Shearing layers of change
I wanna talk about shearing.jpg
It’s a little picture that’s been stuck in my head ever since i saw it and taught me one way to think about change over time:
Stewart Brand popularized the concept, calling it “shearing layers of change.” I believe he was influenced by another architect whose name I can’t quite recall.
Importantly, Brand extended the concept to society as well.
It’s a useful metaphor to describe the way that change works across multiple levels at a time.
You might well see immediate and beneficial results changing one thing, but without the shearing support of the more fundamental layers, those results will be fighting to not be torn apart.
I find this is often the case in personal change. Not to say that the more immediate, psychological kind of changes aren’t bad. You need those.
Merely that you need to be advancing on all levels at once.
For change to be backed up by more fundamental layers makes it Non-naïve.
Here’s an example from my thread on Weird energy:
“Meeting your needs” is the fundamental, over time change. You can’t make that happen right now. “Acknowledging your needs” is something you can do right now.
The most rock-solid way to live life is to just have your needs met, but In the meantime, you need this.
Can’t live on cope, can’t live without it — the nature of any multilayered system.
This is true of any Neurath’s boat—any boat you are trying to repair that you are also on.