No Vision: No Development!

Published on 4th September 2007

Where there is no vision, the people perish.  This ancient saying has universal and timeless impact. Many people miss the message of the saying because they stop at where it says, “…the people perish” or “…the people cast off restraint.”  

How can I have a vision: something that moves me beyond myself; that asks me and others to change; that moves me out of my comfort zone—something that takes me to places I never thought I’d go? How can I have a vision that makes me miserable until I achieve it? 

Where would the world be without the visionary and organizers?   The visionary is the risk taker, the one that calls society to look at itself?  Where would we be without those who envision great things in their mind and work toward creating them? Look all around you and you see the power of the vision, the power of the mind at work.  People thinking—things becoming… A vision can move mountains! Likewise, where would we be without the organizers, the one’s who do those precise calculations? These are the folk who make sure the vision is made real; they make sure the job gets finished.  Yes, where would we be without the organizers who take the vision and make it into something that is tangible and not so abstract?   We need visionaries and organizers, and indeed this is a part of the evolutionary process of life that there are times to grow and times to organize and times to do both (grow & organize) but there is never a time to do neither.  That is when you are dead. 

YOU need to have both a vision and plan to move your life forward. If I don’t know why I exist, I run the risk of losing myself…Losing myself—I don’t care to help, I don’t care to do anything significant, I don’t care about the problems of others—I JUST DON’T CARE! I just want to eat, sleep and die---because my life does not have meaning, I don’t care about anybody else’s life!  It’s happening all over the place today! 

I heard it said once, “There is no such thing as lazy people only uninspired people.”  Isn’t that true!   What inspires you?  What gets you going?  What makes you feel alive?  If you don’t know that means you don’t have a vision for your life; you don’t have a message for your soul!    And you know--this vision thing is not just for the young.  There is a purpose for you no matter your age or station in life!

Your vision of what you want with and out of life is what makes you live; it keeps you alive; it gives you vitality.  Don’t be the musician who died with his music still inside. George Bernard Shaw said it well, “You see things and say ‘Why?’  But I dream things that never were and I say “Why not?”  George Eliot said once:  “It seems to me we can never give up longing and wishing while we are alive.  There are certain things we feel    to be beautiful and good, and we must hunger for them.”

Yes, we need a vision and purpose for our individual lives… But without a plan, you are just fantasizing.  You need to organize your thoughts into a systematic action plan that will catapult that vision to a loftier reality…  You see the plan, the organizing, the structure to get you to your dream is as vital as the dream.  You need them both to manifest your greatness in life. Many cannot see what they want and therefore the plan never materializes. 

The visionary and the organizer ought to be respected as both are equally important. More than that, we must come to see that we are all moving together.

Rich Devos said that most human organisms that have structure start out in the growth phase.  The concern is finding members and spreading the message.  He said the group will naturally go into the organizing phase when they realize that members need more structure.  He said that most organizations fail once they go into the organizing stage, as they forget about the vision, purpose, stop growing and go into a third stage called, “fighting over the spoils”.  As if all that could be organized is right there and there’s nothing more to create; as if there is no more to create in this grand universe of change and opportunity, we fight over the leftovers, metaphorically speaking, and forget, as Devos said to GO BACK TO THE GROWTH STAGE.  I contend that his stages should not be compartmentalized.  There should not be any stages really.   There should be only one stage—growth and organization moving together in a beautiful and harmonious dance!

Organizing must be centered in and around the vision and not the other way around.  The two must work together but our dream, our vision is what creates the growth and diversity and from that we organize dynamic systems and programs to make what we have even better.  Remember that…


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