Thinking in Systems - An Exploration of Systems Thinking
Systems thinking is the opposite of letting go in the meditation paradigm. When you think in systems—or attempt to—you concentrate hard on the system at hand in order to make it fit a certain category, or squared process you and your mind manufacture carefully. You attempt to put things into a broader process. You extract the fundamental meaning of a component to fit it into a larger scheme.
Systems thinking is useful for business operations, for example. Or your life operations. We may not systematize our life operations enough, most of the time. Systematising means fitting the pieces together; it means stepping back and looking at your most important habits, projects, tasks, and developing a thought-after system around those. This is incredibly valuable in the long term if you believe in the power of habits to progress in your life.
System thinking can produce, as a by-product, a productivity system in a world without email that can aid you in gaining significant career capital, silently and mindfully. System thinking can be the difference between sending yourself an email as a reminder of going to the dentist and inputting that event in your calendar/broader life management system. It can be the difference between tension and relaxation.
Systems thinking is the art and science of stepping back, looking at a problem, understanding how it fits into the broader system it’s part of, and developing a solution that addresses the whole system to solve the problem. Maybe it’s a good idea if I break down this definition since it’s composed of multiple elements that look like random cool words casually put together.
Systems thinking is an art and science: It is an art because experience makes the difference in systems thinking. Operation managers need to be adept at systems thinking. When you understand the broad systems underlying your business’ operations, you can streamline those processes and foster effectiveness and efficiency. It is also an art because the ability to think in systems varies among individuals. If you score high in personality traits conscientiousness and orderliness, you may be more naturally gifted to think in systems.
Systems thinking is a science because you can to some degree measure the effectiveness of your implementation—of the processes you put in place. And you can also use literature regarding systems thinking to adjust your target and understand best practices in such a domain of competence.
Stepping back, looking at the problem, understanding how it fits into the broader system it’s part of: this is a valuable ability. The ability to step back from the daily hyperactive hive mind is liberating if practiced with enough focus. When you look at things from a distance—from above—as if you were an austronaut gravitating around the Earth’s crust, you gain invaluable perspective. From an existential point of view, you gain perspective about the cosmos and what things look like from afar. At a practical level, you gain insights into how the components of your system are actually assembled, scattered, organized, shaped.
Then you can understand that it doesn’t matter much, what you deemed as a life-threatening problem when you were stuck in the weeds of the system you are looking at from above now. You can truly understand the system when you step back from it. You are now detached from it, similar to when your meditation teacher tells you “look for the one who’s looking”, while you have your eyes closed and have been trying to focus on your breath for ten minutes until then. How can one do that? Maybe by taking a step back and detaching from the practice to gain perspective. Or maybe not even trying.
Developing a solution that addresses the whole system to solve the problem: problem-solving begins by understanding the problem. That is stage 2 above (stepping back). If you can’t authentically recognize the pieces of the problem and how they interact together in shaping the broader system they compose, you can’t solve a problem, when you have one. You may be able to fix the symptom, but not the root cause. That is a good short-term solution, but a poor long-term strategy.
If you feel completely overwhelmed by your existence and the lack of productivity/effectiveness you have, just attempting to reach inbox 0 every day may not be a proper solution for your existential crisis. You may have the necessity to step back and analyze the core systems in place in your life. What habits do you have? What is the first thing you do upon waking up in the morning? How do you deal with the inevitable problems that you encounter in your daily existence, however minor they are? What system do you have in place to manage your work effectively, if any? How do you deal with negative thoughts, competing commitments, and limiting beliefs? Why? Ask why five times at least to dig deep into the system you are analyzing. Then you can gain perspective. And become stronger in the process—more resilient and self-aware.
That is systems thinking, to my consciousness. When you look at something—analyze something—you may need to look with more attention. Or maybe you need to change the target you are looking at. And step back to look at the system of which that target is a component. Then let go of your competing commitments and biases. Gain perspective, and keep looking. You cannot become happy, you can only be happy.
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