Concerns of “Linguistic Beings”
Body, Family, Work, Play and Sociability
“Body” is the most important, practical and financial fundamental human concern, by far, which is why it requires so much explanation.
Not only is Body the first fundamental human concern, it is also definitive and predetermines our capabilities to take care of the other concerns.
We are born with bodies that are fundamentally the same, e.g., five fingers and five toes, and that are different specifically, e.g., no one’s fingerprints are identical.
In addition, everyone’s bodies are “plastic” in that we all have some finite capacity to learn new interpretations and skills so we can adapt to changing circumstances.
That’s why some people can learn more and perform better than others in different domains, such as in sports, business, politics, science or raising children.
Therefore, it is no surprise to anyone that taking care of our bodies is the costliest concern by far. We must expend more money, time, energy and lost opportunities to take care of this concern than any other.
Our bodies are the concern businesspeople and their spouse are always forced to take care of first in order to live a good life.
When money gets tight people find themselves forced by their pain and suffering to give up taking care of all other concerns but their Body.
The importance of taking care of our bodies to fulfill our Lifestyle, Financial and Business Ambitions, to take care of our spouse and children and to fulfill businesspeople’s financial, career and business intentions,
… can’t be understated.
The same claim is true for businesspeople’s colleagues, employees, employers, vendors and competitors.
It doesn’t matter whether they know it, or not. Financial pressures and the breakdowns, pain, despair and suffering produced by not having enough money to afford the goods and services we all need to help us force everyone to try to take care of their concerns, eventually.
Knowing this is a “Source of Power” IR#4 Businesspeople use to increase their competitive capabilities and advantages, productivity, value and incomes.
Our Bodies are always our first fundamental concern because they enable us to be “present” in life so that we can think and act effectively to take care of any other fundamental human concern, such as our family, work, money, play, socializing or dignity.
When we are unable to be “present” in life with our body for any reason, including distraction, ill health, lack of education, a bad mood or disinterest,
… we are unable to survive, cope with life’s always changing circumstances or live a good life.
And, although we think we “have” bodies and control them with our will, we don’t. They have us, and it is wise to dial down any arrogance we might have that we are in charge.
Everything we think or say is our body at work, including the thought that we have a body that is isolated from our thinking.
The hungrier or thirstier we become, for example, the less able our bodies become to think about anything but eating food or drinking water.
If we prefer chocolate ice cream, it isn’t our choice. We have to deal with the preference, whether we want to or not.
The older we get the less we can deal with stresses and the longer it takes to recover from stress, and there’s nothing we can do about it.
It’s our bodies that are linguistic, historical and Selves. Nothing else exists.
None of the other fundamental human concerns in the rest of this paper could exist unless our bodies were able to speak, or live in language as we do, couple with the language of the past, and live with permanent identities that are always evolving.
Human beings are biological. We are not “things” that walk, talk and have emotions and thoughts.
We are animals with very sophisticated nervous systems that make us “linguistic”.
Our nervous systems have us produce language to interpret our situations and concerns automatically and spontaneously in response to breakdowns, the same way dogs bark and birds sing, so we can survive, adapt and live a good life..
What we call “our mind” is our body coupling to social discourse or by simply talking with others. That is, our mind isn’t “ours”. It’s produced socially as we couple to the language of our culture, which was always invented in the past.
We speak and communicate with our Bodies to coordinate thought and action with others so that we can produce highly valued outcomes to take care of our concerns.
In the marketplace, we “help” one another by transacting, or exchanging goods and services with one another.
Other animals such as dogs, dolphins, apes, horses, etc., communicate in order to coordinate action to deal with procreation, feeding or danger. But only human beings language complex ideas, symbols and actions that refer back to one another for their meaning.
If I say, “heart surgery”, for example, the simple-sounding noise I make triggers layers and layers of different meanings for different listeners.
Every person who hears the words, everyone, will listen the way their body reacts depending upon its underlying organization and structures, state at the time, past experiences, mood, education, etc.
No one is “in charge” of how their body will interpret the words.
If I say, “clown”, your nervous system will interpret its meaning automatically the way your body does it.
You’ll know what the word means, or you won’t.
If you know what it means, you can’t make your nervous system not understand it, which makes human beings easy to manipulate.
And, what clowns mean to you will be as unique as your body and its cultural history.
This is true for your spouse and children as well as your colleagues, competitors, customers, employees, employers and vendors,
… which is why it is in Part #3 of The Strategy, IR#4 Strategic and Competitive Knowledge.
Human beings are historical because where your body has been, how it’s been treated, trained and educated, where it matured, how strong and able it is physically and psychologically now, etc., is you.
It’s who you are, as well as every one of your colleagues, employees, customers, employers, competitors and vendors, and your family members.
The way we “change” our Selves, or increase our competitive capabilities to think and act to fulfill our financial, career and business intentions is to gently and firmly change our ambitions, moods, language, intentions, distinctions, interpretations, commitments, practices and outcomes so they are coherent with enabling us to survive, adapt and live a good life.
“Aji” shows businesspeople how to do this using recurrence, reciprocation and recursion, which are explained in the book.
