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Tag Archives: Maya Angelou

Unicorns, Humanity & the Voices of our Redemption

23 Tuesday Apr 2019

Posted by Thin Air Factory in Uncategorized

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Abrahamic Faits, Anthropomorphism, Christianity, CofE, David Attenborough, Disney, Donald Trump, Genetic Science, God, Goodness, Islam, John Denver, judaism, Maya Angelou, Michelle Obama, Morgan Freeman, Mother Theresa, Oprah, POTUS, Toy Story, Unicorns

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We are funny.

We’ve spent thousands of years navigating the theologically and intellectually boulder strewn path from the pagan arts and necromancy of the darker older world through proscribed religions to finally arrive at a what we think is a mostly enlightened secular state unfettered from the domain of Church and the blind abstractions of the Faiths they vaunt.

And in doing so we have notionally put most other faiths in the same hell-bound handcart on which we dumped our own spirituality.  This is not necessarily always a disrespectful or dismissive pursuit, though the “My Books better, older and more profound than your Book/Scroll/Tablet” sociopathic bullshit of the more bellicose monotheistic religions might make it seem otherwise.

We tend to quite favour religions other than the one’s we are born into. Vast quantities of westerners raised as goodly Christian and Jewish children have embraced other faiths. We’ve had a good old roll in the karmic hay with all forms of Buddhism recently, and plundered some rather shiny variations on an existing religious theme – Kabbalah for instance – courtesy of Madge and a few A Listers.

But certainly in the predominantly Christianity rooted West, bar the odd few tens of thousands of God fearing Commie hunting, Koran burning, Gay baiting, Abortion stoning, Feminist damning, 21st Century hating, gun totin’ rootin’ tootin’ yihaws; some fiery Baptists; and a clutch of die-hard papal purple purists with a fist full of dollars and an incense ball and chain keeping the dream alive in most of Middle and South America, western religion is broadly redundant intellectually speaking other than as a point of plane to pivot and lever off. 

It has become a vestigial spiritual tail – a divine obsolescence from our millennia in the metaphysically charged dark forests and the last three thousand years under the auspices of ‘pick an Abrahamic Faith, any Abrahamic Faith.’

But in doing so, we never really think through the contingency and legacy planning. Mostly we lean on Science as the replacement – the thing that will fill the void left by what has gone. Bt that is to assume that everyone responds in a non metaphysical left brain attenuated manner in times of distress and duress.

So where do we look to these days when all the dark truths of our humanity hove into view? Where do we cast our eyes when our profligate destruction of the beauty of the planet we inhabit overwhelm us and the darker recesses of our human psyche demonstrate themselves in brutality, cruelty, rape, torture, murder, genocide and war?

Morgan Freeman.

Yes. Morgan Freeman.

In the absence of God, many multiple thousands of us look in reverence and seek reassurance from the 81 year old son of a teacher and America actor and star of Shawshank Redemption fame.

OK. To be fair, the substitute religious reverence things is a little muddy here. Morgan has ‘played God’ which might confuse many – and in a far less destructive way than most of his species and more importantly his gender.  But there is something more about him than his Oscar and nominations and  loose, white, open shirted God performances might predict.

Morgan Freeman’s voice alone can salve the most anxious heart and fevered brow. 

Something I called the Morgan Freeman Effect, when discussing how one might make a film that helps patients to relax and perhaps focus of take in information in the midst of being told some very distressing, complex and frightening news rooted in genetic science. Bring Morgan Freeman into the room and into that moment to pop the bubble:

Morgan: Hey…

Patient: hey…

Morgan: Now…you’re not really listening to what that smart doctor lady’s saying are you?

Patient: No

Morgan: Kind of confused and scared?

Patient: I’m really scared.

Morgan: What say you and me take a walk and just talk – about anything – your favourite John Denver song – favourite Toy Story Character? I don’t care. Anythings fine with me.

Patient: OK then.

And with that, most of us would mostly probably get up out of our chair in that Medical Consultant Specialists room and take a walk with Morgan. With no rational reason for doing so.

