A REBOOT TO HUMANITY: THE ZEITGEIST OF THE NEXT ERA
November 11, 2020
With the Biden win, 75 million trapped molecules that finally popped open the cork and exploded with relief and joy.
As they celebrate, I also wonder how the blue molecules will interact with the other half that are red.
Will we attract and turn into a stable solid? Or will we continue to repel each other and remain as a gas of chaos?
Those of you who have been part of my ZEITGUIDE community since 2010 know my goal has always been to guide you through what I will now refer to as the "Decade of Disruption." On one hand, technology forced us to transform the way we work, live and communicate. But on the other hand, it also leads to burnout and new chasms.
Beginning on March 18th, 5 days following stay-at-home orders, many of you have joined my weekly Culture Classes to understand how a new disruptive force, COVID, not only threatened the health of our nation but also magnified the systemic conflicts that continue to plague society.
Well, today... another force has been thrown into the mix. But I'm not calling it disruptive. Instead, the victory of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris will hopefully be transcendent. Indeed, we are at a crossroads in American Culture that questions our collective identity and place within the context of the wider world. We can either reboot humanity or continue to live with hate, fear and contradictory values.
So as I was before your "COVID-Cultural Historian in Real-Time," I will now guide you through my next ZEITGUIDE curriculum: OUR ROAD TO HUMANITY. And it won't be so easy to get to the A+ or let alone pass unless we do the hard work.
Indeed, our culture will move even faster than before. More and more forces will confuse, challenge and impact us in ways we can never prognosticate. But we will fail at shaping a better tomorrow if we remain divided. If we don't listen and learn from each other. If we all don't recognize that we are living in a WORLD ON FIRE, literally.
Wherever our journey takes us, trust that I will continue to Zeit-guide you through the chaos, regardless of where you sit on the color wheel. It's more than just the Red Vs. Blue, but also Blue Vs. Blue. Red Vs. Red. And perhaps, Pink Vs. Purple.
Stay with me and let's shape this next course of learning, unlearning and re-learning for a better future as Americans and citizens of the World.
I love you all so much and am grateful for your continued support.
YOUR ZEITGUIDE,
Brad
NOW LET CORONA REBOOT WORK
March 9, 2020
Many of us can't travel. Networking and educational events have been canceled. We've helped the Zoom Video stock rise as we're now teleconferencing with colleagues and customers, and some of us are working remotely. And pretty soon, more of us may have to take care of our kids at the same time.
We can allow this to drive us crazy. Or perhaps, we can take the time away from normalcy to contemplate and observe how we've been working. What works? What doesn't?
Many of my clients complain to me about how burnt out they are; how they can never get anything done. They can't keep up with emails or what's happening in the world. They can't get off their phones. They can’t sleep. And they feel unbalanced. Technology, in the last decade, has forced us to change the way we work, but adapting to it continues to be a mystery and in some cases, a grind.
So what a great time to evaluate how we've been working and how do we want work to work for us.
As you explore your new Zoom-y remote life, ask yourselves:
Do I really need to travel all the time?
Perhaps we can find a way to make video conferencing work for us. It will be better for our health, our budgets, and most interestingly, the climate. Flying will have to be reduced if we are ever going to reduce climate change. Perhaps we can now prepare for the inevitable.
Do I really have to have so many meetings?
And which ones are productive and necessary or true wastes of time?
Am I taking enough time for myself, outside the office, to learn and think? Or am I just spinning on a hamster wheel chasing the next thing?
Do I spend too much time socializing, or perhaps gossiping and politicking?
Which tasks do I need to do in the office?
But which ones can I do from anywhere?
Do I spend enough time with my family?
And could I schedule in a bit more?
Can I get everything I really need to get done in fewer work hours? Or within 4 days?
The conversation about how we all have to work more "nimbly," "resiliently" and "adaptively" has basically been all talk.
We know we have to do it. We hire keynote speakers and consultants to tell us that we need these new skills to be successful in the future. But none of us know how, nor do we want to spend the time learning as there's just so much to do now.
Well, now we have the time to figure it out:
How in this new world, can we live a better life? How can my life be more balanced and joyful? What do I want my life to be? And how should work fit into it?
I'm not saying that this will replace our need to work face-to-face IRL, nor is it ever easy to change current habits. But, let's at least reevaluate.
Bottom Line: In the same way that technology, within the last decade, disrupted everything about how we live and work, the coronavirus could be the way we "reboot" the unbalanced, less efficient, burning-out ways that have been defining us
With Love and Empathy,
BRAD, CEO/FOUNDER
RACISM & MISINFORMATION OF CORONA
March 2, 2020
In my Culture Class this week, we talked about the Coronavirus or Covid-19.
In addition to briefly touching upon what we had already known like it's spread to Italy (class was last Tuesday), the stock market drop and health issues, I expounded on the following cultural factors:
How today's media landscape impacts culture in the fiercest way in history. In the past, we mostly got our information from TV and printed news. But now with social media, we are seeing a plague develop in real-time.
Much of the information, however, spread within these digital platforms is misinformation.
Misinformation produces not only fear but worse, discrimination.
I also discussed these points within the context of one of the most interesting articles I read on what's happening: Last Sunday's NYT Op-Ed by Yi-Zheng Lian, Professor and opinion-writer for the Hong Kong Economic Journal entitled: Why Did the Coronavirus Outbreak Start in China?. To answer his question, he described 2 cultural causes of the Epidemic:
1. China’s long, long history of punishing the messenger. Lian illuminates a history of Chinese Government doctors and other whistleblowers being contained by police and military. And this hasn't become a new practice in Mao's Communist China, but actually, one that existed since the Confucious Era of 6th Century B.C.
2. Traditional Chinese beliefs suggesting that eating raw, recently hunted meat or blood from wildlife could cure impotence, infertility, jaundice, energy depletion and other health issues. The author explains that "Bats, which are thought to be the original source of both the current coronavirus and the SARS virus, are said to be good for restoring eyesight — especially the animals’ granular feces, called “sands of nocturnal shine” (夜明砂).
I wasn't so much shocked by the information, as scared for our humanity. Are stories like these going to bring about more fear and discrimination? Will people call this a "Chinese disease" when in fact, any new virus results from any number of factors: climate change, modern medicine, globalization, or even just natural evolution?
And then I wondered:
What does it mean that the author is from Hong Kong and an Opinion writer?
Could a Westerner ever be able to right a piece like this without being called racist?
And is there any relationship to what's going on in Hong Kong for Liu (who writes for a publication from Hong Kong) to write this?
And he ends the op-ed with this:
"And so there are strong reasons to say that the current outbreak of COVID-19 has been aided by two fundamentally Chinese cultural practices. This may be discomfiting to hear; the notion might even strike some people as offensive. But it is necessary to investigate all the causes behind this deadly epidemic, whatever their nature — because if we don’t, we will only be inviting the next one."
Indeed, we can't just examine this global crisis as just a health emergency but as a cultural emergency, as well.
With Love and Empathy,
BRAD, CEO/FOUNDER