Penny O

“The sound of the Gion Shoja temple bells echoes the impermanence of all things; the color of the sala flowers reveals the truth that to flourish is to fall. The proud do not endure, like a passing dream on a night in spring; the mighty fall at last, to be no more than dust before the wind.”
― Helen Craig McCullough, The Tale of the Heike

“This is how nature has worked for millions of years. Innovation doesn't happen centrally, according to plan, but at the edges, all the time, when some organism senses a change in the environment and experiments to find a response. Some attempts to fail catch on; others rapidly spread to all corners of the ecosystem. Reality is the ultimate reference.”
― Frederic Laloux, Reinventing Organizations: An Illustrated Invitation to Join the Conversation on Next-Stage Organizations

“How about Proust's In Search of Lost Time?" Tamaru asked. "If you've never read it this would be a good opportunity to read the whole thing."

"Have you read it?"

"No, I haven't been in jail, or had to hide out for a long time. Someone once said unless you have those kinds of opportunities, you can't read the whole of Proust.”
― Haruki Murakami, 1Q84

“The goal is not make everyone equally powerful, but to make everyone fully powerful. This is best understood using a metaphor from nature. A fern or a mushroom growing next to a tree might not reach as high as the tree, but that is not the point. Through a complex collaboration involving exchanges of nutrients, moisture, and shade, the mushroom, fern, and tree don't compete as much as they cooperate to grow into the biggest and healthiest versions of themselves.”
― Frederic Laloux, Reinventing Organizations: An Illustrated Invitation to Join the Conversation on Next-Stage Organizations