The Ingredients Of 'Heart'
There is an old Jewish proverb that goes something like this: ‘guard your heart because it is the wellspring of life.’
It’s a favourite saying of my friend Shane, who first shared it with me around 2005. The proverb was written about 3000 years ago by King Solomon who, by all accounts, was a pretty smart guy.
The Lebanese mystic Khalil Gibran (also a smart guy) related to his readers: “Of life's two chief prizes, beauty and truth, I found the first in a loving heart and the second in a labourer's hand.”
I’ve been thinking of this thing, heart, a lot lately.
I’ve been limiting my time on social media while the extremity of opinions continues to intensify. People’s perspectives are becoming harsher. People’s hearts are being hardened.
This trend is worrying, given the challenge at hand. Another friend, Mark, reminded me last week that sentiment is critical to the story of our country’s economic resurgence. This is a view espoused by Robbie Brozin and Adrian Gore, two incredibly successful business leaders that have both appeared on the Heavy Chef stage.
You’d expect this message from Robbie, who is a natural storyteller. However, a focus on sentiment might seem weird coming from the leader of arguably the most data-obsessed organization in the country. But Gore is right - and Heavy Chef’s own research actually substantiates this. Two weeks ago, my work-brother Louis shared the 2021 Entrepreneur Education Survey that we conducted in collaboration with Xero. It showed that entrepreneurs are driving sentiment. Bucking the trend of the broader population, a key finding in the study revealed that 76% of the 2,000+ respondents of our 2021 survey felt optimistic about their business prospects for 2022 and beyond. It was also emphasised in the winning speeches at the SA’s Top 5 Startups event that we hosted with Xero and PayFast.
This positivity is important. As entrepreneurs, we’re confronted by brutal facts all the time - and the facts are not pretty right now. The world doesn’t believe that South Africa is in a healthy state. Our own media reminds us all the time of how bad things have gotten. Unemployment is at an all-time high. Education is in tatters. The youth are restless. GBV is everywhere. SA is ranked the 5th most violent society from 144 countries surveyed. Sabotage and corruption is still rife. Political opponents are being murdered and criminals are toying with our much-lauded constitution.
In order to overcome seemingly insurmountable odds the challenge ahead requires us, in the immortal words of Ted Lasso, to believe. In order to get others to believe we have to drive sentiment. In order to drive sentiment, we need a lot of heart.
The odds are stacked against us. Yet, the lion-heart of entrepreneurship still beats loudly in this flawed, beautiful nation of ours.
At Heavy Chef, we spent a lot of time in 2021 building a body of practical knowledge to empower entrepreneurs. The three pillars of our curriculum are tech, leadership and creativity. We curated over 120 topics, with over 1000 bite-sized lesson videos shared by over 100 ‘chefs’. In the past 12 months, we hosted 18 people on stage for our community events and broached the most salient topics relevant to our community of over 45,000 entrepreneurs and aspiring entrepreneurs.
In amongst those learning pillars, there were some lessons that really stood out - more than just in a practical sense. Lessons that shone a light on what is required to face 2022.
Lesson #1: Practice Gratitude
On the Heavy Chef platform, Riaad Moosa and Marc Rogatschnig, among others, underpinned the role of gratitude in their lives. In the past, thinkers such as Victor Frankl, Edith Eger and Jean-Paul Satre have spoken about how a perspective of gratitude is critical to a healthy life. Entrepreneurship is brutal. It becomes less brutal when we focus on what we have, as opposed to what we lack. This is an important mental health strategy. Look at the future with optimism. Look at the present and be present. Look at the past with awareness… and be grateful. A lovely perspective comes from mindfulness practitioner Nicci Cloete, whose recipe will soon be live on the HC learning platform. Nicci reminded us of a simple mental hack. Whenever we groan about ‘we have to do xyz’, change the wording to ‘I get to do xyz.’ So, for example, ‘I have to go to work today’ changes to ‘I get to go to work today.’ Gratitude is a choice. It’s always free, always available. However, it requires heart.
