Linear vs. Circular stories

The story people lived up to followed a simple formula: Work hard. Follow your boss’s ideas. Stay with your job. You’ll be safe and earn a lot of money. The new story’s formula is more like: Be creative. Do what you love. Work defines your identity. You can be anything you want and be happy. When talking to people about these two options, three patterns emerge:

1. the driving factor for the old story is fear, respectively safety.
2. the new story puts a lot of pressure on people, because it’s all up to them. As individuals.
3. in both stories, the end can never be fulfilled. Just like the generation that is now about to retire always reached for safety and money, younger people think if they follow the story, they will eventually be happy.

Looking at these two stories in detail, it’s obvious that the old and new don’t differ. One is replaced by the other. Both are about a means to an end. In order to make real change possible, the story needs to change from linear to circular. The ends need to become an innate part of the means.   *Photo by Monika Pejkovska on Unsplash