The Genius of the “And” vs The Tyranny of the “Or”

In my twenties when I was young and stupid, I took my pregnant wife across the Rockies during one deep winter in a 1981 Toyota Landcruiser that had a leaking master cylinder. The breaks in the truck were not working properly and would lock and seize the wheels when pressed hard. After crawling through the rough road for over 24 hours, we finally arrived at The Coquihalla Highway. This portion of the mountain was extremely steep. Being young, ignorant, and proud, I started taking us in descend on this snow covered stretch of hill where semi-trucks were only crawling at 10km to 15km per hour max. Shortly after starting down the steep hill, I realized, I had no breaks and could not down shift which had previously caused us to spin off into the ditch twelve hours ago. The only option was for us to let the truck roll and hopefully we could steer clear off all other vehicles on the road and stay in the middle. Jane was praying harder than I had ever heard her pray. My mind had absolutely nothing in it but total focus. I do not like rollercoasters even in the best of conditions. But at that moment, we had faith that we would make it home to see our kids, trust in more than this unconstrained and broken set of wheels screaming down the hill without any tracks or stopping mechanism except for the hope of hitting dry and flat road at the bottom of the hill to slow us down. At that moment, if I had any doubt that we would make it, or if I spared any focus from steering that truck into safety, you wouldn’t be reading this newsletter today. We lived a moment of the genius of the “And” and survived an extremely dangerous ride that day.

This genius of the “And” is demonstrated in the story of the Stockdale principle told in a few of Jim Collins’ books. In the Stockdale principle, they found that the prisoners of war who made it out of the prison are not the optimists, but the ones who can hold both the belief of being free one day along with the brutal fact that they need to manage their dire conditions and survival in prison.

Another example of the genius of the “And is the first ingredient of a good to great company in Jim’s book: a level 5 leader. By the author’s definition, that is a leader who is humble but highly ambitious at the same time. If we were under the tyranny of the “or”, we would see this as an impossibility. How can someone be truly humble and yet be highly ambitious? Jim explained this leader as someone who has channeled their ambition towards the mission instead of focusing on personal gains. This leader is able to listen, learn and let the best idea lead for the success of the mission and the enterprise.

Once again, a few names came into mind right the way: Billy Graham, Mother Teresa, Nelson Mandella, George Washington, and Abraham Lincoln. I can think of examples in my life as well: Pastors David and Cheryl Koop of Coastal Church in Vancouver, David and Sara Robertson of Dirty Apron, to name a few.

These people have a strong sense of mission in life and an extreme focus on achieving their goals, yet, they are as real as they are ambitious and not puffed up.

Can you think of any dichotomies in your life where you can apply the “And” to draw out the genius of holding the two opposites together at the same time?