Generosity. Kindness. Fierceness. Justice. Pleasure.
Yes, we can have them all, if we understand the ways that they and we are interconnected, the ways that justice and pleasure and generosity and kindness and fierceness all rely on each other. They become more when they are together, not less. They become more, we become more; there is no priority of one over the others.
Transcript
Mina Raver asked me this morning, what values drive
Leela Sinha:me? What values our lives become? And I had to answer with
Leela Sinha:things that don't always go together: generosity and
Leela Sinha:kindness and fierceness and justice and pleasure. And she
Leela Sinha:wrote back and asked, do those things fit together? Do those
Leela Sinha:things fit together? How do they fit together? Do they ever bump
Leela Sinha:up against each other? How do you make a priority? How do you
Leela Sinha:prioritize them? And I asked back in my head, before I
Leela Sinha:answered, I asked, How can there be a priority? They're all
Leela Sinha:important, they don't take precedence one over the other.
Leela Sinha:We need to drop the fallacy that the priority is necessary, that
Leela Sinha:one has to take precedence, that we can't have it all, that we
Leela Sinha:can't have both. Can we have justice and generosity? Can we
Leela Sinha:have generosity and pleasure? Yes, yes, we can have them both
Leela Sinha:if we understand the ways that we are interconnected, the ways
Leela Sinha:that justice and pleasure and generosity and kindness and
Leela Sinha:justice all rely on each other. They become more themselves they
Leela Sinha:become more each other they become more when they are
Leela Sinha:together. More when they are together, not less. They become
Leela Sinha:more, we become more, there is no priority. There is only how
Leela Sinha:do these two things grow together? How do they dance
Leela Sinha:together? How do they fit together? When you plant a tree
Leela Sinha:next to another tree, they are impacted by the presence of one
Leela Sinha:another. But they can both still reach the sun, they can both
Leela Sinha:grow together, their trunks entwined even, and thrive. In
Leela Sinha:the forest, about which I am forever talking, there are trees
Leela Sinha:and trees and trees and trees, big tall trees and short trees
Leela Sinha:and shrubs and bushes and vines. And underneath the soil, all
Leela Sinha:those roots, interconnect, they are close, they are touching,
Leela Sinha:they are talking, they are sharing resources. They are
Leela Sinha:sharing lives. This is how we do the work. This is how things
Leela Sinha:happen, is by not making a priority. Or rather by making a
Leela Sinha:priority of specific things. By making a priority of things like
Leela Sinha:humanity, humanity is a priority. The interdependent web
Leela Sinha:of all existence is an even bigger priority. Taking care of
Leela Sinha:the life around us that's the priority. The priority gets
Leela Sinha:bigger and bigger, the bigger our vision gets. The bigger our
Leela Sinha:understanding gets, the bigger our perception our
Leela Sinha:proprioception our interoception gets, the bigger the body gets.
Leela Sinha:And when the body is at its very biggest It is everything. And
Leela Sinha:that is where we are located, is in everything. And so we cannot
Leela Sinha:just say oh, well we'll have breath but we won't have blood
Leela Sinha:circulation today. You can't do that. I mean, we do, when we're
Leela Sinha:under absolute survival stress we do, our bodies do. They say
Leela Sinha:you can have circulation but only in your trunk not in your
Leela Sinha:limbs. Or they say you could have had breath but that's not
Leela Sinha:working out right now we're going to stick with circulating
Leela Sinha:the blood as long as we can. Bodies say you can have
Leela Sinha:consciousness but not right now because we're under too much
Leela Sinha:stress. So we're going to just put you in shock until we can
Leela Sinha:figure out what to do next. So we do, we don't always do
Leela Sinha:everything all equally exactly at the same time. But when we're
Leela Sinha:planning, when we're living, when we've got a little room to
Leela Sinha:make some decisions- if we are in a place to even think about
Leela Sinha:priorities, and not just act, and not just grasp in
Leela Sinha:desperation. Those are the moments when there are no
Leela Sinha:priorities. Where priorities aren't a thing. When everything
Leela Sinha:is as important as everything else. When everything is as
Leela Sinha:important as everything else. And if these are already the
Leela Sinha:values that I have decided are the priority, they are already
Leela Sinha:the most important thing. And so we will have to find a way that
Leela Sinha:generosity and kindness and justice can coexist. We will
Leela Sinha:have to find a way that pleasure can exist with everything. We
Leela Sinha:will have to find a way to enact love. We will have to find a way
Leela Sinha:to enact love. And this is true even in our businesses, even in
Leela Sinha:our work, even with our teams, especially in our businesses,
Leela Sinha:our work our teams. This is the reason that I do this work.
Leela Sinha:Because it is when we lose track of this, it's when we lose, lose
Leela Sinha:our understanding of the interconnectedness of all of the
Leela Sinha:values that we carry all together, when we lose track of
Leela Sinha:all of that, that's when our institutions lose their
Leela Sinha:humanity. That's when our institutions lose their
Leela Sinha:interconnection. That's when our institutions facilitate and
Leela Sinha:support us becoming disconnected, instead of
Leela Sinha:facilitating and supporting us becoming connected. We need to
Leela Sinha:become connected, we need to stay connected, we need to be
Leela Sinha:engaged with each other, consciously engaged with each
Leela Sinha:other. We need to have systems that support that. So yeah, all
Leela Sinha:five of those things all together, all at once. Because
Leela Sinha:without all five of those things altogether, all at once, we
Leela Sinha:start to make something disposable. We fall out of
Leela Sinha:integrity, because we make something disposable. If it's
Leela Sinha:disposable, then it's not really meaningful anymore. And it
Leela Sinha:causes moral injury. And when it causes moral injury, it damages
Leela Sinha:us. And it damages our ability to move through the world and it
Leela Sinha:damages our ability to make things better. It damages our
Leela Sinha:ability to be interconnected. It damages our ability to lift one
Leela Sinha:another up. And those are inherent to our existence. So
Leela Sinha:no, I don't prioritize those things. I prioritize all of them
Leela Sinha:together. I don't pick and choose. They grow together.