Leadership: Structural Tension/Structural Conflict
The tension between your vision and your current reality can be used as a creative force to move you forward. Robert Fritz
Gregg’s Reflection
Fundamentals of Structural Thinking
I studied with Robert and Rosalind Fritz for three years working towards certifications in Structural Consulting. I was certified as an Organizational Structural Consultant in 2003.
Since I began doing structural consulting in 2003, I learned to look at the secular tool of Structural Thinking through the lens of the Gospel. The legacy I hope to leave behind is an operating system for churches to pursue the twin tracks of teaching Personal Mastery while discipling people of faith into the Gospel of Grace.
The Tension Chart
The tension chart is the application of the creative process artists have used since ancient times to create masterpieces. Think of a block of marble. The sculptor visualizes something within the block that wants to be released. He can see the finished sculpture in his mind’s eye, and only he can know when the reality matches the artistic vision.
Think of how books are written, how movies are made, how paintings are done, each follows this same process. Visualize what you want, clearly describe that. Now look at current reality, what is in place and what is missing in order to fulfill the vision. Think of how God chips away at those parts of us that are not consistent with his plan, how we are shaped to become the person He wants. Find more on these ideas in my post on Leadership & Personal Mastery.
The Tension Chart requires two things, a Vision or Desired Future described as an outcome not a process, and an unflinching view of Current Reality vis-a-vis the vision. The contrast between what I want and where I am creates a strong tension, a structural tension that can only be resolved by moving towards the vision.
For those I coach, the two tasks are to master the tension chart and how to apply the creative process to your life so you can consistently manifest the results you seek. At the same time, walk deeper in with God so what you what and what He wants for you are more and more alike. To me, that has been the pathway to the abundant life Jesus promises in John 10:10.
Our lives can be driven by circumstances, or we can learn to organize our lives around our highest aspirations and deepest values, independent of the circumstances in which we find ourselves. We call the first case Reacting or Responding because the action that is taken is either a reaction against the circumstances, or a response to the circumstances. We call the second case Creating because the action that is taken is motivated by a desire to achieve an end result.The actions are not a reaction or even a response to the prevailing circumstances, but are designed to create a specific end result.
The Creative Orientation
Some people live primarily in a Creative orientation. In a Creative Orientation, your actions are driven by your desire to create a specific end result, independent of the circumstances. This applies both to individuals and organizations: Some organizations react or respond to circumstances, while others create their future and are often able to produce the results they desire. See my post: You Can’t Problem Solve Your Way to Success
We undertook three rounds of visioning in our business in the decade after our father died. This moved us off a plateau and saw us quadruple the size of the business. It spurred us to complete an acquisition and to create three standalone businesses.
Confronted with the two orientations, a conscious choice seems easy: to control our actions and manage the forces behind them, rather than leave our actions to circumstance, letting the forces manage us. The reason to master Structural Thinking is not for its own sake, but to increase your chances of fulfilling your most deeply felt aspirations and values-to create what matters most to you!
Structural Conflict
When we do not articulate a vision of our desired future, often we see two incompatible goals competing and causing what Fritz deemed Structural Conflict. In people this often expresses in two competing goals: I want to change, and I want to stay the same.
In churches, it often looks like this. In reacting or responding to declining membership and shrinking finances, churches will enact decisions to solve the problem (See You Can’t Problem your Way to Success). This desire to grow will result in taking actions: initiating change. Those actions, in the absence of an overarching vision, will spark resistance, since some are always invested in the status quo, even when it is not working.
Church leaders see instability, discontent, members leaving and finances declining. The external focus has members saying, “What about us? What about our needs?” They react to this stress by pulling back, trying to restore the old, cutting outreach, focusing on current member needs. This movement Fritz calls an Oscillating Pattern, as we swing back and forth between two incompatible goals.
However, that last step takes us back to the problem we faced initially (Follow the flow of the arrows). So, the process will start again, and be repeated in a continuing structurally conflict. It can only be resolved by moving from problems solving (reacting/responding) to a creative orientation where you cast an overarching vision and name current reality, and use the structural tension to overcome resistance and create the future you desire. Often, tension arises between Pioneers and Settlers in churches, as this illustrates. Every church plant is led by pioneers. Yet, over time, settlers come to predominate, locking us into what is, and not risking what might be.
This article by Rob Wagner illustrates how this dynamic works in a healthy church.
