the transformative power of AI to create a more inclusive, prosperous, and environmentally conscious world for all. Let us embrace the opportunities presented by AI while remaining steadfast in our commitment to ethical leadership and the pursuit of a better future. The time to act is now, as our choices today will determine the world we create for generations to come. Together, let us forge a path forward that harnesses the potential of AI as a force for positive change and a reflection of our shared values.

#AIReflections #InnerSystems #MeaningfulAI #EconomicEquity #InclusiveSociety #AIandInequality #EcologicalDecisions #CollaborationMatters #SustainableAI #FutureChallenges #HarnessingAI #GlobalCollaboration

 

We Need More Mr Joneses!

Posted on by Martin Murphy

Are our biggest challenges hierarchy and cowardice?

I watched Agnieszka Holland’s powerful drama, ‘Mr Jones’, last night.

James Norton portrayed the real-life Welsh journalist who uncovered Stalin’s genocidal famine in Ukraine known as the Holodomor. Jones brought the tragic events happening in Ukraine to the world’s attention. Moreover, Jones persisted in his mission despite personal dangers which would ultimately see him meet an untimely death shortly before his 30th birthday in Mongolia, at the hands of Russian security agents.

The film is a specific account of Jones’s courageous journey to publish the truth of the Holodomor tragedy in Ukraine under Stalin before WWII.

But it’s a tragic story that is continuously inflicted on people by powerful elites in the pursuit of extreme ideology and development goals. The inaction of fearful sycophants and politicians desperately clinging to power, which emboldens the brutality of the wealthy Machiavellians, Sado-Narcissists and Psychopaths who invariably profit from our exploitation, misery and end up running our countries.

Furthermore, once the truth does come out post the event, the inertia to act on new insights ensures that lessons not only go unheeded but become a playbook for repeat occurrences elsewhere.

Following Stalin’s Holodomor in Ukraine, Hitler’s Nazi Hunger Plan was developed to systematically starve 30 million Ukrainians, Russians and Slavs so that the food surplus created from starving the communities, could be redirected to Nazi forces.

This plan, led by Nazi Food Minister Herbert Backe, was intended to open the fertile soils of Ukraine to German settlers post the conflict. History appears to be repeating itself. Tyrannical psychopaths and narcissistic vandals are often the frontmen, whilst the Machiavellian monsters orchestrate the atrocities from behind the scenes.

During Brexit, Dominic Cummings was masterful at influencing from the rear and ensured that a ‘divide and conquer’ tactic, used by many colonising villains historically, caused enough confusion to break up the EU.

It wasn’t about making an informed decision. It was about who was motivated enough to break the rules and what little democracy was left, in order to manipulate the results. The already rich and greedy trumped the day.

They’ve become so brazen that they don’t even hide it now because there are little consequences even if uncovered…. As long as you belong to one of the ‘in-crowds’.

Britain itself was fond of concentration camps during its colonial ambitions around the world.

It imprisoned around a sixth of the Boer population comprising of mainly women and children of which nearly 30,000 died along with an untold number of black people. During the Mau-Mau uprising in Kenya, members of the Kikuyu tribe were imprisoned and as a result many died from malnutrition and torture.

We could go on to talk about Native Indian resettlement in the USA, the war in Yemen sponsored and supported by Britain’s weapon manufacturers and military, or even the Palestinian situation.

There’s generally a lack of willingness to look at these situations by the mainstream, let alone accept and adapt into the future. Whenever threatened, the elites tend to double down on their tactics, i.e., more capitalism, more propaganda, more divide and conquer.

The establishment is afraid to face the truth about its colonial history because the same strategies are being used in a slightly different way today. Physical slavery is replaced with debt slavery. Nobody is free to do as they want in a capitalist world apart from the 1%. Even fairly smart but wealthy individuals are reluctant to challenge their own modus-operandi.

I’m interested in what people think will happen as we enter this era of existential challenge.

What can ordinary people do, if anything, to prevent themselves, their families and their communities being persecuted by tech-cap titans, wealthy weapons peddlers, aristocratic elites and power addicted politicians?

We’re supposed to be the custodians of the planet, due to our intelligence. Yet the severity of the atrocities inflicted on fellow human beings and the destruction of their own environmental life-support system, by nutcases in the name of warped ideologies, is not something observed in the wild as far as I know?

