Communication anxiety is real. It’s time to start practicing.

This episode of How We Future, features Matt Abrahams, Stanford lecturer and host of the Think Fast, Talk Smart podcast. Lisa and Matt explore how effective communication is a learnable skill and why we’re rarely taught how to practice it.

Matt shares the frameworks he teaches to every incoming Stanford MBA to help them speak more confidently in spontaneous, high-stakes moments. From managing anxiety to the importance of clarifying your intentions, the episode focuses on practical tools for showing up with clarity, presence, and purpose when the pressure is on.

In this conversation, you’ll learn:

• The mindsets and methods of effective communications

• Simple ways to practice spontaneous speaking before the stakes are high

• How to structure answers so people actually remember what you say

• Why listening and pausing are powerful leadership tools

Communication is about connection. It will never be perfect, but like all skills, it gets better with practice.

Please rate and leave a comment, we’d really love to hear from you!

Links from the episode:

• Matt’s website

• Matt’s Podcast: Think Fast, Talk Smart

• Matt’s Book: Think Faster, Talk Smarter

Follow How We Future:

• Lisa Kay Solomon on LinkedIn

• @lisakaysolomon on Instagram

• @howwefuture on TikTok

• howwefuture.substack.com

Want to contact us? Email hello@howwefuture.com

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Matt Abrahams: Perhaps the best and most important thing I can do in a communicative moment is just to be present, to listen, to paraphrase for clarity and accuracy before I jump into planning and judging and evaluating and moving the conversation forward.

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today.

Do you feel anxious when you’re put on the spot to answer a difficult question or nervous when you need to share your ideas with others in a public way? This season is all about the classes we wish we’d been offered sooner, and today’s class on mastering spontaneous communication is one so many of us could use right now. That’s why I’m so glad to welcome Matt Abrahams to How We Future.

Matt teaches strategic communication at Stanford, hosts the wildly popular Think Fast Talk Smart podcast, and has helped millions of people build confidence in high-pressure, unscripted moments. Matt knows that communication is a skill you can strengthen over time, and in this episode, we discuss the mindsets and methods to help you get started. You’ll learn how to warm up before an important conversation, why staying present may be the key to a more positive future’s outcome, and why listening is a pillar of effective communication.

As you listen, I’d love for you to notice one idea or practice that really sticks, and then leave us a comment or rating to share what resonated. Your feedback helps shape this season and lets others know what they’ll gain from listening. Thanks so much for being here. Let’s get started with Matt Abrahams.

I cannot think of a skill more important than effective communication, so it is an absolute honor to have you on the show today.

Matt: Lisa, I am thrilled to be here with you. Your show is fantastic, and I look forward to our conversation.

Lisa: Well, let’s get into it. We’re talking about this as the classes that we wish we had, that we should have had. It’s amazing because you’re actually teaching that class at Stanford Business School, and you have been for many years, about effective communication in different kinds. You’re, of course, tremendously popular around the world. I think one of the things I’m most excited about is the fact that in reading your book, Think Faster, Talk Smarter, the ability to communicate clearly, effectively, is something we can all learn. That in and of itself gets me very excited. Can you talk a little bit about that practice?

Matt: Yes. Communication, many of us feel like you’re either born with it or you’re not. Some people have the gift of gab and others don’t. The reality is it is a skill. It’s a skill that we can all learn. As you’ve rightly pointed out, many of us aren’t taught how to communicate. We might be taught how to write, maybe give a presentation, but so much of our interpersonal communication, our spontaneous communication, we’re never really given instruction or feedback on how to do it. It is critical, but like any skill, with practice, with some reflection, with some feedback, we can all get better at it.

Lisa: I love how you break some of these practices down to be very accessible and approachable. You have a gift of really inviting people in to start that practice because it can be overwhelming. It’s like when you look at a blank screen and you’re like, “I don’t know where to start.” You give this great scaffolding. I know that the class you teach is an elective and is always oversubscribed, but if memory serves, the dean asked you to teach something to every student coming into the business school. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about that.

Matt: About 10 years ago, the dean at the time asked me to help with a problem that they were seeing in our Stanford Business School classes. Our students, as you well know, are just amazingly talented, amazingly bright. You’ll also recall that in classes, professors will pick out our student and say, “Hey, what do you think?” A cold call. Many of our incredibly bright students who knew the answers were struggling in those moments to respond quickly, appropriately, concisely. They came to me and they said, “Is there something you can do to help our students?”

That’s when I did a deep dive into lots of different fields and disciplines, psychology, neuroscience, and improvisation. From that, I developed a methodology that we teach to every incoming Stanford MBA student. They come within the first three weeks of their time with us and we put them through this workshop that really is about equipping them to feel more comfortable and confident and to have the tools they need to speak spontaneously, of which cold-calling is an example.

Spontaneous speaking is much larger than that. We do most of our communication spontaneously, but it’s really designed to help them with a toolkit so that they can feel better about it. The great news is that we see improvement. Students feel more comfortable and confident. Faculty feel like they’re getting better discussion and dialogue. It has been a success.

Lisa: I love it. It’s one of those skills that lift all boats. The experience is better. The learning is better. One of the things I really appreciate about how you approach this is it’s not just the skill of learning to actually say words that are clearer or more resonant, but it’s also a mindset. Can you talk about that?

Matt: The methodology itself breaks down into two major components; the mindset piece, as you said, and then the messaging piece. Mindset’s critical. In the mindset focus, there are really four areas that we need to look at. First and foremost is managing anxiety. Most people are nervous in high-stakes communication, be it planned or spontaneous. We then have to see these situations as opportunities, things we can learn from. Many of us, in all communication, but especially spontaneous communication when people ask us questions or feedback in the moment or small talk, we feel very threatened. We have to reframe that as an opportunity.

We also need to make sure that we are focusing on connection, which is really, I think, the goal of communication, rather than doing it right. We have to reframe what success looks like. To me, it’s connection, not perfection. Then finally, we have to listen well. Listening is a mindset, and listening is critical to all successful communication. In order to get better in your communication, you have to adjust your mindset first before you can actually work on the messages that you deliver.

Lisa: I think that is so important, particularly for these high-achieving students that put so much pressure on themselves to be perfect right out of the gate, this idea of lowering the temperature, of naming, that if you feel anxious about speaking, great, that means you’re a human. How awesome.

Matt: That you care.

Lisa: Right. I’m luckily married to a very successful athlete, among other things, and he used to say he got nervous when he wasn’t nervous ahead of a match. Already that reframe, that physiological response is telling you that you are alive, that you’re human, that you care, and that it’s really not about reducing it, but it’s about managing it productively.

Matt: Very well put. Actors and actresses, and even some executives I coach feel the same way, that if they’re not nervous, that’s a signal that they don’t care, and they need to adjust and adapt. There’s information both in having the anxiety, meaning, “This is important to me,” and not having the anxiety, which is, “Maybe I need to do something to make this more important and relevant.”

Lisa: You also have some great strategies about, I wouldn’t say silencing, but let’s call it managing our inner critic. I know even starting this podcast was a big learning curve for me. I’ve been facilitating conversations for years. I even wrote a book about it, but starting off, was I nervous? I just took a while to find my voice, and listening to you helped me realize that was also natural, that I wasn’t supposed to be fantastic out of the gate.

Matt: No, not at all, and yet many of us worry very much about what others think. Those of us who study anxiety around communication believe this is hardwired. We see it in all cultures. We see it develop at a certain time, in kids development into early teens, this fear of communication and being judged and evaluated, and we think it’s just part of being human. That said, we can learn to manage it.

A few things can really help. We have to realize that in these moments, people want us to succeed. They’re there because they want to get value from us. Sure, the judgment happens. People are evaluating and trying to figure out, “Are you the right person to be delivering this message? Is your message credible?” At the same time, they want to get something out of you.

Our communication is not American Idol. It’s not where people are judging, and there’s a winner and a loser. In fact, I like to tell my students and the people I coach, there is no right way to communicate. There are better ways and worse ways. We get often up in our head about all the things that could have been or should be. Really, when we can clear that and just focus on connecting, it makes a lot of difference for us and for the people we’re speaking to.

Lisa: I think that’s so powerful to remind folks that we are working with that may be listening to this that the people in the room want you to be successful. That’s a huge shift that they’re there for you, and particularly for my younger students where I say, “They’re excited for you. They’re ready to support you,” and it’s a total shift. One of my favorite phrases that a colleague of mine who specializes in thought leadership, Denise Briseux, talked to me about the term of the itty-bitty shitty committee. Nobody invited them to the party. Nobody invited the itty-bitty shitty committee. You can go home.

Matt: I know Denise, and I love her work and her saying. A good friend of mine puts it another way, is that we do a lot of shooting all over ourselves, we should do this, we should do that instead of just being present. That voice in our head is telling us, “You should have done this. You should do that.” Let’s not shoot over ourselves. Let’s not be victimized by our itty-bitty shitty committee. Let’s remind ourselves that our job is to be in service of the people we’re communicating with. When you take that reframe, it really makes a difference.

I actually have a personal mantra. I say, “Some people like affirmations, some don’t.” It works for me. I just remind myself I have value to bring. There’s value I have to bring in this situation and others have value to bring to me in this situation. That reminds me to be audience-centric and it’s about the information, not about the evaluation.

Lisa: Having a mantra, one that really resonates with you is so important. Sometimes when I’m really out of my depth, I’m going to have a little reveal here, I think, “There’s a lot I don’t know, but here’s what I do know, day’s going to start, day’s going to end, something’s going to happen in the middle. Let’s try to make it a good thing.” [laughs]

Matt: Absolutely. I like that idea and focus on making something positive in the world. I think that’s great.

Lisa: Just connecting to the purpose, staying present. Now, this podcast series is all about helping people shape new futures. A lot of your communication coaching is about helping people bring new futures to life and yet I know one of the things you say is one of the most important skills you can learn is to stay present in doing that. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about the importance of staying present even when you’re excited about something in the future that you’re trying to get others to be on board with.

Matt: I really like this question, Lisa, because there’s a lot in the work I do that talks about the future. You should have a clear goal. A goal is what you’re trying to achieve. That’s a future state. You should put a structure together so people can remember what you’ve said in the future. Communication happens in the moment and there is so much that’s going on in the moment that can be helpful to us being successful in what we’re trying to achieve.

I really have to be present. I have to listen. I have to observe what’s going on. This can be very hard because it’s very natural as somebody’s communicating with me to judge and evaluate and plan. It’s a very fine line. You do need to do some of that, but when you do too much of that, you miss the moment. Part of what I do and the work I do is I rely a lot on improvisation activities. I know you know a lot about improv and we have lots of friends in common who do improv. Improv is not about being funny. Improv is about being present and responding. There are very low-stakes activities that you can do and learn to help you feel what it feels like to be present and to see the benefit of it.

Reminding ourselves that perhaps the best and most important thing I can do in a communicative moment is just to be present, to listen, to paraphrase for clarity and accuracy before I jump into planning and judging and evaluating and moving the conversation forward.

Lisa: I think improv is so powerful because it allows you to practice when the stakes are a little lower. I often say the time to practice this is not during your crisis.

Matt: No, not at all.

Lisa: That’s not the moment. Nobody goes off the bench to shoot the three-pointer in the championship game without thousands of hours of practice. I love that. You have a lot of other techniques that actually I’ve started using that. I want to thank you. Even before this call, I grounded myself in getting present by- I’m going to just admit here, by having a little dance party with myself, just putting on some music.

Matt: Physical movement is great for getting present. Athletes listen to songs or playlists. I like to have conversations with people before I go into a big presentation or meeting because it gets me present-oriented. My favorite way, you do a dance party, I say tongue twisters because you can’t say a tongue twister right and not be in the present moment, and it has the added benefit of warming up your voice.

I am so amazed at how people don’t take time to warm up before their communication. Anybody who exercises, anybody who plays a sport knows that warming up is a critical part, yet we think we can go from silence to brilliance in our communication without warming up first. I’m a big fan of tongue twisters. I said a tongue twister before we logged on today for our call, and it’s just a way of warming up for me and being present.

Lisa: That’s fun. You can’t help but smile, even when you get it wrong. Stakes are low. Do you ever mess up your tongue twisters?

Matt: I do. The one I like to say the most has a naughty word in it, so it purposely challenges me to be present so I don’t mess it up. If I do, I do. It’s fine. I just try it again.

Lisa: Your work has a number of elements to it. One is actually giving presentations and speaking. As you said, we tend to think that that’s all of what it is, but this later body of work, which is really about helping people with the majority of their communications in the spontaneous moments, introductions, small talk. I want to start with the first part just for a little bit around what you’ve seen work for leaders, entrepreneurs that are trying to share a big vision about the future with their team or with funders or others that they want to get on board with. Are there some tips or just best practices for leaders that are trying to get others excited about this future vision?

Matt: Oh my goodness. Okay. Fasten your seat belts. Lots to say on this, so let me start. First and foremost, it is critical to have a goal. You need to know where you want to take your audience. A goal to me has three parts: information, emotion, and action. What do you want them to know? How do you want them to feel? What do you want them to do? Most entrepreneurs, most people focus on the information part, “I’m just trying to get information across.” That’s very important. It has to be clear, concise, accessible, targeted to the right audience, absolutely.

Feeling matters a lot. How do I want people to feel? Do I want them excited or concerned, validated? Do I want them just confident? For entrepreneurs, for people talking about the future, that emotion matters. In fact, we know people will be moved more by the emotion than the information in most cases. Then finally, what is the action? A lot of people who want to motivate and inspire aren’t clear on what the takeaway and action is. It has to be measurable. It has to be specific.

I encourage everybody, before you start any endeavor that has communication as a component, be able to articulate clearly your know, feel, do. If you’re doing this in conjunction with others, let’s say a couple entrepreneurs together are launching a company, coordinate and make sure there’s alignment. I might have a goal that’s slightly different than your goal, Lisa, and that’s going to cause trouble if we’re not aligned when we go start sharing it with the world.

Step 1, have a goal. Step 2, figure out a way to package the information so that it is understandable. Many of us, we just list and itemize, especially if we’re excited about something. Our brains aren’t wired for that. I know you know the power of storytelling, but stories are structured, logical connections of ideas. Once you have your goal, think about, “How do I message it in a way that’s structured?” I can talk a lot more about structure.

Finally, what all of this is in service of, is relevance and salience. People are misers with their attention. I believe attention is the most precious commodity we have in the world today. If you don’t convince me what you’re talking about, your vision of the future is relevant to me, has salience for me, then I’m not going to pay the amount of attention that you want to it. Have to have a clear goal, have to have a structure or a framework, and then you have to make sure that you target it in a way that makes it relevant and salient to me. If you do that, then you can really advocate for your vision of the future and have it resonate with people.

Lisa: It’s such a powerful framework to go back to with a lot of flexibility in there. As you said, one story is not the same as the other story. That emotion piece, I just think it’s one of these things where we have to unlearn because I don’t know about you, but I certainly, when I was in business school, never took a class on emotion. Even the idea of storytelling is relatively new as a business practice. It used to be like, “Oh, yes, those artists,” and yet we’re humans, luckily. We are still not robots. It is just a reality of how we’re built to respond and make meaning. It’s something, again, we can learn.

I’m always amazed when people talk about the future, they tend to use a metaphor or a story that’s already out there. You hear a lot, for example, about AI, “Oh, it’s the Terminator. Oh, it’s the Iron Man.” That’s a shorthand for a story that then has meaning. I’m often thinking about when we talk about the future, sometimes people talk about The Jetsons. That was over 50 years ago. Why is that still relevant? It’s really a story of a nuclear family. There’s all these opportunities, I think, to use those to our advantage, to talk about it. Your work is just about being more aware of that.

Matt: Stories provide shortcuts to connection. Our species is wired for them. Long before we had the written word, the way in which information was transmitted was through folklore, through legend, through story. If you can tap into that-- and analogies are a really powerful way to do that.

Lisa: There’s another piece about your work that I think a lot about is that a lot of times, people think that the outcome is to get the answer, versus the outcome is to get engagement, the license to have the next meeting, the next conversation. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about some of the coaching you do around that.

Matt: The goal of most communication is the next communication. It’s very rare that something is going to happen in that moment. “You’re going to sign on the dotted line after I do my pitch initially.” No, there’s always future steps. We need to be thinking about that and appropriately targeting our messages.

