Why potential?
One does not discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time.
~ André Gide
Why Potential?
The title of my book is Transformation: From Potential to Practice. To give credit where it’s due, my esteemed partner, Kriz Bell, came up with this title, and when she suggested it, I knew instinctively that it fit, though I never stopped to consider why. While both aspects of the title are covered in the book, I’m going to use this post to deconstruct the title and say more succinctly what it means.
“Potential” is defined as “a currently unrealized ability.” In physics, potential energy is the energy stored in an object due to its position or configuration. This form of energy has the potential to be converted into other forms of energy, particularly kinetic energy. Similarly, the ability to transform one’s life or some aspect of it is inherent, though often unrealized, in all human beings.
It is important to distinguish potential from “aspirational.” Aspirational describes a hope or desire for something that is often considered out of reach, and that is to be gained through some means such as study or practice. Transformation, as with potential, is realized by recognizing that it is (a) possible and (b) feasible – practice follows, but not to gain transformation. Rather the purpose of practice is to ingrain the new, transformed perspective.
As I go into in detail in the book, transformation, as I am using the term, is the recognition that a person is not the victim of their past, their “flaws,” or their circumstances, but rather transformation refers to something greater – the field or -background in which the events of their past, their beliefs about our limitations, and the conditions in which they live occur to us. By taking that step back, we have the opportunity to realize that our limitations and beliefs are not inherent in just us , but rather conclusions we drew and decisions we made about what we perceived was necessary for us to survive, and that these conclusions and decisions were made in the face of perceptions that were limited by immature thought processes. To add, these decisions are made when our younger brain is subject to an imbalance between the not-yet-mature thinking parts and the fully developed parts responding to threat, both real and imagined.
Why Practice?
Readers of the book will no doubt note that I continually return to the necessity for “practice, over time, in community.” Transformation, becomes a contest between deeply ingrained patterns of thinking and behaving, reinforced by the illusion of survival (on the one hand, and the new awareness that one has the power to go past fear and habit and engage in new practices.
Potential and Practice apply both to individuals and to organizations, a parallel I explain in the book, and both require the realization that, while the past is prologue, it is not destiny.