Living Systems Foresight: How to Draw the Line to the Future

You can find the future in two dots and a ruler.

The first dot is where the system started.
The second is where it stands now.
Draw a line through them, and extend it.

That line? That’s where it’s going.

Not where it hopes to go.
Not where the pitch deck says it’s headed.
But where it's actually going.

This is the essence of Living Systems Foresight.

It isn’t a guess. It isn’t a vision board. It’s the geometry of trajectory.

And it begins with seeing the system clearly: the past that shaped it, the present it’s embodying, and the velocity it’s carrying forward.

Trajectory Work: How the Future Becomes Visible

We often treat the future like fog - unknowable, out there, looming. But most futures are already taking shape. In product, in culture, in architecture, in avoidance.

Living Systems Foresight means:

• Reading the signals most people skip

• Mapping the tensions most people normalize

• Tracking momentum, not just movement

It’s what happens when you stop asking, "What are we building next?" and start asking, "If this keeps going, what else does it create?"

This is the kind of foresight that doesn’t just prevent crises. It names futures. It renders them visible, discussable, steerable.

Why Product Is a Steering Axis

Product is one of the most powerful positions from which to see and steer a system’s trajectory.

Product sits at the intersection of:

• Business intention

• Technical execution

• User experience

• Operational feasibility

From this axis, patterns emerge.
Misalignments compound.
And opportunities surface - but only if you're looking.

Other disciplines often become "dead ends" in the conversational chain.
They hold rich insights, but rarely connect them across silos.

Product lives in the middle of it all.

Which means product can see more of the terrain - if it knows how to look.

You Can’t BLUF a Trajectory

Executives want clarity. BLUF (Bottom Line Up Front). Bullet points. Three key takeaways.

But the future doesn’t live in bullet points - it lives in stories.

As Dave Gray writes in Liminal Thinking, one of the most effective ways to support a new belief - or help others see differently - is through story.

If you give people facts without a story, they’ll make sense of them using their existing belief systems.
So, each person may walk away with a completely different interpretation.
That’s how alignment fails silently.

A good story holds the shape of the future.
It connects cause to consequence.
It paints the trajectory in colors everyone can see.

Because a picture can show you what to expect.
But a story? A story aligns people on what to believe.

Steering from the Middle

You don’t need to be a CEO to steer.
You can steer from the middle.
From product.
From design.
Even from the bottom - though that gets harder, like trying to adjust the blueprints while the house is being built.

Steering starts when you:

• See the line

• Share the story

• Influence the momentum

Sometimes it takes a meeting. Sometimes it takes months.

But if you see where things are headed, you’re already in position to help shape it.

Closing: The Line, the Lens, and the Story

Some of us see the line.
Some of us feel it in our bones long before it takes shape.
And some of us are here to hold the ruler steady and say, "this is where it's going."

The future doesn’t announce itself.
It’s traced quietly and carefully by those willing to connect the dots.

If you see the line, name it.
If you feel the drift, speak it.
If the story needs telling, paint it in colors people can finally see.

That’s how we shape what’s next - together.

Written for the ones who draw the line, then dare to bend it.

Explore the Full Series

1. The Eldest Son Archetype

2. The Value of the Crisis That Never Happened

3. The Shape of a Real Crisis

4. The Art of Early Warning

5. The Forest Lens: How I See Everything, All at Once

6. Living Systems Foresight: How to Draw the Line to the Future