Living Between Worlds #3.7 — Multiple messes AND "vibrantly listening"

You. Welcome everybody to Living Between Worlds. This is our 20th in a series of conversations that we began early in 2020, looking at the multiple crises of COVID and climate and all the other messes that we're living in the midst of here. Glad to have you here. For those of you who are new, we call this living between worlds because I say that's where we are. The Italian revolutionary Antonio Gramsc said, 120, 100 years ago, I think this year said, that the old world is dying and the new world is not yet born, and between is the time of monsters. And so here we are in an unknown. We know that what was is over. People who think we're going back to the post war global economic order, political order, you know it's gone. Peter Zion, one of the people I track on these issues, just came out with a new book called the End of the World is Just the Beginning. And so I'm informed in these conversations by him, by Fernando Flores, Chauncey Bell, Nora Bateson, many of you and a number of others, and how we think about these times and as I've subtitled these talks, how we can find ways to live with grace and dignity and power in the face of enormous unknowns, uncertainty and unsettlement. And just, you know, if there's any doubt, we've got not just Covid and climate, but the global economy, the apparent fraying of globalization, supply chains broken all around the world, culture wars, disruption, ground war in Europe, fundamental challenges to democracy in the United States of a sort that we never expected, and yet, and yet thrilling, creative, exciting work around the world in unpredictable ways. Liz Cheney lost yesterday in Wyoming, as expected, but Kansas flipped around Roe v. Wade in ways that were utterly unexpected. And raises for people the possibility of the Democrats actually seriously winning in November, holding the Senate, holding the House, expanding majorities, depending, of course, on what we all do between now and then. We've had the climate bill signed, an imperfect bill, sure, but which bill hasn't been in the Democratic Republic? We can talk about that a bit about the challenge of where do we focus? Do we look at what's wrong and missing, or what we've done and how we build momentum on that? These are calls not for debate about specific issues and not even for debate about specific interpretations, but a kind of an opportunity, a gymnasium together, a dojo for those of you who know that metaphor, to explore ways of speaking and ways of being together that help us stand more effectively and more powerfully in the world around things that we care about. You know, we've talked a bunch in prior calls about listening across the Gulf, not just speaking with those with whom we deeply disagree, but listening to people with whom we deeply disagree. Patrice Perkins, who I just met yesterday, talks about vibrantly listening. I love the phrase listening, not as a passive activity, but as a vibrant, active activity in which we create meaning together. But let me say, just to kind of kick us off, a few words about the political situation here and this challenge of listening across the Gulf. Janesh Ganesh, writing in the Financial Times a couple of days ago, had something interesting to say about liberals. He said, because their creed, you know, he's looking at all of us, right? Because their creed puts such stress on reason. It attracts those who are hopeless at conflict, at the recognition of its frequent necessity, and at the actual raising of it. Robert Frost wants to find a liberal as someone who wouldn't take their own side in a quarrel. And I raise this because these are times that cause for fierceness in both the willingness to listen and a willingness to fight. There are times when it's important to collaborate, and there are times where it's important to stand ground, and there are times when it's important to do both. I think back to the times of the united front against fascism in the 1930s, when sworn political enemies united to fight a greater enemy and to defeat it, at least for a time. So, you know, one of the questions I'm inhabiting is, you know, what do we do in the midst of, you know, national crisis, maybe civilizational collapse, as some people would say. When is it time for living room barricades? When is. When is the time for the living room dialogues? And when is the time to take to the barricades? Arundhati Roy, who you've heard me quote before and you know, in the setup for this series, you're all familiar with the quote. Another world is not only possible. She said she is on her way on a quiet day. I can hear her breathing. But I looked up this morning, the roll up to that part of the quote, and it's interesting. She said, arundhati Royce wrote, the system will collapse if we refuse to buy what they are selling their ideas, their version of history, their wars, their weapons, their notion of inevitability. Remember this. We may be, we be many and they be few. They need us more than we need them. And then another world is not only possible. She is on her way on a quiet day. I can hear her breathing. So let me hear from you. Let me actually, just by way of introduction, what we're going to do here is for about 10 minutes, we'll have open conversation in the round together here, and then we'll go into a particular kind of breakout conversation that my friend Ken Homer, who's here on the call, can show us where you are, will facilitate to allow for much richer and more active participation by all of you. And then we'll come back together to do some harvesting together. So let me check in with you. Please use the reactions button at the bottom of the screen to raise your hand. What's. What's provoked in you by what I've said today. Or by what you're living in in the world today, Your choice, Don, is that a hand raised to speak? Go ahead, unmute yourself and go ahead and please. Yeah. And then others use the zoom button to raise your yellow hand. Thank you. First of all, thank you. That was an extra excellent introduction. I think there's one big elephant in the room. Got it done. Only one, no one, at least among others that you didn't mention, that's driving all of these. And that's 81 million net increase annually in the human population on the planet. 81 million net increase annually. That is driving climate change. That's driving the potentiality or the certainty of food insecurity and political insecurity, et cetera, et cetera. So I think vastly, this is understated and under integrated into the whole milieu of dynamic challenges. And of course, with all of this, the increasing frequency and severity of incredible storms. Good, Don, thank you for that. I confess I'm not trying to be comprehensive in listing the messes that we're in, but I get that that's one of great concern for you, so thank you for bringing it to the table. Doc Hall. Next. Welcome, Doc. And then David, I think you had your hand up. Well, I certainly wasn't surprised by your opening. And somewhere out there I've listed 123 different crises, any one of which could do in the human race. Climate change is only one, population is one. And so the conclusion is we have to learn how to live very differently and very quickly and otherwise we're going to have a pretty monumental collapse. And that probably isn't very far off within a decade. And you can see the signs of it all around right now. Doc. Thank you. David, did you want to speak? I just was wanting to say that I really like that what you call it, the, that you did to start out with. I, I don't know if I've heard that one before, but it's Just so enlightening. What did it provoke for you, David?

