The Source Code of Heart, Gorilla, and Entelechy, Pointing to Workplace Engagement
The universe is always pointing.
On a good day I am conscious enough to pay attention and listen:
Recently I discovered the universe using the words “heart”, “gorilla” and “entelechy” to point me toward the remedy for 2.2 billion humans in a default experience.
I had been reading Gallup’s latest poll on workforce disengagement with the all-time high of almost 70% of humanity not engaged in their work. In a matter of hours, three seemingly disparate things blipped on my radar.
Blip: A John Maeda SXSW talk with a title quote: “The hand, the head and the heart working together can create extraordinary things.”
Blip: An utterly divine Little Simz track, “Gorilla”, on the album “No thank you.”
Blip: Aristotle’s concept, “Entelechy”, coming up in back-to-back client sessions.
I began to feel that sense of unease when something is being pointed to, but I’m not yet able to see it. Like Kevin Costner darting around that Iowa cornfield, only with real-world things doing the pointing instead of loud etheric voices.
Blip. Blip. Blip.
The universe is maniacally efficient. When an idea is meant to be seen, it will be. The universe will use everything in 365° to point. Whether it’s three labs on different continents having the same breakthrough simultaneously (see shared Nobel prizes, recently on quantum entanglement — kinda funny in context). Or more tangential divining rods (an acacia tree, a detergent commercial, Lynne Twist’s “The Soul of Money”) pointing me to a lesson about flow. It seems the only prerequisites for us to receive are curiosity, openness, and always be listening.
The three blips were pointing me to the pivotal element that powers all human engagement — in work, life, or well, anything. One that is currently tragically missing from all the elite consultancy programs, reigning L&D wisdom, and business culture in general.
No one dares go there. Yet.
And we’re seeing the result of that absence:
The Great Resignation saw 47.8M quit their jobs in 2021, and that was eclipsed by 50.5M in 2022. And both are eclipsed by the Hidden Resignation as represented by the Gallup stats on disengagement — people who remain at their jobs but in body only, or about 2.2 billion (70% of global workforce). That last one costs $8.8 trillion in productivity, or 9% of global GDP.
So perhaps it’s worth a little look-see.
Especially if there‘s a simple upstream intervention that can remedy things. Which there is. As I was being pointing to through Maeda, Little Simz, and Aristotle (that crew would be an awesome dinner) with the words Heart, Gorilla, Entelechy respectively.
Let’s start with Maeda and heart. I have seen this theme in Maeda’s talks since the 2013 RISD Commencement address in which he referenced the work of Professor Marshall Ganz, of the Harvard Kennedy School of Government (oh, Ganz was also by the side of Cesar Chavez, galvanizing and organizing the United Farm Workers for sixteen years — so creds on engagement). He speaks to the three kinds of human knowing: 1) knowing with the head (ego-mind cognitive stuff, information, rationale, etc.), 2) knowing with the heart (purpose, calling, spiritual/authenticity, flow), and 3) knowing with the hands (real-world action). The key to human engagement and committed action being the aligning of the knowing of the head with that of the heart. That confluence powers the knowing of the hands and they then follow with ACTION. Aka, engagement.
Maeda references how the 20th century perhaps thought it might do without that pesky heart thing: “…sometimes the world goes too far in the direction of the head, and it’s how we sometimes get into trouble…”
One can see the Renaissance as a tipping point when the heart was joined by the head (i.e. art joined by linear perspective through architect, Filippo Brunellesch, in 1415), and there flowed a tsunami of goodness in art and science into willing hands and thereby the world. But it seems we misconstrued the causality of this goodness, and because it was the newcomer we made the head alone the rainmaker and humanity’s inner CEO. This monarchy gradually rising in power to reach its peak in the 20th century. While moderately productive perhaps (we don’t have a control group), this solo-reign of the head with its siloed success metrics (Head: “Growth in quantity, scale, and control, at all costs.” Heart: “Growth in service to greater quality, not quantity, and in service to human happiness.”), sans-heart, has arguably brought us the climate crisis, wildly growing rates of depression, anxiety, mental illness, and arguably, now the Great Resignation, the Hidden Resignation, and 70% of the world just not aligned with what business has become about.