Engagement is critical. To me, engagement is sustained attention. As I said, attention is our most precious commodity. Getting attention actually isn’t that hard, sustaining it is. There are several techniques that we can use. They fall into pretty much four categories, and I’ll run through them very quickly. There’s physical engagement. Get people doing something physical. Where their bodies go, their brains follow. If I’m giving a big presentation, I take a poll. You raise your hand, you’re now engaged with what I’m doing. If I’m virtual, I have you type into the chat or use a reaction button. Maybe I show you a video and you watch. All of these are physical ways of getting you to engage and focus. Contrast that to cognitive engagement. We’ve already talked about one, storytelling, very engaging, but using analogies, as you discussed, and asking questions. Our brain responds to questions very differently than information. It lights up. More areas of our brain are engaged when you ask questions. When I lecture my MBAs, I never say, “Today we’re going to cover three topics.” I say, “Today we’re going to answer three questions,” and I pose things as questions.

We’ve got physical, mental. There’s linguistic engagement. My favorite way to engage people is through words. Think about this. Instead of me telling you something, Lisa, what if I were to say, “Imagine what it would be like if--” or, “Picture this,” or, “What if you could?” Those phrases cause you to see it in your mind’s eye rather than just passively receive it from me, using what I call time-traveling language, where I take you into the future, “What if you could?” “Picture this,” “Imagine.”

Then the final way to engage people is through shared experience. This is why in organizations, mission, vision, value are so important, because if I can connect what I’m advocating for to a vision that we’ve already had or a value that we’ve already established, that consistency, that connection brings it together, connects us to it. Physical, mental, linguistic, and common ground are four major techniques to engage people. I know that any speaker you enjoy, Lisa, or any of your viewers and listeners enjoy, go through, and almost like bingo, just check off, “Oh, there’s a physical engagement. Oh, there’s a cognitive engagement technique.” Communicators who are engaging use these techniques.

Lisa: Again, such a powerful scaffold for people to, as you say, first of all, be a better observer, be a better learner about who’s doing it well. I used to do that a lot with facilitation. I’d be like, “Wow, what did they do there to really engage?” Because their styles can be different than mine. Just being aware of it and then, again, practicing it in small ways, even if it feels uncomfortable. I can imagine some folks, and I know this is something you talk about a lot, are memorizing their opening lines and they’re not pausing to be like, “How do I invite? How do I get them into this conversation?”

Matt: It’s a conversation. Even though I might be standing in front of thousands of people, I am having a conversation, and that changes the way we approach it. We respond much better to conversation than somebody who’s just delivering a memorized presentation.

Lisa: Which again, goes back to the goal. My goal is to not convince you. My goal is to engage you. Let’s take some pressure off. Let’s talk a little bit about questions because, as you were saying, in that more spontaneous practice, people are terrified of Q&A. You have such a great approach to making Q&A a healthy part of this practice. If you could talk a little bit about how you think about Q&A.

Matt: Again, it’s mindset and messaging. Many people, as you rightly say, are fearful of Q&A. We don’t know what they’re going to ask. We don’t know if we know the answers. We don’t know how it’s going to go. There’s a lot of uncertainty. Instead of seeing Q&A as a crucible, as a test, as a challenge, which has very direct effects on our communication, I retreat, my tone is curt, my answers are short. See it as an opportunity to collaborate, to connect, to learn.

When I get a question, even if it’s hot and spicy, even if it’s challenging, there’s something I can learn there, there’s some way I can connect to somebody. Even if the person is diametrically opposed to us, there’s something we have in common. We both care about this issue and I can connect on that.

First is approach. Q&A is not a challenge, not a threat. It’s an opportunity to collaborate. Once you have that in mind, you then have to have a way of responding. Here’s a structure. I’m a big fan of frameworks. I like answering questions with a three-part scaffold. I call it ADD for adding value. Answer the question, give a detailed example, and then describe the relevance. Why is it important to the person?

Each of these components serves a very important function. One, a question was asked, you need to answer it. When I give a concrete example, a detailed example, people remember it more. Our brains are wired to remember detail more than high level gist. Then when I make it relevant, when I explain the value, that really connects it to you. If you’re willing, Lisa, can we demonstrate this?

Lisa: Oh, yes.

Matt: You’ve been asking me several questions and I’ve been trying to answer them in this structure. Would you imagine you’re trying to hire me? You’re a hiring manager and I’m interviewing. This is something all of us can relate to being interviewed. Can you ask me an interview question? Imagine that I am interviewing to do the job I do at Stanford, to be a lecturer at Stanford on strategic communication. What might be a reasonable question you would ask? I’m going to try to answer it in ADD so the viewers and listeners can hear how this structure works.

Lisa: Fantastic. I love it. Matt, thanks so much for your interest in this job. I’m wondering, how do you know if you’ve done a good job? How do you have a sense of if you’ve actually helped your students?

Matt: Assessment of effective communication is critical. I look for two things. One, I look to see if the information the student or the person I’m working with, delivered is clear, concise, and accessible. I’m observing that. Then second, I want to understand, does the person feel like they have learned something that’s helping? In my class, for every assignment, we digitally record the students and give them feedback on a rubric. I give them my feedback on clarity, accessibility. Is it concise? They watch themselves and they write their own self-review and reflect on how they feel. I use both my assessment and their own self-assessment to judge if we were successful.

What this does for the student is it gives them very tailored feedback that helps them see a learning path to help them get to where they want to be. Let me take a time out there and I’ll just dissect what I did. You tell me, was that a good answer? Did it give you what you were looking for in an answer?

Lisa: Yes. The thing that I really appreciated, first of all, you had a lot of clarity about the content. What I got from that was like, “I have a point of view. I actually know how I’m going to assess.” You also provided some context about why does that matter? It matters for you as the instructor and also, importantly, matters for them and why that matters. I definitely got a full answer in that. It wasn’t a listicle, which I loved.

Matt: Right, no list. I answered the question. I said, “Here’s how I do it.” I gave you a concrete example of what it looks like so you could see in my class that’s what that experience would be like. Then I explain the value of it. A good answer answers the question, gives a detailed example, and describes the relevance. When you approach your Q&A the way that I talked about as an opportunity and you have a structure, you are in a great position to handle that spontaneous challenge in a way that is helpful to the person or people you’re working with, but also helps you feel comfortable and able to respond.

Lisa: Again, I’m seeing these great patterns, Matt, about, first of all, mindset. It’s an opportunity. It’s not a threat. They’re not there to shoot holes in it. They’re there to learn. Even if you get a tough question, it’s ideas-- somehow they are still confused. There’s an opportunity there. The mindset piece. Then the other piece around the message, how do you actually get prepared to structure it? Again, going back to these are just so valuable. Then I wonder if you coach your entrepreneurs or your students about practicing Q&A. This is another thing. We don’t practice.

Matt: No, that’s right. If somebody said, “Practice your pitch or presentation,” most of them would say, “I see that I should probably do that.” When we say, “Practice your spontaneous communication,” people are like, “What? How do you even do that?” Think of it. We’ve already alluded to the fact that athletes practice a lot. They prepare. We can do the same thing. There are drills we can do. Let me give you a couple examples.

One, when you are in your business, your organization, do you have FAQs? Do you have frequently asked questions that you document so that you can get people aligned or help others in your organization? Go to those and just draft them in the structure we talked about. That act of doing it will help lay down the neural pathways that make it easier. I think a wonderful use of AI is to give us an opportunity to practice.

Go to an AI tool and say, “Giving a presentation on X topic for an audience like Y, generate three questions that they might have.” As each question comes in, practice answering it, not to memorize your answers, but just to get comfortable doing it. Just like an athlete would dribble around cones, this is your way of practicing. You go into it confident that “I’ve done it before.”

Lisa: So helpful. I often say, better rehearse the future than be blindsided by the present.

Matt: Oh, I love that. I want to borrow that. Thank you.

Lisa: Please. All this is just encouragement. We don’t do it because we’ve never been taught how to do it. We’ve never thought about it. I want to talk a little bit about something I’ve also heard you talk about around a growth mindset when mistakes do happen. I want to, again, admit something. I didn’t know this was going to be true confessions. Here we go.

Recently, I facilitated something and I did something I’ve never done before, which is, one of the two people I was hosting a panel on, I introduced them with the wrong name. It took me a second to realize. I was like, “We’re live. Uh-oh.” You actually have some strategies for what happens when you make some mistakes. I wonder if we could talk about it.

Matt: Absolutely. One, mistakes are normal and natural. We make them all the time. It’s part of being human. Second, you have to make a split-second decision if it needs to be remedied or not. In your case, probably needed to be addressed because the person’s coming up and we don’t want them thinking they’re somebody else. We probably do have to do something.

Many of our mistakes, we’re the only ones who really know we did it. We are the only ones who know what we intended to say versus what we did say. Sometimes it’s just something we’ve noticed that others might not notice, and drawing attention to it actually might disrupt the flow and the connection. You have to make that decision in that moment.

We also tend to beat ourselves up and ruminate a lot on the mistakes we make. In my research and the work that I have done learning about this, work by Carol Dweck has been really informative. Carol’s work on growth mindset talks about this one area that I’ve really gravitated to, which is this idea of “Not yet.” If I make a mistake or I didn’t do it right, it doesn’t mean that I am incapable of doing it, I will never do it well. No, what it means is that I’m just not ready yet. When we take that attitude, it means the future is bright. There are things I can do to get ready, so it can be very empowering. I like this idea of “Not yet.”

Another lesson that I think can be really helpful comes from the famous basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski. He has this notion or trained his players on this idea of next play. Many of us, when we make a mistake, in that moment we ruminate, we beat ourselves up, we think about, oh, all the things that might go wrong. If you’re doing that on a basketball court, for example, you are now not in service of your team. If I miss a shot and I’m saying, “Oh, I can’t believe I missed that shot, I practiced all that,” the other team and your only four other players are down court already.

This is not to say that reflection is not important, but rumination in the moment gets in the way. We need to remind ourselves next play. When I make a mistake, I simply say to myself, “Next play, keep moving on,” and then I decide, “Do I need to correct later?”

Then the final thing I’ll say, and I know I’m going on a long time, Lisa, I’m sorry, is reframe mistakes. I like to call mistakes missed takes. In television production, movie production, they do multiple takes. We know that clapboard, take 1, take 2. They don’t do multiple takes because any one take is wrong. They’re just trying different things out. When I say something that I didn’t want to say or it didn’t go the way I want, mentally, I just say, “Take 2,” and maybe I repeat myself and say it correctly. Maybe later I send an email that corrects what I wanted to say, but I don’t beat myself up over it. It’s just another take.

These attitudes and some of the techniques that come from them can help you to address the mistakes you make and actually learn from them so you make fewer in the future.

Lisa: Such a powerful frame for thinking about mistakes as missed takes. You get to try again. How great. What did you learn? The misplaced energy of beating ourselves up when it’s like, “How does that help you?” That reframe of, can you reflect to learn forward as opposed to staying in the past? Again, having that itty-bitty shitty committee come out. Particularly when you present, there’s the presentation you prepare for, the one you give, and the one you obsess about on the way home. Never the same.

Matt: Right. No. My students are digitally recorded presenting. They have to watch it three times, once with sound only, once with video only, and once both together. The biggest learning across all the hundreds and thousands of students I’ve ever taught is they realize, “I didn’t look as nervous as I felt,” or, “I looked more confident than I felt.” There’s this perception gap so that the one that you ruminate over, once you actually see it, you realize it wasn’t as bad as you thought because you only show people what you show them. They don’t have insight to all the stuff going on in your head and in your body.

Let’s try to get rid of that third of those three, the one that we ruminate over and over again. A great way to do that is to record yourself, watch it, even though that’s painful, and you realize it’s not as bad as you thought it was.

Lisa: I think that’s so important to give yourself time. As you said, time, attention is a thing that increasingly has more value because it feels more scarce. To practice that in a way that allows us to grow as opposed to judge. I do worry a bit, particularly for our students, the younger generation, so much of their communication is online, is about did they get the like? Yes or no? Did they get the comment? Yes or no? Which is a binary response versus a growth mindset, as you said, about “Not yet,” and how we can get better.

Matt: I also worry about that with the younger generation as well. It’s very disconcerting when communication is all about getting the likes or appeasing the algorithm so you get more exposure. I think that’s a very dangerous place to be when it comes to our communication.

Lisa: I agree. Again, I’ll go back to something you said earlier, which I think is so powerful, that when you engage authentically, you feel something different in your body. A lot of times I think our students just haven’t felt that. If you can get that feeling of, “Oh my gosh,” they’re watching themselves, “Wow, look at my presence, I didn’t know,” they can’t unfeel that.

The idea is to put out- I talk about as optimistic offense, put out a better feeling so they’re not just in reaction mode. They want to search to get more of that. I think that’s the gift that you give your students and the leaders that you work with.

Matt: I like optimistic offense. Thank you for sharing that. That’s a really great way to be persuasive about what you’re talking about without people raising their hackles. I like it.

Lisa: It connects to something that I think this whole series is trying to do, which is to help expose people to things we can learn that gives us outsized agency and influence. In a world that feels like it’s happening to us, how do we build the skills to feel like we can shape the future? That’s at the core. How do we do it humanely? How do we do it with hope? How do we do it with connection with others and with a spirit of gratitude? Again, this idea that these are teachable and learnable skills, I think in and of itself is a powerful place to start.

Matt: Right. You have to invite people in to make those changes because change, it requires work. I like the framing of the way that you just said what you said, but also this idea of, we need to connect and have those feels so that that motivates us.

Lisa: Absolutely. I want to talk about one more topic. So much of the conversations we find ourselves in about where we want to go are filled with ambiguity because the world is changing so fast. My colleague, Scott Doorley, talks about this notion that we are living at a time where we never feel up to speed. I just wonder if you could talk a little bit about how you coach some of your students and entrepreneurs about how to be in conversations that have high levels of ambiguity, about how to still have presence and still find clarity amid some of the complexity.

Matt: This is very tricky and tough. What I have found most helpful in my own life and those I work with find valuable is to have some stakes in the ground. I need to first do some introspection. What’s important to me? What are my values? What’s motivating me in this moment and generally? Because when things are amorphous and ambiguous, you need to have a compass, and that compass is who you are and what’s important to you.

The next step when it comes to communication, again, comes back to having a clear goal. What is it that I would like to achieve? Not that I will achieve it, but where’s that magnetic north taking me so that as a conversation unfolds, as the experience comes out, what is it that I can do to help bring me back to what I’m trying to achieve? Yet at the same time, I have to challenge myself to remain open because while I have a goal, others I’m interacting with have their own goals, and they might get me somewhere I didn’t think I could go or wanted to go, but actually learned that I do.

You have to have some of these foundational grounding principles. What are your values? What is important to you? What’s your goal? Then there’s an openness.

Finally, and this is probably the hardest of all of these, we need to train ourselves for pattern recognition. We need to begin to see where things are going, where things could potentially go. You are a master facilitator. Not only outside of this, but even during our conversation, you do an excellent job of facilitating, paraphrasing, keeping us on track. That’s a skill that in ambiguous situations, in amorphous communication, is really helpful. I really think facilitation comes down to at least two critical ingredients, one is listening, and two is pattern recognition. Those, I think, are the skills that help, and yet, a lot of us don’t take the time to focus on those. As this whole conversation has been about, these are learnable skills. Those are the ingredients, I believe, that are critical for handling ambiguous situations.

Lisa: I loved how you talked about facilitation as so important. It is one of those overlooked skills. It’s incredible to me, as well as something we talked about earlier, which is improv. We have Dan Klein in common. He was an earlier guest, and he shared a lot about how improv helps navigate ambiguity, the power of, “Oh, good,” leaning into mistakes with some joy.

Robert Poynton is another inspiration of mine. I don’t know if you know his work. He teaches over at Oxford. He talks about how life demands an improvised response. If you just pause and say, “Is there ever a world where you’re going to know everything?” It’s absurd to think the answer is yes. What’s your response then? Learn how to make decisions and act without all the information. That requires the practice and the presence, as you said, the North Star. Then I want to share one other thing I’ve learned from you that, frankly, I’m in a growth mindset about, which is slowing down, the power of the pause.

Matt: Yes. It is very hard for me, but life happens in that moment. That’s where life is happening, is in that moment. Pausing does several things. One, for you, it allows you to collect your thoughts, to ground yourself, to focus. Pausing also gives permission to the other person or people to continue. That’s space allows them to say more. There’s so much beauty that can happen there.

My mother-in-law had a black belt in small talk. She could connect in ways I have never really met anybody who can do it as well as she did. She had just a few tools. Pausing was one. She would give people space, and then she would say, “Tell me more,” in a way that was a genuine curiosity. Those two tools really allowed her to connect. My wife’s from the Midwest. When my mother-in-law would come out, she’d come off the plane with three best friends. I’m not joking. When she was visiting us, they would go out together because they met on the plane because of that connection she was able to make.

