The Social Flow Model
Finding a Natural Flow State for Individuals and Organisations
I’d love more play, wisdom, love and wonder in our society. Here’s how and why.
Isn’t it crazy that these words are missing in so many ‘change programs’, let alone organisational projects or education?
Intro
I’m a play expert. I make processes and insights experiential. And in doing so for 30 years, I learned a lot about relationships and what makes people and organizations come alive. I also find that a playful approach is being taken more serious lately, as consciousness about what the world needs, and how organizations are called to make a difference in ‘new’ ways increases. New being more natural, read aligned with reality as scientific insights like in physics and psychology show us, and also because environmental agendas make such considerations more and more urgent. Here I play with a new model to use to help reveal and address organisational issues.
A new Model for Connected Action
It may all seem quite simple and self explanatory, yet within are some big natural insights, that may help shift everything. Using this model we can understand when and why organizations and communities fail to thrive; why and when people get burned out and where we can start healing. First we’ll explain the model, then consequences and use.
Like YinYang this model focuses on acting within a harmonious balance with everything else. As reality shifts around us, we too can shift and act with it. At the core of each aspect we find the next. The wise at the core wonder. To truly wonder is a playful act. Those who truly play live love. Those who truly love (and sometimes lose it) become wise.
The outer circle works in the other direction. Being aligned leads to better community, a healthy community supports freedom. Those who are free see further and can develop a vision on how to deepen their alignment, and read, from there can help improve their organisation or community.
The Social Flow Model Moves
Both circles are weaving patterns of interconnection in many ways. Through playing together we develop our community. A healthy community boosts loving relationships. Love also deepens our alignment and connection with the world we live in on many levels. From seeking love and alignment we learn and develop wisdom. In practice we see that care, love, alignement with our natural world, even the simple desire to be among trees, can ignite change programs, on personal, local, national and global scale.
Here is a paradox most people miss. Real freedom only matters when you’re aligned with reality. The deeper your connection, the more meaningful your actions. And the more free you can act, the more powerful your interventions. The same with vision, a vision that is connected with your community means valuable leadership. Thus each aspect is related with, and strengthened by, all the others.
Note: Both circles turn all the time, you may find new connections and insights from making new combinations. Like how does love support freedom? Or play vision?
Origins of the Model
The model is based on four pillars. Ubuntu from the South Africa, YinYang and Taoism from the East, the Indigenous American Medicine wheel from the West, and Play Science from Europe. And because I wanted a model with love, wisdom, play and wonder in it, and wondered how they were related.
Why this model? Because the scientific realisation of the interconnectedness between everything around us shifts our understanding more towards indigenous wisdoms. It is essential to understand how we are related to everything around us, how we play a role in our world.
A second reason is the general malaise of unhappy workers, of degrading nature and environment. These are all the result of our attitude and convictions regarding the world. To improve things we must deepen our relationship with the whole and act more with our whole being from a place of love. This may not sound very businesslike, but in fact a thriving business is only truly possible in a thriving world, run by committed people. And commitment has often less to do with salary and more with everything mentioned within this model. There’s so much poverty even within well paid jobs, when it comes to mental states, lack of meaning, or new ideas at work. Loving your job, feeling committed from within, is a wealth within itself.
“The universe is not a collection of objects but a communion of subjects.” ~ Thomas Berry
What can we see or learn using this model?
You can either describe a lack in your organisation, community or relationships and see with which terms there is lack of. Or you can hold your current problem solving programs to the model and check if there’s enough overlap, albeit in very different framing. Where there is lack of overlap you may have an issue.
Current management too often ‘repairs’ issues with more protocols. But more rules, better systems are often blind to the personal experience. When there is lack of community, people go wild or get too self centred. Is a community too rigid and demanding, then freedom grinds to a halt. Without freedom few to no new ideas will be born, or will all suffer from lacking in wisdom. People who don’t feel free, have no love for, or lack wisdom hardly help innovate the organisations they are part of. Why should they?
And being smart is not wisdom. Being clever at making money or running an organisation often lacks love, play, wonder, let alone a systems wide perspective of consequences. Climate disasters are getting worse each year, but economic interests prevent the large scale action needed. There’s enough to invest, but it seems more money goes to expanding the old models than to any of the alternatives. I dare to suggest that all systems lacking love, play, wonder or wisdom have sickening side effects on all they touch. An economy that is based on making money at the cost of, is unsustainable in many ways.
We all need some loving, playing, wondering and envisioning.
We can relate so many issues back to this model. It’s all basic and logic. How can a relationship hold when parties lack insight, lack connection or a supportive community? Children who lack in love, who have no time to wonder, no space to play and or are raised within rigid convictions are either traumatised or will be because of this. Adults who seek to help children overcome any such trauma, without addressing lack of safety in their community, lack of freedom to develop or who lack connection themselves will end up achieving very little. Battling symptoms without wondering what are root causes many ‘solutions’ will fail.