The choice to sell the business and seek my calling from God was the result of getting in touch with our deepest desires, and using tension charts to set the path. The tension chart, the primary tool of the Learning Organization discipline of Personal Mastery, has kept us moving from vision to vision, unfolding an abundant life for three decades now. For a detailed look at this tool, read Robert Fritz’s The Path of Least Resistance. Move from reacting and responding to creating your life as art (another Fritz book). Come along and find the path to abundant life. Blessings.
Journaling Prompts
What is my current reality, and how does it compare to my vision for my life or ministry? Where have I been living reactively—allowing circumstances to dictate my choices—rather than proactively creating the future I desire? What competing goals or structural conflicts might be keeping me stuck? (e.g. I want change, but I also want comfort or approval.) When I think about my deepest values and aspirations, what specific, compelling vision emerges? How can I use the tension between my vision and my current reality as fuel for creative action rather than frustration?
Scripture
Then the Lord replied: “Write down the revelation and make it plain on tablets so that a herald may run with it. For the revelation awaits an appointed time; it speaks of the end and will not prove false.”
Habakkuk 2:2-3
Where there is no vision, the people perish; but blessed is the one who heeds wisdom’s instruction.
Proverbs 29:18
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
Matthew 5:8
But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 3:13-14
A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways.
James 1:8
Ancient Writing
First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.
Epictetus, Enchiridion, Chapter 33. Establishing a vision, then acting toward it—a classic tension chart in practice!
The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book V, 20. Obstacles as the fuel for movement, transforming tension into progress.
Withdraw into yourself and look. And if you do not find yourself beautiful yet, act as does the creator of a statue that is to be made beautiful: he cuts away here, he smooths there, he makes this line lighter, this other purer, until a lovely face has grown.
Plotinus, Enneads, I.6.9. Vision of a desired outcome—sculpting reality to match that vision.
The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled.
Gregory Nazianzius, Oration 27.10. The creative process is sparked by vision and sustained by the tension between what is and what could be.
Modern Writing
Problem-solving is taking action to make something go away. Creating is taking action to bring something new into existence.
Robert Fritz, The Path of Least Resistance, 1989, Chapter 1
The most common pattern in the structures of people’s lives is oscillation—back and forth between conflicting goals—because their structures are created by conflicting motivations.
Robert Fritz, The Path of Least Resistance, 1989, Chapter 3
The tension between your vision and your current reality can be used as a creative force to move you forward.
Robert Fritz, The Path of Least Resistance, Chapter 4
The tension between your vision and your current reality generates energy. It creates a dynamic in which the structure itself—not your willpower—drives the process toward resolution.
Robert Fritz, Your Life as Art, p. 46.
Structural conflict is like having two rubber bands pulling you in opposite directions. When you try to move toward your vision, another part of the system pulls you back.
Robert Fritz, Creating, 1991
The essence of personal mastery is learning how to generate and sustain structural tension in our lives.
Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline, p. 142
The gap between vision and current reality is a source of creative energy. It is this gap that motivates people to change.
Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline, 1990, p. 150
Personal mastery is the discipline of continually clarifying and deepening our personal vision, focusing our energies, and developing patience to see results unfold. It’s in this gap—between where we are and where we want to be—that learning occurs.
Charlotte Roberts, The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook, 1994, with Peter Senge
What you want and what you think you want are often different. Tension is where creativity comes to life.
Rick Rubin, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, p. 98
The goal of art isn’t to eliminate the tension but to dance with it.
Rick Rubin, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, p. 162
Creation is a state of harmony between vision and reality, shaped by the tension of what could be and what is.
Rick Rubin, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, p. 135
Blessed are the pure of heart, for they will see God. Matthew 5:8. The heart does not need to be grown or evolved, but it does need to be purified. In its spiritual capacity, the heart is essentially a homing beacon, allowing us to stay aligned with those emanations from more subtle levels of existence.
But, when the signals get jammed by the interference of lower-level noise, then it is no longer able to do its beacon work. The Christian Wisdom tradition proclaims that the source of lower-level noise is “the passions.” The problem with the passions is they divide the heart. A heart that is divided, pulled this way and that by competing agendas, is like a wind-tossed sea: unable to reflect on its surface the clear image of the moon. (Structural Conflict)
Cynthia Bourgeault, Heart of Centering Prayer, p. 61