Hope.

Say more. It's just the reason I'm asking, David, is that some people would listen to that and say it provoked for them despair and kind of intrigued it for you to provoke hope. So if you could say a bit more, that would be great. I guess I got optimism from my, from my mother and my family. But yeah, to me there's only one thing to do and that's keep moving forward. There is lots that we can be doing. We don't need to stand and watch people get into the lifeboats and wave them goodbye. We need to keep doing what we've been doing and do more of it and do big things. Thank you. Well, yeah. Shel, greetings. Hi, Gil. Yeah, just to respond to David's comment, I'm the eternal optimist, but optimism has to be leavened and I deliberately say leavened rather than tempered by activism. And I think you were totally correct, Gil, to point out the victory in Kansas. And there will be more. I think we can actually perhaps turn this Congress around, get a filibuster proof Senate and a decent majority in the House and not have to rely on the good graces of people like Senator Manchin to get anything done. I think it's important to celebrate the huge victories that are in the Inflation Recovery act, in spite of the fact that it's one tenth of what we had hoped for and probably one half of what Biden originally hoped was pushing for. But it's still a victory, an important one, and it is something we can help use to rally the troops and get to the point where we can do more. Yeah. Thank you. What I think about November is that I see that possibility there. Filibuster proof. You're more optimistic than I am. But something in that direction, if there's a big if, if the Democrats run and run hard on the issue for which there is super majority support across the country, even in red states, as we see in Kansas, you know, not the kind of, you know, happy middle Democrat campaigns that we've seen before, but really going strong on Roe and guns and perhaps CL and perhaps a couple of others and fight for that majority, which means a very different kind of compromise in legislations to come in the future if we can get there. I think LGBT rights might be part of that equation also because at this point, so many people know someone in their family or their circles who are directly affected by that newfound animus. Are you seeing super majority supports for that? Well, I live in a Blue area where. Yes, I can't speak to the country at a whole. Okay, yeah. And you know, there's a lot of issues of concern. I'm not saying that we exclude any of them, but I think if the legislative focus is tight on the ones where looking at 70, 80, 90% majorities that win seats, that's my own perspective on it. I'm trying to gather for you, and I haven't gotten it yet, but a list of. Of key strategic election organizations for those of you who want to either donate money or put in time and do canvassing, phone calls and so forth, focused on strategic districts around the country. If I can't get that to you during this call, I will send it out to you all afterwards. Ken, how are we on time? We're ready to break. Please unmute. Ken.

Rookie mistake. Sorry. This is about the time we should look at switching.

