Earlier this week, best-selling author and master blogger Seth Godin wrote a blog post entitled “lessons from very tiny businesses.” The last line of the post was “just be human” referring to the essential lesson he derived from the stories of several small businesses.

In my web radio interview with leadership consultant Cheryl Esposito, which will air in the next couple of weeks, we landed on similar terrain, and at one point Cheryl observed that idea of “just being human” is just good common sense.

Yesterday I had a delightful conversation with Norman Wolfe of Quantum Leaders, Inc, who is part of an emerging group of business people explicitly organizing around the idea of spirituality in business, which, when he articulated it, sounded like “let’s just be human” and apply our humanity with the systems and processes of business to create conscious businesses.

“Just be human” is the principle message of Working for Good: Making a Difference While Making a Living, and my principle mantra at work. Part of that message is a call to cultivate the skills for becoming more human – at work and in general – and apply all of your humanity, which includes, among other things, awareness, the full spectrum of your intelligence, and the ability to connect and co-create with others.

I firmly believe that if a great number of people simply approached work as a forum to “just be human” together and to co-create products, services, and businesses that embodied and served humanity, the world would quickly become a healthier, happier place for millions if not billions of people, and would continue to become ever more so.

"When the dust settles from this Armageddon, the only companies left standing are going to be the ones that stand for something that improves people’s lives.” ~ Roy Spence

Purpose is the essential, core, single underlying or overriding reason we move, as individuals and organizations. It is the big “why” underlying what we do. On the most basic biological level, we may be driven to survive and reproduce, yet that is hardly the purpose of our existence. In the words of Ed Freeman, author of the stakeholder model of business management, “We need red blood cells to live (the same way a business needs profits to live), but the purpose of life is not to make red blood cells (the same way the purpose of business is not to exist to make profits).”

Purpose is an activating, motivating, and animating force. It is what moves us to get up in the morning to dive into life with our full being. Purpose sustains us when times get tough, and serves as a guiding star when we stray off course.

Purpose is one of the three core principles of Conscious Business™ as articulated by John Mackey and Conscious Capitalism, Inc (aka FLOW). Knowing and embodying our purpose focuses our business’s products, services, and processes toward goals larger than just making money.

Purposeful people build purposeful companies. And purposeful people make an impact through whatever their work or role may be.

Jim Collins, author of the bestselling Built to Last and Good to Great, defines purpose as a company’s fundamental reason for being—its soul. In It’s Not What You Sell, It’s What You Stand For, Roy Spence Jr. and Haley Rushing tell great stories of the power of purpose in the success of clients like Southwest Airlines (to democratize the airways: “Freedom to Fly”), Wal-Mart (to save people money so they can live better: “Save Money, Live Better”), and BMW (to enable people to experience the joy of driving: “Sheer Driving Pleasure”). Great companies with the most significant impact and influence invariably have clear and compelling purposes.

The same is true for great beings!

“This is the true joy in life—the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being a force of nature instead of a feverish selfish clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.... Life is no “brief candle” to me. It is sort of a splendid torch, which I have a hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it over to future generations.” ~ George Bernard Shaw

LINKS

It’s Not What You Sell, It’s What You Stand For

The High Purpose Company by Christine Arena

Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren

Thoreau wrote: "Though I do not believe a plant will spring up where no seed has been, I have great faith in a seed. Convince me that you have a seed there, and I am prepared to expect wonders."

This week was filled with the wonder of emergence and great reinforcement for having faith in seeds. In this spirit, I spent a good part of the week holding space for, facilitating and witnessing a process of deep healing between colleagues both reflecting and informing the transformation of an organization. While at times I may be more inclined to “try to make things work” or to intermediate, as my faith in emergence increases, I do less of this (and less pushing or trying to control) and focus on how can I tap into the emergent possibilities and create conditions to foster their manifestation.