Lisa: Again, speaks to that engagement and curiosity, talking to strangers and actually learning about them, a great place to practice. We just finished teaching View from the Future where we bring in different guests every week, talk about where the future is going. Some of my students said to me- they said, “Lisa, we love the guests, but we loved how you met the guests.” Inevitably, they were on a plane or just standing in line waiting for something at a conference. You build up a conversation and you show curiosity. Next thing you know, you’re staying in touch.

So many amazing things can happen. This, of course, connects to an earlier guest this season, Tina Seelig, our shared friend, whose beautiful new book, What I Wish I Knew About Luck. This is a strategy of capturing luck, being curious.

Matt: Being open and being present. I think that’s great. I just interviewed on Think Fast, Talk Smart, my show, Nick Epley, who actually studies talking to strangers. He finds that it is far less awkward than people think it is and far more beneficial and rewarding to do it. Take the step to really, one, initiate communication with people you might not know well and allow yourself permission and the grace to pause and really appreciate what comes after that.

Lisa: Matt, that is a great segue to my final question, which is where can people learn more about your strategy? You mentioned your podcast, which is extraordinary and a huge congratulations to you for not only all the reach that you have, but the spirit of generosity. It’s really a gift to help people feel like that these are skills they can learn, they can learn from other people that you bring on. Your podcast is one of them. Where else can they learn? I know you’re always putting out new lesson plans and new communities.

Matt: Thank you. Think Fast, Talk Smart is a great place to go to learn more from me, but more importantly, the amazing people I talk to. Mattabrahams.com has a lot of my work. Fastersmarter.io is dedicated to the podcast and other learnings. I am an avid user of LinkedIn as well. Would love to connect with anybody in your community and really to find and learn from people who are passionate about the future and about communication.

Lisa: Matt, in the spirit of a future that we know is filled with lots of uncertainties and lots of unknowables, one thing we do know for sure is that when we connect authentically with other humans, our days are better, our ideas are better, and what we bring to the world is filled with more possibility and connection and inclusivity. Thank you for all that you do, for bringing your expertise forward in such a generous and caring way.

Matt: Thank you, and thank you for the work you’re doing. Keep up spreading the word about the future and how we can learn skills that we never learned to help all of us improve and be better human beings.

Lisa: Thanks so much for listening to this episode. Before you go, here’s something to carry into your week from this conversation with Matt. The next time you feel that rush of nerves before speaking, pause and remind yourself, “This moment is all about connection, not perfection.” You can also try a small warm-up beforehand, say a tongue twister, move your body, or even sing a song.

If this episode helped you think differently about communication, leave a comment and let us know what you’re practicing next. For deeper reflections, episode notes, and ways to keep building these skills, check out the How We Future Substack. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thanks for listening, and I’ll see you next week.

What if you can learn to be lucky?

In our first episode of season 3, Lisa Kay Solomon is joined by author, educator, and neuroscientist Tina Seelig to explore how curiosity, generosity, and small daily choices can dramatically expand what’s possible over time.

Drawing from decades of teaching at Stanford and her forthcoming book What I Wish I Knew About Luck, Tina reframes luck as a skill that can be cultivated rather than an accident we stumble into.

Tina shares how taking risks, showing appreciation, and staying open to unexpected opportunities can create compounding advantages. She also reflects on what she’s learned from teaching thousands of students, leading the Knight-Hennessy Scholars program, and watching ideas evolve when people are given permission to experiment.

In this conversation, you’ll learn:

• Why luck often shows up at the intersection of preparation and openness

• The role generosity and curiosity play in long-term success

• How to design environments that make luck more likely

The future is something we shape through the questions we ask, the risks we take, and the people we choose to learn alongside. If you’ve ever wondered how to tilt the odds in your favor, Tina offers practical wisdom and hopeful perspectives on how to get started.

Please rate and leave a comment letting us know what classes you wish you had taken.

Links from the Episode:

• Preorder What I Wish I Knew About Luck: A Crash Course on Turning Aspirations into Achievements by Tina Seelig

• What I Wish I Knew When I Was 20: A Crash Course in Making Your Place in the World by Tina Seelig

• inGenius: A Crash Course on Creativity by Tina Seelig

• Creativity Rules: Get Ideas Out of Your Head and into the World by Tina Seelig

• Tina’s Ted Talk: The Little Risks You Can Take to Increase Your Luck

• Tina’s Website

Follow How We Future:

• Lisa Kay Solomon on LinkedIn

• @lisakaysolomon on Instagram

• @howwefuture on TikTok

• howwefuture.substack.com

Want to contact us? Email hello@howwefuture.com

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Tina Seelig: You can learn the tools to become luckier, and it’s very sad that we don’t teach people these tools. The way we engage with the world in everything we do can unlock luck if we have the right approach.

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today.

Do you consider yourself lucky? What if luck isn’t something that happens to you, but something you could actually learn to harness? Welcome back to How We Future. This season, we’re focusing on essential skills we wish we learned earlier, the ones that help us navigate uncertainty, spot hidden opportunities, and shape the futures we’re excited to be a part of. There’s no better place to start than with my friend, Tina Seelig.

Tina is a bestselling author, celebrated educator, and the director of Stanford’s Knight-Hennessy Scholars Program. She’s spent decades teaching creativity, innovation, and entrepreneurial thinking. Her new book, What I Wish I Knew About Luck, helps us understand that luck isn’t random. It’s a skill we can all practice, develop, and expand.

In this conversation, we get into the difference between fortune and luck, why a thank-you note or a hello to a stranger can compound into something extraordinary, and why imposter syndrome might actually be improvement syndrome in disguise. This episode is a master class in building your ship, recruiting your crew, and hoisting your sail to catch the wind of opportunity. Be sure to stay to the end. Tina leaves us with one small action you can take this week to start expanding your luck right now. Let’s get into it with Tina Seelig.

Tina: Oh, I couldn’t be more delighted, and so looking forward to our conversation.

Lisa: Tina, you’ve written over 18 books among other resources. I want to start with why luck? What was it about luck that captured your imagination this time around?

Tina: My father and I have debated the role of luck in our lives forever. I don’t remember a time when my father wasn’t saying, the harder I work, the luckier I get. As I got older, I realized that expression was correct but incomplete, and that you really needed to understand, “Okay, yes, that might be true, but what is the hard work? What is it you actually have to do to become luckier?”

Lisa: I think that captures so much of what this book does, which is takes these big concepts that we’ve heard, sometimes cliches, sometimes abstract sayings, and breaks it down to these very concrete, actionable ways of being and acting in the world. It’s just every chapter I found myself going, “Yes, that’s so true,” and “Oh my gosh. Wow, now I understand that better.” This book felt so personal, Tina, and you open it up with the beautiful story of your family. It just feels like it captures so much of your ethos, your personality. This is not just a how-to book. This is a very vulnerable, personal, and inviting book. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about what it was like to have this book represent so many facets of your life.

Tina: I really appreciate that you noticed that. I tell a lot of stories about places where I’ve made mistakes and where I didn’t know how to do this, as opposed to being on high, saying, “Well, you need to do this, and you need to do that, and shame on you if you don’t know.” Nobody knows these things when they’re young. It’s really an incredible gift I’m hoping to give people to learn from some of the big mistakes that I made as I was trying to craft my path to the future.

Lisa: I want to start with also the beginning of the book, where you really dive into definitions of luck, because I think luck is one of those words we throw around a lot. “Oh, I’m lucky, they’re lucky.” It’s different than, say, I know you talk about the difference between luck and fortune and maybe some other adjacent words. Can you talk a little bit about that important distinction and why that was so important to name upfront in the book?

Tina: Yes. This is a big pothole for people. They conflate the concepts of fortune and luck. Fortune is things that happen to you, things that are out of your control. It’s either fortunate or unfortunate that it rains today. It’s fortunate or unfortunate who your parents are. There are so many things that happen to you that are out of your control. Luck is something over which you have more control.

Now, we are in a dance with the world, right? We’re constantly in a dance between what happens to us and how we respond. Because luck and fortune are so closely interwoven, it’s easy to imagine that they’re actually one thing, but once you parse that, once you create in your mind an understanding about what’s happening to you and how you respond, you gain much more agency.

Lisa: I’m so glad that you focused on agency as a key theme. As I read every chapter, I was like, “Yes, this is a way where we can help shape the future versus having the future happen to us,” which is, of course, a big theme of the class that we taught for many years together at Stanford on inventing the future. I wonder again if you could just talk a little bit about how you thought about these different facets of your life and how you came back to this idea that luck is something that can be shaped and harnessed.

Tina: Well, I have been teaching at Stanford for many years. It’s now 26 years. I get the opportunity to observe so many young people and how they navigate the world. Some, you see, they know how to squeeze the juice out of every opportunity, and others leave those opportunities on the table. I realize that it’s my responsibility to help them understand where those opportunities are.

I truly believe that there’s a gift in every room. It’s up to you to find it. When I see people walk right past these opportunities, I want to be able to tell them, “Hey, look, if you had behaved this way or if you had done this thing or if you had followed up, who knows what wonderful opportunities would have befallen you.” It’s often not appropriate for me to do that in real time. I thought, “You know what? I’m going to write a book that shows people all the ways, all the tools they have at their disposal to unlock luck in their lives.”

Lisa: I appreciate that it’s not just these big concepts. They’re really, oftentimes, these small, micro moments, whether it’s introducing yourself to someone that’s next to you or writing a thank-you note or just sharing appreciation, which I definitely want to get into because I know gratitude and appreciation is a big part of your practice as it is mine. This very idea that it can be teachable, I think, is so enlightening.

Tina: It’s interesting. One of the things that I really try to teach young people how to do is how to make yourself easy to help. Now, people, especially when you’re younger, and certainly it happens throughout your whole life, but luck comes often through other people, other opportunities, or other people who have to help you realize your dreams. How do you set the stage for people to want to help you? That’s part of the framework. If we go back to the beginning, the idea is that luck is like the wind. Luck is ubiquitous. It might be invisible, but it’s very strong. You need to build a sail to catch it.

There are three major parts of the framework. One is that you need to build your ship. That’s all the internal work you’re going to do. You need to recruit your crew. That’s getting other people excited about helping you. You need to then hoist the sail. If we talk about recruiting your crew, how do you get other people excited? One of the most important things is to know how to ask for help and to make yourself easy to help. It’s not always obvious because, for example, someone might send an email to someone that they want some help from.

There’s so many different ways that you could craft that message to either make it so likely that someone’s going to write back instantly, or someone’s going to either leave it in their inbox or hit delete. You need to know what it is you want to have in that email so that they instantly want to say, “Wow, I want to learn more. I want to connect.”

Lisa: Is that something that you have explicitly taught some of your students on how to do?

Tina: Absolutely. In fact, sometimes it’s even alumni who send me a message, and they want me to introduce them to someone I know. I say, “Okay, fine, write an email that I can easily forward to that person.” Then they’ll write the email, and I go, “Okay, let me show you how you have to do this.” Again, it’s not obvious. The key thing is to look at it from the perspective of the person who is going to be getting it. Not looking at it from your perspective of what you want, but how can you frame it in a way that is interesting enough to them that they are going to want to respond

Lisa: I love that so much, Tina. It reminds me of a class that I used to teach at Stanford called Networking by Design. It was very much that this idea we think of networking as transactional. This whole book is about how you center your values in a way that can create more value for more people and the world. There’s really nothing transactional about it. It’s like, how do we make different choices in order to make deeper connections, in order to help people help you? You’re exactly right.

My experience was like, we’re just not taught this. Once you’re taught it, then it’s a total game-changer. Even that notion of, “Hey, help me help you, write a quick request, write a little blurb.” The other thing that you say, which I love so much, is this idea of be specific. Not let me sit down and have a chat, but to be very specific in your request.

Tina: It’s funny. The worst messages I get, the worst, are the ones where someone says, “I want to meet with you to pick your brain. Like, “Oh my gosh, what does that mean?” First of all, it also is a strange visual concept. The idea is like, be very specific because it might be that I’m actually not the right person to talk to. It might be that there’s someone else that I could refer you to. By being very specific, I can either sometimes just help you right away, like, “Oh, here’s an article, or here’s a person you should meet, or this is an event you might want to attend, or here’s an answer to your question.” Often, I can be very helpful if I know exactly what you’re looking for.

Lisa: Which is another way of honoring your time, not having you sift through it. Also, asking the person to do some of that work ahead of time. Wait a minute, how can I honor this person by really being clear? Then, the important thing that I try to teach my students, you come back to them, and you let them know, “Hey, thank you so much for doing this. Let me tell you what happened as a result of that introduction, as a result of that article.” I wonder if you could talk about that part of it.

Tina: I think you’re absolutely right. I think closing the loop is so important, and people miss the opportunity. Whether it’s closing the loop and saying, “Thank you so much.” That is the minimum viable response is, “Thank you so much for helping me with this.” When someone helps you, it is time, effort, and energy that they’re not putting into themselves or someone else. There’s an opportunity cost. You need to understand that. People aren’t just sitting around waiting for your message or your request. They’ve got a lot of other things on their plate. You need to honor that by saying, thank you.

There’s a great story which I tell in the book, and I just love it because it’s such a perfect example of so many of these concepts in action. There was a young man named Oliver who watched my TED Talk on luck. He was really intrigued, and he’s a very lucky guy. He thought, “Oh, I’m going to go become a luck coach.” He shot me an email, and he said, “I saw your TED Talk. I really liked it. It resonates with me, and I’m thinking of becoming a luck coach.” I thought, “Oh, what a great idea.” In fact, part of me thought, well, I wish I thought about that.”

[laughter]

Tina: I thought it was a great idea, and I had just started working on this book in earnest. I said, “Great, happy to have a call”. He had a very small request. I’d love to just have 10 minutes of your time. We got on a call, and I listened to some of his ideas, gave him some feedback. He followed up with a very nice thank-you note, but he didn’t stop there. That’s the most important thing. He didn’t stop there. He sent me a link to a Google Doc where he made a list of all the ways he could help me with my book.

Now, nothing that was on his list was exactly what I needed, but I was so taken with his initiative and his creativity and his enthusiasm that I said, “Would you consider being a research assistant for the book? Now, I’ve never, ever, ever used a research assistant. That was a real leap for me. I thought, I think he could help me because what I wanted him to do is to help me find research that was out there that reinforced some of the concepts that I was talking about in the book. He jumped at this chance. We had a great time getting to know each other through this process. I learned about the ways that he attracts luck and ended up writing an entire chapter about him in the book.

It shows you that what can happen if you ask in a way that people respond, you show appreciation, and then you also build on those small wins. He didn’t just leave it there. He built on it and then ended up building a relationship that resulted in a win for him as well as for me.

Lisa: Such a great story. There’s so many shades of that story, too, not just that one. I know you talk about when students apply to the Knight-Hennessy Scholars Program that you now lead or other fellowships that you have led in the past, and the response that they have, whether they just respond to say thank you or they respond with curiosity to continue the relationship in some way. Time and time again, those that come back with an offer, with an idea, with appreciation, and an extension just seem to pay so many more dividends, not just the kinds of things that are possible, the expanding of surface area, but in the connection that you have, the relationship that you build.

Tina: I think an important part here is that nobody else would see what people did. No one would have seen what Oliver did to end up with a chapter in the book. I saw it, and I can then share with you, this is the magic that’s happening behind the curtain. This is what’s happening. Another story I told in the book, which is about another student, Azza, who ended up becoming the videographer for Kamala Harris while she was at the White House. Now, how does a young person get this job documenting the vice president at the White House?

It’s such an amazing story. Again, you have to look behind the curtain. She took one videography class when she was in college, and she was taken with it. She ended up staying in touch with that professor for 10 years, keeping this professor up-to-date on her progress, when things went well, when things didn’t go well. She ended up coming to graduate school at Stanford. When she graduated, she was having a really tough time finding a job. She sent hundreds of letters out to all different news outlets and media companies. Nobody even responded.

She reached out to this professor and said, “I’m really struggling. I just need one opportunity.” The professor said, “You know what? Someone just reached out to me about the fact that they’re looking for someone for this role. I’d love to throw your hat in the ring.” It happened 10 years after she took that class. It was 10 years of cultivating a relationship. Now, of course, she didn’t cultivate the relationship because she wanted this job. When you do cultivate really meaningful relationships, good things come to life that you could never even have imagined.