What happens when the delusions of national boundaries are realised as just another command-and-control mechanism and that the real boundaries are between the rich them and us?

History

Thanks to the work of anthropologists, we’ve learnt that our ancestors lived for 200,000 years, a mostly egalitarian hunter-gatherer lifestyle. If people did live in cities, inequality and exploitation were not a given. It seems we drifted into hierarchy. But anyway, back to what we believe now.

Our contemporary social systems and beliefs are built upon what happened around 10,000 years ago. The big transition is known as the agrarian revolution but really it was the beginning of the Tech-Cap era.

We’ve been stuck in re-branded versions of tech-capitalism ever since and its sole aim is to own everything and replace humans with tech, so as to increase production. This is so wealthy people can exploit more of the earth’s resources for less hassle. As more tech replaces humans, less and less homes and schools will be needed to house factory workers or hospitals to maintain their health.

Humanity has been widgetized and externalised.

Scientists might dream their work will one day benefit humanity and the bio-sphere. But wealthy elites always usurp and secure the use of new tech to gain even more wealth which doesn’t trickle anywhere but into their offshore accounts.

They know their game is up, it’s just a matter of jockeying for the last morsels and working out how to survive the collapse.

This all began with farming. It was then that people started competing for ownership of the land. Nutritional levels decreased and it also became hierarchical and warlike in Europe and elsewhere.

This then morphed into colonialism. National competition for dominance meant that over the last few centuries, power went from the Dutch with their navy to Britain, who replicated and overtook the Dutch navy with cheap labour, but who were eventually usurped by the Americans. But whichever country gained dominance, they all went exploring and exploiting other lands.

The two decades of war in the middle east was a massive pay day for the usual players and they’re not in the least bit bothered about terrorism. Terrorism and 911 were just tech-cap opportunities.

Incidentally, the contemporary San people of south west Africa, have been around for thousands of years and outlasted many dynasties and empires. It appears that cities and hierarchies come and go, whereas egalitarian hunter gatherers and nomads, if not exterminated by colonialism, fare much better longevity wise.

It’s All in Our Heads

According to Dr Iain McGilchrist it’s all down to the way we use our brain and we’re overly reliant on the left-side of our brains.

London cabbies, who having undertook ‘The Knowledge’ training – driving around London to learn all the routes – re-shape certain areas of their brains.

I bet that’s what’s happened to the left side of our brains. The left is concerned with ‘think-do’ to compete and control resources. It is ego-centric, likes predictable problems and can’t see the woods for the trees.

When it’s won the competition for wealth and power either through birth or being in the right place, with the right product, at the right time – lucky in other words – it then wants to control the resources so as to not have to share their wealth.

That’s why they keep developing new TAP’s-Tools to Accumulate Power. ChatGPT and other forms of AI are the next phase. It’s ‘think and do’ quicker. We’ve overly developed left-sided brains it would appear and the tech evolutions are external manifestations of our inner world.

The right side of the brain is more able to understand complex situations and can ‘sense and feel’ it’s way around ambiguous and novel situations. It’s more sociable and empathic. Ecological in other words.

But the rich and infamous don’t like tricky and transient problems. They can’t control ambiguous and novel challenges with capitalism, centralised solutions and hierarchy. So, they ignore them.

These are known in economics as ‘externalities. Whilst they plunder and exploit the earth and other people not in their ‘in-crowd’, they push the cost of all this onto societies.

And we are too afraid to do anything about it because they allow the rest of society just enough resources so that you won’t tell them to “Foxtrot Oscar!”

They pay the police enough to turn on their own people. They manipulate the narrative through the media to generate a divide and conquer situation. They have us running on hamster wheels too exhausted at the end of the day to do much else. They build gated mansions and pay their army of lawyers to stop people walking on the land they’ve snatched and they’re making it illegal to protest against them.

Our response…

So far, our response seems to be that similar to a fish in a fish bowl.

We’re swimming in a bowl which is filling up with trash. The owners are feeding us less and less. So, our response is to swim in the other direction whilst begging the hand that feeds us, to come back and clean up the mess.

And of course, they never come back or clean up, do they?

But that doesn’t stop people making a living trying to tell other people which way to swim. No, they want to appear saintly so make a living telling the exploited they’re being exploited by foreign invaders.