This same awareness is deeply informing how I approach the “marketing” of my new book, Working for Good: Making a Difference While Making a Living. When I was marketing Private Music, Yanni, Spinning, Seeds of Change, ChiRunning, among other things, I was informed by my understanding that marketing is a process of cultivating relationships, and relationships are emergent processes. Thus, in marketing Working for Good I need to show up for the exploration of relationship and put forth what I have to offer to the relationship (in this case, the book), then it is up to others to relate to and respond to the offer, or not. Offering blog posts reflecting my experience and insights, writing articles, engaging in interviews, presenting at conferences, and delivering Working for Good engagement experiences at bookstores are all part of the process of showing up, and presenting my offer. The next step is up to others – to receive it or not. And from there, the process continues, as dialogues with people who have read the book are already leading to other things.

I find this orientation of embracing emergence, versus driving towards a specific goal, to be highly satisfying, full of delight, and fruitful – as in producing significant results.

Not that emergence is always easy or stress-free – on the contrary. But trying to control or push for a specific outcome is at least as challenging if not more so, yet lacks the ease, grace, and flow of emergence.

You can’t pull the leaves of a plant and make it grow faster or differently from its nature, but you can understand its potential and needs, and create the conditions for optimal growth.

So, we can ask ourselves “what does this situation need for its emergence to unfold?” And in the answer, find right action.

I had a very strange experience Thursday. At some point during the day, I picked up my iPhone to make a call, and staring at me were the words “Nothing is undone” with no attribution to a sender of this text message. I quickly unlocked the phone to see who sent it and what else, if anything, they wrote. I found nothing – no message, no sender. I called a friend who had recently sent me a text to ask if she had sent it. She hadn’t. Goose bumps.

This passage from the Tao te Ching flashed across my mind’s eye, especially the lines “When nothing is done, Nothing is left undone.”

In the pursuit of knowledge,
Every day something is added.
In the practice of the Tao,
Every day something is dropped.
Less and less do you need to force things,
Until finally you arrive at non-action.
When nothing is done,
Nothing is left undone.

True master can be gained
By letting things go their own way.
It can’t be gained by interfering.

Tao te Ching # 48

While I am careful not to jump to conclusions, I could take this message as a reminder that, while doing is necessary to getting things done, being and not-doing are even more essential, especially if the doing is done with pushing or forcing. Things have a mysterious way of working, without us having to “make them happen.” We can participate in the process (watering plants, adding fuel to fires, providing useful information, etc), but we don’t need to make them happen.

And, in a larger sense, in some way, everything is perfect the way it is and nothing really needs to be done, but that’s another story!

One of my daughter, Meryl Fé’s first words and one of the most important lessons her mother Margaret Jane taught her was “done” and, with it, the concept of boundaries.

I remember when it first began. Meryl Fé was about ten months old and beginning to eat solid food. As MJ would feed her and get to the point where Meryl Fé turned her head away from the spoon (rather than gobbling it) MJ would ask “Done?” Then she would approach with the spoon again and, when Meryl Fé turned her head again, MJ would pronounce with great energy “DONE!”

It didn’t take long before Meryl Fé added “DONE!” to her vocabulary – it was one of her first ten words.

I remember an event about six months later which clearly demonstrated that Meryl Fé had learned the lesson well. We were visiting my parents in Pennsylvania and I was putting Meryl Fé to bed one night. My 6’ 2” 200+ pound father was at the foot of the bed making faces and otherwise putting on a show, when all of a sudden, 15-month old Meryl Fé looked up at him and proclaimed “DONE!”

I have never (before or since) witnessed anyone stop my father in his tracks as completely and immediately as Meryl Fé did with that one word and the way she declared it. Pop stopped dead in his tracks, stuttered a “dddone?” said goodnight, and left the room.

I was floored and thrilled as I witnessed this profoundly important recognition and skill deeply embodied by Meryl Fé at such a young age, when most adults I know haven’t come close to mastering this one.

I won’t elaborate here, as the story speaks for itself. But I will add that, I continue to explore the idea of “DONE!” for myself and to support others to do the same, and I encourage you to recognize when you permit people to cross the line with you when you really want to say “DONE!” or “STOP!” or whatever equivalent word is the appropriate message.

Clear boundaries are essential to healthy relationships – with oneself and others.

Yours in Working for Good,

Jeff