Systemic thinking
‘The question
is not what you look at,
but what you see’
Henri David Thoreau
Every time when I am in my bathroom,
I see this quote next to my mirror.
It reminds me that what we look at means little compared to what we see. What is not filtered away. And what’s going beyond the physical limitations and moving into feeling, intuition, or sensing. My own experiences in life have taught me that there is so much we often don’t see. Even in the little things.
I still remember very vividly the first time
I took an ‘en plein air’ painting class.
The teacher taught us to look at the colors of the fields. To see the wide variety of greens. A field is numerous shades of green. I remember the moment I drove home after that class and my eyes couldn’t stop looking at all these different colors of greens, I suddenly saw around me. The colors were there long before my class;
I just didn’t see them.
We see the world not as it is,
but as we are (Anaïs Nin).
Fascinating, isn’t it? It leaves me always wondering what else is there, that I am not yet seeing …
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I see an analogy with systemic thinking;
I have always thought ‘big picture’ and my concerns for the world turned me into a vegetarian more than 25 years ago. For me this was the only way forward with the overpopulation of the world and the enormous pressure it puts on our natural resources. I set up a charity in Nepal to support orphans and we have been running three children’s homes for nearly 15 years. Of course, I am not a saint and
I have been flying frequently and still buy too many clothes. Oops, ...
However, the way I managed my consultancy assignments in communications strategy and change management was always with a clear perspective of future-back, outside-in, and considering all stakeholders. It never occurred to me it was called systemic thinking and that all of this could be used in team coaching too. Until I heard the term systemic team coaching, got curious and noticed the impact on clients.
Now it feels I can’t stop seeing it ...