The Gravity Well Effect

Even good things are bad. Take the cult of wellness. This was supposed to be a way to improve health in all of its dimensions, physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. It hasn’t always turned out that way. Many people say wellness proves to be trying and diminishing. It’s become “you are not good enough” theater. One respondent captured the prob

After all, the point of culture is often less the content than the sharing of the content. Entire communities, substantial, lasting communities, spring up from shared shows to say nothing of the tribal pleasures of shared lifestyle. The failure of sharing comes from a failure of culture and that makes culture a problem.

This is too many things. The chances of finding someone prepared to chat about something mutual (like, baseball) are small. When we stop chatting round the water cooler (and its social media equivalents), our world gets less clear, less organized, less cooperative, and less mutual. This threatens the American “we.”

“Apps monitor you. They report on you. They shame you.” At the extreme, apps make somethings a little like a police state.

The university that cannot fix itself is disqualified from educating our young.

We no longer see things as culture dictates we should. We are now getting closer to see the thing itself. Culture is breaking as we attempt to use it. In these few instances, it is slipping away before our very eyes.

Our competitors are looking not just to beat us but baffle us. So, yes, the new American culture makes even business more changeable and chaotic. And culture, those underlying assumptions, are the culprit.

When our heroes are failing, what hope is there for the rest of us?

Our mutualities are fading.