The Solution!

It would be an enormous task to outline a solution and not the work of a simple fella like myself. We collaborated our way to the top of the evolutionary tree. It’s going to take better decision making and powerful collaboration to survive, if’s it’s still possible.

I think there are three virtues that we need to instil in everyone first.

Adaptability- We need to become more experimental and get out of the goddam fish bowl.

Resilience- We’ll need resilience to keep operating in less-than-ideal circumstances over the long term

Courage- It’ll take the courage to act before pain motivates us into rash actions. We’ve got to realise that we are the heroes we’re looking for.

We have to accept that we and the planet are being exploited by the people we vote for. We have to see through their false dichotomies of left and right.

So stop voting!

We need to stop asking for permission and just get on with implementing experimental solutions. Progress will not be big leaps but one small step followed by another, with lots of back-sliding too.

How about not buying the next smart phone which relies on the exploitation of kids in the Congo?

How about learning to grow your own food?

How about building a community?

We need more Gareth Joneses in the world. Humble, curious and courageous.

Published by

🌍 Martin- 'Murph'-Murphy🌍
🌍 Martin- ‘Murph’-Murphy🌍
Eco-Leaders Academy- Egalitarian & Eco-friendly Leadership, Stoic Pilgrim Adaptability, Resilience & Courage & Super Team Concepts For a Transforming 🌎 Rebels Chatting – Podcast
Published • 19m
46 articles
Time for us to tap into our inner Mr Jones! courage curiosity adaptability resilience leadership

Eco-Leadership for Rebels, Mavericks and Change-Agents

Posted on by Martin Murphy

I’ve always been a rebel.

I wasn’t very successful at school which these days I put down to preferring an exploratory approach to learning. So back then school and its authoritarian approach was anathema to my style of learning and being. It wasn’t long before my dysfunctional home life got worse and so I escaped – by climbing out of a bedroom window – and running off to pursue adventure.

My first job was as a double glazing sales rep. This was a stop gap to me joining the army. Not because I liked the idea of the military as I was opposed to war, but I needed somewhere to sleep and eat.

I thrived in the military but that was only because the hierarchy believed I was potential officer material. I enjoyed the routine and believe it not, bulling boots was an excellent form of therapy and a flow-state inducing activity, subjects I would pursue later in life.

The other reason I thrived was because I engineered it so that I could be away from the barracks and out in the wilderness. My first posting was to the Far-East which I had secured by blackmailing my commanding officer in training.

I explained in a meeting with him that I would leave if he didn’t approve my request, because by some extraordinary faux-pas, they’d forgotten to get me to sign the dotted line when transferring regiments. So basically, I had completed basic training and was presented with the prize for ‘fittest recruit’ by the then HRH Prince Charles… As a civilian.

Knowing he had been outmanoeuvred, the CO agreed to my request.

I wanted to be posted to Hong Kong because I was, at the time, fascinated in learning all I could about martial arts. In Hong Kong I learnt different forms and styles, but focussed on Muay Thai.

My instructor was a South African friend call Paulo Tocha. He worked nightclub doors by night but trained and pursued acting by day. He eventually became the first foreigner to win the title of ‘Champion of China’. He often used me as a sparring partner. I was the only soldier who had promised to spar with him that actually turned up to the back street gym, above a fish shop in Kowloon. I trained in boxing by day with the army and worked on my Muay Thai at night with Paulo.

To gain enough money to travel as a lead walker and climber on an expedition to the Himalayas, I moonlighted as a doorman when I was based at camp. The rest of the time I was either on exercise in other countries or on the Chinese border. We would capture people trying to escape China and even sometimes go into no-mans land on the border, to rescue them before the Chinese military caught the poor souls attempting to escape to a better life. I was often tempted to let them go.

I was ear marked to return to the UK to re-sit a commissions board… Or so they thought.

I used this knowledge to engineer that I spent as much of the time on courses as I could. I was allowed to apply for selection into the Recce platoon, much to the chagrin of my current platoon sergeant. This led to me spending two months in Brunei. Firstly, completing a long-range patrolling course with the SAS and learning how to survive in the jungle with the Iban hunter-gatherer community. Then advising and guiding an infantry platoon commander who was fresh out of Sandhurst.

