Consuming Thoughts: T

T is for Trust That We Now Sorely Lack. Peter Gabriel: You can blow out a candle but you can’t blow out a fire. Alone, and many of us feel more alone than we care to admit, no matter how brightly we burn we are still a single flame, an isolated candle. I love Ignite Portland, an event where an unpredictable array of individuals assaults, entertains and inspires us with a non-stop onslaught of 5 minute presentations. It’s brilliant. It truly shines. Thank you Raven for making it so. Yet, it is a collection of bright spots, a series of separate flames, a parade of fireflies.

Most of us in our work, often even in our home lives, remain disconnected. Work has demanding deadlines and we sacrifice the human quality of our teamwork to function mechanically. We sacrifice “trust” for “alignment.” I’ve been in a number of meetings where the detente of alignment censors discussion of deeper, later very destructive issues. At home the distractions of PS3, computers, smart phones, cable TV-technologies that are supposed to connect us-actually make us experts at remaining apart.

One of the catalysts for our over-consumptive ways is a lack of connection. We substitute stuff for substantial relationships. The foundation of strong, healthy relationships is trust. The source of Abundance in our lives is trust. Trust in our selves, trust in relationships with others, trust in the power of community, trust in the wisdom of the systems that support and sustain us.

Trust demands an openness, an intermingling of mutual vulnerability. Somatically, energetically it is supported by a strong core of self-awareness and feels and acts a lot like love. Ask people who were part of high-performing teams. The adjectives and descriptions they use to describe their experience could easily describe a good marriage. High-performing teams emerge from deep and enduring trust. Strong communities are sustained through webs of relationships woven with threads of trust. Together, we burn brilliantly, much brighter, than a collection of disconnected  individuals.

Tags: alignment, cable TV, fireflies, healthy relationships, high-performing teams, Ignite Portland, Peter Gabriel, PS3, Raven Zachary, smart phones, trust