Lisa: It just gives me chills. I know I read the story, but hearing you talk about it gives me chills all over again about that there are opportunities everywhere. It connects to another core theme throughout the book. You talked earlier about that idea that we often hear, the harder I work, the luckier I am. Another core quote that you come back to comes from Louis Pasteur, around fortune favoring the prepared mind. I think that story, in many ways, captured 10 years in the making. I wonder if you could talk a little bit more about what was so captivating about that quote.

Tina: Whenever I tell people I’m writing a book about luck, they go, “Oh, yes, fortune favors the prepared mind.” There are these throwaway lines like, “The harder I work, the luckier I get. Oh, yes, I get it.” I’m like, okay, what is a prepared mind? [laughs] If fortune favors a prepared mind, what the hell? How do I do that? The first part of the book is essentially unpacking that. What does it mean? I talk about really understanding your core values, understanding your risk profile, understanding the story you tell about yourself, and understanding what your aspirations are and, of course, putting in the effort to increase your knowledge base.

These things all set the stage. They build your ship because you know what? If you don’t have core values, for example, that’s like the ballast under the ship that keeps you from falling over. We see people in the news all the time. I don’t even have to make you a list of people who have not had strong core values and have ended up on a slippery slope of bad decisions and end up in prison. It is an easy thing to happen. I tell a story about how, when I had just first graduated, I was asked to do something that was unethical; it wasn’t illegal, but it certainly was unethical. I didn’t question it. I ended up getting caught.

It was such a wake-up call that, “Oh my gosh, I didn’t even think about this. I had been asked to do something by someone with authority who made it sound like this is just a normal thing to do.” You know what? I learned my lesson and have since then really been doing whatever I can to strengthen my core values and to think about that every single time I have to make a hard decision. Then, also to teach our students to do this themselves.

Lisa: It’s so critical, especially in a world that’s moving so fast. It can be hard, first of all, to find the time to do that deep reflective work, to check in with yourself about what are the principles and values that you want to honor in the choices that you make with your time, with the kind of job you’re going to do, and also how that shows up in the kind of relationships that you build. Again, Tina, I just really want to compliment you for being so vulnerable and authentic throughout that book.

I just have to read something from the book because this really captured my attention. You say, “Capturing luck is a skill that can be mastered. The key is understanding the physics of luck and how to apply it to reach your goals. There is no magic. We live in a world of cause and effect. What you do determines what happens next. However, like gravity, luck is invisible, and you need to trust that it is there. Mastering the underlying mechanics of how the world works enables you to harness the abundant opportunities that surround you.

Tina: Wow, who wrote that? That sounds pretty good. [laughs]

Lisa: Isn’t that incredible? That’s incredible. I also think it’s important that the tagline of this book is about turning your aspirations into achievements. It’s about having a fulfilling life. It’s not even just about building the resume. It’s who you are as a human. It felt like this book about luck was almost like an amplifier of the other books that you have written about creativity and about innovation. This was both very personal, about how you show up, not just on behalf of bringing a new product to market or scale. Also, if you do this, when you then read your other books, as everybody should, you’re going to be that much more successful in how you think about those other processes and practices.

Tina: It’s interesting that you reference my other books. The last three books are about creative problem-solving and about entrepreneurship, right? What I Wish I Knew When I Was 20, Creativity Rules, and Ingenious. You could ask, “Well, what is the relationship with luck, creativity, and entrepreneurship?” They are all closely related because one of the core underlying tools for being luckier is to be a great problem-solver, right? The world is presenting us with challenges all the time. If you can be a creative problem-solver, you’re going to be able to find a way out of those and come up with a solution that might end up becoming even better than what you even imagined.

They’re definitely related. Also, the other interesting thing is that whenever I talk to people about creativity, the first thing they always ask is, “Oh, come on, can you really teach creativity?” I just laugh because it’s like, no one says, “Can you teach science?” Nobody says, “Can you teach history? Can you teach math? Can you teach sports? Can you teach art?” We teach these things. Why should you not be able to teach creativity? There is a set of tools, a set of attitudes that can be fostered, can be mastered, and the same is true with luck, is that you can learn the tools to become luckier. It’s very sad that we don’t teach people these tools.

In fact, it’s really quite funny because I was thinking this morning, there are even more chapters I could have added to this book because every day I think of other tools that we have that like, “Oh, I should have put in a chapter about negotiation. Oh, I should have put in a chapter about some other tool that we have, because the way we engage with the world in everything we do can unlock luck if we have the right approach.

Lisa: That’s why I love that this book is about your mindset, as it is about these practical takeaways. After every chapter, you have questions, reflective questions, and prompts for people to consider. I want to build on this notion of agency and harnessing luck to help you become more successful. We talked a little bit about it earlier, but this idea of gratitude and appreciation as something that you can do as a daily practice that can actually increase your chances of being lucky.

Tina: It’s really interesting because those are another two terms that get conflated, gratitude and appreciation. Gratitude is how you feel. I feel grateful. You could keep a gratitude journal and every day write down all the nice things people did for you. If you don’t actually show appreciation by doing something to thank that person or those people, then you have missed the mark. You need to close that loop because, as we talked about before, anytime someone does something for you, they’re not doing it for someone else. I think we underestimate the importance for the other person of being appreciated.

Let me tell you a story, which I think that you probably read, about how I was in college, and I had a professor who was extremely impactful in my life. He was this absent-minded professor. It was in neuroscience. It was my first neuroscience class. He would give us these big questions like, “How would you figure out what this part of the brain did?” Of course, this was the first time I felt like I was at the frontier of science. I wrote and wrote and wrote and wrote. I got my paper back, and at the top it said, Tina, you think like a scientist.

At that moment, I became a scientist. It felt it was literally as if every cell in my body changed as he told me, which also goes back to the question about what’s the story we tell about who we are. He helped me change the story about what I could accomplish by telling me I felt like a scientist.

Twenty years later, when I started teaching, this was rattling around in my brain, this impact he had, and what’s the impact I could be having on my students?

I sent him a thank you note thanking him for having such a big impact on me, and that now I am teaching and I’m using a lot of the same skills that he used, and that he was an inspiration. I didn’t even know if he got the letter because I didn’t hear back. I didn’t know if he was even still alive. Twenty years later, so last year, 20 years later, so 20 years after I started teaching, 40 years after I had been a student and got his note, I received a letter from his granddaughter. She said, “ My grandfather just died at 95, and at his funeral, her father read an excerpt from my letter.”

To realize that the thank you note I had written 20 years earlier in response to his encouragement 20 years before that is truly remarkable. I think we have to understand that our showing of appreciation is extraordinarily meaningful and an opportunity that should never be missed.

Lisa: I love that story so much. The generational impact of showing appreciation. Oh my gosh, that must have been so meaningful to hear that story. You wrote it just to show your gratitude. You weren’t even expecting anything bad.

Tina: Yes, of course. I didn’t expect anything, exactly.

Lisa: Incredible. We just finished teaching the winter quarter of You From the Future. This year, the main assignment besides the final reflection paper was to have our students write two handwritten thank-you notes-

Tina: Wonderful.

Lisa: -to the speakers that came in. I wanted them to be handwritten because I didn’t want it to be outsourced to Gen AI, bot. The other, there is something about taking time to really write down something meaningful. We haven’t sent them out yet. I think our speakers are not expecting them, and they are going to be so surprised. These are many speakers that are top of their field. They do this all day long. I don’t know how many handwritten thank-you notes that they get.

I imagine our students will look back on this as being one of the most meaningful assignments and to realize the power of just taking time to, as you say, both be grateful and show appreciation.

Tina: I save all the thank you notes I get. In fact, if you were here in my office, you would see there’s a whole bunch of them all here on my desk. It’s really meaningful when somebody takes the time to actually write down, “Wow, thank you so much. That class, that lecture, whatever it was meaningful,” because there was a huge amount of time and effort that goes into preparing this. I think about you, the amount of time and effort you put into this podcast or to your teaching or to anything you do. It is so rewarding for somebody to say, “You know what? I see you. I see the effort you put in, and you stuck the landing. Thank you.”

Lisa: Thank you. I agree. It’s one of the reasons why I love spending time with you, Tina, because I see you do it so generously. You actually make that point in the book that luck is not to be hoarded. Luck is to be given away. Luck is to be circulated and shared. That in and of itself can help others feel lucky and can make the opportunities grow for everybody, lifting all boats. Back to the wonderful metaphor that really frames this whole book.

Tina: Thank you. It’s interesting because there are other chapters about other aspects of interpersonal dynamics, like resolving conflicts, right? It’s not just about saying thank you. Yes, it’s easy to say nice things to people who’ve done things for you that you really appreciate, but how do you get rid of the baggage of difficult relationships? When we have a difficult relationship, when we have a conflict, it takes up a tremendous amount of your brain space, your mind space, your energy. It is such a huge weight that you’re carrying around. It’s such a relief and a lightening when you can resolve those conflicts. The sooner you resolve a conflict, the easier it is. I give a bunch of tools for how to think about doing that.

Lisa: Well, I think we so often think about managing our time. You hear that a lot. “Oh--” it’s really about managing energy, right? I think, to your point, when we have those things hanging over us, when we are, going back to an earlier point, operating outside of our values, it causes stress, and that stress takes a toll.

When you talk about, and I love that you open up the book with values, it does remind me of a quote I often think of from Bob Johanson, I’ve mentioned in a couple of podcasts, the future will reward clarity, but will punish certainty. If you have that clarity of your values, as you said, it acts like a foundation of your boat because we can’t necessarily predict what is going to happen, but we know who we are, that we get up every day. We go to bed every day, hopefully, and in between, some stuff’s going to happen. When we know who we are, that gives us power to make choices that we may not even have realized that we had.

Tina: I quote Viktor Frankl, the famous psychotherapist and Holocaust survivor, who said, “Between stimulus and response, there’s a space. That’s where your agency, that’s where your power comes, is in that space when you get to choose what you do.” I think owning that power, that’s where your agency comes in, and understanding that that space exists, and that’s where you make your future.

Lisa: It’s so powerful, not only for people that want to bring new ideas forward, but I say, do you want to be someone who is never without options? That’s a pretty powerful place to be, to always know that you, regardless of the tricky situation you’re in, have the tools to come up with an option to move beyond it. I think that’s what this book does, Tina, for so many people. There’s a lot more questions I have. I won’t get to all of them, but I have to ask, of course, about luck in the long game as someone that is trying to teach long-term thinking and how to think beyond the immediacy and the reactive moment.

Tina: This is, I think, one of the most important things that I teach is that the choices you make today determine the choices you’re going to have in the future. To understand that so clearly, and that we are constantly laying the foundation for the options we’re going to have. Some of the stories that I told earlier are perfect examples.

Just yesterday, I got a call from my cousin who’s a doctor on the East Coast. He said, “You know what? I just met with a former student of yours. Tell me about them.” I realized whatever I said was going to influence what happened next, and that person would have no idea. We are constantly planting the seeds for the future. If we’re not thoughtful about it, we really, really can hurt ourselves in the long run because luck is a long game.

Lisa: Such a great story and such a great reminder that how we show up every day matters. Just this morning, went for what I call my regular slow runs. My runs are getting slower. I’ve started to realize that I’m measuring my runs by how many people I can smile at when I pass them and wave to. Those moments where it’s like, what an opportunity to be around my neighborhood and share some joy. I’m just going to smile. It’s just for me. It’s just fun. It’s like, oh, what can you create in the moment?

Tina, when you and I used to teach together, I just remember how much care and thought you put into greeting the students and meeting them where they are. You would often bring up the Maya Angelou quote about people don’t necessarily remember what you say, but they remember how you make them feel. You don’t even necessarily have to be in a position of status to do that. You can do that-

Tina: Of course not.

Lisa: -wherever you are, and that has power in and of itself. It feels good. It comes back to you in ways that you may not realize. Even if you just go to bed that night knowing, “You know what? I did my best today. I tried to be a good human. I tried to care about someone.” I think people really underestimate what kind of generative and creative power that can offer because we don’t necessarily think about that as an approach to going through the world in that way. I just love how you call it out. Again, you don’t even necessarily need to be a certain title, a certain position to make a difference in someone’s life.

Tina: You know what’s so interesting, though? I noticed in the last few years, students walking around campus with their earbuds on and their headphones on, and they don’t look at you. They don’t wave. They don’t say hello. I make a point of saying hello to everyone I pass, but I realize that having these devices on that essentially separate us from everyone else is an anti-luck. It’s an anti-luck machine that so many of the most important relationships I have in my life, and I kid you not, are people I met sitting next to on an airplane.

There’s someone who, instead of putting on my headphones and going to sleep, you’d say hello, and you have a conversation. There’s this wonderful mixing that happens on airplanes or standing in line for coffee. A couple of weeks ago, I was in New York, and I was standing in line to get a cup of coffee at a cafe, I’m thinking about this all the time. I’m thinking, “Okay, where’s the luck in this room? Where’s the luck in this room? There’s something here.” This lovely young woman was standing next to me, and I turned to her and I said, “Oh, that’s such a pretty dress.” It was a pretty dress. I said, “Oh, that’s such a pretty dress.” She said, “Oh, it’s Rent the Runway.” I said, “Oh, that’s so interesting. So many of my former students use Rent the Runway. What do you think of it?” We had a conversation. She said, “Oh, students. Where do you teach?” I said, “Oh, I teach at Stanford.” She said, “Oh, I’m a graduate of the business school.”

We ended up having a really great conversation. By the end of the conversation, we were linked on LinkedIn. Who knows where that relationship will go, but it came from just saying hello to the person standing next to me. These opportunities are all day long. You don’t have to be an extrovert. There are lots of different ways to engage with the world where you invite new inputs, and you follow up in ways that you take them to their logical conclusion.

Lisa: You just don’t know. I’m smiling, too, having concluded The View from the Future, where again, a speaker series. A couple of students said to me, they said, Lisa, we love the guests that you bring in, but we’re also interested in how you met them, because one of them was someone that I met on a plane 10 years ago.

Tina: Really?

Lisa: Yes. Yes. It turns out we were just exchanging information. He was a very senior person at ESPN, and we stayed in touch over a decade. Sure enough, he came in. He talked about the future of sports. You just don’t know. It doesn’t have to take much. I appreciate you saying that you don’t have to be an extrovert to be able to do it. I’ve got one more really important question to ask you that I thought was so essential to the book, and I’m so glad you put it in, which is the idea of sometimes what holds us back from saying hello, or just you have a lot in there about taking risks, about being okay to push yourself. That’s just this idea of imposter syndrome.

You and I are lucky, fortunate, all of the above, to be working at Stanford. There are a lot of students that we know are high-achieving who are walking around with imposter syndrome. You have just a beautiful reframe on that. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about it.

Tina: In thinking about imposter syndrome, aren’t we all imposters all the time?

Lisa: Absolutely.

Tina: Nobody gave me a script for today. Nobody gave me a script for tomorrow. We’re constantly making it up along the way. If you think of it actually as improvement syndrome instead of imposter syndrome, I’m always getting better. I haven’t mastered this yet. Think about it, Lisa. Did you walk the first time you tried? What about a bicycle?

Lisa: For sure not.

[laughter]

Lisa: For sure not.

Tina: I’m watching. I have a brand new grandbaby, and watching this little baby who’s just a few weeks old trying to figure out where her hands are. We are constantly learning when we’re children. Why do we assume that really complicated things that we’ve never done before, why do we assume that we shouldn’t make a mistake or we shouldn’t have to stretch to accomplish them? If we have that mindset that we’re constantly improving as opposed to impostors, it’s a much more realistic view of the world.

Lisa: A much more forgiving view. A much more energizing and human way of thinking about it. I love that reframe, that imposter syndrome to improvement syndrome. What a gift.

Tina: There’s another piece of the puzzle here, if you don’t mind. I asked the students to share what’s their mental model of failure. What happens when you fail? At first, they think, “What are you talking about?” I was like, “No, when you think about failing, what is the bottom made of? Are you going to hit concrete? Is it going to be rubber? Is it a black hole? Is it a trampoline? What is it?” We go around the room, and people are like, “ It’s burning lava. It’s broken glass. It’s a dark black hole I’ll never get out of.”

You’re like, “Wow, if you have a mental model that failure means that you’re going to be in burning lava, well, of course you’re not going to take any risks.” If you can tell a different story about it being a trampoline or rubber, all of a sudden it’s like, “Okay, yes, I might hit bottom, but I can bounce.” How do you build that resilience and tell yourself a story about resilience as opposed to one of failure?