Okay, go ahead, Todd. All right, so the podium is yours.

Hello, everybody. My name is Ken Homer. I live in San Rafael, California, and I've known Gil for many years. We've been talking more recently, taking walks and having lunches. And I spent 10 years of my life with the World Cafe developing that process as one of the pioneers. And I'm really interested in conversation and how we can have more effective conversations. And it's really hard for me to be on calls where it's one talking to a whole bunch of people or that person becomes the center and all these people have to go through them. I really love to get in a small group and talk. So that's what we're going to do today. We're going to actually break out into breakout rooms with about four people each. Oh, good. Chauncey just got here. So we will now have a total of 20 people, which is terrific. So we'll have four per room. We're not going to. Oh, sorry, Lauren. Sorry to see you go. I'm not going to give you a whole big background on how to do this. You've been talking in small groups your entire life. Imagine you're just sitting around a campfire or a coffee table or a cafe table with a cup of coffee and some new friends. And we'll give you a question to get you started. You don't have to answer that question in particular if it doesn't resonate for you. But hopefully the question we've designed will give you something that will get you started. It's self organizing, it's self facilitating. It doesn't mean everybody has to have the exact same amount of time. But Please make sure everybody has a chance to talk. You'll have somewhere around 18 minutes or so in the breakout room. So. So please, if someone starts to dominate, just say, can we make room for somebody else? I think you're all adults, you know how to do this. So it's going to be really simple. We'll let you know when you have about a minute left. I'll send a little broadcast message out so, you know, to wrap up and we'll come back and move into another room. We're going to do this three times and then we'll come back and we'll harvest and see what people are talking about. Are there any questions? Brad, is that a question?

Yes. I'm so busy doing other things. What was the question?

Haven't asked that yet. So.

So I didn't miss anything?

You didn't miss anything. You didn't miss anything. All right, any other questions about how this is going to work? Yes. T.R. duncan, you're on mute. There you go.

Can we have a two minute warning rather than a one minute? It just allows bigger groups to come together a little more gracefully.

Sure, I will do that. Any other questions, suggestions, comments? Okay, I'm going to send you off into breakout rooms. The first question is, I'll put it here in the chat. Let's see, where is it? So what concern or concerns most have your attention these days? What concern or concerns most have your attention these days? What are you paying attention to? What's, what's. Whereas a friend of mine used to say, not what are you working on, but what's working you. Okay, so let me see if I get these breakout rooms to go here. Oh, also there's going to be a Google document where you can take notes. Let me put the link for that in the chat. So if you want to take any notes. So we can all see there's a link to the Google document that is set up so everybody has edit access and hopefully you will not have a problem getting in there. If you do, please let Gil or myself know. We'll try and straighten that out for you. All right, Breakout rooms coming right up.

Yeah, we had a really good discussion that went awful fast. And mostly it was positives that are coming and then how do we get those positives out to a wider audience? I would say. Is that a. Is that a kind of a synopsis? Don? Joe says two thumbs. Yeah, good. I'd agree. I'd agree. Because there are many of the kinds of technologies that we need to do, to use to transition to the post fossil carbon society that are increasingly being invested and increasingly being improved and with the electrical vehicles issues so on. Getting the grids really transformed to post fossil carbon systems is a crucial and doable concrete area. And we're really moving forward globally in many, many areas. Not as fast as we should, but just for us, we're going to be able to move, accelerate, and if you look at the rate at which investment in wind power, solar, geothermal and so on is going, it's very hopeful on that side.

Great, we'll take one more. David.

We had a group with two Aikido practitioners and all three of us were involved in spirituality. It dawned on me after coming back to this main group that the solutions to the challenges we face cannot be reached by the intellect. I think it's a mistake to be engaging in policy level discussion here that the issues are far deeper and far more existential.

Okay, thank you. All right, we're going to go to the second round. Let me get the question here. Did that go? Put it in the chat. Question for the second round is. What are you doing with or about your concerns? What are you doing with or about the concerns you talked about in the first round? I've reset the breakout rooms so that you should be in there with different people. And again, you'll have about 18 minutes and maybe. Well, I think I'll make this about 17 minutes and then we'll do one more round after that and we'll come back and talk together before we leave. So here you go. Have a good time. All right. Welcome back. Hope you're having a good time. I had a chance to go and join a room this time around and it was really lovely to talk with some people and hear about what's going on with them. Let's take a minute. Anybody want to say anything that they heard or were moved by or surprised by in this last round before we move to the next round? Anybody? Brad, go ahead, just speak up.

