Mark: Most people think 'disruption' is a brilliant idea born in a Silicon Valley garage. That's wrong. True disruption often starts with a tragedy, a crisis, or the moment you realize no one is coming to save you. It’s a survival tactic, not a luxury. Michelle: Whoa, okay. That’s a heavy way to start. So you’re saying we’ve got the whole concept of disruption completely backward? Where is this idea coming from? Mark: It's the central argument in a really powerful book we're diving into today: Disruptive Thinking by Bishop T.D. Jakes. And Jakes isn't just a theorist here; he's lived it. This is a man who started his first church while working a day job at a chemical plant, someone who was forced into leadership as a boy when his father fell gravely ill. That experience is the heart of this book. Michelle: That context changes everything. It’s not an abstract business book. It’s forged in fire. Okay, so he’s framing disruption from a place of hardship, not just innovation. Let's start there. What does he mean when he says disruption is a reaction?

Mark: Exactly. For Jakes, disruptive thinking isn't something we're drawn to; it's a response to circumstances that are thrust upon us. It’s what happens when normalcy is shattered. He tells this incredibly moving story from his own childhood to illustrate it. Michelle: I’m listening. Mark: It’s 1968 in West Virginia. Jakes is just eleven years old. His father, Ernest, who he describes as this big, strong, vibrant man, is suddenly diagnosed with debilitating kidney failure. The family’s world is turned upside down. They had just moved into a bigger house, things were looking up, and then this calamity hits. Michelle: Oh man, that’s devastating for any family, but especially for a young boy to witness. Mark: It gets more intense. At first, they have to make these grueling four-hour trips to Cleveland every week for dialysis. But eventually, they get a dialysis machine installed in their home. And it falls on this eleven-year-old boy to learn how to operate it. He had to learn how to stick these huge needles into his father's arm, manage the machine, and essentially keep him alive. Michelle: Wait, an eleven-year-old was running a dialysis machine? That’s an immense amount of responsibility. That’s not just a chore; that’s life and death. Mark: It is. And he tells this one harrowing story where his father, just worn down by the pain and the process, decides he wants to die. He grabs onto a railing in the house and refuses to let go, refusing to go for his treatment. And Jakes, this little kid, has to physically pry his father's fingers off the railing, one by one, to get him to the machine. Michelle: Wow. That’s… that’s almost unimaginable. So for Jakes, disruption isn't about building an app in a dorm room. It's about prying your father's fingers off a railing to keep him alive. It’s about finding a way when there is no way. Mark: That’s the core of it. He quotes, "Hard times produce strong leaders." Disruption is born from that kind of pressure. He also points to other figures, like Elon Musk. Jakes notes that Musk didn't just join the endless, circular debate about climate change. He stepped past the argument and built a solution: a desirable electric car. He disrupted the auto industry not by arguing, but by creating. Michelle: That makes so much sense. It’s about providing a solution rather than just joining the debate. It’s an action, not an opinion. But you can't build a car company or, frankly, survive a family tragedy all by yourself. Where do other people fit into this? Mark: That’s the perfect question, because it leads right to the next, and maybe most counter-intuitive, part of his argument. You can't survive or build solutions alone. And this is where Jakes introduces a really challenging idea: to truly disrupt, you often have to partner with the last person you'd expect.

Michelle: Okay, "unlikely alliances." I've heard the phrase, but it can feel a bit cliché. What does Jakes mean by it? Give me a concrete example from the book. Who are we talking about here? Mark: He gives a fantastic one from his own life. Years later, as a pastor in Dallas, he founded an organization called TORI, the Texas Offenders Reentry Initiative. Its goal is to help formerly incarcerated individuals get back on their feet and reduce recidivism. But to do that, he needed jobs for them. And most companies, back then especially, were not eager to hire ex-offenders. Michelle: Right, that’s a huge barrier. So who did he turn to? Mark: He reached out to Randall Stephenson, who was the CEO of AT&T at the time. Think about that pairing. You have a charismatic Black pastor from a humble background in West Virginia and the white, corporate CEO of one of the largest telecommunications companies in the world. On paper, they have nothing in common. Michelle: That sounds good in theory, but how does that actually work? A pastor and a CEO have completely different worlds, different languages. How do you even start that conversation without it being awkward or just a polite 'no'? Mark: That’s the disruptive part. Jakes says you have to be willing to put your ego aside and find the single point of common ground. For them, it was a shared belief that giving someone a job, a purpose, was the best way to disrupt the cycle of recidivism. Jakes had to be humble enough to ask for help, and Stephenson had to be open-minded enough to see the value in the partnership. Jakes has a great line: "Just because you’re a disruptive thinker, that doesn’t mean you have all the components to complete the assignment." Michelle: I love that. It’s about admitting you can’t do it alone. It’s not a sign of weakness; it’s a strategic necessity. Mark: Precisely. And he uses the biblical parable of the Good Samaritan to drive this home. The man beaten and left for dead on the road is ignored by the religious figures, the people you’d expect to help. The person who saves him is the Samaritan, a member of a rival, despised group. The solution came from the most unlikely source. Jakes's point is that we need to constantly be looking for our "Samaritan"—the partner who has the skills or resources we lack, even if they come from a completely different world. Michelle: That reframes networking entirely. It’s not about finding people like you; it’s about strategically finding people who aren't like you. Okay, so you survive a crisis, you build an unlikely team... but Jakes argues the biggest fight is still ahead, right? The one inside your own head.

