One of my heroes is Buckminster Fuller. He was a brilliant man who is a source of great inspiration and has transformed my thinking showing me how to live life differently.
He is arguably one of the most fascinating and original minds of recent history. He is one of the world’s first futurists and global thinkers.
Born in 1895, Fuller rejected the established religious and political notions of the past and the conventional disciplines of the current universities. He was against the establishment twice being expelled from Harvard for his dissidence.
He never graduated from higher education and yet was awarded nearly 50 honorary doctorates for his work in science and the humanities. He authored 28 books that sold well over a million copies. He had over 100 major awards of merit, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the USA’s highest civilian award.
He adhered to a philosophy based on the unity of the natural world and used experiment and intuition as a means of understanding it. He saw the order in nature and applied the design to science.
To me he is a modern day Leonardo Da Vinci. He was a Philosopher – Designer – and Entrepreneur – a Student – Scientist and Mathematician – an Inventor – Artist and Poet and an Activist – Author and Architect. A true example of a whole brain person.
The point he continued to make and demonstrate is that ONE MAN CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE. To this end Buckminster Fuller coined the phrase Trim Tab as a metaphor for his life – in fact he had this inscribed on his tombstone. He explained it as follows: Think of the Queen Mary — the whole ship goes by and then comes the rudder. And there’s a tiny thing at the edge of the rudder called a trim tab.
It’s a miniature rudder. Just moving the little trim tab builds a low pressure that pulls the rudder around. Takes almost no effort at all. So I said that the little individual can be a trim tab. Society thinks it’s going right by you, that it’s left you altogether. But if you’re doing dynamic things mentally, the fact is that you can just put your foot out like that and the whole big ship of state is going to go. So I said, call me Trim Tab.
I think it is wise advice for us as chiropractors. We have the privilege of working closely with people and they allow us into their world as we develop rapport.
Every thought, word and action we make has an effect on those around us. Just the right thing at the right moment can be like tweaking the Trim Tab on that person’s ‘rudder’. Their life’s direction can be changed forever.
Respect the power of you as the Trim Tab.
