Dancing in the Space in Between — How Relational Intelligence Determines Success in Transformation
“The future can’t be predicted, but it can be envisioned and brought lovingly into being….
We can’t control systems or figure them out. But we can dance with them!”
— Donella Meadows
A Dance of Relating
The other day I got to see the premiere of LOVETRAIN 2.0, a dance performance choreographed by Emanuel Gat at Staatstheater Linz.
What made the performance exceptional was the attention to relating: Each dancer acting from a basic set of instructions, but the choreography was not fixed, it unfolded in the execution of each dancer’s instructions while in relation to each other in space and time. The result was some of the most authentic individual movement I had seen from these dancers, while there was also more coherence in the whole as they moved together.
In that, it served as a beautiful metaphor for my work with leaders and their organizations around relational intelligence: teaching them to enable and encourage authentic self-expression and creativity from their people, while moving together coherently as a team.
Dancing with Systems
The idea of dancing also came up while talking to my friend sebnem who had considered becoming a dancer, but decided to become a developer instead — only to realize that as such, she was dancing with systems (she also shared with me this excellent piece by Donella Meadows on Dancing with Systems). Once a dancer, always a dancer.
Dancers: Masters of the Space in Between
Dancers are some of my favorite artists.
Their body is their instrument, and in order to dance fully, they have to relate to it, to their emotions and thoughts and everything that informs their body, and they have to relate to space, and to others in that space.
Dance is about the space in between.
Similar to how music happens in the space between the notes, dance happens in the relationship of the dancer with themselves and their environment.
The Universal Space Between
Marina Abramovic said that performance art happens between the artist and the audience. In many ways, we are all performance artists — and all the world’s a stage as Shakespeare said.
We all have to constantly navigate the space between: Between “i” and “I” and “Other”; between our “me”, the part that experiences itself through body, emotions, thoughts, and our awareness of ourselves in itself, and with that our potential, our higher self, or simply who we could become in every moment.
Every moment beckons emergence in the space in between.
On the fine line between chaos and order, between surrender and discipline.
Navigating the space in between is the core of relational intelligence.
Evolving Toward Relational Intelligence
After the evolution of mental semantic intelligence, our capacity for rationality and reason, we are now called to evolve the next level of intelligence: that of relating.
We are in the middle of massive transformations. As our planet is growing together, everyone is at least on some level aware that diversity is an 8bn people conversation — even if our politics might not reflect that at the moment. In addition, technology in the form of AI and in particular LLMs has already reached a level of reasoning way beyond most humans’ capacity, and is even beginning to mimic relating.
We are likely doomed as a species if we do not evolve the capacity to relate more consciously.
We get to learn to relate to ourselves anew, to each other, and to the world we live in.
This goes for our personal lives, for our teams, and for our organizations.
Transformation: The Space Between What Was and What Will Be
Transformation means that what was, isn’t anymore, and something new, a new form arises. This requires letting go, and it requires navigating the space in between, the liminal space of transformation, so that we can actively create what will be.
Navigating transformation will become a key capacity for leaders on all levels as organizations will continue to transform in a constantly changing context.
Making transformation a practice and increasing the relational intelligence of their workforce therefore is quickly becoming a top priority for any leader who is planning to be part of the future.
So, let’s start dancing!
If you’re curious about relational intelligence and learning to navigate transformation, connect with me here — let’s have a chat.
Please connect and reach out on LinkedIn, my website or if you are leading transformation at your company and can use some support via LUMAN.
