"Always remember that conformity is where tomorrow's greatness goes to die." - Futurist Jim Carroll
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Futurist Jim Carroll is writing his end-of-2025 / introduction-to-2026 series, 26 Principles for 2026. You can follow along at 2026.jimcarroll.com. He welcomes your comments.
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I've long suggested that one of the best ways to align with the future is through this thinking: when everybody is running one way, run the other way!
Be the contrarian. The hole in the bucket, the square peg with a bunch of round holes, the one who says "why not?' when everyone else is saying 'why?'
We are on Day 17. Yesterday, we looked at the terrifying math of the future—the sheer scale of change that is coming. 1-2-4-16-64 vs. 1-2-3-45.
When faced with that kind of overwhelming scale, the natural human instinct is to feel overwhelmed. And I am willing to admit that one reaction I see in common with all of my audiences is that this feeling is universal. I've been doing text-message-based polling from the stage for over 15 years, and one overwhelmingly consistent attitude is that people feel universally overwhelmed by the speed of the future.
So they try to avoid it. They try to fit in. They take the cautious route.
They choose the comfortable over discomfort.
The result? When we feel a need for comfort, to fit in, to follow the herd instinct, we try to be like everyone else. We look for safety in numbers. Case in point: we look at our competitors and say, "Well, they are doing AI this way, so we should too." Korn Ferry made this observation about AI: "Among the most expensive keeping-up-with-the-Joneses games in corporate history."
Need more proof? We seek out "best practices," which is usually just a fancy word for "copying the average."
I rest my case.
In a linear world, fitting in was a survival strategy. You survived by being a cog that fit perfectly into the machine.
In an exponential world, conformity is a death sentence.
Here's why: read the full post at the link below.
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**#Uniqueness** **#Conformity** **#Contrarian** **#Rebellion** **#Innovation** **#Curiosity** **#Differentiation** **#Misfits** **#Authenticity** **#Exponential**
The story of Oblio has defined much of Futurist Jim Carroll’s approach to life.