Lisa: Spoken like a true neuroscientist [laughs] exploring the plasticity of our brain. Tina, this is just one of your many gifts. I’m so grateful that you talked earlier about the metaphor and the framework for this book because I think that ability to pause and connect it to a metaphor that gives us a chance to deepen our understanding about it or to reframe something as binary that has a multiplicity of possibilities. Again, just another layer of agency. Who do you hope reads this book?

Tina: I am hoping that people read it and want to share it with others. Not any specific person, but that they see in here tools that other people around them could use to increase the opportunities in their life because we often see in other people ways that they could improve that they might not be able to see themselves. If you see someone and go, “Oh, you know what? They would really benefit.” That’s what I’m hoping people will do.

Lisa: Well, I love that it’s coming out in spring, just before graduation for many folks. I think it’s the greatest graduation gift ever. I hope that everyone listening to this will buy multiple copies, particularly for the young people in their life. Going back earlier, when I read this book, Tina, I felt like this needs to be a class. We need a class on luck.

I also thought a few weeks ago I had a great opportunity to speak to some members of the Stanford Women in Business, an incredible group of talented young women. Very ambitious. They want to put their talents to work on behalf of making the world better. My advice to them was to encourage them to be excellent, not perfect. I was like, “Be excellent.” Now, if I had to go back, I would say, “Be lucky. I want you to learn how to be lucky and to do it on your own terms.”

I want to close with just yet another fabulous quote that I took away from the book, Tina. You say, “Luck is a long game that compounds over time. Construct your ship in preparing your mind. Recruit your crew by developing trusting relationships and hoist your sail by doing the hard work of seizing opportunities as they blow by. Luck is like the wind. It’s always there. It’s invisible but ever-present, ready to be caught and capable of carrying you far, transforming your aspirations into tangible achievements.”

Tina: Thank you, Lisa. I am so delighted that you found meaning in this book. You are one of my personal heroes, and I look forward to many more conversations.

Lisa: This conversation was such a great way to start our new season of How We Future. Tina’s framing of luck as something we’re capable of benefiting from is such a useful, positive way to move through life. Here’s a first step to increasing your chances for luck. This week, write one thank-you note to someone who’s made a difference in your life. Be specific, and maybe even find out if there’s a way you can return the favor. Showing appreciation doesn’t just make someone else’s day. It plants seeds for your own future in ways you can’t predict.

Tina’s new book, What I Wish I Knew About Luck, drops April 21st. You can pre-order it now in the link in the show notes. If you know a recent graduate or someone navigating a big transition, this is a perfect gift. If you’ve enjoyed this episode, leave a comment and tell us what idea, question, or reframe stayed with you. For deeper dives, reflections, and behind-the-scenes context from each episode, check out the How We Future sub-stack. That’s where we extend the conversation and share more ways to practice futures thinking in everyday life. Thanks for being a part of How We Future. I’m so glad you’re here for Season 3.

Build the Bridge to Connect Your Community’s Gaps

Lisa is closing out season 2 with Olatunde Sobomehin (Tunde), co-founder and CEO of StreetCode Academy and co-author of Creative Hustle. Tunde believes that underrepresented communities should be participating in the upside of technology instead of being excluded from it. StreetCode’s mission is to hack, hustle, and design the future to bridge that gap, starting in East Palo Alto and expanding outward.

Tunde started out experimenting how to uplift those underrepresented communities. He designed business computer camps in Portland, basketball programs mixed with tech education, and community organizing around music and technology. In 2014, StreetCode Academy took form.

StreetCode Academy has evolved over the years from a program that includes younger students, parents, and other disciplines like entrepreneurship and design. The tagline “Hack, Hustle, Design the Future” captures the mindset, skills, and access are the three outcomes they’re building toward.

In this conversation, you’ll learn:

• Why tech education works better when whole families learn together

• What college basketball and tech education have in common

• How to map your gifts to your goals through principles, people, and practice.

Tunde is taking both StreetCode and Creative Hustle on the road to places like Hong Kong, Finland, Botswana, and cities across the U.S. If you’re inspired, visit streetcode.org or creativehustle.org. Or reach out! As Tunde says, building community is how the work gets done.

Links from the episode:

• Creative Hustle

• Get the Creative Hustle Book

• StreetCode Academy

• Hack Hustle Design The Future, article by Lisa Kay Solomon

• StreetCode Tech Journey @ Stanford Men’s Basketball

People Mentioned:

• Reverend Jesse Jackson

• Coach Eric Reveno - General manager and associate head coach of Stanford men’s basketball

• Coach Kyle Smith - Stanford basketball coach known for using statistics and data

• Ebuka Okorie - Stanford freshman basketball player mentioned as generational talent

• sam seidel - Co-author of Creative Hustle

• Hope Meng - Designed custom lettering for Creative Hustle

• Jori Tytus - Designed custom art for Creative Hustle

• Khristopher “Squint” Sandifer - Featured in Chapter 1 of Creative Hustle, film director

• Bryant Terry - Award-Winning Chef featured in Creative Hustle

• Sarahi Espinoza Salamanca - Community organizer featured in Creative Hustle, Forbes 30 Under 30

• Jennifer Brandel - Previous How We Future guest, civic entrepreneur

• Hakeem Olajuwon - NBA legend

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today.

Welcome to the Season 2 finale of How We Future. To end our second season, I’m sitting down with someone who embodies everything this podcast is about. Olatunde Sobomehin is the co-founder and CEO of StreetCode Academy, whose mission is to hack, hustle, and design the future, starting with communities in East Palo Alto and beyond. Tunde’s projects span from Stanford basketball collabs to community hackathons, always working towards bridging gaps and uplifting voices. In this episode, Tunde and I talk about how the tech industry is much more than just coding, how to channel your gifts to meet your goals, and why knowing the right people matters just as much as having the right skills. I’m so excited to finish the season with Olatunde Sobomehin.

Olatunde Sobomehin: Thank you, Lisa. Every moment with you is special, and the way you have framed the work that I do has even influenced how I see the work. I’m excited to have another great conversation with you.

Lisa: I love that. I want to start a little bit with the work you’re doing right now as co-founder and CEO of StreetCode Academy. I think one of my favorite things about StreetCode is the tagline, “Hack, Hustle, Design the Future,” shirt you’re wearing right now. Tell us a little bit about StreetCode and how you came to bring it to life.

Olatunde: Well, there are so many stories. I think the origin stories are interesting. We get to choose them. I think there’s a lot that are true about origin stories. I want to ground it and root it in a very timely experience that I had because Jesse Jackson passed away last week, Reverend Jesse Jackson, a civil rights leader. I always and often give the origin story of StreetCode Academy from my perspective. I start with him because it was in 1998 when I came to Stanford from Portland, Oregon.

In ‘98, you had this tech boom where people were actually leaving school to go start businesses. For someone who came up, “College was the destination. How dare you leave school? What’s more important than that?” That began to open my eyes for what’s really going on. That had my eyes open and ready to receive an answer to that. It was Jesse Jackson’s quote on the front page of a USA Today article that talked about this idea of the digital divide and it being a civil rights issue.

That was so powerful to me because it answered the two questions I was wrestling with. There was generations long, I would call it, but certainly a lifelong question for me about what’s the civil rights issue of our day. I wanted to be Dr. King. I wanted to go to Morehouse. I wanted to follow in the footsteps. Here was Reverend Jesse Jackson, someone who had been passed the baton from Dr. King and was in this civil rights era, that was answering that question.

It gave me an answer to, “Yo, what’s going on with all this tech stuff?” I’m not a tech person. I don’t have entrepreneurship by definition in my DNA, per se. He answered that. A digital divide was a civil rights issue of our era. Black people needed to participate in the upside of all this technology, really, for the economic empowerment it provides. That began to seed. Now, StreetCode Academy obviously wasn’t started in 1998. We’re a decade-old organization and been doing programming for 12 years, but it did plant the seed.

I did a number of things that I’ll just bullet-point out that led to StreetCode. One was a program called the Applied Business Computer Camp, where I went back to Portland the first summer after learning that, and created this business computer camp that would allow people to build websites. I did an alternative spring break trip my sophomore year that was called “From the Revolving Prison Door to the Evolving Digital Door,” which explored how technology and technology education could be a solution for the recidivism that was so notorious in the African-American community, and then I did a lot of other things.

I ran basketball camps, but I brought technology involved in that. We called it “Hoops in High-Tech.” I’d always been trying to explore how do we bring this technology into our community in a way that makes sense. There was actually a negative engagement that I had with the d.school that propelled it even further. I was at the d.school, and they were talking about creative confidence and a need for creative confidence in the ecosystem.

I’d been doing some work with an organization called the Mural Music & Arts Project, where young people were doing really cutting-edge community work using technology, using music production. I was like, “If you need, you as the industry, you as the d.school, you as whoever, need creative confidence, I have a lot where I’m at, and we’re right down the street.” Somehow, the industry is not seeing this community as a source for the gap that’s in this economy.

I said, “Forget it. We got to do something strictly that nails it on the head. We’re not doing basketball Hoops in High-Tech. We’re not doing arts. We’re going to call it coding. We’re going to call it innovation.” That led to the creation of StreetCode Academy, where we co-founded it amongst many people to create something where we offer free tech education to communities of color and try to be the solution for this diversity gap that has existed for so long.

Lisa: Thank you for sharing that origin story. I didn’t know that about Reverend Jesse Jackson and the kind of impact he had on you. I think that there’s something so beautiful in that long-term passion that’s stirred in you and that framing, and how, when you have a framing like that, that’s really pulling you forward. You don’t necessarily know how you’re going to get there, but it’s something like a North Star.

You can keep coming back to it again and again. “Wait, oh, this didn’t work. Oh, this didn’t work. Oh, this didn’t work.” That belief that I feel so strongly in you, and I have had the pleasure of watching you in front of students, in front of your community, in front of various alumni communities, the basketball team, that clarity of the pull, and that invitation to join you in it is so strong.

I think we can lose it in this moment where we’re feeling so overwhelmed by everything that’s happening to us. I just love hearing that that’s been with you for so long in these different manifestations. At every step, you’re asking yourself, “What is, what could be? What is, what could be?” Even taking setbacks and saying, “Oh, okay, this just means we have to try this other way.”

I’ve just seen what you’ve done in your whole career, but particularly in the last 10-plus years of watching StreetCode Academy grow, evolve, change, it’s incredible. What I have experienced at every point was this idea. It’s not just classes. It’s community-building. It’s capacity-building. It’s unleashing the potential of everybody in the community in a variety of ways, as you said, meeting people where they are.

Olatunde: It’s a powerful reflection. I’m just bouncing off the idea that I got from you just now, this idea that there’s something so big, so compelling, that it can carry us through these rough moments. When I think about How We Future, how we hold on to a belief for what could be is by having something that you’re so convicted by, that you’re so connected to. It has to be big.

Oftentimes, it’s connected to the past because I often am pulling on these stories about the civil rights movement leaders, of whom I’m pulling on stories of ancestors and even stories of my own family, and knowing that I’m just playing my part in something that’s much bigger. It gives me strength to pull through moments where it feels like you’re off course. It did and does come from a lifelong really passion for doing good in community, building community, and doing whatever the community needs at that time to be better.

Lisa: So true. Interesting. I just got actually off a call about the national civic engagement initiative we helped start to infuse civic behavior, civic engagement into student athletics. I felt, particularly when I was really trying to give it lift, this idea that we can help athletes be civic influencers on their campus. We could see them beyond performing in their sport. I was working until midnight, getting up early. This was a passion project. I believed in it so strongly.

I felt like it was my personal resilience strategy to everything going on. Again, that notion, when you have clarity, yes, you’re working so hard, but there’s something that’s really life-affirming and energizing about it, that it’s not about time. It’s about energy. It’s about pull. It’s about passion. When you’re doing it with others, there’s something that is so communally resilient about that as you’re moving forward. I really get that from everything that you’re doing.

Olatunde: Thank you.

Lisa: I want to just make this even more concrete for folks that are new to StreetCode Academy. Maybe you could share just a little bit about the kinds of classes and who takes your classes and where they show up in the community.

Olatunde: Just one deeper dive into the origin story. We started off wanting to be a bridge between this community, East Palo Alto, which also Jesse Jackson called the Selma of this big civil rights issue. Selma, for those that know our history, was really pivotal in ensuring that there were Voting Rights Act in America for all the people who could vote and were left out of voting based on the color of their skin or prejudice of who people assume they are.

Selma was a small community that showed that disparity. Then because they overcame it there, it became an inspiration for the rest of the country. Well, Jesse Jackson thought the same thing about East Palo Alto. Hey, we’re a small community that really show the gap, right? We’re a community of color, self-governed, powerful, diverse, justice-oriented, and left out of the technology economy, and left out of the tech education, and left out of the tech investment.

How do we bridge that? That was the original goal. When we started StreetCode Academy, that was the goal. Let’s create tons of jobs. “Let’s Motown the industry,” was the slogan we had at the time. Motown referencing the way Black folks did it in Detroit to bust into the music industry, and then change the entire landscape of music industry. We wanted to do that same thing in tech. We started with a boot camp. It was for 16 to 21-year-old folks who were trying to get jobs into the economy.

That’s how we started. We noticed a couple of things. First thing we noticed was that we needed to start a lot younger. Right now, our core audience is middle-schoolers. We also noticed that their whole family needed to be involved, that the way to first change what we now call “mindset” is to allow whole families to understand where people fit in. We understand where we fit in with bits and parts of culture. We understand where we fit in, perhaps in certain sports. Where do we fit in this technology ecosystem?

If I don’t have an uncle where, now I may have an uncle that played in the NBA, or I have a friend who played college basketball. Well, if I don’t have an uncle who started Meta, or I don’t have an auntie who works at Google or is a software engineer, where do I learn that? We learned we had to start early. We had to also open up to the whole family. We had to squash the notion that this tech ecosystem is all about coding. We had to open it up. That’s where “Hack, Hustle, Design” came from.

It included entrepreneurship and included design much more than just coding. That was our first couple of years, opening up, really broadening. That meant that we had to give different experiences. Sometimes there’s one-hour experiences. Sometimes there’s 60-second experiences. I just see something on that alerts me. Then there’s longer, there’s 60-hour experiences where people are really going in. That’s our classes.

We see it as a bridge. On one end are people who are new to tech. On the other end, it’s this whole beautiful innovation economy. On that journey, we have three particular outcomes that we want to see. One is mindset. The other is skills. The last is access. We see the first step in this is expanding your mind to see things that’s possible and things that you didn’t know. We have programs that build mindset. These are things like the programs that we do at the basketball program, right?

We have a partnership with Stanford basketball, where, before you enter into a game, you have a chance to experience how technology is influencing the game of basketball. We have AI folks that are showing how stats are being tracked. We have people who are looking at how tickets are being distributed. We have folks that are helping you build skills. They’re using AI to track the ball and how fast you pound it. Those things may open somebody’s eyes. For me, I really love basketball. I didn’t know there was this whole other field of how technology is influencing it. That’s a mindset shift. Then we have skills.

Now, we have programs that deal with skills. Those are programs in schools that are helping you learn the fundamentals of coding or the ethics of AI or how you use storytelling to advance good policy and technology. Those are all building skills. Then we have access, programs that give you exposure to jobs, exposure to the different fields, and give you real-world experience in that. That entire bridge, if it’s done in community, if it’s done with culturally relevant experiences, that will bring somebody who never knew about tech into the innovation economy.

Lisa: Incredible. I just want to say, when I hear all that, you know what I hear? How We Future.

Olatunde: How We Future.

Lisa: That’s How We Future.

Olatunde: When we think about those of us who are counted out, who say we don’t have a shot, our elders often are in that realm. They often say, “I still have more to give.” Who’s to say your time is up? We like to anchor and like to focus, and we need to have some primary audience. That remains middle-schoolers because we know there’s such a big lifetime. We also can’t count out what happens when a grandmother gets pride in a particular thing. Can you imagine how many middle-schoolers are now then inspired? Can you imagine how many times somebody says, “My grandmother introduced me to that? That’s why I love that. It’s because my grandmother taught me that.”

If a grandmother is now teaching a seven-year-old or encouraging an eight-year-old to, “Hey, you need to pick up that microphone because did you know that there are podcasts that are being made now?” If a grandmother knows that, that seed is being planted in their grandchildren. That’s the things that these programs that we have in our schools need to latch onto. It starts much earlier than just some of the programs that we have. That community-based approach, that integrated approach you talked about, is very fundamental to our success, we believe.