I just was waiting. I couldn't find the raise hand button. Sorry about the phone. I was heartened by the fact that despite all the crap that's going on, all of us are still doing things. We're still trying to make a difference, be it driving less, planting our own food, trying to make changes on a bigger level at a very large financial institution. So I was very heartened is, I guess the best word I can think of. Excited, optimistic, even more than I normally am. And I'm pretty sure I could say it for everybody on the phone because I know several of these People, I've seen them month after month. Everybody's still doing shit. We're still trying to make a difference despite the incredible odds that we're up against. And that's very encouraging. It's very heartening to get up in the morning and just keep doing what I'm doing. Just keep making a difference.

Thanks, Brad, Joe.

Thanks, Ken. I just want to follow on a little bit from what Brad was saying, actually. Uh, so in the. The two rooms that I've been in so far, sharing Brad's optimism there that everyone is still going, what occurred to me is also that everyone is. Everyone that I've met so far is working on slightly different pieces of the puzzle. And I find that reassuring because one of the things I worry about sometimes is going, ah, I can't do all of it. I can only do this one little bit. And so I'm finding it reassuring to hear from other people that they're working on other pieces of the puzzle. So that's been good for me.

Terrific. I'm going to move us along so we can get one more round in and then we'll come back and have a little longer harvest. So the question for this last round. And by the way, welcome. Stuart. Good to see you. We're doing some breakout rooms here. So the question for this last round is what's your dominant mood these days? And what do you do to cultivate reinforcements or shift it? So open the rooms and we'll do 15 minutes this time.

Excuse me, please repeat it.

It's in the chat. It's what's your dominant mood these days?

Okay.

And what do you do to cultivate, reinforce or shift that mood? What's your dominant mood? What do you do to cultivate, reinforce, or shift it?

Thank you.

Anyone else have a question, comment request? All right, this one will be a little bit shorter because you want to have some time at the end. So I'm going to do 13 minutes. Okay. Here you go. Thank you so much for playing along today on this little. Let's get together in small groups and talk. We have about 13 minutes. Let's hear from some people how that was for you. Anything you want to share, anything that touched you, moved you, surprised you, stayed with you, provoked you to think differently, heartened you. Anything. Just who'd like to like to share? Yes, Brad, please.

This was one of the best ones that you've ever sponsored, Gil. I loved the interaction. The more people that I met and hearing different high highs, low lows, and a lot of in betweens. Very inspiring. And I think one of the best ones I've attended so far.

Thank you, Brad. Don, please.

Yeah, through. I've always enjoyed coming here because everyone has such deep. Expertise and in this program we connected to the. What's underlying all of us. I feel like there was a connection besides through all that, you know, underneath all that, all that people bring with their expertise.

Terrific.

Very nice. Don, would you want to give a name to that connection? What you, what you said? Yeah. Underneath it all, we all are coming from similar values. We just, our life experiences and what we've done are on these different routes. But our, our. The essence is coming from a similar place of caring and concern and, and, and initiative.

Thank you, Dawn. Dale, how about you?

Well, I, I was struck. These have been the. All three of the groups are wonderful. I was, I was struck. And one of the things I was thinking about is how paradoxical because each, when we talk seems like there's this thing about, well, I'm feeling this, it's tugging me toward despair and I'm feeling this, it's tugging me toward hope and then trying to get off of that hope, despair axis. But I was reminded of. I only know, I don't know it by heart, but there's a poem that the poet says, I love those two young girls who have just read a poem and have discovered the secret of life and I, who wrote that poem have forgotten it. And so, you know, it's, it's, it is like coming back. I, I say the half life of my good attitudinal mood is very short and so I have to put a lot of breadcrumbs on my path all the time. And anyway, so yeah, that's my little comment.

Thanks, Dale. That was lovely. Who else, if you're shy to talk, you can put something in the chat for us. You can use the Google Doc. By the way, the Google Doc will be open. If you want to add additional comments after the call, please feel free to do so. Joe, how about you? You got anything you want to add? I'm calling on Joe because he and I have an offline relationship here, so I feel like I can do that.

