Walt Hampton, J.D.

Creating the Work & Life You LOVE

Lord of the Flies
April 14, 2011

The prisons we create are our own. We are both the jailers and the jailed.

I am the Lord of the Flies.

Don’t get excited.  It’s not a good thing.

Transformational leader John Assaraf tells this story:  One summer day, he passed by a window and saw a fly buzzing against the glass.  A short time later, he saw the fly still buzzing against the glass.  When he returned a few hours later, the sound was gone. He looked down on the sill and saw dozens of dead flies.

What was remarkable, he noted, was that a short distance away, there was an open window.

How often I am that fly: butting up against the same obstacle, over and over again; failing to see the possibilities of another way.

I so resonate with that old definition of insanity: doing the same futile thing again and again, expecting a different result.

This is certainly true in climbing. Sometimes in the mountains when the way seems so much harder than described, it means I’m “off route.”  If I were simply to retreat a bit, to get back on the route, then the climbing would become easier.  But often I have just muscled on, convinced that my way was the way. Failing to see the other way.

It’s true in most of life as well: Work problems, client challenges, kid issues, relational stuff, home improvement projects, and artistic endeavors.  The solutions are often nearer than near if we but open our minds (and our hearts) to the possibilities.

Working recently with a remarkably talented creative team, I spent several hours brainstorming new ideas for an exciting new project I’m working on.  So linear am I in my thinking, so accustomed am I to the “necessity” of being “right,” that I literally had to give myself permission to simply toss random ideas into the universe.  How exhilarating it became to explore the possibilities, to discover new ways.  And how much more vibrant the project became!

I love the phrase: think outside the box.  But consider this: what if there is no box?

I often envy my wonderful friends Sasha, Kit and Doreen who are so gifted with such keen intuitions and the sensitivity to read energies.  Their ability “to see” is remarkable. It is so easy for me to get wrapped up, tied up, in my own “rational” head. Dan Quayle might have said: what a waste it is to have a mind.

Remember the safety pitch on the airplane?  The attendants tell you about the exits.  And then they remind you that the nearest one may be just behind you.  Now that’s a concept!

To turn around.

To let go. To explore.

To risk being wrong.

To be open to a new right.

The possibilities are endless.  The open windows are everywhere.

My dear friend JT DeBolt in his superb new book Flight Plan To Success says: Fly High. Fly Fast. Fly Far.

This presumes we find the open window.

It’s not good to end up on the sill.

How are you at being open to all the possibilities in your life? Leave a comment and share your thoughts.

1 Comment

  1. JT

    Brother, I so resonated with this piece! What a beautifully articulated lesson. The art of letting go is so rarely discussed, yet you captured it in such vivid imagery that the lesson hit me square between the eyes. Being like the flies, thudding against the glass in an attempt to be free…who cannot relate to that?

    And to risk being wrong; what a noble pursuit!

    Thanks, Walt, for an inspiring post. Looking forward to your next offering!
    ~JT

    Reply

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