Lisa: Well, what’s so beautiful about it is that you’re really showing that you can always learn, you can always evolve, you can always grow. Now, there’s a different kind of conversation that’s happening between the generations that’s not just transactional, “Tell me what happened today,” but, like, “What did we learn today? What did we build today? What are we bringing forward today?” Gosh, that’s missing so much. Particularly in this world where everything seems faster and tech-based and through an intermediary of a phone or something else, this is like core.

I just think that it’s just so foundational to what we need right now to be of the earth, learning together, connecting together, building together, finding pride together. It’s it. It’s everything. That stays with you. Particularly when we have communities that are so dispersed, this loneliness epidemic, I think, like, “Yes, we can send a lot of money. We can do all these programmatic things, but at the end of the day, why don’t we just give space for people to be together, find joy together, grow together?” I just see you doing that at every step.

Olatunde: Beautifully said.

Lisa: It is magnificent. It’s just magnificent. Let’s talk just a little bit more about this partnership that you referenced with the Stanford men’s basketball team, just because I think it’s emblematic of something from nothing. [laughs] Sometimes we feel like, “Oh, well, that has never been built before, so I don’t know how to do it,” but that’s not you. That’s not your style. You’re like, “You know what? Here’s what I’m noticing, and here’s an opportunity.”

Olatunde: “Here’s an opportunity.”

Lisa: Yes, so just share a little bit about some of the work you’re doing and who you’re doing it with, because I know, again, you’re building a community around it.

Olatunde: There was so much beauty that came from your last reflection around, particularly in this age of what we’re seeing, increased access to technology and technology tools and an increased epidemic of isolation and loneliness. We’re seeing how the two are connected, right? How do we want to make sure that community is still a part of us building in technology and advancing in technology? Because we need that two to go together, and it’s better that way.

I think the other piece that is so fundamental in our effort to try and get communities who are not often involved in technology and the innovation economy into it is relationship. Part of access actually is the network. We need access to network. I just want to surface that before we go in, because it really was this whole partnership with Stanford men’s basketball. It really is symptomatic of relationships.

Me and Coach Reveno, who is now the general manager and the associate head coach of Stanford men’s basketball, is a dear, dear friend of ours. We know that he, too, is somebody who is a futurist, and he also is a doer. This is somebody who, like, “I’m ready to do.” We could talk all day long, but I think Coach Reveno, one of the beautiful things about him is that he’s ready to move. There was an opportunity for us to showcase our program, particularly on the night of Nerdball, where Stanford basketball is known.

Coach Kyle Smith is recognized nationally for the way in which he takes in statistics, he analyzes data, and then has won everywhere he’s been, including at Stanford. We just got our 19th win yesterday due to the fact that how he’s using math and statistics and all that. They were able to use our program to showcase. At that time, it actually was the North Carolina game. We were able to do so many other things.

I think that was the real win. We were able to bring new people into the Stanford community. By bringing StreetCode in, we purchased 100 tickets and brought our community in. That brought new energy into the community, right? Stanford basketball is long. It’s historic. Oftentimes, you want new inputs of community, parts of them, to bring that diverse experience that can happen. We brought 100 kids from our program. That was inspirational, right? We also said, “We want to do our own tribute to players on the team.”

We brought a tribute to Ebuka, who is just setting records. He had a historic game. We did things our way. We had a really fun engagement before the game. It wasn’t just a static “learn about StreetCode.” It was “experience StreetCode.” Our community was able to come. We had Mike Wu, who’s the founder of Hooper, an AI app. We had all this complex, you call it the integrated experience. Stanford basketball was like, “Man, we want more of that. Whatever we just did, let’s do that more,” and so we were able to do it four more times.

Lisa: So much to love about that story. One is, you didn’t focus group your way there. You weren’t like, “Should we just do a survey of the community with that?” No.

Olatunde: We’re from the d.school. You got to learn by doing, and you got to prototype.

Lisa: No, you got to learn, but you’re also like, “I wonder if,” right? It’s worth saying right now that even at a place like Stanford, well-resourced, well-funded, well-known, the landscape of college athletics is incredibly fraught. It is filled with transactional incentives that actually don’t put athletes at the center. We can have a whole separate talk on that. I know just enough to be dangerous to say that there are some trends happening right now that are making it a very uncertain landscape for everybody, for the players, for the coaches.

Here you are going, “You know what, but there’s so much here we can build on.” That has nothing to do with transactions, but it has everything to do with relationships. Here you have a generational talent, this freshman, Okorie, coming in, putting new life back in. You are bringing middle-schoolers and high-schoolers that are celebrating him, that are honoring him. As a freshman who’s 18 years old, that’s a lot to take in for a freshman to have all this attention on you.

You are reminding him of the impact he’s having by how he shows up, by how he steps on the court, by the kind of poise he has, the kind of player he has, giving his all, not having the best game every game, but coming back from resilience. You’re reminding him that it’s not just about this transactional play, but it is about the relationships and the aspiration that he’s fostering in these young people in the community.

That, to me, gives a whole different lens on how to look at the privilege of playing at Stanford, what it’s like to be in this community, and what’s possible. So much of what we’re trying to do with this podcast, as you know, all my work is about amplifying bright spots so that we can build the capacity that we all have to unleash our creative prowess to say, “That doesn’t exist yet. That doesn’t mean it can’t. Why don’t we try? Why don’t we try?”

Again, all that risk aversion, I’m like, “Well, let’s just do a focus group.” No, no, just try, and then learn. The thing that’s so magical that I’ve seen you do that I certainly try to do is that once you feel it, you want more. “Oh, I didn’t know I needed that. Oh, I needed that. Now what? Let’s do it again.” It’s not necessarily a ton more money. It’s just different intentions, which I think of as design.

What choices are you making to help deliver emotional engagement, some kind of functional gain of utility, of connection, of knowledge? Gosh, when I was at that game, I felt less lonely, and that was everything. I felt joy, and that was everything. I felt excitement, and that was everything. Now, I want more. Now, we know. That’s the humanity. Congrats to everything you’ve done.

Olatunde: Thank you. Thanks for that reflection. I think it’s meaningful for the world to hear it. I think it’s meaningful for the various stakeholders to hear it because you’re right. You’re so right. You landed that in terms of where we are with college athletics, and how we can really bring and highlight the pieces that are there, that are about the things we love about the game, right?

The coming together of community, the bridging of these communities, the celebration of players more than just what they do on the court, and celebrating the fact that Ebuka Okorie doesn’t just want to have an impact on the court. He also cares about this. There are so many things that you laid out. This just highlight on it. Leveraged it. We tested it. We did it. I think there’s a lot to learn from it, so I appreciate the highlight.

Lisa: Well, I want to talk a little bit about this notion of this is how you go through life. You had the chance to actually articulate that in this fantastic book that I love looking at-

Olatunde: Thank you.

Lisa: -dog-eared. For those that are just listening to this, I’m holding up Tunde’s incredible book called Creative Hustle that he co-authored with another dear friend of ours, Sam Seidel.

Olatunde: Oh, I love Sam, yes.

Lisa: This book is beautiful. I want to spend a little time talking about it and the growth that this book has had because it’s been out now for a couple of years. My goodness, what a journey you’ve been on with it. Maybe start a little bit, and tell us the origin story behind Creative Hustle.

Olatunde: Well, it is beautiful. I want to just quickly shout out Hope Meng and Jori Tytus, both of whom did the custom lettering and a lot of the custom art. Then, of course, our good friends, Khristopher “Squint” Sandifer, who told me, “I need to give you a bear hug.” He also did so much for the book, including being the chapter one, and we built on his Creative Hustle, but then gave us so much about his art in the book. It is a beautiful book.

The origin story behind that is similar to what happened with Coach Reveno. It started with a relationship. At the time, it was very budding, but Sam invited me in to experiment and to go. He showed a ton of heart, as he often does in everything that he does, when he first met us. The way in which he would express was he said, “This is meaningful. Thank you for giving me a chance to share this.” We’ve been around Stanford.

I’m a graduate of Stanford. 2003, I graduated. I was class of ‘02. That’s 20-plus years that I’ve been around Stanford, including the four that I was there, five that I was there as a student. Stanford has had this relationship with East Palo Alto that’s always been tense because East Palo Alto feels the community. Not to speak for them generally, but often many of us in the community feel like, well, it’s lopsided. There’s papers being written. There’s campuses being built. There’s money being generated.

Often, that is lopsided, right? It comes to Stanford. Oftentimes, it doesn’t come to East Palo Alto, and yet we’re participating in the work. Sam really just floored me with his invitation. He said, “Well, if we were to do a class at Stanford, of which I’m teaching, could half the students be from StreetCode?” I said, “Man, we’ve only been given one slot or two slots at a class.” He offered for half the class to come in and to participate in this notion that we would co-teach.

We co-taught a class called Creative Hustle. We had nearly 100 applications from across the campus, law students, medical students, undergraduate students applying to participate in this pop-out called Creative Hustle, and then we brought half our students. We had 30 in there. We chose 15 of that 100. We brought in 15 from East Palo Alto. We had this experience, this two-day experience. At the end of the experience, you didn’t know who was who.

You didn’t know who was coming from the law school, or who was an undergrad, or who was a student at StreetCode. It just literally was this blend of people who all felt like, “We’re on a journey to create our own path, our own life. We’re struggling to figure it out, and we all could help each other out.” It was just this beautiful community learning experience. A couple of years later, when the d.school was thinking about this source of books, this collection of books that was going to redefine what design is in this modern stage, they asked our class to be a part of that book.

Sam and I spent time really during COVID over Zoom, writing and thinking and uplifting stories that motivated us. Started with Squint, who was a key person for us in terms of defining what it is. It went on to Bryant Terry, who also was part of that first class. It has so many good stories in there. Nine stories that are uplifted around people who are making work in the world that matters in their own way and blazing their own path, as we call it.

Lisa: It is such an extraordinary book. I’ve reread it a number of times. Each time I find a new layer, it embodies everything that you were talking about at StreetCode. It’s about a mindset. You are a creative hustler, and to put a spin on that, and you don’t shy away. For example, from the fact that hustle doesn’t always have a positive connotation, but you’re leaning in. It’s a mindset, some skillsets for how to think about it, and access through these stories that are often overlooked. God bless you for getting Squint to actually tell a story.

Olatunde: Exactly.

Lisa: One of the most talented people behind the camera who refuses to be in front of the camera. Good on you for making sure we all know who he is for his genius. The whole book is really about, as you say here, “intentions intention,” and to, again, as we talked about earlier, find that purpose beyond the noise. I did my own little cheat sheet of one of the core frameworks that you have in this class.

Olatunde: Oh, I love it.

Lisa: Again, for those friends that are listening in the audio and not looking at the video, it’s this incredible, very simple, but very generous and generative framework of how you go from your gifts on the left-hand side to your goals on the right-hand side. In between the bridge here is thinking about principles, people, and practice. I know, Tunde, this is something that you actually do in your practice, that this is something that really helps you with all of the things going on, stay centered on how you want to take your very abundant gifts to goals on the other side.

Olatunde: The viewers will be able to see what a blank one looks like. Now, you can see what a complete one looks like. I look at this all the time, right? This is something that grounds me. Right behind my monitor is what I look at. You’re right. I often do these because they shift. My life shifts, right? What gifts I’m in tune with. The way you’ve centered me as a futurist today, the way you’ve articulated the work.

Those things should end up on my gifts list. It should end up that those are gifts that I’m now in touch with, and then there are goals. There are goals that evolve, and life changes. It happens. My goals evolve. I’m often doing these. I have a 20-20-6-1 that I look at, and ones that are very seasonal for me. Yes, I practice that. Writing it was a chance to bring access to folks that we don’t always understand as futurists, or as creative hustlers, or as designers. These are labels that we don’t always know about ourselves.

One of my favorite stories in the book is Sarahi Espinoza Salamanca, who is a community organizer who is powerful. She was well-known. She was Forbes 30 Under 30 before we wrote the book. It just was fun to surface a lot of her work on the why she built the app that she was recognized for, to recognize some of the work that doesn’t even exist in the app. During COVID, she raised millions of dollars to help people pay their rent, and she’s a community organizer.

To surface that, because it’s easy to highlight perhaps somebody who’s making $1 million or the Jay-Z who’s running multiple companies, but it’s interesting to look at her as someone who we uplifted as a creative hustler because she embodies everything we’re talking about even more than a lot of these entrepreneurs who may have their face on the front of Forbes. She’s somebody who I think deserves all the accolades. That was fun. Sam and me getting to choose who do we think are the creative hustlers that we want to start off with in this book. Squint, Sarahi, and so many others, I’m happy we chose them.

Lisa: It reminds me of something I try to teach in my classes and try to bring forward in conversations like this, that when you learn practices of futures and design, this idea of understanding both where the world is going and why and the world you want to bring to life, and then the choices you make to help make them true, to actually use Creative Hustle, to go from an idea to a thing, to a concrete action.

By telling these stories, you’re helping other people learn about what’s possible. That is, in and of itself, outsized leverage. Earlier in our podcast, we had Jennifer Brandel. She is an incredible community organizer, a civic entrepreneur. Lately, she’s really focused on this idea of community interstitium. The folks that are often unseen and overlooked that are actually doing the connecting, the glue that is building community resilience.

I think these stories are just a great example, again, of the often overlooked, undervalued, underfunded folks that are making our neighborhoods go, that are ensuring that the invisible work is happening. This book really honors them in beautiful ways. The fact that you leaned into gorgeous type and gorgeous photographs and that it’s beautiful to hold and look at. Listen, I don’t think it’s a secret that when Hakeem Olajuwon came to the d.school, and I gave him a copy, he was like, “Hey, I’m in. I’m in. I want a part of it.”

Olatunde: I love that. That was a treat, too. I’m Nigerian myself. To meet him was an idol. I appreciate the way you advanced it.

Lisa: Well, it was so exciting. I love being people’s unpaid PR. Before I let you go, because I know you have lots of pulls on your time, how can more people learn about StreetCode, about the work you’re doing, about Creative Hustle? What’s the best way? I know that you’re growing. You’re not just in East Palo Alto anymore. You’re impacting other communities, and you’re expanding the web. Tell us a little bit about that and how we can help.

Olatunde: Well, thank you. Of course, our website and social handles are all there, @itscreativehustle and creativehustle.org are places to see Creative Hustle. Then @streetcodeacademy, and then also streetcode.org are the places for StreetCode Academy. Then we’re on a tour. We’re going to Hong Kong in two weeks for Creative Hustle. We’ve taken that across the globe. We’re doing the same thing with StreetCode Academy. We presented at several conferences. One in Finland, one in Botswana, several places across the country here.

We’re doing our tech tour, our tech tourney tour, doing the kind of exhibits that we’ve done and piloted at Stanford basketball across the country as well. We think that’s a model that can move. Yes, if people are interested, we want to hear from them. We want to stay in touch. We want you to follow our moves on social and through the website. Then yes, no matter where you are, you have access to our programs. You have access to log in. We have virtual classes. We have in-person classes here in the Bay Area, so we would love to just build a community.

Lisa: Tunde, I can’t think of a better way to end. If I think about where we started this conversation, about you reflecting on how the digital divide was one of your core motivators, and you’re leaning in with relational connection. In some ways, the exact opposite, right? Digital, relational, divide, connection, how you’re living your life, how you’re uplifting communities, how you’re inviting everyone to be a part of it. I’m so grateful. I’m so grateful to know you. I’m so grateful to share your story. Thank you so much for being on How We Future. I just can’t wait for that big old bear hug that Squint told you to give me because it’s got to happen soon.

Olatunde: Yes. Lisa, I can’t thank you enough. We talked about Creative Hustle being a place to surface these stories. I will never forget that moment on the d.school site that was followed up by a beautiful article you wrote about StreetCode Academy and myself. You have positioned our story so many times beautifully in the way that you’ve talked about it today. I just want to thank you for the way in which you’re uplifting, and you’re shining a light on the work that’s out there that can inspire others. I’m so blessed to be a part of your circle. That is just a gift of mine. Thank you, Lisa. I’m all in on the How We Future.

Lisa: I am so inspired by Tunde’s energy, enthusiasm, and warmth. Here’s something he’s inspired me to try this week, and I invite you to do the same. Reach out to someone in your community who’s doing work you admire. Thank them. Tell them that you see the work they’re doing and ask them about their story. Simple moments like that bring our community together.

You can learn more about StreetCode Academy at streetcode.org, and find Creative Hustle wherever you get your books. If you’re inspired by what Tunde and his team are building, reach out. They welcome collaboration from wherever you are. Thank you for joining me for Season 2 of How We Future. What a journey it’s been. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and we’ll see you soon for Season 3.

