A Mason's Work

[00:00] if this has happened to anybody, I know it's probably happened to you and it's definitely
[00:05] happened to me, but imagine a meeting. It could be lodge. It could be work. It could be you and
[00:11] a buddy at a coffee shop, uh, having a beverage, whatever. Uh, and you start a conversation like
[00:18] we should do this. We're going to fix that. The, the world would be at a better place if
[00:28] everyone did this. And for a little while, it seems like that's going to make a change.
[00:38] There's a little twinge of utility. There's a little bit of behavior change potential. There's
[00:45] an option to start making it just a little bit better. And somewhere in there, it changes.
[00:55] It's not that anybody made a decision. It's more like the, the mind that you had that started
[01:06] the conversation shifts from talking about the way the world could and should be to complaining.
[01:16] And by the time that meeting ends, by the time that conversation concludes, you have two people,
[01:24] three people, a whole group of folks disenfranchised, kind of down, vaguely kind of malaise.
[01:36] And while it was productive at getting when everyone agitated, it was not productive for
[01:43] moving the conversation forward. You know, these meetings, I'm sure you've been in them. You may
[01:49] have even been in charge of one. There is a way to tell when that shift has gone from productive
[02:02] conversation about things you're going to do to a non-productive complaint session. And you'll hear it
[02:12] in two words. Typically, someone will say, if only, if only the leadership were different,
[02:22] if only this wasn't so political, if only we had more money, if only there were more people,
[02:28] if only the organization wasn't so resistant, if only there wasn't, you know, if people were more
[02:33] engaged, if only the system worked the way it's supposed to. Those sentiments are all on the other
[02:43] side of a phrase, if only. That problem that happens when you switch to if only is that it neuters
[02:55] all of the power. It takes away all of your agency and capacity. The conversation moves from,
[03:03] of a problem to a meta conversation about the problem. You moved from in it to around it.
[03:12] You're not working in the problem anymore. It requires people from outside of the problem in
[03:20] that if only kind of way to address it or fix it or alter it or change the conditions in some sort of
[03:27] meaningful way. It feels productive. It feels like analysis. It feels like insight. This,
[03:32] uh, this emotional satisfaction that comes with complaining and diagnosing these difficult things,
[03:37] but it requires absolutely nothing of the people saying it. It's seductive. It's alluring because again,
[03:49] it feels like progress. That meta conversation isn't quite laziness. It's important to understand
[03:56] the folks that fall into this are often really intelligent and really articulate. They're
[04:02] the most genuinely frustrated people in the room. The meta conversation is seductive precisely because
[04:10] it is sophisticated. It uses a vocabulary of systems thinking. It demonstrates awareness. It creates a
[04:16] real bond. It feels like a collaborative discovery. There's genuine, genuine warmth in the experience of
[04:24] that commiserating, that bonding, but it's not the work. And the longer it runs, the more it masquerades
[04:36] his work while quietly making the work more and more inaccessible. It makes it feel more impossible.
[04:45] Every time you have those, if only statements, and it may not be those words exactly, but it's that
[04:50] sentiment. The statement increases the distance between where things are and where they need to be.
[04:57] Every hour spent in the meta is an hour the stone sits unworked. And this is what makes it more
[05:07] than a productivity problem. It starts a pattern. This idea that complaining about the problem is part of a
[05:17] solution. That bonding is the solution. That bonding is the benefit. You get attached to the idea of the idea.
[05:25] In Fight Club, it was like they used the phrase, the copy of a copy of a copy. You are so many levels
[05:32] of abstraction away from the problem itself that you have essentially subtracted any opportunity you have
[05:39] to actually do anything. This is a very normal behavior, but it has some real meaningful challenges.
[05:52] The good news is we tell each other a story where this kind of behavior has the worst possible outcome.
[06:03] We have a lesson about what happens if these conversations go unchecked.
[06:10] They weren't villains when they started sharing their concerns about not earning the word of a
[06:19] master mason. They were craftsmen with frustrations and cares and concerns whose meta conversation took
[06:27] over. And by the time they understood the cost of the decisions they had made, it was too late to take them
[06:34] back. As you go through your everyday life, hold your radar high, your attention high for these kinds of
[06:48] conversations. They are the beginning of an outrageously slippery slope towards destruction.
[06:57] We're not here necessarily to put an immediate stop to it. We'll talk over the course of this week
[07:06] about what it means to pivot and to change from that meta conversation, to reclaim your agency
[07:13] from the commiserating and really make a meaningful change in the world. See you tomorrow.