On running the living organism we call Michelberger

Energy is always in balance. Like the amount of energy in the ocean. In a collective endeavor there are always waves of giving and taking. Run sustainably, overall there is balance. In the early stages of a business or a child’s life, there is an outside investment. An injection of kinds, which makes you start up. As a child, business, in a physical or abstract form. This injection is intended to build the base for growth, as the system itself is not productive enough to take care of everything on its own from the getgo. The sooner the child or business runs on its own fuel, the more learning it can do on its own. And learning happens when energies bounce back and forth in a chaotic directional forward movement. In weaker phases the system needs more energy than it creates, so it’s eating on the substance, at this point the leaders or any part of the system need to step up and ramp up the energy production to support the organism. Like the organs in our bodies. If the organs themselves are in a bad shape to get into the crisis and need help themselves, this energy demand of the organism puts even more pressure on the organs, which then can result in a downward spiral. At this point the injection of cash, as the lowest or most simple quality of energy, is not really helpful. So, if we just ad more junk food as energy for our bodies, with little nutritional value, it takes more energy to deal with the aftereffects, then this food initially brings in. When the child does not learn more and more on its own, it keeps needing and taking from the parents, and you end up with grown up babies running around, and forever parenting parents. Or babies which mistake anyone they encounter as their parents. Be it their boss or love partner. Or a start up that never starts up or always keeps starting up. Creating unhealthy organisms, which pop up and disappear as fast and loud as they showed up. Energy drains to the overall ecosystem.

Our learning curve which keeps learning, the current idea is for us to be aware of the quality of energy individual parts bring into a living system. It’s never the quantity, although sometimes quantity is misperceived as quality energy, because quantity of energy sometimes does the contrary of what it perceives itself to be and do. It is energy which is not given to the organism for the sake of giving, but it is given in the expectance of immediate returns in form of recognition or cash. This transactional thinking is not healthy. Because systems are complex, and the giving sometimes returns from other directions or in different times than expected. Any system has ingredients, organs or input which temporarily take more than they give, this is balanced by the organism, by the collective.

Our festivals in 2016 and 2018 are the perfect example. The amount of quality of energy given and put in by so many people… 220 musicians, 40 engineers, 200 michelberger staff and volunteering friends, an audience of 5000 people… a train of creation and giving that overcame the craziest obstacles. A train that could not be stopped by anyone. A momentum that put the egos in check… at least temporarily for these 2 moments, these 2 weeks out of time. Because what does ego mean, what does it do… The ego needs identification, its its own sole base of being. On this train of creation the crowd energy was the identification. The common goal was eye to eye, free creation and sharing of it with others. The egos had nothing to identify with, because they found their way back into their universal ocean of togetherness and connectedness. The trust, the love was experienced, because when a collective creates, there are only winners. Only people left with more than they put in. That to us is our human experience, this is why plants grow, because the nutrients and living organisms in the ground cocreate so the plant is their expression of growth and life, and then a plant does what a plant on a healthy soil does. It just grows and lives, and it would never identify as a plant, because it does not think like this… and this is why ever plant is more beautiful than every ego can dress up in.

So we try to take care of the soil and then we trust the plants to grow. So for the soilkeeper, the main job is to make sure whatever we bring in from the outside initially gives more than it takes, so this new incoming in the long run can also live through weaker phases and be carried through by the collective energy. So the responsibility of every single ingredient in turn is also to take care of its own soil, to be an enriching part to any system it encounters instead of just feeding of it. When the bigger systems go mad, our job is to keep the sanity in our smaller microcircular systems, which in its smallest form are individuals. The best place to start is always with yourself, if you want a different world. If you are ready to give more then you take, then you are a great addition to any organism, because you lay the foundation for creation & survival. The collective’s and in consequence your own.

This is easier said than done, but we know it’s our only way. To take care of the soil, the interplay of quality and quantity of energies, the identifications of egos and support of each other. And the the clarity of identifying energy drains and maximising the intake of quality nutrients, so the system can learn and grow in its interplay with life.

Living organisms like any small businesses interacting with each other create the life we desire to life. So what are we ready to bring to this life ? What are we ready to give!

Tom Michelberger March 2023