Lesson #2: Search For Truth
The facts don’t always lead us to obvious conclusions. So, what is the truth? This is tricky. For example: Vaccines are great. They’ve solved some of the most heinous afflictions known to humanity. Look up ‘dying of small pox’ on Google image search and you’ll get an idea of what we’ve avoided with these miraculous medical inventions. With this seemingly obvious truth, there is no topic more polarizing right now than mandatory vaccinations. Another truth: business is hard. Entrepreneurship is probably the most failure-prone option available to us as a career path. Yet, Heavy Chef is predicated upon inspiring people to start. Are we being truthful about our messaging? I believe so, but it’s complicated. There are truths that are even more difficult. South Africa is the most unequal region on the planet. We still have much unfinished business to deal with from our past. The remnants of colonialism are still prevalent. Neither socialism nor capitalism is a silver bullet. So, what is the answer? Spoiler: I have no idea, but I’m hoping that empowering entrepreneurs as an important part of the answer. Perhaps the only clear truth is the one espoused by Bruce Springsteen in a podcast interview with Conan O’Brien. Springsteen, when asked how he was feeling being in his 70’s, responded: “What is essential, as you become an adult, is that you have to refine the ability to hold two contradictory ideas in your mind at the same time, without it driving you crazy. That is the mark of adulthood.” Truth doesn’t always provide clear direction, but it’s by far the most grown-up way to navigate the tricky path of life. Heavy Chef’s friends over Daily Maverick are building a tough business on a tough mantra: ‘defend truth’. Let’s join them on this mission. Let’s build a better nation by being truthful and truth-filled. Truth requires heart.
Lesson #3: Take Ownership
One of South Africa’s finest ever sportsmen, Bryan Habana, told us this about leadership: “If there was one common trait [to the great leaders that I’ve played rugby with]: it was the fact that the great leaders took ownership of the position they were in.” It’s easy for us to cast blame, but what is our role in making a difference? Entrepreneurs understand this question well. We see the problems, but we also see our role in fixing those problems. It’s not the role of government to heal the country. It’s the role of government to help us heal the country. Let’s embrace the spirit of ownership. However, a real sense of ownership requires real heart.
Lesson #4: Be Curious
By far the most common trait of all the folks we’ve hosted on our platform has been an attitude of curiosity towards their journey. There is a key lesson in this. A common trap that I often fall into is to fixate upon a conclusion, then seek data to support it. This misses both the science and the art of entrepreneurship. A better mechanism should be a spirited approach to experimentation. Learn the landscape, pick a route and then zoom out, observe, then zoom in again. Let’s be genuinely curious around the outcome and then use common sense on whether to pivot or retain the course. That’s critical thinking at work. Nearly every single chef on our platform conveyed a deep sense of curiosity in their recipes. The spirit of curiosity is founded on, yup, a strong heart.
Lesson #5: Tell Better Stories
Our story can be written for us, or it can be written by us. Award-winning writer, creative director and speaker Pierre du Plessis explained in his fascinating Heavy Chef recipe: “Storytelling is a very, very powerful tool. The basic job of a leader is to define a new reality: This is the way the world is now. Let me tell you a story about what it could be.” Rich Mulholland, whose latest book Here Be Dragons is out now, spoke about storytelling in his recipe entitled ‘Presenting With Impact’: “The answer to why [a great story] is interesting is the dragon. Voldemort makes Harry Potter's existence interesting. I think that people should become obsessed with dragons.” In other words, what is the real problem you’re fighting? What is the enemy of the community you’re trying to serve? Who is the dragon that you’re helping them fight? 2021’s world-champion of public speaking Verity Price, adds that telling a great story requires life force. “That's what people remember, your passion, your energy, the you that you bring, is what people remember.” Zolani Mahola, co-founder of Freshlyground, concurs. In her serene recipe on ‘Creative Expression’ Zolani emphasised: “None of us, nobody here on this planet, is the same as anybody else. There is only one of you. And there's only one person who's going to do it exactly like you - and that's you.” Our stories make a difference. They convey who we are in a way that resonates and moves audiences. Netflix, one of the most extraordinary entrepreneurial success stories of the 21st Century, understands this well. At the end of Netflix’s culture memo, there is a quote by Antoine de Saint-Exupery, author of The Little Prince: “If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.” - Heart.
Lesson #6: Be Playful
We need to relearn how to be playful. Life gets all too serious all on its own. There’s no point in making it more serious. After all, play was the primary way we used to learn prior to the agricultural period. As hunter-gatherers, children explored their territory and educated themselves by playing with fellow tribe members. Over time, humanity attempted to beat playfulness out of us through slave-labour and strict colonial education systems. However, play is hard-wired into us. It’s part of evolution. No matter how hard we suppress it, our natural million-year-old instincts will out. So, we may as well embrace play - in our workplaces, in our messaging, in our home lives, in our own lives. Another rather famous Jewish thinker said 2,000 years ago ‘the way to heaven is to change and be like little children.” This does not mean giving up responsibility. It’s not about being childish. It’s about being childlike.
And yes, there’s an obvious thread through all of these lessons. The very unscientific, the very unprovable, very unstoppable message of: heart.
In short, moving into 2022, we need the hands of labourers, the heads of scientists, and the hearts of lions.
The chaos of life in Africa requires us to look for beauty and truth.
That is a choice.
Blessings to all of you, and thank you for your ongoing support.
Guard your heart. It is the wellspring of life.
Peace.
