Episode 40

craving water

If we all discount our own power, then we forget that if we all act together, things can change. It is now on us to alter ourselves to recognize the interdependent web that we are a part of, engaging with all of those people to ask the question: what are we going to do? How are we going to be different? Who do we know who can make an even bigger difference? How can we collectively make a bigger difference? This is all about using your power, my power, our power- for good.

Recorded September 19, 2022.

Transcript
Leela Sinha:

I am craving rain. and Puerto Rico and Pakistan are

Leela Sinha:

drowning. There's something wrong here. And it's not just

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the climate, although the climate cannot be discounted.

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But the problem is more than that more than the imbalance, it

Leela Sinha:

is the utter disregard for the collective awareness of our

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collective existence. We cannot not be aware, that is not

Leela Sinha:

possible our human brains don't do that. We can, however, choose

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not to engage, not to interact, not to be part of that

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awareness. Not to allow that awareness to creep into the

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backs of our brains not to allow that awareness to keep us awake

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at night not to allow that awareness to affect our

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investing choices, our business choices, our building choices,

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we can't allow that. And it seems that people are, it seems

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that people do it seems that we might have a problem. Because

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people are doing that a lot. People are making space for

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themselves at the expense of others an awful lot. There's

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this rush of investment in Puerto Rico right now. People

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want to invest, but they don't want to invest in like giving

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Puerto Rico an independent, but government run infrastructure

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for their electrical grid, so it won't all go down at once.

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Instead, what they want to do is snap up land or property at a

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low price, so that then when Puerto Rico is rebuilt, they own

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wealth, at the expense of the people who have lived there this

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whole time. That's not good business practice that's not

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using your power for good. It puts a foul taste in my mouth.

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It disgusts me. And I wish it disgusted more people than that.

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Puerto Rico and Pakistan are drowning. And it's going to take

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months if not years, to bring them back even to the state that

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they were in before the flooding started. And we know that we are

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entering an era of more flood and more drought at the same

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time. I myself sat in my comfortable home and watched

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thick rain clouds whiz right by. Microclimates are a blessing.

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Sometimes microclimates are a curse, we need the rain, we need

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the water, we need the thing that connects us all. That

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center, that base of life, we need it. But we do not need it

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in the ways that it drowns places, we do not need it in a

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way that it impacts poor and marginalized areas more than

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wealthy areas. We do not need the thing that it does, where it

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augments the imbalance of power. And the only people who can

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change how that works are the people who have power. Now most

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of the people that I know who own businesses own tiny

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businesses own small businesses, and apparently, we are in the

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majority. The vast majority of businesses have very few

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employees. Have very few contractors, are mostly a

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bootstrap, and a shoestring and an idea and a passion. But if we

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all discount our own power, then we forget that if we all act

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together, things can change.

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We can change how the world is as these tiny little pieces of

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the world. I am not the first person to point this out. But

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one mosquito in your bedroom at night can ruin an entire eight

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hours of sleep. It doesn't take much. But it does take engaging.

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We have to engage. We have to engage and engaging at that

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level begins with engaging with our people. It begins with

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engaging with each other. It begins with having these

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conversations out loud as though they are normal because if they

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are not yet they need to be. It begins with engaging with the

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people over whom we have the most direct influence. Some of

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those people are our contractors and our employees. Some of those

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people are our customers. Some of those people are our

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families. Some of those people are our neighbors, all of those

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people engaging with all of those people to ask the

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question, what are we going to do? How are we going to be

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different? Who do we know who can make an even bigger

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difference? How can we collectively make a bigger

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difference? Because the thing that's keeping me up at night is

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the way that everything feels like it's sliding downhill at

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once. Mudslides are also the effect of water. Where I come

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from in New England, we have fewer of those because

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underneath the mud, underneath the pile of dirt, is rock. And

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rock requires a different timescale to be altered by

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water. But here in this part of the West Coast. The hills are

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just piles of dirt, there's nothing under them. There's no

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structure, there's nothing keeping them there. They're like

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slightly damp sand dunes. And a lot of water can send them

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sliding off, reconfiguring, rearranging. That's fine. That

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is the world we live in that is this terrain. That is the living

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landscape. And also, and also, how are we going to live in

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concert with this living landscape that we have partially

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made? How are we going to be leaders in that change? Instead

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of taking it as a dominion that we are supposed to alter? It is

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now on us to alter ourselves to recognize the interdependent web

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that we are a part of. And to engage with that web in a

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sustainable way. Sustainable for all of us. I'm not saying we

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should sacrifice massive numbers of human lives just because the

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way that we're living now doesn't work. But what are we

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going to do? What are we going to do? We have to begin by

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recognizing that as a leader of a business, we influence all of

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the lives of the people who work with and for us, who buy our

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product or our services. And figure out how to make that even

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more humane even more just.

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I saw a TkTok

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Yes, I'm on TikTok, and no, I don't make videos, I just watch.

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I saw a TikTok about an autistic-friendly city that was

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being kind of crowd imagined by this person and all of their

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followers. And the person just rattled off a list of features.

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And by the end, both I and one of my partners, were crying. To

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imagine living in a city with that kind of environment with

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that kind of culture with that kind of support. We can imagine

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what could be better than what we are doing now imagine first

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and then work backwards to how we're going to do it. That's our

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strength as intensives. And that's our strength as founders.

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We know how to start with a vision and work backwards to the

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mechanics instead of starting with what we already know and

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believe and think is possible and working forward to what we

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think we can do from here. That old way just gets you breeding

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better horses the new way, gets you cars. Now, I know cars are

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not the fantastic 100% perfect thing that we all wish they

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were.

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But we have to

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imagine first. So we need to be imagining first, what kind of a

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work environment would be so good. What kind of a life would

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be so good, what kind of people would be so good, what kind of

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international relations would be so good that we would be

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delighted that we would be joyful that we would feel like

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we had all the extra mental and emotional capacity we needed to

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imagine something even even more delightful, even more caring,

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even more interconnected.

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What do we need to do

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you to take care of all the people on the planet? And how do

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we start with our own organizations, our own

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microcosms? California, California is moving towards

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socialized medicine. We keep expanding the state paid health

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care system, and involving inviting more people into it. I

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am so excited about this, not because I live in California,

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although also that, but because I want the places that I live to

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use the resources that we have. And this state has tremendous

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resources to model what is possible. We are so large, our

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economy is bigger than some countries' economies. We have

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the means and the tools and the structure to model what

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socialized medicine could look like in the United States. And

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so we're doing it. That's what I want each of our companies to do

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figure out what we can model what we can show off. Is it a

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four day work week? Is it better pay? Is it better working

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environment? Is it something even bigger? What can we do that

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will ripple outwards and show what is possible and

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collectively put pressure on larger organizations, companies

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and governments to

Leela Sinha:

behave differently so that nobody is drowning?

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Leela Sinha