What is it that we long for? Money? Fame? Power? Community? Love? A home? Children? Position? Success? What is it that drives us? Maybe it is not one thing. Perhaps it is many.

For most humans, deep down it is meaning. Yes, meaning may be disguised something else. We may give it another name. And yet, when we peel back the onion, we find meaning. We want to matter. And we tend to want to be remembered.

And it is not just us. It’s everyone.

As we know, when we seek to bring about change, we often face resistance because change impacts our identity. The identity of those who are part of our teams, our community. And our identity is more often than not the answer to our question of meaning and mattering. Therefore when we destablise this, it is unsettling for those involved.

Change can be the clash of different stories of meaning, of relevance. It can be different beliefs about what matters and how we matter.

This can be tricky to navigate. Change makers are all ‘meaning navigators’. And all navigation involves a LOT of listening and observing.

What are you navigating today?

Photo by Jean-Frederic Fortier