So, yeah, I think this has been a, this has been an interesting shift to dynamic. So that's been fun. So thank you to you, Ken, and to you, Gil, for going along with that one. I think, I think for me, one of the things, one of the things that I sometimes find a little surprising, like every time, one of the reasons I come on this is to remind myself that there are Other people out there who are kind of thinking about and working on the same things as me. And I guess for me, the biggest thing is always that, you know, you talked about breadcrumbs just then. Dale, this, this call is a. Is a big, big old breadcrumb for me. It's like a great big, you know, massive current bun or something stuck in the middle of the path. So thank you to everyone for your contributions today.

Thank you. Gil, did you have any questions you want to pose to people? And how is this for you? Because I know this is a big shift for you to actually step out of the control chair and let someone else, you know, play in your sandbox. How did this work for you?

Well, this is what I've been wanting all along. I want, you know, not a. Not a platform for me to give speeches, but a chance to provoke conversations that we can all have together. Because I have enormous respect for each and every one of you, even though I know just a little bit. And the richness of what needs to emerge in the world is in the richness of the conversations that we have together. And this is something I've learned very much from Chauncey and others, that this is where we create worlds, is in our speaking, our interpretations, the offers we make to each other, the requests we make of each other, the promises that we make to each other. So I'm happy and curious. And I was in one of the great breakouts I was with. Folks were talking about hope and despair and a couple of people talked about the notion of radical hope. Doc, I think you said it's the doing of things even when you don't know what the outcome is going to be. To which I add, even when you don't have any basis for predicting any outcome, it's sort of a commitment to do in the face of the uncertainty. I've got kind of a weird mood around the uncertainty. I mean, like many of you, I. You know, Dale, you talked about the half life of your good mood. I oscillate between anxiety and dread and ambition and enthusiasm. And sometimes the cycles are fast and sometimes they're slow. But I'm finding more and more the background mood that I'm living in, this kind of mood of wonder, like amazement at what we are living through. For all its, you know, all its scary aspects, you know, we're in a time that's going to be looked back on hundreds of years from now as the pivotal moment in human history. This is, you know, this is what that stuff looks like. You know, we Learned about it in school. But we're in the middle of something. We have no idea how it's going to play out. I'm not constitutionally designed to just, you know, crawl into a hole and wait for everything to end. I'm not constitutionally designed to just say, well, it all, let's go bowling. But in the midst of it, I'm just fascinated at watching this drama play out, you know, so there are some days I just want to, you know, kind of pull up a good easy chair and a big, big pot of popcorn and watch the movie. I'm also not constitutionally designed to just watch the movie. I want to be in it, you know, so I'm always attuned to, you know, where can I do things that speak to the things that I care about, hopefully speak to the things that other people care about, you know, have a chance of having some beneficial impact, and if not that, at least, you know, be engaging along the way. And, man, this is wild. So, I mean, it's a strange mood, and it's one that I never would have expected to find myself in because I'm usually much more attached to what. What the plot is and how the movie is going to end. And here I'm just fascinated by watching the story that we are living in the middle of. But, you know, but again, not as. Not as a removed dispassionate viewer, but as a guy in the game and watching the game at the same time. It's unusual and it's. And it's. It has fueled me to be more effective, I think, in the work that I'm doing, in the actions that I'm taking, the commitments that I have.

Thanks, Gil. George.

Here. I like that idea of amazement, Gil. And there are so many movies going on at the same time. Right. So I think we shouldn't forget that. You know, there's the climate movie, there's the political movie, there's the war movie, there's the hunger movie, there's the weather movie. There. All of these different movies. There's the money movie, there's the people movie. All of these movies are happening at the same time, and we're all participating in them. And I would also like to second what others have said. This is the kind of conversation that I've been looking for from these. To be able to meet all of you wonderful people in a small group and then maybe figure out how we can do stuff together, you know, one to one or one to many, because we were all doing stuff and we don't Know what all that different stuff is? And maybe it can fit together. Maybe the piece that I'm missing is someone of you doing something else. And so I really appreciate Gil and Ken for putting this together today. It's been very, very, very, very, very good and has elevated my room, my mood.

All right. Couldn't ask for more than that, for sure.

