What’s love

…got to do with it?

What sort of business related blog talks about love? Well this one for a start. This is a longish story but the message is relevant in this sad and broken world.

I’ve had the benefit of living a life full of contrast. I’ve been loved and hated and found irrelevant and spent a lot of time wondering what the cause of any of it has been.

I have children who are mine, children who aren’t mine but feel like they are and as time has gone on, partners join the team and the dynamic creaks, groans and makes space for whatever the new reality is.

This last weekend has been what has become referred to as the Rogers-Luxton AGM. My ex-partner and her fabulous husband came. My son and my sons by another father came. The partners of the big kids were here. My baby girl and her friend were here. Family from my boy’s girlfriend’s family were here, both current and ex.

All the makings of a cluster for all. But it was a wonderful affirmation of life and of how you can navigate treacherous waters and deliver a result that enriches everyone. Others will have a better head count than me but I would assume that there were twenty-odd people sitting in the sunshine with the BBQ running, cleansing beverages flowing and conversation flowing.

Bear in mind that sitting in the sun were people whose lives had come apart bitterly decades ago, new partners and some significant cultural differences. I was rushing about cooking, which is my happy place, but as I drifted in and out of the picture I was struck by how mellow the atmosphere was. No-one was hostile. No-one was picking fights. No-one was doing anything other than giving space to each other and honouring a desire to be connected and secure.

It really made me realise that we get to make choices in life about the quality of our relationships. We can be arseholes and surrender to the base instinct of giving back whatever perceived injustices have been done to us. Or, we can choose to pick a path through all that and reconnect with the things that we loved or liked about each other in the first place.

This is a really important choice. One road leads to endless drama and pain and the other leads to understanding and peace. I’m lucky enough to have ended up with a wife who over 20 years has continued to put up with my frailties and quirks. Being around her has made me a better man.

What’s this got to do with business you ask? A lot actually. But don’t just look at this in the business context. Look at it as though your business life and your real life are just the same thing on a spectrum.

Now think about all the people in life you have some kind of unresolved beef with. It could be a supplier, a customer, a colleague, a competitor, a wife, a husband, a child, a parent, a grandparent etc etc. You get the idea. You only need one for this simple exercise but you may have hundreds depending on who you are.

OK, so you’ve got that person in mind. Now think about the issue between you and instead of going straight to the terrible thing they did to you, hold up a big metaphorical mirror and take a good hard look at what your part was in the breakdown. It may have only been 2% your doing and 98% theirs. It really doesn’t matter. You only get to own your own shit and do something about that.

Once you’ve recognised the thing that you did (or didn’t do) acknowledge it and apologise. Best is face to face, but if that isn’t possible email or phone will do. If they’re dead, just quietly reflect on what you might have said if they weren’t dead.

The secret here is not in the reaction you get. Some people will take your apology and immediately respond in kind, incredibly relieved to put something long festering to bed. Some may have no reaction other than to express relief that you finally admitted you were an arse. Some may not even accept the apology. None of that matters.

What matters is that you have owned your own stuff and made amends for it. The sense of lightness and freedom that comes with this is not to be sneezed at. Try a little side experiment. Take a close look at the lives of those who refuse to accept the apology and move on. Metaphorically, they will seem as though they are wading through treacle with a huge weight on their shoulders. It represents all the baggage and unresolved hurt and grief they feel but probably don’t recognise.

A test for you is this. If you find making your amends and not receiving an equal apology or acknowledgement in return just causes you to be even angrier, you’ve missed the point.

The corollary of this in business is quite simple. Hanging on to petty and even serious hurts and injuries inflicted by “other people” has the effect of draining your energy, killing your creativity, muting your ability to interact fully and freely with others and messes with your mood, sleep and quality of life. That costs money. Strange to say it but not letting go of shit shows on the bottom line.

It doesn’t quite work this way, but if every “thing” you dealt with added up to an extra 1% of sales revenue or .5% of EBIT, would that make it worthwhile? Wouldn’t you start hungrily looking for unresolved shit to deal with?

Now, all I have said could be utter nonsense. There may be no shift in sales or EBIT, but the consolation is that you will have given yourself a gift that will nurture your soul and make you a better human being. Who knows, maybe you being a better person is worth money. Nothing to lose. Give it a go.

If you’d like to try this and share your experiences, I would be so delighted to hear from you. I’d like to anonymously share those stories with others to show that even in business, love has a lot to do with it.

That’s me done for today. Thanks for reading my tortuously long thing. I hope it makes a difference.

John Luxton +64 275 665 682 john.luxton@regenerationhq.co.nz