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Holistic philosophy views each person as a flash
of consciousness in existence that is of
existence. What a person is, is what everything
else is. Thus, a person perceiving the world is
in fact world perceiving itself.
Painting by
M C Escher
Nature as a phenomenon of 'wholes' can never be
fully known by our mind for the very reason that
our mind is part of it. Seeking absolute
mastery, as reductionism does, misses the point
of being human. The point is that the complex
web of interdependent interrelationships is the
very nature of mind. In fact, mind is the object
and subject of complexity, not an externally
appointed master over it.
Systemic thinking begins with an intuitive grasp
of the existence and demands balancing
mastery with mystery, which means living
somewhere in between the hopelessness of the
belief that we are unable to understand anything
and, at the other extreme, the naivety of belief
that our mind can know everything.
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Thoughts from some of the leading 'systems
thinkers': |
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"Result-based management" has a bad name these
days. It is typical to hear people lament that
"all that matters around here is the bottom
line." Bosses everywhere focus people "on the
numbers" and seek to motivate them to perform.
Yet few organizations perform up to their
potential, and, ironically, the inability to
realize that potential is a deep source of
dissatisfaction among most organization's
members. No one wants to be on a mediocre team.
Here in lies a deep puzzle. Results truly matter
to people. Yet focusing on the results is often
a poor way to succeed - at least the way it is
typically done in most organizations. |
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- Peter
Senge |
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When you are thinking something, you have the
feeling that the thoughts do nothing except
inform you the way things are and then you
choose to do something and you do it. That's
what people generally assume. But actually, the
way you think determines the way you're going to
do things. |
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- David
Bhom |
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While a self-organizing system's openness to
disequilibrium might seem to make it too
unpredictable, even temperamental, this is not
the case. Its stability comes from a deepening
center, a clarity about who it is, what it
needs, what is required to survive in its
environment. Self organizing systems are never
passive, helpless victims, forced to react to
their environments. |
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-
Margaret Wheatley |
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