His calming modulated tones and open expressive and gentle face are a modern human phenomena.  It is a form of gift – one that is hard to explain in our hard edged data fuelled rationally obsessed world.

There is the sense of everything is going to be OK while Morgan is in the world.

In that way he is remarkable. In that way he is no different to the Unicorns of myth, whom some believe to be a sign of the world being in balance – and their death or absence being indicative of the world tipping toward the dark.

And in Unicorn terms I am most assuredly referring to the horsey single horn mythological creature type as opposed to the over blown silicon valley algorithmically charged frothy Investment stock type of the new digital world order.

Granted – Unicorns can make many people respond with anything from a bluster to an outright screech of derision, and, if the following answer to the question Are Unicorns real? posted on answers.com were to be taken at face value no-one would want to be identified as a believer in any kind of Unicorn:

Actually if you are christian you should know that they did exist well the story begins back with the story of Noah’s ark see the animals were going on the ship but the unicorns just stayed there and played and Noah couldn’t get them aboard so he had to leave them to drown. but many people think (including me) that the unicorn still lives somewhere possibly on an island because unicorns are magical nothing will stop them.

But saying that [and someone really did], lets take this in the spirit in which it is meant. AKA just go with me on this for a minute.

Unicorns represent a sacred creature to whom the prospect, balance and spiritual well being of the world are inextricably attached. Unicorns merely by their presence predict good things – even the briefest glimpse of them augurs a world where good prevails.

On that basis, Morgan Freeman is a Unicorn for millions of people – in that his presence in the world offers us a sense of salve and reassurance. But thankfully for him, he is not alone.

Another of our Unicorns is David Attenborough. One of the most remarkable creatures we share this planet with. His one man crusade to bring the truths and beauty of the natural world to bear across millions of screens in millions of homes is a staggering act of will and craft.

That he creates such compelling and mesmeric filmic storytelling without the sickly sweet confection of Anthropomorphism favoured by Disney et al is even more remarkable. 

Unlike Morgan Freeman, David Attenborough carries the added hindrance to his fantastical mythical Unicorn status of being a die-hard sharp-cornered scientist rooted wholly in the rational world. There isn’t even a whiff of the spiritual about Mr Attenborough. [Even if there was, I sense it would be a be of the swift-5-minutes-of-High-Church-C-of-E-chapel variety, with a cup of tea and a slice of cake in the sacristy to smooth out the God wrinkles in it all.]

But none the less, there he is: the voice of such superior human vantage, such purview, creature insight, expansive understanding and natural intimacy that grown men and women almost weep when they hear him, and people clamour to be near him in much the same way they would pilgrimage to touch the sleeve of their most revered prophets sages and saintly personae.  

Now, is this a male dominated domain, like some throw back to a paternalistic misogynist church or medieval men and their power lusts?

Nope. Oprah is right up there for me on the runway to Unicorn. And Michele Obama [though sadly not the next POTUS – but how we pray!!] is also a Unicorn in waiting.

And death will not silence the Unicorn, however sad its coming. Maya Angelou, though gone from this mortal coil has [and I use the present tense knowingly] a similar effect – her words and recordings chiming the zenith of our humanity and the depth of our feeling in such a way as to give people succour and support and bolster them for what life may bring. She is alive in, with and through them. 

Equally I cite the saintly phenomena that was Mother Theresa, even with all of her subsequently revealed peculiarities and sharpness [who wouldn’t be consumed and sharpened by witnessing and carrying so much suffering].  

So I’d like to give a small ‘praise be‘ on this Easter Sunday, and say, in the increasing absence of any kind of faith in advanced cultures, let alone Abrahamic ones, and in the face of the staggering circus act of hubris currently being demonstrated by left brain reasoning and a blind faith in science knowing all, thank deity for Unicorns in all of their wondrous being.

Something tells me that, as more fires and floods ravage, as more religious fundamentalists scour and murder, and as the pillaging self interest of corporatism supported by the likes of the straw haired idiot to the West continue to thrive, we’ll need as many of them as we can get. 

storytellers, trust & the power of simple sincerities.

