Radical Reframe
By Les Mottosky
Can you do it?
Can you bury your preconceptions for 3 minutes?
After 40 seasons tracking elk in the Cascade Mountains, Tim Waller mocked every Sasquatch tale he heard. That was until the morning he found a perfect footprint outside his tent. It was identical to his own but twice the size and pointing into a sheer cliff face. Thinking it was a prank, he followed a trail of freshly snapped saplings up a ridge, only to discover his missing rifle carefully leaned against a tree. As he reached for it, a low, chest-deep exhale rolled through the timber. It sounded close, deliberate and almost… amused. He didn’t spot a creature, but when he rushed back to camp to pack up, the lukewarm mug of coffee he’d left beside his backpack was now empty. After Tim got out of the woods that day and returned home, he sold his hunting gear – gun and all – never to step into the Cascades again.
This story is fictional. But it does contain details, patterns and responses tens of thousands of indigenous, settlers, farmers, hunters, locomotive engineers, hikers, loggers, oil field workers, campers, ranchers, biologists, truck-drivers and fisherman have reluctantly reported. Their hesitation arises between the rock and hard place of social mockery and a rigid scientific refusal to study this phenomenon. (As notable Canadian Phd Biologist, John Bindernagel summarized: “It is not the sasquatch which is avoiding scientific recognition; it is science which is avoiding the sasquatch.”)
Most of us consider Bigfoot to be isolated West Coast folklore, but indigenous cultures planet-wide possess oral histories – along with contemporary reports – rich and deep with large, hair-covered, upright hominids. All told worldwide, there are almost 500 unique names for them. In North America, these beings have been reported in every US state, Canadian province and territory. Despite the Mount Everest of evidence pointing at their likelihood, with the exceptions of Nepal, Russia, and China, governments have not dedicated meaningful scientific research towards the topic.
It's likely that you reading this (plus the guy who wrote it) don't actually know if these wild forest people exist. So if that isn't the lesson, what is?
It's more nuanced, practical and relevant...
One of the most disciplined and respected ways of turning information into knowledge is also one of the most biased. A bias that runs so deep, academia has its own razor-edged joke: ‘Science advances one funeral at a time'. Meaning: progress only occurs when a scientist dies and takes their ideologies with them.
This isn't a critique of scientists. It's an insight into human nature:
The more we believe to know, the more challenging it is to learn.
The application for us non-scientists is that our own learnings, the most meaningful growth, those lessons with the greatest impact on our lives requires the demise of old assumptions.
One of the skills high-performers prioritize better than their less competent colleagues is speed of implementation. Not strategizing. Not timing. Not networking. They learn something then apply it. Regardless of what was getting them results 5 minutes ago.
If we grasp too tightly what we believe to know, we can't pick-up a new lesson.
For learning to live, knowledge must die.
TAGS: #Radical Reframe #Wisdom In Leadership #Curiosity Is Our Nature #Adaptation As Innovation #Breaking Bad Habits
Les Mottosky
Adaptation Strategist // I help organizations turn creativity into their competitive advantage by aligning leadership, culture and strategy to unlock adaptive innovations. It's not easy. But it's simple.
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