You know, the many movies, George, I like that image. It's like, you know, we're all. We're all in this grand multiplex, you know, and there's. There's the horror movie, the disaster movie, the rom com, the political documentary. We get to choose which movie to go to. You know, we don't control the way the world's playing out, but we can choose which movie to put ourselves in to some degree and what mood to put ourselves in and where to act. And so thank you for that. And I'm delighted that this process. And Ken, thank you for facilitating this and actually for helping.

Pleasure.

I'm delighted at the richness of the interactions that people would have. I would be, you know, thrilled to see people plotting and scheming together and doing things together. I've been very clear from the beginning. I'm not trying to create a new organization here. The board knows there's a lot of organizations out there we could participate in, and I don't feel called to create another one. But if this can be a venue in which people can find things to do together and collaborate together and reinforce each other's work, I'm thrilled at being able to help support that. I agree. I think that would be fantastic. I think we should give some serious reflection to what can we, as a group and our respective groups that we work with, make some plans for some concerted efforts.

I'd like to comment on that if I could. I just finished a book today called how to Make Big Things Happen by Damon Santola, who's a social network analysis guy at the Annenberg School at UN University of Pennsylvania. And a lot of what we can do, we each belong to many networks and the way in which our model of change has been viral. It's been, if you're exposed to a contagion, you become infected. And that works for simple contagions like information and ideas.

I'd like to ask if it's okay with you if we go a couple of minutes over so we can hear from Peter and then a very brief wrap from me. Thank you. Not a wrap. Okay. Peter briefly enjoyed it. I just want to know, want you, the people in the Bay Area I don't know who you are. On the 30th, which is next Tuesday in Cort of Madeira at Book Passage Bookstore, we're going to have an evening with Michael Mann, climate scientist. Could you put the details in the chat, please? Sure. Next Tuesday at 6. Take a look at that again, just by way of wrapping it up. Thank you all for this. To the things that you've said in the last few minutes, I'd like to suggest that next time, Ken, if you're able to join us again, maybe you can open up with a bit more about Sentola's work and this process of viral networking. And then let's presume that we're going to do another of these Style World Cafe breakouts. Let me invite each of you, please suggest what the central questions for each of the breakout sessions might be. You had a model in what we did today should be something specific that people can focus on in 15 minutes and share richly about. Ken and I will cook up a more detailed request to come out to you. But think about how we might shape these conversations the way that's going to be rich and productive for you. Okay. And let me just close. On Twitter, there's an Ursula Guinbot that's pulling out phrases from her voluminous and magnificent works. And the one yesterday said, no darkness lasts forever and even then there are stars. So I'll leave you with that and the reminder that the stars are invisible without the darkness. Thank you, everybody. Go forth, do the good things you do. Thank you for being here. We'll see you next month. Thank you.

And that works for simple contagions like information and ideas.

I'd like to ask if it's okay with you if we go a couple of minutes over so we can hear from Peter and then a very brief wrap from me. Thank you. Not a wrap. Okay. Peter briefly enjoyed it. I just want to know, want you, the people in the Bay Area, I don't know who you are. On the 30th, which is next Tuesday in Cort of Madeira at Book Passage Bookstore, we're going to have an evening with Michael Mann, climate scientist. Could you put the details in the chat, please? Sure. Next Tuesday at 6. Take a look at that again, just by way of wrapping it up. Thank you all for this. To the things that you've said in the last few minutes, I'd like to suggest that next time, Ken, if you're able to join us again, maybe you can open up with a bit more about Sentola's work and this process of viral networking. And then let's presume that we're going to do another of these style World Cafe breakouts. Let me invite each of you. Please suggest what the central questions for each of the breakout sessions might be. You had a model in. What we did today should be something specific that people can focus on in 15 minutes and share richly about. Ken and I will cook up a more detailed request to come out to you. But think about how we might shape these conversations the way that's going to be rich and productive for you. Okay. And let me just close. On Twitter, there's an Ursula Guinbot that's pulling out phrases from her voluminous and magnificent works. And the one yesterday said, no darkness lasts forever and even then there are stars. So I'll leave you with that and the reminder that the stars are invisible without the darkness. Thank you, everybody. Go forth, do the good things you do. Thank you for being here. We'll see you next month. Take care.