Are sci-fi stories the key to a better future?

This week’s episode of How We Future features Ruth Wylie and Ed Finn, co-directors of the Center for Science and the Imagination at Arizona State University. For nearly 15 years, they’ve been running what might be the most unusual university center in the country, one that brings together science fiction writers, scientists, artists, and engineers to imagine hopeful, yet practical, futures.

Ruth and Ed describe how they turn imagination into practice: Kids building Scribble Bots and debating who deserves credit when a robot makes art. Commissioning writers worldwide to explore what human flourishing looks like in a warming world. Pairing speculative fiction with expert essays and original artwork, creating story packages that explore what might actually be possible down the line.

Stories work when data doesn’t. A science museum table advertising “ethics discussions” sits empty, but one about Frankenstein draws crowds. People engage through narrative, play, and art in ways they never would through charts or lectures.

In this conversation, you’ll learn:

• How collaborative worldbuilding helps experts ask each other new questions

• What happens when you pair exciting stories with science-backed facts

• Why reflecting on the futures you consume in media matters more than you think

CSI’s website hosts free teaching resources, the Imagination Sketchbook video series, and the full Future Tense archive. Ruth and Ed both emphasize they welcome cold emails and collaboration ideas. That’s how some of their best work starts!

Links from the Episode:

• Center for Science and Imagination

• Smithsonian Futures Exhibit

Book and Articles:

• Frankenstein at 200, Ed Finn, New York Times

• Step Into the Free and Infinite Laboratory of the Mind, Ed Finn, Issues in Science and Technology

• Collaborative Imagination: A Methodical Approach, Ruth Wylie and Ed Finn, Science Direct

• Climate Imagination: Dispatches from Hopeful Futures, edited by Joey Escrich and Ed Finn

• A Rewilded Mind, Corey Pressman, CSI Imagination Fellow

• When Robot and Crow Saved East St. Louis by Anna Lee Newitz

Exercises and Resources:

• Frankenstein Kit, Resources created by CSI

• Futures by Choice, Futures by Chance, CSI

• CSI Resources for Teachers

• Solar Tomorrow Resources, CSI (Great for Educators!)

• Postcards from the Future, Futures Exercise from CSI

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow, starting today.

This week, I’m joined by two amazing guests, Ed Finn and Ruth Wylie. Ed and Ruth run the Center for Science and Imagination at Arizona State University. It’s an incredible place that brings together scientists, writers, artists, and storytellers to imagine hopeful futures we actually want to live in.

In our conversation, we explore how stories shape what we believe is possible, why a robot learning to speak crow can change how we think about technology, and how simple games and exercises can help kids wrestle with deep questions about responsibility and ethics. Ed and Ruth share so many resources for teachers, parents, and anyone hungry for permission to think more hopefully about what’s ahead. Let’s jump in with Ed Finn and Ruth Wylie.

Ed and Ruth, thank you so much for being here.

Ed Finn: Thanks for having us.

Ruth Wylie: Yes, thank you. So excited for the conversation today.

Lisa: I am so excited. You really are the embodiment of How We Future that is everything that you all do in your work. I think probably one of the most important things we do, from the top, is to explain to our listeners: what is the Center for Science and Imagination? Because usually, I will say, when I tell people about your work, the first thing they say to me is, “Wait, can I work there?” “What is that?” Ed, maybe you could give everyone a better understanding of what you do and even how you came to be, because it is one of my favorite stories.

Ed: Absolutely. I often wake up thinking, “Do I still get to do this job?” So, I feel that, too. Every week, every month, every year that the Center continues to exist, I think, “This is amazing. I can’t believe it’s still going.” Because we’ve been at this for almost 15 years now. The Center started in 2012, and it does have this origin story. Way back when I first started at ASU, I had this fellowship, this one-year fellowship called University Innovation Fellow. It was really hard to tell what that meant. There were a lot of buzzwords, but I was very excited.

Maybe in my third week on the job, my boss came by and said, “Hey, Neal Stephenson, the science fiction writer, just had this really interesting conversation with the president of Arizona State University, Michael Crow, and I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of Neal Stephenson.” I was like, “Yes, I’m a huge fan. I’ve been reading his book since I was a kid.” We wanted to see if we should do something about this conversation here at ASU. The conversation was, Neal had written this essay called Innovation Starvation, about how when he grew up in the ‘60s and the ‘70s, we were doing all this big stuff.

Our relationship with the future was really positive. We were going to the moon, they were the Apollo program, we were going to go to Mars next. We were building big infrastructure. We were planning for the long term. There was the Peace Corps. The future was bright. Young people were going to work on these generational, long-term projects. Everything was really exciting. When Stephenson wrote this essay in 2011, we weren’t even flying to space anymore. We were paying the Russians to fly our astronauts to space.

All of the infrastructure was crumbling, and all of the smart young people weren’t going to work on these long-term things anymore. They were working on better ads for Silicon Valley, micro-targeting, or better mortgage-backed derivatives on Wall Street. This really short-term thinking. Stephenson’s argument was, “What happened? Why aren’t we thinking big anymore?” Crow’s response was, “Well, you could blame the entrepreneurs and the scientists and the engineers, but maybe this is your fault, Neal, because I’ve read your books.” Michael Crow’s also a huge Stephenson fan.

“They’re pretty dystopian. The future they present is not really hopeful. Maybe if we want to be working towards this better future, we need to start with better stories about that future. We need to tell stories that could inspire people to build that future and make it real.” That was what landed on my desk. I thought this was so out there and weird that it was just sort of a test. They wanted to see if I could write a memo. I was like, “Okay, yes, let’s do this.” I found this quote from Albert Einstein, “Imagination is more important than knowledge.”

I thought, what if we created a place where we can bring together the writers and the artists and the storytellers with the scientists, the engineers, the researchers, to come up with technically grounded, hopeful stories about futures we might actually want to live in? Then it became a thing. I think part of why it still is here is that so many people are hungry for that permission to think more hopefully about the future. That’s been throughout our whole time of existence, the singular thing that everybody reacts to say, “Oh, I’m allowed to be hopeful. I’m allowed to think a different kind of dream about the future. I’m allowed to have a relationship of joy with the future.”

We can’t tell anybody to do that. We can model it and perform it, but that invitation has been hugely and enthusiastically received by people. That’s, I think, why we still get to do this crazy thing.

Lisa: I love that story. There’s so much to unpack there, including one of the core principles of certainly my work in this podcast, which is that you can’t build a future you haven’t first imagined. I love that the Center for Science and Imagination started with a dialogue. Started almost with a challenge between Neal Stephenson and Michael Crow saying, “Wait, whose fault is it that we’re not imagining and we’re not building the jet packs and the things that somebody imagined?” Michael Crow is such a titan and a futurist in his own right, who has totally changed the way we can think about higher ed.

The idea that he leaned into that as an opportunity, a way to maybe challenge the status quo and say, “Why doesn’t this exist?” I just think it’s so extraordinary, and how wonderful for you that you took up that invitation and said, “Wait a minute, what if this could exist?” I love that you are going on almost 15 years, because I think the need for more hopeful stories is more important than ever. I feel like the harder our present feels, the more it’s important that we have stories that can pull us towards a future we want to be a part of and give us permission to flex our own imagination and agency in that. There’s so much this ripple effect of goodness in what you’re doing.

Ruth, I want to bring you in because we met in part because of a really exciting project that CSI did a number of years ago that I think, again, really encapsulates this beautiful integration between imagination and science, with the Frankenstein celebration. Was it the 200th celebration of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein? I think that was 2019. We met right after. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about that project as a concrete example of just one of many that’s unfolded from that initial prompt.

Ruth: Yes, thank you. Yes, that was the Frankenstein Bicentennial Project that celebrated the 200th anniversary of Mary Shelley launching Frankenstein. This was in 2018. It really invited people to take another look at the story that many of us are familiar with, that probably has more impact on how we think about science than maybe any other stories, and the themes around innovation and responsibility. The question about what are our responsibilities for the things that we create is still something that we grapple with.

We look at this with AI, we look at this with autonomous vehicles, we look at this in all spaces and ask, as creators, as innovators, as engineers, what are our responsibilities to these things and to the society in which we’re launching them into? We used this bicentennial of this launch to put together a project that brought these questions in many different forms, but particularly to young people, using play, using imagination, using creativity, and really bringing in some pretty deep science ethics questions, but in ways that people might not originally expect.

Lisa: I love that you took that theme and then you really made it accessible with the kind of partnerships that you had, particularly with science museums. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about how you thought about not only building it, but making it more accessible to more people.

Ruth: Yes, of course. The thing is, if we were to just put up a table at a science museum that said, “Come talk to us about science ethics,” we probably wouldn’t get many people to show up. When we’re at a science museum, especially in October of 2018, and people are dressed as Frankenstein, they’re dressed as the creator, and we say, “Come talk to us about Frankenstein,” people come up. They have stories. They remember the book maybe they read in high school, or TV shows, or the cereal that they ate. It’s just such prevalence in our society, that people are excited to engage with it.

So they come up and they’re like, “Tell us about Frankenstein.” Then we have them do little art projects. Our favorite was the Scribble Bot, which is, I’ll try to keep this brief, but it is a little robot, if you will, that you take a pool noodle, and you can decorate it, and you can put markers as legs that are attached with rubber bands. Then you put an electric toothbrush, that you can just get at the dollar store, in the middle of this thing. You turn it on and it starts to shake and draw, and it creates these really interesting images. You can do this from as young as about three years old to-- we’ve had adults that get really into this activity.

They’re playing with this, they’re designing, they’re creating. Then we start to ask them questions. Like, “Okay, is this thing art?” At first they’re like, “Of course.” Some people are like, “I don’t know, and they’re just a bunch of scribbles.” We’re like, “Okay, well, if it is art, who is the artist? Is it you or is it this creature that you made?” Get lots of different opinions here. A lot of times, if people like the art, they start taking responsibility for it. Sometimes people distance themselves. Then we move into, “Okay, well, what if somebody wanted to buy this art? Who should get the money?”

My favorite is doing this with elementary school kids who start to get into these really delicate trust relationships. They’re like, “Well, I would take the money, but I would make sure that my Scribble Bot had all the markers that it needed, that it was well cared for.” It’s like, “Okay, great.” Now I say, “Well, what happens if it accidentally turns on and draws on something expensive, like your homework or your couch?” Now they take a little step back, and they’re like, “Oh, wait, that wasn’t what I intended. I like that question that you asked before about someone buying my art.”

Then you can, with a really short series of questions, questions that are pretty easy to understand, again, these are questions that young people understand what we’re trying to get at, but are actually pretty hard to answer. You can start to engage in these really deep conversations around science, ethics, and responsibility, in a playful, in a non-threatening, in a really engaging manner. We created a set of table talk activities like the Scribble Bot, we distributed them to over 50 science museums and children’s museums around the country.

They created sets of programming. They used it sometimes in their summer programs. Then we measured how it impacted people’s thoughts and feelings around science, ethics, and responsibility.

Lisa: It’s so awesome. I often talk about how design and futures can have outsized impact if it’s oriented in the right way. I think that is just such a great example of it. The other thing, that just sort of model of giving, particularly young people, a chance to practice these thorny, complex, even ethical questions in ways that engage them authentically, and where they can work it out without the consequences. I think so often, and particularly now, we’re expecting people to know how to be an ethical decision maker without any kind of explicit practice.

I love that you made it experiential, and then you created different formats for people to take it into their classrooms or to make it accessible. I will say, speaking of getting the ideas out there, it’s worth noting that it is, in fact, the reason why we all know each other. Because Ed wrote this beautiful op-ed in The New York Times shortly after you put that out in the world. This was, again, 2019. I was like, “Wait a minute, this really sounds like the work that we’ve been doing.” I cold emailed Ed, who happened to be on sabbatical, who pushed it off to you, Ruth, and you decided to accept that cold email.

I often teach my students the power of a cold email. This is just one more example. We’ve been collaborating closely ever since. Thank you not only for doing that project, but for taking the time to write it up. I really think it’s had exponential dividends of positivity.

Ruth: Well, thank you for sending that cold email, because the work that we’ve done together has really shaped the work that we’re doing here at CSI. It’s been just so much fun. I’ve learned so much. We’ve been able to collaborate on such great projects that, again, not only that power of that cold email, but for folks that receive those cold emails, say yes, because sometimes they turn into these amazing things.

Lisa: [laughs] Thank you for that. It’s circulating the imagination. I want to pick up on the theme of how you’ve been writing about your work. I just can’t believe, for such a small team, how prolific you are in your anthologies, in your books, and all of the free resources that we’re going to link to in the show notes. Ed, I want to congratulate you, I think, on your most recent edited anthology on Climate Imagination: Dispatches from Hopeful Futures. You’ve been exploring climate futures, CSI has, for almost as long as you’ve been around. We’ll talk a little bit more about that. I wonder if you could tell us about this latest book.

Ed: Absolutely. Like so many of our projects, they just keep expanding. You start something, you build a network, and then that network keeps creating new connections. When you were talking about how you cold emailed us around Frankenstein, Frankenstein just continues to open all of these doors. All of our climate work is like that, too. This book is the culmination more immediately of a project that started during the pandemic and immediately after the pandemic.

Kim Stanley Robinson, who’s another really well-known science fiction writer, and someone we love and have worked with for a long time, talked during the pandemic about how that crisis, that catastrophe, showed us that we could make major changes happen. If you remember, 2020 is the only year on record where carbon emissions went down, because suddenly we realized we could. We could stop flying as much, we could stop driving and shipping things. Now, I’m not saying that that was a great way to make those changes, but all of these things that everybody said were impossible, suddenly became possible.

Public squares emptied, entire school districts going online over the span of a day. Things that were really difficult and challenging, but also reminded us that the way we organize the world is not the way it has to be. From that starting point, we started to think about how we could engage this kind of shared imagination around climate. Robinson’s point is, this is the major crisis that humanity is facing in the next century, and we need to have a radically different imagination in how we approach it.

Our immediate response to that was to create this Climate Imagination Fellowship and invite people around the world, a small group of science fiction writers, to imagine hopeful climate futures from their own communities and geographical regions on the premise that we’ve tried the other thing. We’ve tried the doom and gloom. We’ve tried the now, what? Maybe 50 years of scientists telling us that things are getting bad and getting worse, and people trying to frame this in the context of individual responsibility, or, “Stop doing this, everything you’re doing is wrong and bad.”

That narrative is never going to get us to the kind of transformational change we need. You’re not going to motivate people through that kind of framing. We need to inspire people to imagine the futures that we actually want. Which isn’t going to mean that we’re waving some magic wand and it’s all going to be sunshine and unicorns and climate change is just going to go away, because that’s not going to happen. What does human flourishing look like? How are we going to adapt? What are the things that will remain true? What values do we want to bring with us into this future? What elements of community history and personal meaning and narrative do we want to bring into these futures?

All of that is bound up in this project, in this book. We commissioned these fellows to write long novel at length short stories for this project. We have a group of many other people writing fiction and nonfiction from all over the world who contributed to the book. We’re really excited that it’s now out in the world. It just came out a couple of months ago with MIT Press. It’s, again, with all of our projects, really an invitation to do more imagining around the future. As hard as we try to engage lots of different people around the world, this is just a small sampling.

We need, I think, every community, every individual, to feel empowered and invited to imagine their own future, and especially in the context of climate change. This really comes back to, the mission of our Center is to inspire collective imagination for hopeful futures. The target is not, “Oh, we’re going to come up with one particular vision of the future, or one prediction.” The target is, how do we build our collective capacity to imagine?

Lisa: It’s hard to do our best creative work when we’re being told we need to eat our beets. That has been the mindset, right? No, no, no. Now I’m just going to give you more horrible data to make you feel worse about what’s happening versus this whole other side of inviting more people to imagine wider. Just yesterday, in my view from the future class, where every week we bring in a guest to help our students understand the futures that are unfolding, to get them also to imagine the kind of roles and careers they want to take, it was focused on sustainability.

Our guest actually runs an industrial design studio totally focused on using materials that are regenerative. She said, “I don’t even want to call it sustainability, because already there’s a mindset that there’s going to be lesser than versus introducing students to what’s possible now to create with mycelia, or how we might be walking around in clothing made from algae that’s capturing carbon in the air, and how compelling those stories are with a purpose to want to work towards it versus feeling like we’re already behind.” I often think that the psychology of futures isn’t talked about enough.