Using “The Body” existentially at home
When businesspeople and their spouse use the fundamental human concerns existentially, they use them to:
1. Survive, as in a competitor can cause an existential threat to businesspeople’s careers or abilities to fulfill their financial intentions to take care of their spouse and children
2. Live a life that is meaningful, or worthwhile, from their point of view such as being able to earn and save enough money to live a good life with one’s spouse, including 25+ years of unemployment during old age, or not becoming a “parent tax” on their adult children because they run out of money.
When people fail to fulfill their existential intentions or live a life that is meaningful from their point of view, it triggers moods called “existential despair”.
In either case, and no matter anyone’s personal philosophy about what it means to live a good life, their political orientation or their religion,
… everyone will include having “enough money” to afford food, housing, medical care and transportation for their spouse and themselves
… because it is a biological necessity that precedes anything else.
Put another way, no one’s marriage vows, e.g., love, honor and cherish, includes being casual about earning and saving enough money to prevent one’s spouse to face a future in which they are certain to run out of money — and the help everyone needs to survive, adapt and live a good life — if they live a normal lifespan.
Who would allow someone they love, honor and cherish to grow old and frail without being able to afford the goods and services we all need to help us take care of our fundamental human concerns for our body — food, housing, health care and medical care?
Then there are our children. What parent who loves and cares about their children would willingly become a “parent tax” on them, their children’s spouse and their grandchildren, and reduce their financial capabilities to survive, adapt and live a good life?
And what child, or especially an in-law, wouldn’t deeply resent having to support parents who just didn’t bother to save and invest enough money for their old age because they were distracted, having fun and being irresponsible?
When businesspeople use the fundamental human concerns existentially at home with their spouse and children, they use them to design their intentions for living a good life and the skills they need to take satisfactory care of each fundamental human concern.
This enables them to design and fulfill the:
Commitments
Declarations to produce financial outcomes with their spouse by a specified time
Directions
The instructions or methods needed to fulfill businesspeople’s financial intentions and commitments
Velocities
The speed with which businesspeople need to make money, or the amount of money they need to earn and save by a specified time
Focuses
What businesspeople need to pay attention to, notice, observe and assess in order to fulfill their intentions to survive, adapt and live a good life
… that are needed, or that must exist, to take care of their spouse and children to a satisfactory standard.
The BODY’s BIG Expenses:
Housing, Food, Transportation and Health Care
To take satisfactory care of their most fundamental concerns at home, or existentially, businesspeople and their spouse must be able to afford the goods and services everyone needs to have available every day of their life in order to get the help we all need to survive, adapt and live a good life.
And it surprises no one to discover that the costliest goods and services all businesspeople and their spouses must be able to afford every day of their life, no matter how old they are, are needed to take care of their body.
The 4 costliest domains, by far, help people take care of their Body.
They are (1) housing, (2) food, (3) transportation and (4) health care.
These are what businesspeople and their spouses earn and save their money to take care of first, and always.
When people do not have enough money to take care of each one satisfactorily, their survival is threatened.
When people run out of money, or realize the outcome is inevitable during old age, and begin to suffer from “chronic financial stress”, these are the concerns they will give up last.
They directly affect people’s abilities to survive and adapt to changing situations,
… or sets of threats they need to avoid, obligations they need to fulfill and opportunities they need to exploit.
Because of our nervous system’s organization and structures, or how we have evolved, the only way we can survive and adapt is by speaking with others to make interpretations and commitments. And the way we speak is in “domains” of languaging that are always historical.
Mortgages, utilities, insurance, property taxes, upkeep and maintenance belong in the “linguistic domain” we call housing.
Breakfasts, lunches and dinners, vitamins, proteins, fats, etc., belong in the “linguistic domain” food.
Loan payments, gasoline, regular servicing, replacing tires, etc., belong in the “linguistic domain” transportation.
Regular checkups, prescriptions, medicine, hospitals, vaccines, antibiotics, etc. belong in the “linguistic domain” health care.
As we look at the rest of our fundamental human concerns it’s important to keep in mind that however important they are, and they are all important,
… the expenses associated with taking care of your body and your spouse’s until your death are, by far, the costliest.
Using “The Body” competitively in the marketplace
Businesspeople use their fundamental knowledge of The Body competitively by designing their offers, practices, narratives and strategies (OPNS) whose “help” is marginally superior to those of their competitors.
* “Marginally” in this context does not mean small or of little consequence.
It means “on the edge” or border.
When people value the mileage of their automobile’s, for example, and one gets 20 mpg and another gets 22 mpg, the latter has a “marginal utility” of 2 mpg.
When people assess the value of a marginal utility that they value highly and is scarce relative to demand, they are forced to first assess the value of the common offer that lacks marginal utility and then the value of the marginal utility.
This compels them to buy quickly, which produces the lowest possible transaction costs, and to increase their willingness to pay a premium, which produces the highest possible purchase price.
When speaking about an offer, the differences in descriptions, meanings, relevance, value and purposes between competitors’ offers of help are its marginal utilities.
They are the marginal differences between one fundamental offer of help and another. (You will be reading papers about them in The Course.)
An offer’s, practice’s, narrative’s or strategy’s marginal utilities make it fresh, new, highly valued and scarce relative to demand.
Its marginal utilities make it superior to the OPNS produced by competitors.