Pause: you can and should
Do you allow yourself to pause?
In the universe of entrepreneurship, leadership and innovation, there is growing talk about living in the BANI world — brittle, anxious, nonlinear and incomprehensible. Different from the VUCA world — volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous -, expression created in the 1980s, in the current BANI world it makes no sense to try to control or interpret the chaotic conditions of the world. You need to “know how to react to everything that happens”, say the experts.
Your decisions need to be faster, “open a million windows at the same time”, as Alberto Roitman from School of Chaos explains:
“Did you lose your job? Stopping to interpret what happened is something in the VUCA world. Going out making contacts, getting work (and not a job), calling a thousand people, shaking dust is BANI. Broke the company? Blaming the government or the pandemic is VUCA. Making money with what’s left of it, getting close to competitors, getting back to the market is BANI. Waiting for the promise to be promoted by the boss is VUCA. Setting up a company in parallel to your job is BANI. Waiting for the best time to invest is VUCA. Having more sources of income is BANI.”
Okay, we really need to be agile, innovative, make assertive decisions and move forward with what we have, because the ideal conditions will not arrive. But, wait, does it need to be running like that? It is a doubt.
Certainly people who study to develop and apply these theories have expertise for that and they are based on consistent data and analysis. These are useful theories for certain contexts and people. I highlight that this is not my field of study and research.
However, I confess that it often doesn’t make much sense to me personally:
First, because this approach sounds somewhat apocalyptic, “welcome to the era of chaos”, and it seems to me that this world has been chaotic — unequal, unjust and unbalanced — for some eras…
Second, because these concepts often reinforce a glamorization of overwork that makes many people ill, as the burnout generation shows.
Third, I don’t see myself making better decisions with someone saying “run! don’t stop! innovate!” in my ear. Often that person is myself, and I’m not helpful. On the contrary, I want to become increasingly better at creating breaks.
How many possibilities can fit in a breath, a space, a silence, a pause?
In general, in Western culture, the pause is associated with negative ideas such as hesitation, laziness, doubt, delay.
“Pausing can be interpreted as a lack of decisiveness or a sense of being unsure. People do not want to be seen as unsure. Those in leadership positions would sure as hell not want to be described as someone who hesitates or delays. Perhaps someday great leaders will be called reflective, calm, unhurried, and possessed of the ability to pause in the midst of the fray to discern right action. Perhaps someday these descriptions will be valued as necessary for success, contribution and clarity. We are not in this place today although as human consciousness in our organizations continues to widen, these new adjectives are showing up in the hallowed halls of many companies”, write Joanne Hunt and Laura Divine, founders of Integral Coaching Canada.
Hunt and Divine highlight the importance of the ability to pause: “This ability to notice when our actions are in disagreement with our intentions first requires the ability to pause… to actually observe what is occurring in this moment… to discern what is required in this moment, not based on what we planned or what we are unconsciously carrying out but on what is actually going on. Right here. Right now.”
Our world is indeed fragile, anxious, non-linear and incomprehensible. We need more than ever to reverse old behaviors, make better decisions. So, instead of running, think better. “Pausing is the ‘in-between’ step. It lies in-between our old ways and our new ways. It lies between this breath and the next one. It lies in-between a conscious action and an unconscious reaction.”
+ There are several TEDx Talks about “the power of pause”, with different approaches: Tim Tompkins at TEDxTimesSquare; Nancy Scannell at TEDxValparaisoUniversity; Monique Gomez at TEDxABQWomen and Ralph Simone at TEDxUtica are great examples.
“Pausing is not a “nice to have.” Pausing is not a wouldn’t that be wonderful if I had the time.” Pausing is a core competency necessary to support any personal and professional development work with people who are interested in bringing about new results and meaningful change that can be sustained over time”.
As Paul B. Preciado said in his Chronicles of the Crossing, which accompanied and inspired me this January:
“The revolution does not begin with a march under the sun, but with a hiatus, a pause, a minimum displacement, a deviation from the game of apparent improvisations.”
“Every revolution, personal or social, requires a break from the enunciation, the reconnection with etymological lines that were closed or a direct cut in living language to introduce a difference, a space, a deferral.”
In fact, we have no time to waste, but pausing is not wasting time. Breathing and thinking twice is necessary to break with patterns that limit us.
A silence where we can suspect the words and paths we intend to follow.