Although I was nearing the end of my three years, this experience of training with the SAS appealed to my need for autonomy, agency and egalitarian values. So, years later I would go back into the military, attempt selection and experience life as a Sabre trained member of the Special Air Service. Just to see if I could but also because I was doing a lot of security work and it looked good on my CV when networking.

But even in the SAS, there came a point when I considered whether to make it a long-term career path or leave. An argument with a Staff sergeant decided this for me, especially when he said “You need to stop thinking you do Murphy” …. That was never going to happen.

What next?

A BSc in Environmental studies and outdoor pursuits.

I entered university as a mature student and paid my way by starting a door security business. Studying during the week and cycling forty miles at weekends to go train security teams, bouncers and bodyguards, working late into the night.

The degree course shifted my perspective.

I realised that the military is often used as an extension of the oil and wealthy elite world.

I cherished the values and virtues of the warrior tradition as protectors, I help veterans with mental health issues where I can, but capitalism has twisted reality, aided and abetted by media propaganda. We truly live in a delusional, matrix-like world which dupes the unsuspecting.

This often means the soldiers are defending the rich against the already downtrodden. There is profit in war and Machiavellian bureaucrats use divide-and-conquer within countries to secure control of their natural resources. When soldiers are injured in battle, being commodities, they are externalised onto society and forgotten about by the rich and infamous that profited from their sacrifice.

Mostly, they’re inadvertent mercenaries tricked into believing they’re fighting the good fight. Realising this I began to understand hierarchy and Oiltech elites have also used capitalism to turn ordinary people and the planet into exploitable commodities. Bureaucrats utilise corporate language to disguise what they’re doing.

In this tech-driven capitalist world, everybody is a widget and technology will disguise the brutality of what’s happening in reality. As we get wiser to the human costs of war, ‘entrepreneurs’ are making  robots and drones to kill the ‘others’ who will be transformed from mothers, fathers and children into terrorists and units by bureaucratic politico tech-speak. Remember austerity? Remember WWII?

It was entrepreneurs that built the ‘gas chambers’ and they made them soundproof so the soldiers were hidden from the horrors of what they were doing. They were not killing women and children, they were killing ‘Jews’ or ‘processing units’.

Up to this point I had been a rebel without a clue, convinced mostly that I wasn’t very intelligent. I later realised I just learn differently than the way the education system is designed. I was recently accused of being a polymath by a polymath coach. Perhaps I am an accidental polymath due to life’s circumstances but since that time, I’ve continued to learn across a wide breath of subjects and being ‘polymathic’ found the connections between the subjects, amalgamating them all into a complex but unified understanding of the world.

It was when I began studying the fields of personal development, therapy, Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP), philosophy, psychology and coaching that I realised I have a talent for helping people unlock their potential. I began supporting people who had suffered trauma from accidents on horses, but then moved into helping entrepreneurs, leaders and teams, as I had operated in high performing teams and had developed and led them internationally, to prevent terrorism.

But something I noticed in myself is that when you set goals, then set off with lots of positive mental attitude, even with super-human effort; timing, ecology and serendipity still play the major roles in your success.

Sure, chance favours the brave, who dares wins and all that, but not often. Mostly, success of entrepreneurs is around 1in 400 from start-up to selling. The majority flounder in what entrepreneur guru Daniel Priestley calls, ‘The Wilderness’ which is just a really stressful place to live.

The personal development industry became an arm of capitalism and hierarchy i.e., if you’re not winning, it’s because you’re not ‘doing’ it harder, faster or competitively enough. Out came ‘The Secret’ to hammer home that you’re to blame if you are suffering.

I looked at my own situation and reflected on my past. If you put a mountain in front of me, I would climb it and furthermore carry you on my shoulders, if you needed me too. I knew this from experience not ideology.

But when it came to goal setting, setting up businesses or applying for jobs I struggled. I didn’t fit and when self-employed, I was banging my head against institutions that were built upon European funding which usurped smaller players with original ideas from getting a look in. These monsters engulfed the industry.

In the institutional world, you get hired for the job of teaching by paying them to qualify you in old-world industrial revolution, linear logic. Even though I had been coaching, mentoring and facilitating since before they existed as businesses, if I applied to be a coach with them – since they had secured all the work – they told me I had to pay them to play.

