A spring equinox party, a butterfly and their wings of destiny: Both / And Leap Day Edition

Leap day is interesting. It's a great lesson in "both and" and I wanted to take a little bit on this day to walk you through some thoughts I've had, on this the 514th leap day of all time.

Here are some examples of “small” things that can eventually make a big, big impact:

• Compounding interest (a favorite of Mr. Buffet)

• Bees and their pollination of countless plants

• A Butterfly flaps its wings in Brazil and in time a Tornado emerges in Texas

• You're Julius Caesar and you want your spring equinox festivals to fall on the same day, so you create Leap day and 514 years later, Guacamole is free at Chipotle.

This is no "small” day. Not by any means.

If you're Raenell Dawn, who was born on Feb 29th, 1960 and happens to be the founder of the 'Honor Society of Leap Day Babies', (LINK) this is her Sweet 16th Leap Birthday. She's also firmly in touch with how small decisions make major impact on individuals and in her (and her fellow leap-year babies).

Think of it. You're a kid, you hit your 8th birthday, you've been excitedly waiting for your birthday for 1460 days because the last time you could celebrate it ON your birthday was 4 years ago. That's the experience of a young Ms.Dawn and an estimated 220,000+ humans who also celebrate their birthdays on February 29th.

Why do we even have leap day?

The original leap day was proclaimed by Julius Caesar back in 45BC and roughly 40 years later it became part of the calendar of the day. Why? Most likely, according to Judah Levine, Head of the Network Synchronization project of the Time and Frequency Division at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), for a party.

According to Levine, most likely, Caesar wanted to keep the date for the Spring Equinox in the spring (and not the winter). Roman scientists were realizing that time was slipping and without a correction, dates based upon celestial events (think Moon cycles) would be off. And they weren't wrong.

There actually isn't 365 days in a year, it's closer to 365 1/4 days. After so long, that adds up and Caesar's folks knew that so they added the date. Then Pope Gregory adjusted it slightly more in 1582 because they found that for every 100 years, the Spring Equinox was off slightly. How did they find that? Because Easter was slowly creeping into the summer and, as per Catholic doctrine, Spring falls on the day after the equinox.

So the decree came down that for every 100 years, or so, we'll remove an extra day. Creating our modern, Gregorian Calendar that we follow to this day.

Besides the history lesson, this is intriguing to me because it's clear example of how small decisions, while not felt in the immediate, can have large impact over time. What if in fact neither Caesar or Pope Gregory cared? What if they just said "meh".

To the Christian, a summer Easter seems almost, dare I say, blasmephous.

To Ms. Dawn and her 220,000+ leap day counterparts - it would remove part of their identity.

Why is this both/and?

For that we dig into Edward Lorenz and his obsessive studying of the weather patterns.

But can a Butterfly flapping its wings in Brazil create a Tornado in Nebraska?

First of all, let me clarify, the theory that a single butterfly flapping it's wings in Brazil on one day and the next there's an F5 ripping through my hometown of Beatrice, Nebraska is just that - a theory. But the work of Mathematician and Weather nerd, Edward Lorenz was not a theory. It was his research into weather patterns that not only coined the theory of "Butterfly Effect" but that also created the basis for Chaos Theory which studies how complex systems are sensitive to initial conditions.

Back in 1960, Lorenz was feverishly studying and analyzing the weather patterns and data he could gather about it. He created a model to predict weather systems using the prevailing "linear" theories of the day and they were never correct.

What he found was that minute differences in initial conditions can have radically different outcomes as a result. He concluded that, as a result of this, it was impossible to predict the outcome of most, if not all systems that have more than one variable being analyzed in a predictive model.

In order to predict anything, you needed to understand both the variables involved and the conditions under which they began.

In short: to understand now, you must also include the past.

Seems obvious doesn't it? Feels like "duh" but how often do we embrace this?

What about at work?

When you begin to make a decision on an important strategy that has both short term and long term implications? How do you take Leap Day, Butterfly wings and your job all into consideration before making a decision?

Both/And in action at work

Dr. Wendy Smith has been an influential factor for me in my own learnings about Both/And in the workplace and I'm drawing from her work on the workplace paradoxical relationship that we all endure.

Specifically, I want to show you how her research lends itself to balancing the art of making an important decision for the short term and long term and I want to leave you with the steps to do just that:

First Move your mindset from one of a "well-intentioned consistency" where all of us want peace and balance and quiet at work (I just got my Inbox to 45!) to a "consistent inconsistency". This is your new norm. This also doesn't mean you have to embrace chaos. Instead, you observe that a) work is meant to be messy to some degree and b)you don't have to find balance because it already is in balance.

Change your mindset from one that finds resources scarce to on that finds "solutions abundant". It's a simple move that is a critical one when deciding upon which idea or decision you'll go with.

From a reliance on stability and certainty for your calm, to one that embraces dynamism and change. This is the most constant-constant. In other words - you'll make a decision today based upon the "initial conditions" you are provided with and then the day you put that idea into action - those conditions change because of your awesome idea. What do you learn from this? How do you adapt and change to that because now you're embracing dynamism and change.

Understanding that today's decisions do impact future behaviors is an important step to your understanding of how behaviors change over time, or how leaders make an impact on those they lead or even how Caesar's decisions thousands years ago create free Guacamole today. Oh and join me in welcoming Ms. Dawn a happy 16th birthday.