Insanity, Innovation, Diversity

Diversity and innovation have always gone hand-in-hand in my experience. Progress arises from ways of seeing the world differently – and for that to happen, one needs to be different.

But society is built around conventions – subtle and not-so-subtle cues that tell us who belongs and who doesn’t, who is normal and who isn’t.

Hey – ‘everyone’s an individual’, right? And yet if you truly want to be conventional you have to have a little individuality – to be utterly conventional would be – well… odd.

And that’s where you will find the herd: one step to the left of utterly conventional. Acceptably different, but short of diverse – because diverse is where people start to feel uneasy and where prejudice begins.

Prejudice. All the subtle cues that tell you, you don’t quite belong. All the pressure that goes along with that. A step closer to insanity, but with different take on the world.

I have always laughed at people who think they can take a short-cut to innovation. As if it wouldn’t come at a price. As if it wouldn’t hurt. As if they could work in a little innovation into the daily routine.

Innovation – the sense horizon – the last point where people can understand what you are saying and hate it with every fibre of their being. After that you’re just incoherent. Unintelligible. Inaudible.

Just as convention is properly defined by the step into individuality, so innovation is truly defined by the step into insanity. The spooky, nameless things that you bring back from the future, that you wrest from destiny – so you can proudly hold them aloft and have people say ‘what the hell is that thing!?’

In conventional terms everyone knows exactly what you mean; beyond innovation you’re entirely on your own.