As a result of this, I have a distrust of hierarchy, elitism, institutions, false dichotomies and the simplistic personal development field and looked to develop models of decision-making, coaching and facilitating which encapsulate the complexity and the requirement of systems thinking within the natural world.

For instance, I developed a model of eco-coaching nearly two decades ago. Now top business schools are charging a fortune to learn about it and more and more ‘institutions will try to encompass, control and profit from what should be an inclusive and accessible philosophy in the ambiguous and transformational times we’re navigating right now. We need change fast, we’ve no longer the luxury of studying slowly, we’ve got to operate like Special Forces. Learn fast, take leaps of faith and adapt as we go.

And to top it all, they fail to really understand the real nature and benefit of eco-coaching is.

Yes, it can include being outdoors, using the natural world as a metaphor and ‘walking and talking’ in nature. But it is more than that. It is adding back into decision-making what our egalitarian hunter-gatherer ancestors did, which is to include an ecology-check.

I’ve taken an ancient wisdom that accepts the complexity of relationships and systemic impacts within the natural world and developed a simple model to gain more insight into the present situation, and where we might go next.

That’s how complexity is navigated, with simple rules and tools. As Leonardo da Vinci espoused:

‘Simplicity is the greatest sophistication’

Furthermore, I’m making it open source as we need the rebels, mavericks and change agents who’re collaborating in small teams to be able to learn how to be make ecological decisions, be creatively brilliant and collaborate powerfully so they can sense and feel their way forward.

‘Creative collaboration’ is the opposite leadership style of ‘Compete and Control’. The industrial, technology and capitalist revolutions are based on ‘Compete and control’ and we’ve been stuck there for far too long.

Small groups of people are discovering pathways into a brave new world.

A world which is sustainable, socially just and a soul-satisfying place to live and work in balance with each other and the natural world. Just as our hunter-gatherer ancestors did for 200,000 years before some bloke got his hands on some agrarian tech around 12,000 years ago when we regressed back to dominance-behaviour, just like our ancient ape ancestors.

Coaching and facilitating are not mysterious ‘dark arts’ which should remain inaccessible to the many.

We’ve been doing it for thousands of years and it is very much a part of our everyday conversations. Let’s stop with the barriers to entry, the increasing BS associated with ‘institutions’ and get back to being creatively collaborative so we can solve our present challenges before it’s too late.

I’m now a rebel with a cause.

If you want to learn the tools of eco-leadership such as eco-coaching and ecological decisioning, I run one day workshop retreats by the side of Rudyard Lake in Staffordshire.

I teach people who’re interested in learning how to lead in a more human and ecological way, how to make ecological decisions, facilitate inclusive group-meetings and eco-coach each other. A qualification doesn’t make you a better leader or coach, commitment to a practice does.

Or I can travel to you if there is a group who are interested as there will be less pollution on travelling.

It’s useful for anybody but especially coaches, facilitators, leaders and the mavericks, rebels and misfits who’re challenging the status-quo. If you want to know more connect with me on LinkedIn or below and I’ll send you more information.

Best wishes

Murph

www.martinmurphy.coach

Instagram: ecocoachmurph

#redefinesuccess

#clarifywhatmatters

#campfireconversations

#coaching

#ecocoaching

#leadership

#ecology

#collaboration

#creativity

#smallteamsmakethedreamwork

The winners of this paradigm are not going to save the world.

Posted on by Martin Murphy

They’ve no interest in doing so. they’re okay.

There’s little point trying to persuade them either, but what is crucial, is to not be duped into thinking, that they’re going to save the planet’s biosphere OR create social justice.

They just want to appease you long enough until they reach retirement age.

If you’re stuck in a goldfish bowl swimming around in a system of inequality, hierarchy, capitalism, tax avoidance, corprotocracy, corrupt politicians, then how is swimming in a different direction going to help?

You’ve got to look at the systems and challenge the system by building new pathways to a brave new world.

You’ve got to get out of the Goldfish bowl and swim in the uncharted oceans of possibility.

Not easy I know!

#leadership #teamwork #community #systemsthinking #paradigmshifting

DEAD vs LIFE Leadership

Posted on by Martin Murphy

Dr Kathy Allen made many excellent points when I spoke to her about her work at the intersection of leadership, system change and innovation.