02 Wednesday Apr 2014

Posted by Thin Air Factory in Uncategorized

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Tags

Caring about what people care about, changing the language of sustainability, Commercial & Civic Alignment, Copenhagen Film Company, Corporate Integrity, Credentials, Emotion vs. Reason, Intellect worn lightly, Mads Ovlisen, Maya Angelou, people Powered Change, Setting the Agenda, Stakeholder power, storytelling, Sustainability Pillars, Tone Of Voice, Trust. Sustainable Strategy, UNGC

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I watched a film today. A discrete film. An understated film. A short film.

No popcorn. No slash cut dash glut editing. No highly confected verite cutaways. No corporate schlock horror probe. No desperately arch atavistic activist paddling in their own propaganda.

The film, by the Copenhagen Film Company, focused all of its attention on one man.

The camera is unwavering. A set up shot. A few discernible cuts. One push in. Otherwise, clean, clinical and respectful of the subject.

Sitting in a sparse elevated office, we see incidentally through the window behind the subject that life relentlessly trammels on behind and below, regardless of us and our elevated conversations.

The man, Mads Ovlisen, a Senior Advisor at the United Nations Global Compact, speaks of running sustainable businesses. He speaks of the UNGC, committed to setting the agenda and aligning policy around sustainability issues – Energy, Water, Agriculture, Renewables, Food, Transportation, Building and Pharmaceuticals: most every pillar and issue one might ever imagine turning up on a company’s sustainability strategy slide.

He speaks of a discrete yet powerful stakeholder group who collectively make astonishing impacts in the world through their brands and businesses. He speaks of how much fortitude it takes to merge civil and corporate interests.

The man speaks of things that still fall far from the ears or the offices of the average Brand Jonny or Jane (and probably far from their frame of reference or, to be blunt, self interest). Though, to be fair, they would I hope understand the emotion that the film evoked in me.

Maya Angelou’s exposition on the transformative power of emotion versus reason – “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel”-  is a powerful philosophical sound bite for an ad man or woman looking to do more creative and insightful storytelling.

It is one I respect, as I do spend most of my time seeking to make very complex things simple through creative story telling.

But the storytelling here is not some confected theme or hashtag slogan mantra being played out. The storytelling here is in the nature of the Storyteller.

It is not the dry content of his words that I particularly remember: though there is one axial moment in his discourse that did fix itself in my memory.

“This is about how a company makes its money, not about how it spends it”

The scintillating simplicity of the statement enables one to view a company’s resilience strategy with a powerful philosophical clarity.

If a company finds that its focus resides in the first part of the phrase – the pursuit of a more sustainable business becomes seemingly infused with a richer seam of intentions – of purpose beyond profit, ethical perspectives and corporate morality – and it gives a clear measure of the degree of humanity that might be enshrined within that company.

If the focus is on the second part, then the company errs on the side of rational efficiencies and economies and smart procurement – potent and very very necessary but a far less compelling and more importantly far less desirable mantra in attracting the right people towards that company.

The reason why this subtle difference is or should be so important to companies is rooted in the part of their resilience strategy that demands best possible future talent be attracted in to the business.

I sense that the leadership and purpose at play in the first shading is vastly more attractive to Millennials than the second, which suddenly feels quite ’90s Business School in comparison.

Its not about which one is right or wrong. It is about which one is more powerful and compelling: and fit for the purpose. And though the ability to sustain itself financially is paramount and primary to any business’s success, its ability to relentlessly and profitably attract best in class new and enlightened talent has to be the only strategy for purposeful future growth and stability.

As I have said, for me, though powerful, it is not ultimately this axiom that made me ‘feel’ something to remember beyond the words. It was the man that I found more compelling. He was the story. The storyteller as the living embodiment of the story he tells.

It was not what he was saying so much as how he said it: his demeanour in the telling.

