And Talk about God with the Homeless

I just finished relatively small amount of menial administerial work (for a client, not myself) and boy, let me tell you, the spiritual word, work, world can’t come fast enough for me. Everyone is afraid to make a decision so research has to be done. In the research, half the people say it depends on what it looks like, why don’t you just start something or it would depend on the strategy. It’s boring enough that I would never trouble you with it here. Suffice it to say that no one wants to stick their neck out. But a good proportion of the people still resent the time it takes to make a decision by group. Ugh, if any of us had any support at all we could move so much faster.

What management really does is replicate itself. It models behavior that is recreated all the way down the chain. Arrogant management—arrogant customer service. Fearful management—scared services. And all of this—all—gets to the customer. Every bit of control, arbitrary decision and nonsense.

This is what it means to live in transparency. People are so sophisticated now that they can tell everything. All that may register is that they like it or don’t but they’ll see everything. Even if it’s just from an ad. You can’t produce love from fear—ever.

Which means you can never fake spiritual or cultural value. Ever.

I saw a thing about an Apple iPod ad that some customer made in his free time that ended up getting large (on the net)—a couple of people said that it didn’t mesh up with their campaign. What?

Can I go on record here as saying that we don’t care about campaigns? We don’t care about contrived consistency. If you knew your own ass you’d probably have a deep and predictable idiosyncrasy that we could all love, but it wouldn’t worry if the logo was in the same place every time. Do you want your sex consistent that way? No, you want it to return the similar (or better) feel every time. Which involves doing things different always. Being present. Being alive. Hello!?

I can’t wait to see a company with a 3-D logo—that rotates it every time they use it so that we, the customers, see a fresh perspective on what the company is every ad we see. (I already pitched this to the coolest, most avant co. I could find—they balked). And there’s the lovely thing about a spiritual economy—everything is out in the open. I could tell you every marketing “secret” that I know and it wouldn’t matter. What these companies lack is the will, the guts, the balls, to put their vulnerability into play. To play! And that’s why a lot of them will go the way of the dinosaur. Everyone’s happy now ‘cause they’re cool. They don’t dream about Netscape—who innovated a whole new way of looking at the world and then got whupped by my friend Thomas Reardon (among others) at Msoft.

The game is long my friends and you may already be behind. That doesn’t mean you have to speed up. Speed is only one small way to advance. In fact you may find the greatest reward from slowing down and getting deliberate. Becoming yourself. Getting more essential.

Go ahead, Whole Foods. Go ahead skateboarders, musicians and artists—all you cultural innovators and cool hunters—go ahead and innovate and find. The million ton gorilla is right behind you. A little sleepy and slow, but it’s steps are big. It’s grasp complete. As soon as you think you’re cute you’re done. The game is long and change happens fast. You can win—you’ve got the goods. Something no gorilla will ever have. You have access to knowledge—the truth—the ground. But you’ve got to want to win. You’ve got to take responsibility for continual growth.

And you’ve got to turn around and face that gorilla.

If you’re too good to move up—someone else will. If you’re too cool to move down—someone else will. If you’re too mechanical to go spiritual—someone else will. If you’re too spiritual to be grounded—someone else will.

And it’s not that there’s anything wrong with you. You’re perfect. But you’re a flower too. And you not only want to grow, but also to spread your seed. Some of that growth requires a winter’s death. Some of it requires smelling manure. And some of it requires stretching and some sitting in the sun. How will you know what to do? Easy—you’ll be yourself. Your self has no preconceptions or limitations. Your self wants to wear (or make) a $10,000 gown some days. And put on thrift store jeans another.

Your self wants to butt heads and run numbers with CEOs. And talk about god with the homeless. It even wants to talk about god with CEOs and run numbers with the homeless. It just doesn’t think it can. But the world is open now, and all that’s holding us back is ourselves. Not the soul of ourselves, but the fear of ourselves. The truth is we don’t have to protect ourselves anymore. Unless we want to. We are forgiven every second. When we divide our company, our life, our hearts, all we get is division. Which means not only a more sheltered life, but also a more limited market.