One point was that old paradigms get really ‘loud’ before they fall. I noticed that in 2008 with the last bank crash. Paradigm winners get really greedy as they try to exploit as much as possible before the collapse, because they know they’re not going to be able to keep extracting so ruthlessly for much longer.

I’ve noticed it this time as well. Disaster capitalism loves war and now pandemics because again, the crony politicians and greedy corporates have ruthlessly exploited the situation. There would be no wars if there was no profit. More and more research is being uncovered to show that our earlier ancestors didn’t engage in war until hierarchy and exploitation became the main drivers of colonialism.

This leads to another well-made point by Kathy.

People are often coming up with ‘types’ of leadership such as adaptive, transactional and transformational.

Business owners and managers are often taught them on institutional leadership programmes.

These ‘types’ reflect people’s personalities and/or they described what was happening at a certain time and place in history.

You usually find that ‘great’ leaders emerged from society to overcome the challenge that society was facing i.e., they were the right person, with the right skills and attitude, at the right time and place.

When that time passes, we then find there is another type of leadership required and invented.

Kathy suggested a new way of describing leadership.

How about describing the outcomes of traditional leadership such as polluting, exploitative, cronyism or, as Kathy described, leadership that ‘makes places unliveable’.

At the end of the day, leadership is leading to our demise or it is liberating and life affirming.

#leadership #leaders #regeneration #society #climatechange #socialjustice #sustainabilityleadership #sustainability #businessowners #change

Fascinating talk here: https://youtu.be/8-9fX2uX9hY

3 Types of Mindset

Posted on by Martin Murphy

Mindset differs for mavericks, rebels and change agents.

Mostly people are limited by the economic, political, social, academic and philosophical boxes they grew up in.

Some people can think outside the box, but they ask permission of the box.

Through fate or enlightened insight, there are those who can see the matrix of the box and want to find a socially just, sustainable and spiritually fulfilling alternative well outside the influence of the box…But not on Mars!

#elon #eliteidiots

#stoicpilgrim

#stoicpilgrimphilosophy

#robust

#resilience

#mindset

#mentalhealth

#survivalskillsforlife

#doingwhatsrightnotwhatseasy

#adventure

#alwaysalittlefurther

#redefinesuccess

Adam Smith, the grandfather of capitalism said:

Posted on by Martin Murphy

“Concern for our own happiness (self interest) recommends to us the virtue of prudence (self-command), concern for that of other people, the virtues of justice and beneficence –- of which the one restrains us from hurting, the other prompts … (us) to promote that happiness.”

He didn’t intend for some people to become extremely wealthy at the expense of everyone else and everything else including nature.

Much like the stoic emperor Marcus Aurelius, Smith believed in the virtue of moderation because it threatens our social structure and the capacity for effective decision-making when you confuse wealth and power with wisdom.

Unfortunately, economists seem to have taken what benefits elites and ignored the warnings for excess.

How will business leaders operate in a future world which can no longer accept simplistic and short term thinking, decision-making and hierarchy?

#power #happiness #leadership #ecologycheck #decisionmaking #decisionmakingskills #complexity #future #business #superteamconcept

Don’t Be a CAD Leader!

Posted on by Martin Murphy

Unfortunately, the world of work and capitalism is driven by stressful neurotransmitters such as cortisol, adrenaline and dopamine.

Founders and Entrepreneurs have to be driven people when it comes to breaking new ground and competing for their place in the world.

Technology and processed foods need to be addictive and give you a ‘RUSH’ otherwise you’d probably get off your phones and go spend more time in nature and eat fresh local produce.

People who’re very competitive rise to the top of the food chain in hierarchical organisations. They get a rush from crushing the competition. Status and power give them that adrenaline and dopamine rush they crave but it triggers the stress hormone cortisol in those around them.

From a leadership perspective, this feels great for the leader but it can mean that an organisation is reliant on the leader to keep driving. After all, if you can get by as an employee doing the bare minimum so as not to irk the mansplaining chump at the top, then why not?

It just isn’t very satisfying to live under the rule of a CAD driven leader, is it?

I sat in a meeting not long ago with one such white male (there were two females in the room). He asked if he could give me some blunt feedback. “Sure” I replied, realising I shouldn’t have taken this meeting whilst recovering from a dose of flu!

As he pontificated the two females were silent. It was obvious he was getting his dose of CAD at my expense as he continued to ‘no-mark’ me.

