There is one essential ingredient that allowed the scene above to play out: Trust. All high-functioning superorganism societies require it. I need you to perform your function for my survival, and you need me to perform my function for yours. When we share the same goal, we trust our “teammates” to do everything they can to make it happen. Their success is our success. If we choose not to cooperate, we lose our hive or it gets sick. Everyone must contribute or everyone suffers.
Have you ever been stranded on the side of the road and had someone pull over to ask if you’re okay? Next thing you feel are tears welling up because you are so touched that this perfect stranger is caring for you? It’s why Jack Canfield’s book series, Chicken Soup for the Soul, is such a smashing success. It reminds us, in its own words, that we are part of a superorganism. Humans are deeply interlocked and interwoven. What we do to ourselves, we do to one another. Although we often get confused about who we are, the way we feel when we are cared for by a stranger quickly reminds us.
The way our superorganism society works, we can’t even turn on a light without hundreds or thousands of others, each one playing a crucial role: manufacture the bulb, package it, ship it, ring it up at the counter, wire our homes for electricity, run the power plant, et cetera. All this to bring us light. Think about that the next time you flip a switch.
Bottom line, on a purely evolutionary level, humans are designed to connect. Without connection, there’s no light, no team, no soup. You are part of this tasty broth, and no one in the world is quite the vegetable that you are. You must gift your gifts!
While giving often seems counterproductive in the short term, it is productive in the long term. Relationships take time to develop enough to provide value we can see. Rest assured, each time you act as a giver, you are also giving to yourself. In his book Give and Take, Wharton professor Adam Grant explains how “givers” (those who help others without selfish motivation), “takers” (those who take without giving in return), and “matchers” (those who strive for equal trades) can affect our success—both as individuals and at the corporate level. Here’s one tidbit: Evidence suggests that in sales, givers begin with 6 percent lower revenue than takers and matchers. But by the year’s end, givers finish with a gargantuan 68 percent higher revenue!2
WHAT IF . . .?
So we, some bugs, and those cool naked mole rats share this superorganism thing, but do we humans have anything that is unique to us? You know, the anteater is best at eating ants, the cactus is best at living in the desert. What are we best at? What is our “superpower?”
Some say that humans are separate from nature. This is simply not true. Look around you. Everything you see is part of nature. This includes plastic Barbies and Budweiser caps, which, however processed or far removed from the source, did in fact come from nature: just like us! But there is something else unique about us. As Dr. Woolley-Barker puts it, “We influence our evolution more than any other species by asking, ‘What if . . .?’”
That’s right. You don’t see ants practicing biomimicry. Only humans do that. Why? The answer is quite specific. Humans have a genetic basis for understanding time in a sequential, narrative way. We tell stories. As storytellers we choose what we want to create and grow into. We time-travel in our minds. When we ask, “What if . . .?” we’re imagining how things might be different in an alternate reality. You know, different from right now. Religion, inventions, stories, promises: these things all come from the ability to imagine parallel realities. Our species’ ability to ask “What if . . .?” opens us to an infinity of choice. It is this question-asking ability that allows us to influence our evolution.
What if . . . I cut my hair?
What if . . . I could end world hunger?
What if . . . I could get out of debt?
What if . . . I could be happier?
What if . . . there’s a better way?
What if . . . I could get charisma?
What if . . . I could climb the castle wall like a gecko?
I like to think “whatiferousness” is our superpower, the magic wand into infinite possibility. Unfortunately, it often hurts us as well, by keeping us constantly going around in “what if” circles.
What if . . . I’m late?
What if . . . they don’t like me?
What if . . . I make a mistake?
We spend a lot of time using “What if?” to cultivate fear. It’s not difficult to see that humans, as a species, are suffering as a result. Even first-world countries (mostly them!) register sky-high levels of depression. Author Brendon Burchard points directly to this epidemic in his book The Charge. “Face it: the emotional energy of the world has flatlined. Over the past forty years, across almost every developed country in the world, the diagnosis of clinical depression has grown nearly tenfold.”3 Like the superhero burned before he learns to master his superpower, so it is with our mental time machine. As long as we use our power for fear and separation instead of love and connection, we will suffer. We must choose our questions with care. As soon as you ask a question, your mind starts grinding away to crank out an answer. You can’t help it; it’s what your human brain is made to do. But you can fabricate a lasso for that magnificent mind of yours and reel it in when you notice your question-asking cycles teetering on the edge of destruction.
How? Stop asking questions that hurt! Critical thinking and debate can be illuminating. I am not suggesting you stop asking the hard questions of yourself and others. I am, however, suggesting you stop asking the questions that encourage verbal self-flagellation. If you’ve been asking “what-if-I-f—ed up” type questions for a good portion of your life, putting down the whip may be harder than you think. We will explore this process more deeply in the next chapter. But go ahead and start using your whatiferousness superpower for love and connection right now by asking the question “What if I never feel the urge to ask another belittling question again?”
Let’s garner a better idea of how your whatiferousness works by taking a look at the question, “What if I could climb the castle wall like a gecko?”
Think about it for a minute. Ask yourself, “What if I could climb the castle wall like a gecko?”
Notice how your brain immediately starts wondering how the gecko climbs walls.
Are his feet sticky? Are they webbed? Could I create a pair of wall-climbing shoes that mimic the gecko’s castle-climbing capabilities?
The fancy word for this mimic-creation process is “reverse-engineering.” Whatever you put your human imagination to, your mind automatically tries to make so. Granted, climbing castle walls might not be number one on your bucket list, but I bet there are other things you would like to use your blood-pumping, full-breathed creative juices for. Maybe you want to solve the California drought. Maybe you want to date Paris Hilton. Maybe you want to learn how to get the spot out of your carpet. Your brain can’t tell the difference. They’re all questions to be considered, imagined, and turned into results. The mental magic starts with a question, and you get to pick which ones you ask.
As Jesus Christ, one of the first people in history to be called a “charismatic” leader4 said, “Ask and you shall receive.”5
Here’s the deal: Humans would not possess the ability to ask “What if?” unless it supported conditions conducive to life. Further, humans evolved to function as superorganisms, so whatiferousness must be a condition conducive to life. Riddle me this, Grasshopper: If only some of us were meant to manifest change, to influence our species; if only some of us were meant to create life-enhancing conditions; if only