It seems consciousness has simply reached the place where spending over 50% of waking life in an experience that is not aligned with its very reason for being on the planet — its aliveness and calling — is not tenable or even possible for it. Good.
Jump-cut to the universe’s next loud jabbing index finger. While driving in my dimpled pick-up— the track-randomizer pops up Little Simz’s “Gorilla” just where Topanga Canyon Blvd hits the Pacific. The horns, orchestra and gospel stems of this track already feel like the eucalyptus-infused air of that spot, and then her beautifully liquid lyrics pour over everything.
“…Monkey to Gorilla, Who is this woman that I’m seein’ in the mirror?…”
While some reviews relay the meaning of “…Monkey to Gorilla...” to be simply her rise to power in the music industry, that’s not fully it. In the Genius/Verified interview, she breaks away from the track to relay meaning: “Gorilla…this is about me being unapologetically myself, and that I want to tell the world about it…”. That is, in the male-dominated industry (“…Run through the jungle, they should’ve never let her…”) she describes, after “…10 whole years and 10,000 hours of hard work…”, to be arriving not just at the top but with her true self intact and blazing (“…Beatin’ on my chest goin’ apeshit, put him in the grave shit…”) Monkey to Gorilla is an epic description of Simz’s personal journey from the reign of the head, to the reign of her heart with head now in service. A monkey being more a small, manic, insecure, loud and frenetic animal — aka the ego-mind, and a gorilla more silent and calm but a formidable presence with true power, aka the True Self: “…Been a different species…”
That in finally lifting out of the survival and scarcity paradigm of the head (literally — today called “monkey mind”) and daring to operate from her true nature, her heart, she then finds her voice, her greatest works, her scaled business success. So much so that she recognizes it as something beyond her, beyond the mind — again from Verified:
“…I don’t believe we can take all the credit ourselves…to understand that something is running through you and working through you...”
And lastly, “entelechy”. Within 24 hours, one client while in session spoke about their discovery of “panpsychism”, one about “biocentrism”, and one about Adrienne Marie Brown’s book, “Emergent Strategy”. Research into each kept guiding me to a central principle first recognized by Aristotle: Entelechy.
Put as simply and clearly as I can using context: the entelechy of an acorn is to become an oak tree. Aristotle, and many since, was putting a name to that thing we all know is present and our biggest force but beyond definition and measurement:
“There is a vitality, a life force, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique, and if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium; and be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is, not how it compares with other expression. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open.”
— Martha Graham
We look at Steve Jobs, Miles Davis, Maya Angelou, an aspen grove, a starling murmuration, you right now. There is that ever-present force yearning for its unique expression.
Each of my clients was describing a discovery that reflected a core principle in our work together:
There is a deeper, truer, more wise and alive self than mind, than persona, and we attain our greatest success by connecting to it, trusting it, and creating from it. A principle perhaps best defined by the godfather of the Civil Rights Movement, Howard Thurman:
“Ask yourself not what the world needs. Ask yourself what brings you alive and go do it. Because what the world needs are more people brought alive.”
All the pointing through Maeda, Little Simz, and Aristotle was toward the ultimate importance of our true nature, life’s source-code, “knowing the heart” to move the hands. And lest this is misperceived as a woo-woo thing:
McKinsey: “People who find their individual purpose congruent with their jobs tend to get more meaning from their roles, making them more productive and more likely to outperform their peers.”
MIT Sloan Management Review: “[Companies] vow to provide more flexibility, opportunities, and an inclusive culture. While these factors matter, they don’t cover what is often the most important one that’s missing: a personal sense of fulfillment.”
A study by IBM surveyed CEOs globally and noted that personal purpose is in the top three things they focus on.
In recent years I have worked with leadership teams using the power of this principle, from the design team of Barbie in Los Angeles, to a multinational team in Saudi Arabia developing a massive Vision2030 project. When does the space light up, whether it’s a showroom near LAX, or amidst the ancient ruins of Hegra? When people see where their own personal purpose intersects with the broader mission of their company. Where the knowing of the heart intersects with that of the head.
Perhaps best expressed, yet again, by Simbiatu Ajikawo, aka Little Simz:
“…Heaven and Earth, Attached to one killer …”