After he ran out of steam he asked “So why do you want to work with us?” …. By that time, I didn’t.

Normally I’d have asked to give him back some feedback in return, but I was pretty drained by then and I knew it would have fallen on deaf ears.

Why should I compete with his ego to explain why he and his ‘world-class’ organisation suffered from simplistic thinking, He didn’t realise there was a difference between complicated and complex. He is materially successful selling old world ideas and style over substance because he’s great at competing for business.

We’re experiencing stressful times; we don’t need more trauma inducing leadership.

In a world of ambiguous and novel challenges, we need more self-aware, purpose focussed and supportive leaders who are open-minded and willing to learn collaboratively their way forward.

Leaders who don’t need to be rewarded with the rush of cortisol, adrenaline and dopamine at the expense of those around them.

#business #leadership #work #power #entrepreneurs #leader #complexity #traumainformed #leadership

 

Eco-Coaching – What is it? & Why the World Needs it Now!

Posted on by Martin Murphy

Like most ideas in life, people have various viewpoints on what terms mean and entail.

Eco-Coaching will be one of those too.

From my perspective eco-coaching can be utilised out in nature and if possible, should be for 4 reasons:

  • Whilst walking side-by-side in nature we begin to feel a level of connection, and as we exercise our legs and our lungs, we begin to release beneficial neurotransmitters. One in particular is Anandamide. Anandamide derives from the Sanskrit word for bliss and it opens our blood vessels allowing oxygen and nutrients to flow more easily around our body and brain. It also makes us more creative.
  • The natural world has 3.8 billion years of evolutionary wisdom embedded. Being amongst it allows a skilled coach to utilise examples of the natural world as a metaphor during the conversation.
  • We were designed to look over wide vistas, when we look at small screens and live in cubicles, it narrows our perspective and as a result our options.
  • It’s just an enjoyable and rejuvenating experience.

But that’s not the fundamental principle of eco-coaching in my view. At the moment humanity is out of balance with its own eco-system. This is because we’ve been using egological systems and ideologies at the expense of ecological ones.

In summary, the personal development field has been dominated by ‘What I think’ & ‘What I want’ over ‘What we think’ ‘What will the impacts be?’ & ‘What else could we do?’

We’ve built systems based on the mechanistic, linear and hierarchical ever since technological gave some bloke and advantage at the beginning of the agrarian revolution 13k years ago.

But in order to realise that, the winners of the simplistic paradigm have had to externalise all the messy costs onto the rest of society and the natural systems which support us.

It’s like some people have climbed a tree and are now cutting the tree behind themselves because they don’t want to share the fruits of the tree.

On the  Joseph Campbell called this:

‘The Refusal of the Return’

Using an ecology check in your coaching and decision-making means putting in a CRAP filter in the process:

Consequences: What are the other effects downstream of this decision?

Real costs: If you do this, what will be the real costs other than just financial?

Assumptions: What are you assuming to be true? What are the unexamined beliefs that require testing?

People & Planet: Do people really want to go to Mars? Does Mother Nature want us to destroy what’s left of the ecosystem and exploit children, just so that a small minority of the world’s population can travel in EVs?

 

What Hunter Gatherers – ‘The First Affluent – Society’ Can Teach Us About Surviving a Changing World Order!

Posted on by Martin Murphy

Ray Dalio the famous investor said it’s a good idea to look back into history to understand and predict the future. It’s an insightful talk (I’ll leave a link in the comments) in which Ray outlines the various changes to world orders that happen around every 250 years (not 500 as I say in the video) and if we want to stop the downfall of the west as China increases it’s power & influence, then we’d better be nice to each other and not spend as much as we earn!

I think whilst his analysis is excellent and solutions useful, it doesn’t take into account the evolutionary aspect of why the human race is heading towards an ecological collapse. It’s dominance hierarchy.

It seems that as soon as founders, entrepreneurs & managers get positions of status, wealth & power, then they switch-on their ‘Inner Chump’.

Your inner chump is competitive and controlling, harmful to the ecosystem, because it is driven by unconscious bias, motivated by fear & greed and paradigm blind and suffers inertia to change.

The hunter gatherers it appears, have the answer. They don’t stand for greedy indivduals because they understand the damage it does. Damage that’s all too plain to see in our leaders. Have a watch: