Words&Dirt

“The walls of a cathedral had to be not just good, but perfect. This was because the cathedral was for God, and also because the building was so big that the slightest lean in the walls, the merest variation from the absolutely true and level, could weaken the structure fatally. Tom’s resentment turned to fascination. The combination of a hugely ambitious building with merciless attention to the smallest detail opened Tom’s eyes to the wonder of his craft. He learned from the Exeter master about the importance of proportion, the symbolism of various numbers, and the almost magical formulas for working out the correct width of a wall or the angle of a step in a spiral staircase. Such things captivated him. He was surprised to learn that many masons found them incomprehensible.”

––The Pillars of the Earth, by Ken Follett, loc. 171

“It’s not so much in what they do, but in how they do it, that Teal Organizations have a different approach to dealing with their environmental and social impact. They look at the matter from a different angle. Instead of asking the question: What will it cost? they start with the deeper, more personal question: What is the right thing to do? Only then follows the question, How can we do it in financially acceptable ways? Of course, not everything is possible, and trade-offs need to be made. But from an Evolutionary-Teal perspective, it all starts with inner rightness.”

––Reinventing Organizations: A Guide to Creating Organizations Inspired by the Next Stage of Human Consciousness, by Frederic Laloux, pg. 169