Normal is a truce we negotiate to feel safe. But the spider’s “business as usual” is the fly’s last minute, and both stories are true at the same time. The label we choose decides who gets empathy and who gets blamed, who gets budget and who gets ignored.
In companies, “normal” is the process that serves the spider, teams optimized for their own web and chaos is anything that serves the fly, customers, edge cases, the inconvenient signal that doesn’t fit the dashboard.
We harden our webs with SOPs and OKRs until feedback can’t stick, then act surprised when outcomes don’t change. The web looks elegant from the center and predatory from the edge; perspective isn’t decoration, it’s governance.
The same pattern shapes relationships. One person calls it honesty; the other feels ambushed. One calls it stability; the other calls it stagnation. Most conflicts aren’t about facts but about frames, and frames are invisible until someone bleeds. If you’ve ever been told you’re “too much” or “not enough,” what they meant was: you don’t fit my habitat.
So here’s a harder question than “What’s right?” Whose normal is this protecting? If your answer always benefits the spider you’ve become, find a fresh corner and spin smaller. If it always defends the fly you’re rescuing, remember that webs hold ecosystems together, too. Wisdom is learning when to redesign the web and when to teach the fly to see it sooner.
Today, before you enforce a rule or reject an idea, ask: what looks like chaos only because I’m standing in the center? Then move, two steps toward the edge and look again.
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