Too many programs lack the aspects mentioned above. They’re often organised as systematic steps that claim: “Just take these steps and success is guaranteed.” (I fear, way too many business books and self help books fall into this category too). It makes sense to us that mental health care fails, when there’s no love, no deeper connection, just steps to be taken towards being ‘adjusted to function in society again’. We understand that you can’t say to your child: “I will bandage that bleeding knee of yours now, but Daddy only has time for the emotional caretaking part until after dinner.” And the same goes for organisational change programs. There too must emotional connection, care, meaning have a place too.
Speaking Truth to Power or Take a Hard Look in the Mirror.
“Please, dear employees play pretend you like my program so I can make my promotion, and beware if you make it difficult for me.” ~ hidden manager message.
What can help us see, this goes for so many failing reorganisations? Way too many employees within organisations play along with such programs. They do this out of fear for their job, career, or ‘that’s how we learned that it works’. But play pretend ‘all is fine’ and systemic deadening steps are not really playful. Hence all the onboarding efforts by management to get people to play along with their new incentives. No wonder all the resistance they often meet, when introducing once again a new change program ‘that will help the organisation take the next step’. Employees generally feel the stink of programs lacking integrity and the pressure behind well chosen awesome words by excited CEO’s, even when they don’t say so. Enforcing programs works for a bit, but wear organisations thin. One result is the current stress to fulfil certain jobs. You work for an organisation. You’d love to work to help make something that matters happen. These two can overlap, but are too often separate.
Natural Actions Regarding Issues within Relationships and Organisations.
So when people have not enough courage, improve their sense of safety to take a risk and their sense of community and purpose. When focussed on ‘what might go wrong’ (for me or in general) innovation is hard. But when we focus on desired outcome, and feel safe we may take a risk to try new ideas. When people have courage and are still not innovative enough, improve their sense of wonder and play.
When your ‘program’ doesn’t work, improve your own relationship with everyone involved and show more love. Connect with them on a deeper level and find out the real why. When people don’t show love enough, develop more play and more wisdom. Those who play come alive in body and mind. Love becomes easier. Those who who focus on wisdom care more for the essential things, like love. And work on improving connections and alignment. And if that all seems impossible, because your organisation is mainly about making money and profits, then the lack of heart and meaning at the core will make caring for the job within near impossible. Then the work to make it work will often feel like marketing within and or contain enforced aspects.
In short, each aspect triggers others. Improving one, will enhance others. Each stuck aspect is because another aspect that supports it is weak or stuck as well.
Examples from my Personal Work.
To boost play and wonder, like with paradigm shifting events can help. Or shake up convictions and stuck patterns with crazy out of the ordinary workshops. Here I may use Play Day (originally day for starting students at Knowmads, or experimental day in management leadership course), Switchball (a 21st century team sport that you can’t win by winning), or The Way of the Fool workshop (especially meaningful for those in care, and or in need of more creativity).
To boost freedom I’d also offer The Way of the Fool, expression skills or creativity. Many people don’t realise that courage is a key element of creativity. Do you dare to say or do the crazy new idea?
To boost wisdom and vision, and meaning facilitated processes are the way to go. Think dialogue sessions like through World Café, Theory U or campfire sessions can help. Here management must refrain from demanding a specific outcome for the process. The process is there to help clarify things and bring undercurrent issues into the light and then together decide on next steps.
To boost alignment, bodywork, nature walks, retreats can help. Here I use very simple nature quests, that work that bring subconscious wisdom to light. Also increasing interactions with customers, clients end users can help. What and who do we do this for?
To boost sense of community workshops like Swarm Leadership, the sense of the interconnected leaderless movements. Why should leaders care? Because it’s about taking responsibility for self and surrounding by everyone. or the world song exercise can help.
Also playing with personal archetypes can help. Here too, lack of certain archetypes in a community will weaken the community as a whole. The Archetype of Community is the Mother. That of Freedom is the Warrior. That of Vision is the Leader. And that of Alignment is the Healer. That of Love the Lover. That of Play the Child or the true Beginner’s Mind. And that of Wonder? Please wonder about that one. ;)
Much of this work I combined at Knowmads. How are we influencing the whole with who we are? Where do I fit in best? Where may ‘who I am’ shine? My Knowmads school took time to ask explore these questions. Here personal leadership programs can help too.
To boost love. Hmm. I think love can be worked on, love can be invested in, but never demanded or trained. People who lack in expressing it, and managers demanding it, better go find some therapy. Motivation or care for the job isn’t something that can be created. It grows because our work has meaning for us, and all relationships around it feel alive. Thus when your organisation lacks it, either focus on play, or organise the work more meaningful (vision driven) or increase alignment and connectedness with what is essential. If your organisation can do none of those, then what does it exist for? I personally would move out.
My profession is filled with love. I love doing what I do, I love the variation, the important questions people ask, I love people, I love seeing inner lights flare up in eyes. If you’d like to take a step in the same direction or help your organisation do so, then connect with a private message.
Floris
Published before on https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/natural-flow-state-individuals-organisations-floris-koot/?published=t
