Multiple Ways of Knowing

In our Exploration of the Metacrisis, we offer three framings - three lenses with which to perceive the world. One of these is ‘multiple ways of knowing’.

What we mean is that it’s all too easy to get trapped in only one way of knowing - one way of seeing and understanding the world around us.

🧠 For some, this is the head - rational and analytical.

🖐 For others, it’s the hands - practical and physical.

❤️ It might be the heart - emotions drive our responses.

🧬 It can also be the gut - instincts take over.

For most of us [of course], it’s a combination of these ways of knowing - we move between them at different times, and in different ways.

However, there is currently a bias towards the head [particularly in business]:
» “Show me the numbers.”
» “What gets measured gets managed.”
» “Prove it.”

As one simple example, this is why a tree is worth more dead than alive: the value of the sawn planks is easy to quantify. But the tactile ‘value’ of climbing that tree as a kid, or the emotional ‘value’ of sitting under a tree in the sun, or the awe we feel in an old growth forest … these are less easy [impossible?] to put in a spreadsheet.

The image shows me at Cathedral Grove in Canada. I remember what that tree felt and smelt like. I remember the calm and serenity of that moment. I also remember the reverence I felt … I don’t remember wanting to measure the tree, or cut it down.

If the metacrisis is [among other things] a crisis of consciousness, then responding to it means getting more comfortable with using our multiple ways of knowing … of getting out of our heads, using our hands, opening our hearts, and listening to our gut - responding to the world with everything we are - reconnecting ourselves with all that is around us.

And if we can do that, then maybe we can navigate a way through our predicament …