Hello Everyone and welcome to the podcast of the Ordinary Maverick. This is Ajey, your host, an ordinary Maverick sharing real life thoughts and experiences and Maverick tips.
It’s a new year, in fact a new decade. I must say, this particular new year brings with it a different feeling. It’s not your normal new year…right? It’s the new year coming after the most extraordinary year. A year that none of us will ever forget. 2020 is definitely going down in the history books for so many reasons, but most importantly for the triumph of the human spirit. With the many odds and challenges that we all faced, one thing stood out and shone through….the resilience of the human spirit. And it’s this very resilience that makes us now welcome the new year with the same anticipation and conviction that the new decade will be better than the one gone by….the new year will be different.
But even in that difference, there is a connect. Now what do I mean by that? Well, anything and everything we see around us, anything created and developed new, an innovation for example, there’s always and always some connection. There’s some start somewhere. This is also true in relationships, in life’s journey and how our different experiences all get connected. Often times, there’s a pattern, if only we look deeply and identify it.
This is also the right time to remember the Maverick formula. Of going with your gut, being true and falling forward. Here is where sometimes the interconnectedness becomes even more pronounced. We here about practicing mindfulness. Well, that’s about being present in the moment. And that’s exactly when we are able to even be conscious of our gut feeling, our instinct and able to respond to it.
Let me ask a question here, what is he connect of an horse’s ass with a space shuttle. Ha ha….at first thought you would say, what? How could there ever be any connection with an horse’s ass with a space shuttle of all things? Well, that’s what I said…look deeply and there’s always always a connect. Now 4 feet, 8.5 inches….could be a strange number. But it’s the distance between the rails of the US railroad gauge. Now why was that gauge used? It’s coming from England because as we well know, the British were the leaders in railroads and they are the ones that also designed the US railroad system.
But now why did the British build them like this? It’s because the railroads came after the tramways and the tramways had the same gauge. Now how did the that happen? It’s because the tramways were built by using the same tools and know how that was used for building wagons. And the wagons had that wheel spacing. Now here’s the interesting bit. Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing of 4 feet, 8.5 inches? It’s because any other wheel spacing would make the wagon wheels break on some of the old, long distance roads in England because that was the spacing of the wheel ruts. But one would think why did these old rutted roads have this spacing. Here is where Rome comes in. The Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts and everyone followed suit else the wagon wheels would get destroyed. All the chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the rear ends of two war horses.
So how does this connect to the Space shuttle? Well, try and imagine a shuttle sitting on its launch pad. You’ll remember there are two big booster rockets attached to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are the solid rocket boosters. And as the story goes, the engineers who designed these boosters would have liked to make them a bit fatter. But these were made in the factory at Utah in the US. And they had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory runs through a tunnel in the mountains and these boosters had to fit through the tunnel. The tunnel is a bit wider than the railroad track and the railroad track as I just shared is about as wide as two horses’ behinds. So a space shuttle design was determined over 2 thousand years ago by the width of a horse’s ass!
See the connect!
Let me share another interesting concept here and perhaps this will be helpful as we move forward into the new decade. The concept of risk interconnectivity. Let’s take an example. You might remember the headlines in June 2018, the rationing of beer as we face the worst carbon dioxide crisis in decades. This happened in the UK during the world cup. Now why did this happen? It was because the supply system had broken down and there was a decrease in supply of beer. Why did this happen? It’s because carbon dioxide was in short supply. Why was that? It’s because the fertilizer plants were shutdown for routine maintenance in the summer. Now who would have thought that a routine maintenance exercise would result in headlines and a decrease in beer supplies …all coinciding with the World cup which typically increases the demand and need for a product, in this case beer.
The interconnectedness and interdependency that we all have in this world is very real and here is where the concept of risk interconnectivity comes in. It’s something being looked at more and more. Before taking decisions, one can do a risk interconnectivity mapping….for example, if this had been done for the maintenance of the fertilizer plants, one would have seen that the carbon dioxide supply would have been hit during this time, and it’s the same time of the world cup where demand for products like beer would be high, and so a contingency plan or possibly change in timings of the maintenance or a phased maintenance could have been done to avoid a crisis.
We often chart out plans and look at different scenarios and even have plan B and plan C. we may even do risk identification and risk mapping. But have we explored risk interconnectivity? Here is when we create the connections and are able to see the bigger picture and take action accordingly.
This is where the interconnectedness comes in. The positive and the negative as well as the side effects.
Of course, there are some obvious and well known and understood connections, example, diet and cancer, pollution and wellness and so many others. But then there are the not so clear, subtle connections, connections where we need to look deeper, need to understand further. And for that one needs to keep an open mind, be curious. You know that’s another key Maverick quality, being curious. But I would like to add, be curious and open. Open to discovery, open to exploration and learning.
As we start a new year, let’s keep this curious and open spirit alive.
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This is Ajey, signing off and wishing you have an amazing day. Keep well.