#61: Ants and Bees and Collective Consciousness

I knew from one of Pip's and my first phone calls that he was verrryy "pro-human," meaning he has always had a super positive outlook on human beings and their capabilities. He's made me be more observant of all the little magnificent things people have accomplished and continue to flourish at. 

He mentions Brinton in this piece, who is a beekeeper! And Brinton actually wrote a piece back in February called Bee Time where he sheds light on the beauty and importance of truly being present. And I do think slowing down and fully being present in every possible moment can create the most meaningful and pivotal experience when collaborating with one another. Thank you Pip!  

-Amanda 

Pip Coburn    pcoburn@coburnventures.com

Ants and Bees and Collective Consciousness

Some people (even beyond Brinton)…    love…  ants and bees… 

I marvel at the collective consciousness.

Ants and bees – it seems -- do have major advantages:

They don’t seem to suffer the downside from “politics” or “corporate ladders” or “bonus pools” or “exit strategies” or “529s” or  “remote working” or “promotions” or “work/life balance” or “face time” or “timing of vacations” or “transference overlays with authority or bosses” or “how millennials are different” or “automation”...

…isolators…

…the list of what MIGHT isolate co-workers from one another goes on for miles…  and ants and bees seem immune.

Ants and bees even largely dress the same so there is little use of fashion for self-expression it seems.

Some people consider that ants and bees might be models for humans to work better together and there sure is a lot of room for that.

Ants and bees don’t  require a special word – such as “collaboration” – to describe working better together.

No off sites. 

They just “do” collective consciousness.

Ants and bees also…    well…  they don’t have too much in the way of brains and minds.

I find humans all the more extra-ordinary:

Humans “grow” and self-actualize.

Humans can marshall resources to create something way way better than what exist.

…and the massive potential that COULD be tapped is all the more reason to learn from the ants and bees without doing subversive human bashing. 

One bit of good news is that we can design “collaboration” itself around the potential isolators.

For starters:   many people’s worst nightmare of “collaboration” is that we will be forced to build something together like ants and bees do.  YUCK!    Slow.  Compromised.  Un-fun.  Assignments w people we don’t enjoy.  Agreeing when you don’t.

And we have been falsely trained that “collaboration” must involve building together.

But we observe that 95% of the time collaboration is a shared experience that allows each participant to return to their home base afterwards better prepared to create what THEY want to create!

Zero forced compromise.

When we gather people together to “collaborate” and share this orientation we can almost hear (1) the collective consciousness sigh of relief followed by the (2) sounds of joy manifesting in the energy in front of us.

Pip's first-person bio: 

More than anything I suspect I am driven by “community”.   Across the past 15 years, I have grown to realize that most any success or fortune I have had in the work I do I have re-invested back into my activities such that I spend more and more of my life with people I adore and admire and just loving being around and working on a whole bunch of things that I am incredibly excited about.   I like to study monumental change at the levels of society, marketplaces, organizations and most significantly… people.  I like to study culture deeply. I like to attempt to create culture. I like processes and helping others advances their processes and being trusted deeply.   My wife Kelly is both supportive and probably confused by what I do for a living which makes two of us.  My greatest joy in my work is when I have the chance to draw from two decades of intense work in order to perhaps help someone have a break through.