Not knowing what the mountain looks like

Su Shi wrote four lines on a temple wall after climbing Mount Lu, and they're among the most quoted of his poems.

Seen from the side, the mountain is a ridge. Seen from the front, a peak. From far and near, high and low, it's a different shape each time. He can't recognise its true face, and the reason is that he's on it.

Everyone in China has memorised that. Almost nobody uses it. Because the moment we're inside a situation we describe it as if we're standing outside it.

I've read hundreds of coaching intake forms, and the pattern is consistent. People describe the situation from one position and treat the description as the whole mountain. Then they feel stupid when a colleague moves three feet and sees a different ridge.

The service this poem does is smaller and better: it tells you that your account of your own life is necessarily partial, and it's partial in a specific direction. You're inside it. The part you can't see is the part where you're standing.

Practically: what does your situation look like from your partner's position, your client's position, your competitor's position, the version of you in five years. Not to find the true mountain. To know which face you've been mistaking for the whole.

MOJOWAY's reports are written to make that move. The same facts from a second position are the whole product.