March 17, 2026

Learn to Surf

Imagine change as a wave crashing on the shore.

If you're strong enough, you take the hit and keep standing. For decades, that's how we've understood resilience: endure, recover, move on.

Mike James Ross, this Thursday's guide at Seeds of Flourishing, thinks the metaphor has broken. There is no longer just one wave. There is a never-ending succession. Resisting all of them is impossible.

What's needed, he argues, is to stop bracing and learn to surf.

In a survey of more than 1,200 global CEOs, Mike notices, 92% agreed they need to cultivate a level of adaptability that goes beyond anything they've previously imagined. The destination is in constant motion. The classic "from-to" exercise no longer works, because the "to" keeps shifting.

This is true of organizations, but it's true of something even more personal: how we find meaning in what we do.

And that side of our lives is about to be hit by one of the biggest waves in human history.

The Wave That's Coming

Most of the conversation around AI and work is about jobs. Who keeps theirs, who loses theirs.

Mike goes deeper.

He argues that our modern sense of "meaningful work" is far more fragile than we realize. When AI can outpace any human in knowledge and problem-solving, we're forced to ask what's left.

The uncertainty about the destination keeps moving deeper.

We're no longer facing a wave. We're facing the ocean.

And yet, Mike doesn't think this is a tragedy. He thinks it might be exactly the disruption we needed.

Mike knows what it feels like to be hit by a wave. He was a finance lawyer. New York, London, Boston. Billion-dollar deals, 300-page credit agreements, and a growing sense of...

What am I doing with my life?

He discovered that the prestigious deliverables, the stuff his career was built on, weren't what gave him energy. It was often the marginal stuff. Thirty minutes with a junior associate, helping them navigate the firm. Things no one asked him to do.

That discovery sent him on a path, from McKinsey to running HR for one of Canada's iconic retailers, to a PhD at Concordia, drawing on Nietzsche, Hannah Arendt, indigenous Māori philosophy, and the lives of zookeepers who work for free yet feel deeply called to what they do.

His discovery is that meaning is not something you find, but something you cultivate.

Like a garden. In whatever soil you're given.

"Even in winter, there is beauty" he points out.

This Thursday: Meaning at Work in the Age of AI

Will AI take away our drive to struggle, to build, to do stuff?

Or will it force us to double down and cultivate our sense of purpose in something that has real meaning for us?

The wave is here.

This Thursday, Mike will guide us to surf it.

The session is online, 45 minutes, free, and open to all, with the possibility of making a donation.

If you're not registered yet:

If you are registered already, we can't wait to see you there.

With warmth,

The Centre for Human Flourishing Team