Simply put, his easy intelligence held lightly, the fixedness and the quiet purpose of his delivery were what drew me in. His eyes and his voice where in some ways hypnotic. A ruse perhaps the cynics might say. Or is he just another modulated technocrat? Maybe.

But the simple fact for me is that his demeanour, delivery and my sense of the integrity of his intention created license for me to find his arguments both authentic and trustworthy.

I would go and listen to him speak again. I WANT to find out more of what’s in his head and heart. And therein lies the emotional killer insight.

Why is this so compelling to me?

Having spent a large amount of time around the professional cabal of the sustainability world and the consultancies that advise them, I find the thing this man seemed to hold within him all too often surprisingly lacking in the room.

I realize now that the sustainability scene is populated with the same kind of politicking sociopaths and psychopaths as the financial and advertising worlds that the sustainability crowd so often deride. A realisation which to be fair simply throws a sharp light on my naivety.

The messianic fervor of righteousness is never far away. One need only scratch a little to find it. This should at best be a powerful driver towards a success. But all to often it can equally become blinded and corrupted by its own sense of righteousness and lose sight of all that it has consistently fought for

I said once that I was stunned by the amount of self interest I found in what is vaunted as a shared interest space. In the 3 years between that observation and today that feeling has only strengthened. (As someone who has spent near on 30 years in the Ad world that’s starting from a fairly low expectation base and heavily tinged with black, kettles and pots but bear with me.)

BUT the sudden clarity the film gave me around the simple human levers and pulleys: of a voice and eyes that I trust. And the sudden realization that when imparting a world view, it really does matter if the storyteller’s smile seems to barely penetrate past the retina, or simply fixes like a grimace slung under cold eyes. It really does matter whether I find the storyteller sympatico or antipatico because if I don’t trust the messenger or the storyteller, the message is utterly lost to me both rationally and more importantly emotionally.

Playing ones intellect and credentials before you into very carefully prepared rooms like a buttered juggernaut full of Bona Fides to ensure the room is won before it is entered takes us nowhere – other than to the next room.

Does that mean I think we should all grin like an idiot or play the touchy feely ‘down with the people’ card? Or not deploy fierce intellects when they are needed for fear of intellectual bullying?

Not at all. I would be the first to say that the way in which intellect is wielded, whether in arch seriousness or as playful banter is more a matter of style, circumstance and empathy than a measure of integrity.

I am the first to admit that my own flippancy and ‘lightness of touch’ brings the veracity of my deeper values and beliefs in this space into question amongst people who do not see levity as even faintly endearing.

I am certain it annoys the crap out of some of the more esteemed minds of the sector, especially if they feel people such as I are seeking only to trivialize their cause.

BUT I am on a populist agenda: I want us to find the language, the demeanour and the presence that makes more people turn towards us, listen and find what we impart desirable and accommodating of the real life they lead.

So for me there needs to be creative storytelling based upon what people care about to illuminate sustainability truths. And there needs to be humanity. But mostly there needs to be trust. Trust that is human and effortless; not something we demand via an attrition of rationality and polemics.

It’s a simple human mechanism: Do I trust the person imparting the ‘wisdom’ to me. Do they make me feel bad and stupid? Or good and smart? If its good and smart: Great. Thanks. Two of those please.

Who knows. Perhaps I am far too one dimensional for all of this and I miss the complexities and subtleties inherent in the thrust and parry of the polemicists.

All I do know is that the average man or woman trying to get to the end of the month and have a nice life without bankrupting themselves and the planet need some Trust in there to even begin to listen and change tack.

Degrees, conferences, credentialing, linked in profiles or executive steering committee positions are great to set the agenda but not to democratise it. They just don’t cut it with the 85+% of the people out there. That’s your dinner party conversation. Not their life.

So I return to the film. And the man who speaks discretely. Sets out his stall: his beliefs, and the benefits of what he does.

At the end of it he gets my vote. I’d put him in a pub with a load of people I was trying to bring round to the cause.

He might not be their cup of tea. They might even find him boring.

But I think they’d trust him.

The film can be found at http://thisistouch.com/this-is/the-news/

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