Mark: Yes, exactly. He says you can have the perfect strategy and the perfect partners, but none of it matters if you're trapped by your own internal barriers. And he introduces this powerful metaphor to explain it: the invisible fence. Michelle: I love that metaphor. We all have those fences. What does Jakes say they're made of? Is it just fear? Mark: It's more than just fear. He tells a simple story about his two dogs, Bentley and Honey. They have an invisible electronic fence. Bentley, the big, strong dog, learned the boundary once and never challenged it again. He was content. But Honey, the smaller dog, hated the fence. She would test it constantly, enduring the shock, because whatever was on the other side—a squirrel, a scent, freedom—was worth the pain to her. Michelle: And we're the dogs in this story. Some of us stay safely inside the fence, and some of us are willing to take the shock to get to the other side. Mark: Exactly. And those fences are constructed from all sorts of materials. They're made of the negative things people have told us. They're made of past traumas, like the story he tells of the man whose destructive behavior stemmed from his mother telling him he was a mistake. They're made of societal expectations. And sometimes, a new fence is built by success itself. Michelle: What do you mean? How does success build a fence? Mark: He talks about the terror he felt after closing huge, groundbreaking deals with major companies like Amazon and Roc Nation. He was the 'first' in many of those rooms—the first pastor, the first person of his background. And he felt this immense pressure, this new fence. He felt that if he failed, he wasn't just failing himself; he was failing his race, his faith, everyone who looked like him. It’s a heavy burden. Michelle: That’s a really profound insight. The very act of breaking one barrier creates a new one made of expectation and responsibility. So how do you jump these fences, especially the ones in your own head? Mark: Jakes says you first have to understand what they're made of. You have to do the work to understand your own history, your own hunger. He has this great line: "We’re never hungry for what we were full of; we’re hungry for what we didn’t get." And ultimately, you have to decide that the prize is worth the fight. He says, "The real prize of life is not the comfort that may come with riches; the real prize is the fight it takes to get there." It's embracing the struggle itself as the reward.

Michelle: So, after all this—the survival, the partnerships, the internal battles—what's the one thing we should take away from Jakes' idea of disruption? It feels so much bigger than just a business strategy. Mark: It is. I think the core takeaway is that disruption isn't an event; it's a process of becoming. It starts with pain, is fueled by connection, and is ultimately won inside your own mind. It’s not about where you start. He tells this amazing story in the essays at the end of the book about a man named Leke Osinubi. Michelle: Tell me. Mark: Osinubi grew up in Nigeria, obsessed with sneakers but with no money to buy them. So, as a teen, he taught himself how to hack into sneaker company websites to divert the latest releases to himself. He started with an ethically questionable act. But that skill, that disruptive impulse, led him to a career in tech. Today, he oversees digital risk for Goldman Sachs. His journey began with stealing sneakers, but it culminated in a high-level position at one of the world's top financial firms. Michelle: Wow. That perfectly captures the idea that it's not where you start, but where you finish. It’s about harnessing that disruptive energy and aiming it toward something constructive. Mark: Exactly. It’s about the fight. It’s about tenacity and consistency. And Jakes leaves us with a question that I think is the perfect way to end. Michelle: What is it? Mark: What invisible fence are you staring at right now, and is what's on the other side worth the pain of the leap? Michelle: A powerful question to sit with. This has been incredibly insightful. Mark: This is Aibrary, signing off.