The Data Center industry is full of many people who are convinced their way is the right way and others are wrong. They have years of hard work to prove their methods are right and work, emphasizing the strength and speed of what they can get done.
TED conference has a talk given by Lewis Pugh on a mind-shifting experience he went through that has a good lesson to learn from. If you want to jump to the point where I am referencing it is at 6:25 mark. The video is only 10 min, but quite enjoyable.
Lewis discusses as a lesson to make a true change for the climate requires a different mind-set.
Lewis starts using the same methods he has successfully used in the past.
And then we got up to this small lake underneath the summit of Mt. Everest, and I prepared myself, the same way as I've always prepared myself, for this swim which was going to be so very difficult. I put on my iPod, I listened to some music, I got myself as aggressive as possible -- but controlled aggression -- and then I hurled myself into that water.
I swam as quickly as I could for the first hundred meters, and then I realized very, very quickly, I had a huge problem on my hands. I could barely breathe. I was gasping for air. I then began to choke, and then it quickly led to me vomiting in the water. And it all happened so quickly I then -- I don't know how it happened -- but I went underwater. And luckily, the water was quite shallow, and I was able to push myself off the bottom of the lake and get up and then take another gasp of air. And then I said, carry on. Carry on. Carry on. I carried on for another five or six strokes, and then I had nothing in my body, and I went down to the bottom of the lake. And I don't where I got it from, but I was able to somehow pull myself up and as quickly as possible get to the side of the lake. I've heard it said that drowning is the most peaceful death that you can have. I have never ever heard such utter bollocks. (Laughter) It is the most frightening and panicky feeling that you can have.
Almost dying gave Lewis a dose of humility. And his crew gave him a new plan.
And there, we sat down, and we did a debrief about what had gone wrong there on Mt. Everest. And my team just gave it to me straight.They said, Lewis, you need to have a radical tactical shift if you want to do this swim. Every single thing which you have learned in the past 23 years of swimming, you must forget. Every single thing which you learned when you were serving in the British army, about speed and aggression,you put that to one side. We want you to walk up the hill in another two days time. Take some time to rest and think about things. We want you to walk up the mountain in two days time, and instead of swimming fast, swim as slowly as possible.Instead of swimming crawl, swim breaststroke.And remember, never ever swim with aggression.This is the time to swim with real humility.
And here are the two big lessons that Lewis relates.
But I learned two very, very important lessons there on Mt. Everest. And I thank my team of Sherpas who taught me this. The first one is that just because something has worked in the past so well, doesn't mean it's going to work in the future. And similarly, now, before I do anything, I ask myself what type of mindset do I require to successfully complete a task. And taking that into the world of climate change, which is, frankly, the Mt. Everest of all problems -- just because we've lived the way we have lived for so long, just because we have consumed the way we have for so long and populated the earth the way we have for so long, doesn't mean that we can carry on the way we are carrying on. The warning signs are all there. When I was born, the world's population was 3.5 billion people. We're now 6.8 billion people, and we're expected to be 9 billion people by 2050.
And then the second lesson, the radical, tactical shift. And I've come here to ask you today: what radical tactical shift can you take in your relationship to the environment, which will ensure that our children and our grandchildren live in a safe world and a secure world, and most importantly, in a sustainable world? And I ask you, please, to go away from here and think about that one radical tactical shift which you could make,which will make that big difference, and then commit a hundred percent to doing it. Blog about it, tweet about it, talk about it, and commit a hundred percent. Because very, very few thingsare impossible to achieve if we really put our whole minds to it.
So thank you very, very much.
(Applause)