Inception - The power of words

The inspiration behind this blog is a Karyashalla (workshop) at SSV 2011. Four teams (of about 18) were given the task of crossing a hall without any of their members touching the floor. They had 15 mins and three chairs. Their brief was “get as many people across as possible”. For those of you who are familiar with this the most common technique is to take two people across using the chairs and then for one person to come back using the chairs then take another person across and so on. Indeed, this is what all the teams did for the first 5 mins (n which time they got 5 people across in total). As this time one of the instructors paused the activity and pointed this out to the teams and emphasised that they only had ten mins left and at their current rate they would only get ten more people out of 70 over. The reaction of the participants was to continue to work as they were but to try to speed up. From an external view point the solution was clear.

 I suggested to one of the participants: “work together with the other teams”. He immediately realised what I meant and began shouting instructions to his team mates to join another team ( that way they would have more chairs and form longer bridges). Initially the other teams were very closed to this idea, in their minds it was still a race between the teams. Then one of the teams got stuck halfway (they had pushed a chair too far and couldn’t reach it).Almost immediately the team which was shouting at the other teams to work together decided to help the individual stuck in the middle. This incident made the other teams realise that it was much quicker to get all of their members across if all four teams worked together to create one bridge of twelve chairs which would span the width of the hall than if they individually ferried back and forth. After this they managed to transfer all 75 people to the other side in just under 7 mins!

This incident got me thinking, clearly the participants were very clever and capable individuals. Initially however they approached the task from a very selfish perspective, a competitive perspective. Is this how we are taught to think by societal norms? We live in a “survival of the fittest”, “every man for himself” society where being selfish is an indispensible asset. This is despite empirical evidence that if groups work together, they can achieve much more. On the hockey pitch, football pitch, no matter how good an individual is, he is nothing without the team. Even if we look at the Jewish community, it can be argued that they are so successful at business because they help each other.

The view point with which we are taught to approach life is individualistic. Life is a race. There has to be winners and loser, just like the teams in the workshop. What does it take for people to see the world through a different lens? An “us” lens instead of a “me” lens... I feel that the idea has to be planted first (hence the title Inception) then triggered by a particular situation changing the way they view the world. As I said in my first blog “my impact in the world is almost entirely subjective to the way I view it”.

Change your thoughts ,and you change your world..Change somebody else’s thoughts and you change their world.

The idea can be planted by talking to someone, by an inspirational speech or even a quote. The idea should be simple something people can act on. The key to inspiring people to act then is words, language, because it is only through that medium that thoughts can be generated. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said:

Thought is the seed of action.

I therefore strongly believe that to bring about a change within you, within society, it is important to have an extensive grasp of the language and of the effect words can have on people. We should be a be able to plant thoughts to move people to act.

Words have set whole nations in motion…Give me the right word and the right accent and I will move the world. Joseph Conrad