Business Buddhism

Step 1

The short version
What is, is.

Gesundheit! What?

The long version

Life is one of the harshest: we age, we die, we lose our looks, we get sick, we could lose our jobs and wealth at any moment, we could lose our partners, friends, families, the earth could shake, the bombs could drop,…we are completely out of control of almost everything around us.

All the circumstances that we might use to describe ourselves could disappear from one second to the next and who are we then? Sometimes people’s story of their identity gets shattered and they are so distraught by it that they consider suicide.

But then,…
Life is one of the lightest: we are free to be any which way we want, we can break expectations from dusk til dawn, we can reinvent ourselves in any moment of our lives, complete and utter failure changes nothing really important. Aging, decay and death come and there is no benefit in worrying about it, just the opposite. We can define ourselves independent of the circumstances that we partake in; we can define ourselves by how we respond to our circumstances.

To hold up pretensions is exhausting of energy and draining of self-respect. We are anxious to confront reality and scared to be found out. To give up pretensions frees us up for recognizing opportunity, for growth, for change. This is obviously true for us individually, as well as for groups, businesses and nations.

Pretense has temptations, but in every moment we can choose to give into it, or to be real with ourselves and others.