Episode 32

one-legged table

We are made to be interconnected. We are made to rely on each other, which means we need other people around us. We fall down when we become too reliant on our individualism because being an individual is like being a table with only one leg.

Transcript
Leela Sinha:

Sometimes everything is just hard and

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there's no way over or around it, you just have to go through

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it. Like that kid's song that some of us grew up with, you

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know, there's no way over it, there's no way around it. Well,

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here we are. And sometimes everything at once is just hard.

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And it's in those moments that we are most particularly

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vulnerable to making bad ethical calls. Because everything is

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hard and our systems are scrambling for survival. Our

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systems are scrambling for a break, for a space, for any

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opening, for a way up out of this valley that just seems to

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go on forever. And sometimes, it seems like the only way we're

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ever going to get out is if we step on someone's head. Or if we

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crush that completely irreplaceable plant. Or if we

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drive stakes into a wall of rock that's been there for millennia.

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We've got to get out, we've got to get out, we've got to get

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out. And so we do whatever we have to do to get out and there

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is a certain amount of survival. And there's a certain kind of

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survival that we need. And so we go after it in any way we can,

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there are thresholds of survival where almost anything is

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justified. But we tend to think that we're in those corners long

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before we are especially if we're intensives, especially if

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we feel everything at all-or-nothing levels.

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Especially, especially if other people are also relying on us,

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if other things are also riding on us. If we're in the public

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eye. If we're in leadership roles, it's really, really easy

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to think that things are at survival pitch before they are.

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That things are at "anything justifies this" before they are.

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It's really easy to let Machiavelli run the show. But

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this is not Machiavelli's theatre, this is life. And

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sometimes we need to tell him to take a seat. So what do we do?

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If the ends do not justify the means? What we do if what we

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think is a survival question is actually more of a "this would

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be much easier if I didn't have to do this" question. How? How

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do we take our power and turn it to the good when we are the ones

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under stress? Well, the good news is, the good news is that

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we get to use our own judgment. And the bad news is also we get

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to use our own judgment. That judgment that is impaired by the

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fact that we're under stress, that we might think that it's

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more of a crisis than it actually is, that we don't

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exactly have the perspective we need, which is why, which is why

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we have other people in our lives, which is why we have

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other leaders in our organizations, which is why we

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ask around, but probably not on Facebook or LinkedIn. We ask

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around, but we have to ask people who get it, people we

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trust. And that doesn't always mean people who are doing the

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exact same thing we are from inside the company. Sometimes it

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means someone who has known us longer, it seems, than time

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itself and can look straight through our bullshit. And

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sometimes it means someone who can embrace us and tell us it's

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going to be okay. And sometimes it means someone who can look

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through the emotion to the logic because sometimes the logic is

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what we need. And sometimes it's someone who has better intuition

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than we do and can look straight through the numbers to the

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truth. But almost always, it's someone outside of ourselves.

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They say it's lonely at the top. And it's true. It's hard to find

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the right person or the right cadre of people. It's hard to

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gather that group and keep it tight. Everybody has stresses,

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everybody has things that take them away, just at the moment

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that you need them most. Everybody is trying to do a

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little more than they can or they should, because nobody else

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can do it. Because that's the state of the world right now.

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And everybody is simultaneously fighting that impulse in order

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to keep ourselves afloat, so that we can in fact help to

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float others. It's complicated, it is not easy. And it's not

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really something you can always explain to people who are not in

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that position themselves.

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I don't blame people who don't want to be in that position. But

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I can't imagine choosing to be anywhere else except that

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position even when it's desperately uncomfortable, even

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when I hate it, even when I'm just sitting there at my desk at

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my computer, wishing that being a barista paid better. Wishing

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that my biggest problem was whether or not I was going to

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make all of the coffees correctly that day. I almost

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certainly would not, I would be a terrible barista, you do not

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want me making your coffee. I don't even drink coffee. But

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sometimes I long for the apparent simplicity of a

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straightforward job with a thing that you produce that everybody

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knows they want. I know it's not that simple. I know it's not

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that easy. I know at least one of the people in my circle runs

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a coffee shop. And she would almost certainly tell me that it

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is not that easy. But here we are. Here we are backed into a

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corner trying to figure out if it's a real corner. Or if it's

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an illusion, if we really have no choices, or if we just can't

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figure out what those choices are. And that's why we need

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somebody else. That's why we need each other. Sometimes

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everything is just hard. And sometimes the reason it all

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seems harder than it needs to be is because we have been raised

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in this culture of hyper individualism. If you're in the

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West, it doesn't really matter what your sub cultural context

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was. Because outside of that sub cultural context, there is the

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bigger soup. And the bigger soup, this world of

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entrepreneurship, the dominant cultural space, emphasizes so

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much individualism, that we fall down. We fall down regularly

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because being an individual is like being a table with just one

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leg. It's ridiculous. It's ridiculous. It's, it's not a

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pedestal, we don't have a broad base to help. If we had a broad

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base, we would have a community, if we had more than one leg, we

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would have close friends and family. And we do, sort of. But

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somehow there's this valorization of getting it all

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right all by yourself all on your own, no help, no help, no

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help, you shouldn't need help you shouldn't- And it's

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bullshit. We all need help. We are made to be interconnected.

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We are made to be interdependent. That is how our

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brains work. That is how our biochemistry works. That is how

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our bodies work. We are made to be connected. We are made to

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rely on each other, which means we need other people around us.

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Who can tell us when we're trying to operate like a table

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Leela Sinha