I am an artist. Which means on any given day I have a lot of visions rolling around in my head. Over the years I’ve learned to refine my craft and sharpen the edge of those visions but the thing I am most glad of is that over the years I’ve learned that my visions have only improved as I’ve become a better and better collaborator. A lot of designers like to call themselves custom designers but in the end just use their client’s home to overlay their own formula. But in my opinion you cannot truly be a custom home designer if you can’t embrace someone else’s story. So in the end you need to share the credit with someone else. You need to collaborate.

There are three core principles which fuel a successful collaboration:

First, the humble acceptance that your vision, no matter how great, has limits—you do not and cannot see all ends.

Second, there must be a fundamental belief that other’s perspectives have something truly valuable to contribute. Something which will ultimately make the expression of your vision better than it ever could have been alone.

Third, because you do not know it all or see it all, you must accept that your vision can afford to evolve. That means change. Change is hard, but change is life.

We can disagree. We will disagree. But the rules of collaboration require that when disagreements arise instead of going on the offensive we first look inside ourselves to reexamine what is truly important and, most importantly, to discover why, and then find a way forward.

As the old saying goes, “In essentials, unity. In non-essentials, liberty. In all things, charity.”

Collaboration, like all good improvisation, is never, “No, but …” It’s always, “Yes, and …”

Collaboration requires equal parts honesty, respect, self-confidence, patience, and trust.

Collaboration at its most magical is confidence and boldness wrapped in humility and deference. It’s a powerful thing. It’s a beautiful thing. It’s a dance. A dance whose rhythm comes from separately beating hearts believing our individual lives will be better if we make these moves together.

Unity is not very popular these days. In fact, the most popular voices right now are the most divisive ones. That’s not hard to understand. Divisiveness is easy because to remain divided means you don’t have to change. But make no mistake, the voices which call us to entrench ourselves in our own limited perspectives are calling us to be nothing but our smallest selves.

Every collaborator should remember the old African proverb which says, “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”

Collaborate is much more than just tolerate. Collaboration is not about having to work together, it’s about wanting to work together because you believe that together we have an even better chance of building ourselves a beautiful life.