Boundaries

I found myself in a conversation yesterday on the nature of boundaries in an unhurried conversation organised by Johnnie Moore. It was an enlivening experience.

I think boundaries is one of those chameleon words that changes its meaning depending on where it crops up in conversation. For populists, it represents something to be defended or attacked. For coaches, something to be aware that we are crossing. For biologists, something that defines identity. Closed boundaries equal closed systems, lack of exchange, and inevitable decline, whilst no boundary means no identity at all.

For some, they are most manageable when they are well defined and fixed. Something we can label - like Brexit, or as a basis to build a wall somewhere. It is something intellectual property lawyers can work with, as the recent court case of the enormous Oatly company taking its much smaller oat-based milk competitor Glebe Farm to court for naming its product Pure Oaty, as though they were a genuine threat. (I hav…