You mentioned Kim Stanley Robinson, whose book, Ministry for the Future, I think probably did more than any climate report, to get more people talking about the real possibility of what happens when the earth heats up. I remember hearing him say like, “I am a fiction writer. If I’m getting asked to be the expert at the climate change conventions around the world, we need to investigate that.” Again, speaks to your angle and why it’s so important.

I want to build on that, Ruth. I know you’ve been a part of a lot of projects that take things like Climate Imagination: Dispatches from Hopeful Futures, and turn it into curricula for teachers to bring more concretely into their classrooms. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about some of that work.

Ruth: Yes, I think it’s a great opportunity to talk about work that a student, Nicole Oster, did. Actually took stories from the book that Ed mentioned and created curricula designed for middle school and high school teachers, so that they could use those stories and the themes that emerge from those stories in their classrooms. This idea, I think it gets at some of the conversation we’re having. That stories can be a great way to engage people on topics that they might otherwise either be too fearful of, or not feel like they have the expertise, but like with the Frankenstein project, stories bring people in. They want to learn more. Stories and art.

A lot of our projects, you mentioned the beautiful cover of the book, a lot of our projects, we also work with great artists, because people see that and they want to learn more. They want to find out what it is and what’s going on. We use stories and art, and recently been building a set of curricular tools so that this can go into classrooms and we can be working with teachers and young people to inspire that imagination, to start building them as futures thinkers, and to really change the relationship with the future away from one where they just are reacting to whatever’s coming, to one where they feel like the things that they do, do matter.

A greater self-efficacy towards the future. All of this is important, and it’s important to start as young as possible, and it’s work I’m really proud of.

Lisa: It’s amazing. Really want to encourage people to check out the Solar Tomorrows curricula. Even just the naming of it is so cool. You guys are so good at naming. Your climate cards. I’ve personally used your Postcards from the Future method as a warm-up, where I just have students create postcards from the future. Ruth, you’ll love. I remember this. A couple years ago, I taught a class called Flights and Futures, around imagining new stories. We kicked off class with that exercise. One of my students made the most beautiful postcard from France in 2040.

“Greetings from heated Paris, where we’re sitting under these gorgeous canopies that our ancestors planted for us so that we could have a little relief from the heat.” I just felt like it doesn’t have to be hard. It could just be that little trigger. Like, “Oh, now I’m going to look differently at who’s doing that kind of investing for the future. What are cities doing? What could I do to get more involved?” Again, I just love your attention. I’ll also say that not only do you create these resources, but you also continue to work on a number of other publications with some of your colleagues like Corey Pressman.

A rewilded imagination is required reading for my class. The idea that our imagination has been domesticated and it is up to us to rewild it. Again, that self-efficacy and agency. So many publications that can really change the status quo in powerful ways that don’t require a lot of money. [chuckles] Just a lot of intention. I want to pick up on that and go back to another series that I love so, so much, called Future Tense. One of the things that we’ve been talking about, but just to name, that you do so beautifully, is to invite diverse perspectives, which is such a core part of futures work.

That it’s not one future from one voice, it’s multiple voices. I think as you’ve gone about growing your collection of science fiction stories, I know you’ve been super, super thoughtful about the kinds of authors and perspectives that you’ve brought in. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about the Future Tense series and just what that experience has been like for you.

Ed: Yes. This is another project that I feel really lucky that we have been able to do and keep doing. Future Tense has been around now for a long time. I don’t know. It’s possible it’s even 10 years. I’d have to go back and check, but it’s been a while. It started as a one-off experiment where we published a short story by Paolo Bacigalupi, the author. It was called Mika Model. We published it in Slate, because ASU had this partnership with Slate and New America, called Future Tense. We’ve now published, I want to say, close to 100 stories through that project.

Slate left that partnership last year, but we are now publishing these stories with Issues in Science and Technology, which is an amazing new venue. That’s the house magazine of the National Academies of Science. So it’s a wonderful place to be sharing these stories. The ethos of the project is still very much the same. We’re publishing not just original speculative fiction that’s set in the near future, and is exploring all sorts of different narratives and possibilities, social change, technological change. We’re also publishing an original piece of nonfiction that goes along with each story, by some kind of expert or really thoughtful, well-informed person, to explore the real-world consequences of that story.

Where are we now? How does this change how we might think about what we’re doing? Most importantly, we also publish original artwork with each story. We have this wonderful archive now of these little packages of futures. They’re great for teaching. They’re great for inviting somebody into a future. Throughout the project, we’ve really thought about Future Tense as a way to use science fiction and the power of great stories about the future to invite people who might not think of themselves as science fiction fans into these possibilities.

That’s one of the things that has been most useful as we’ve gone along, is to realize that the stories are helpful not just to engage the public, but even all the people who might think that they’re experts in particular elements of this. To quote Neal Stephenson, from our Hieroglyph days, a great science fiction story literally puts everybody on the same page. Can save you hundreds of hours of PowerPoints and meetings. In the same way, when we’re doing one of these speculative fiction stories, the data scientist says, “You know, I don’t do ethics.” The engineer says, “I don’t understand what this political argument is about.” The politician says, “I can’t read these charts.”

Everybody can look at this story, and now have a shared vocabulary to have a conversation about the future. All of those experts can talk to one another in a more open way, and anybody else can join that conversation, too. Now you have a description of a room with a couch in it, and you can decide, “Well, where does this couch go?” Future Tense has been a really great way to build this, really, an ongoing conversation about the future, and we’ve gotten to work with all sorts of amazing writers.

People who might think of themselves as speculative fiction authors and others who maybe are a little bit more exploring other genres, people from many different parts of the world and perspectives. It’s such an adventure. It’s one of the best things we get to do, and we have this amazing editorial team to make it happen. So, you should all come and check it out.

Lisa: I love this series so much. I wish every middle school or high school science or English teacher, there’s so many entry points to it, just like you were saying. Just to really put a fine point on the juxtaposition of, write a science fiction story, now look for science fact, and help you understand which about that story are things you need to investigate further. What would be great if that happened? What would be terrible if that happened? Practice the future before you get blindsided by it. You can do that through stories. Just the invitation to be in a discovery mode of wonder, as opposed to an opinion mode of judgment or defending.

It reminds me a little bit when I used to teach Inventing the Future at Stanford. We would have our students do these 50-year utopia and dystopia debates on an emerging technology. The point was not to beat the other down, like traditional debate pedagogy, who won, but to surface these questions. My favorite part was that we would invite an expert in the field, whether it was swarm drones or lab-grown meat, to comment on it, and to comment on the research happening now. My favorite part is that they would often leave with new questions that they were going to take to their colleagues, or to inform the research agenda.

There is this incredible synergy that can happen if you invite all parties. The last thing I’ll say, which I think is so brilliant, is that when you extend beyond a very near future, you can get into a different place of conversation. When scenario work is done well, you can see things that you can’t see when you’re so close in and you’re defending. It’s great. Okay, I have to ask both of you, because I know that you’ve been involved. Do you have a favorite story? I know you love all the stories, but is there one that really captured your imagination?

Ruth: You’re just going to get us in trouble now, Lisa.

Ed: [laughs]

Ruth: If you ask us-

Lisa: We won’t tell. We won’t tell.

Ruth: This is the off-the-record part?

Lisa: This is the off-the-record part.

Ruth: Well, I have one. I said I wasn’t going to share, but I still go back to Annalee Newitz’s story, Robot and Crow Saved East St. Louis.

Lisa: That’s one of my favorites.

Ed: You stole mine. I really like that one, too.

Ruth: That’s why I had to go first, Ed, it’s because I was worried that was going to be your favorite. It’s so playful, it’s so interesting. It’s about this CDC drone that starts working with this intelligent group of crows and this young scientist. I just remember reading it and feeling that hope that we’re trying to inspire, and this idea of technology and nature coming together and solving a problem. It left me feeling better. I think that a lot of the things that we do at CSI, we’re trying to give that hope. We’re trying to give people new perspectives.

One of my favorite parts of bringing together interdisciplinary groups is, like you were saying, Lisa, they ask each other questions that they haven’t been asked before, and they’re able to tackle these challenges in new ways, in non-threatening ways, because stories are fun. Stories are playful. I just really liked that one.

Lisa: It’s so good. It’s so good.

Ed: Okay, before I tell you one of my other favorite stories, because they’re all my favorite story, but I’ll tell you that one, I want to say I knew we were onto something with Future Tense, just to connect to what you were saying a minute ago, Lisa, because the response for the first story by Paolo Bacigalupi was by Ryan Calo, who’s a legal scholar. In this essay, he said, “This story made me think about this whole legal question in a new way that I hadn’t thought about before.” That, to me, was the signal we look for. That someone interacts with our projects and our work, and now they’re thinking about the future and their own work, their own relationship to the future, in a different way.

This story that I will nominate today, even though I love all the stories, is a little bit like When Robot and Crow Saved East St. Louis, because it’s also got a little bit of a cozy vibe, even though sometimes there are dark things that happen in the future. This story is called The Skeleton Crew, by Janelle Shane. It imagines a group of people who’ve created a haunted mansion-style, spooky ride, but it’s also gig work, and there’s this faceless corporate overlord, and they’re making it all work. It’s a great story. It, again, finds the human element.

Really, the central thing that makes Future Tense tick is that we can’t just think about the future. You have to go beyond a sterile report or a scenario that’s only a paragraph long. You need to get into character. You need to get into an extended narrative world, and that’s because we can’t think without feeling. You have to feel the future. You can’t just think about it. These stories really invite you to inhabit this future in an empathetic way, and that’s really powerful.

Lisa: I’m so glad you brought up empathy, because certainly what I know Annalee Newitz does so well is help you have empathy in a truly expanded way. This idea that the robot can learn to speak crow. Now, all of a sudden, you’re like, “Wait, crows talk to each other?” We know crows talk to each other, and we discount it because we don’t speak crow, but the robot learns to speak crow, and together, they help save humans by their understanding that something is happening and using their superpowers together. It is such a powerful story. I know it’s won a number of awards.

We actually invited Annalee Newitz to come and speak to the d.school, to talk about their work. Also, I think Annalee is one of the prolific writers about interspecies communication like that. That’s a theme in the writing. One of my colleagues, this is one of my favorite moments, she admitted to Annalee that because of that story, she now says good morning to every crow that she sees.

[laughter]

Lisa: Because she’s like, “You just don’t know. You just don’t know what they’re able to pick up.” We recently got a dog, and who knows if the dog can understand us, our sweet dog Pippi, but every now and again, I’ll just whisper into her ear, “We really love you. Thank you for being a part of our family.” I think it’s inspired by that story of maybe we pick up on more and that we’re capable of different kinds of empathy.

Ed, you said something important in passing, where you talked about it as cozy fiction. I think you all helped put that idea on the map. That, again, the stories we read really can inform how we feel about the future, and it’s important to recognize that. I want to say that Annalee Newitz, they recently ended it, but their podcast with-

Ed: Charlie Jane Anders.

Lisa: Yes. Right. Our Opinions Are Correct. It’s just a fantastic deep dive into the connection between science fiction, science fact, and-

Ruth: Picking up on that, we’ve been doing some work lately where we’re inviting people to reflect on what they’re consuming, and the futures they’re consuming, because we are being presented with them all the time, but we’re often not reflecting on where they come from. Whether this is in TV shows or movies or books or even advertisements, they often depict some sort of future. We have created an exercise where we invite people to talk about and look at and think about what futures they’re consuming that are informing their own thoughts. The values that are depicted in those futures, how those resonate with their own, or how they differ.

Again, it’s not about a right or a wrong. It’s not that you’re consuming the right futures or the wrong futures, but to be more intentional about it. We also ask people to place them on an axis of, is this a hopeful future or a dystopian? Is this one where you feel like you have agency or no agency? Again, just as a reflective exercise, if you are happy with how you’re thinking about the future, great. Don’t change anything. If you are trying to change your relationship with the future, then maybe start looking for what you’re consuming and how that influences the way that you think.

Lisa: Oh my gosh. This ties into another conversation we’ve had on How We Future, with Aditi, about democracy. She is the founder of a project called Democracy 2076. She does a lot of this research with other groups, like Harmony Labs, to understand, where do our visions of democracy and what civic futures look like? She did this great work, Ruth, to your point, about understanding that a lot of people outlaw, making it okay to-- come from watching Reacher, or these unexpected heroes that are under the law or outside the law. Just to exactly your point, like pausing, to say, “Wait a minute, why am I okay with this?”

I think she started that work understanding scandal. For six years, we watched stories of a president doing things that were illegal or under the radar and was wildly popular. What we watch influences what we then perhaps have in real life. We don’t need to go into that detail. It’s just interesting to pay attention to those images of the future, for sure. Ed, I want to talk to you a little bit about the fellowship that you helped start, around imagination, to help spark more people doing work connected with the Center, but also in their independent. Can you just share a little bit about that program?

Ed: Yes. We’ve had several different fellowships. Actually, we’ve just launched a new one called the Community Climate Fellowship, which is tied to the Climate Imagination book. As I said before, all of our projects just keep [chuckles] going. Like Frankenstein, Frankenstein’s monster is a really good metaphor for a lot of the work that we do. Once you bring it to life, it never stops. We have several different fellowships. This new one is to invite people around the world to engage in acts that are in the same spirit of the Climate Imagination book.

Projects that they might work on, they could be artistic or community engagement projects. We’ve been sharing about them. We’re releasing videos, over the next several weeks, for people to learn more about those fellows. We have also had several cohorts of ASU-Leonardo Imagination Fellows, with the Leonardo Art Science Organization, which are wonderful partners. ASU hosts them as well, but they have a journal and a book series and all sorts of networks of events all around the world. Those have been fellows working at the intersection of art and science, including a couple, by the way, doing interspecies translation using machine learning and AI.

Annalee’s story was so incredibly prescient in terms of people thinking about pandemics, the CDC being dismantled, and interspecies AI-powered communication. We’re not in the prediction game, but sometimes it comes around anyway. That fellowship, it’s currently on pause, because we’re all navigating the funding challenges of this current era, but we’re hoping to bring it back maybe next year. We also have our own imaginary college, which is a way that we recognize people all over the world who we have worked with, or we have aspirational relationships with.

Occasionally, we have people here at ASU who are fellows, but it’s really, I think, more powerful and meaningful to connect with people out in the world, who are doing something and they’re affiliated with us. Sometimes they’ll do a project with us, or the fellowship becomes a way for us to work with them. It’s been a wonderful way to visualize and celebrate the network of people that we’ve gotten to work with over the years.

Lisa: Such a powerful part of, I think, futures work, which is, how are you learning? Are you learning wide? Are you learning broad? How are you circulating ideas and empowering people? One of the things I’m increasingly focused on is the mindsets of agency and thinking about abundance over scarcity, as an example. That strikes me as a real abundant approach to uplifting the community of practice, as well as projects, as well as people. That just has a net positive effect for everybody. I so appreciate that you are not a huge group, but your impact is so wide because of the care and the intentionality you put in those relationships.

I want to talk about one more relationship that I know you were so foundational in bringing to life, which was with the Smithsonian Museum. Your participation in the, unfortunately temporary, I think it should have been permanent, but temporary exhibit at the-- is it the Arts and Sciences building? Back in 2022, I think, 2023. Ruth, I know you were a huge part of that. Maybe you could share what that project was and just some of the impact that came out.

Ruth: Yes, that was a really exciting, again, email to get that sparked a great collaboration. We were invited to put together an exhibit for, I think it was the Arts and Industry buildings, but this is where we’ll need to fact-check it.

Lisa: Yes, I think that sounds right.

Ruth: At first, we came up with this great idea where we were going to go to D.C., and we were going to collaborate with the different researchers and scientists at the various museums and research institutes and do futures thinking and imaginative world-building together. Then COVID happened. So they said, “Well, can you still do this online?” My first reaction was panic. Then we thought, “We can do this.” We took one of our favorite activities, which is a collaborative world-building game called Futures by Chance, Futures by Choice.

We had a series of Zoom calls where we worked with a museum or a research institute, experts from those fields, invited science fiction author, and a graphic artists to be part of that as well. We did this collaborative world-building. Then after that session, the science fiction author would write a short story that depicted a future that the team had come up with. The artist would create almost a museum exhibit poster from the future.

We were thrilled that when you first walked into the building, one of the first things you saw was this wall of all eight of these future museum posters, and links to the stories that were on Slate, and that it was such a great way to reach such a broad public and talk about the work that we’re doing, to imagine really interesting and wild futures with just the best experts who have such a rich history in this space. Some of my favorites are this one where they imagine, what if mosquitoes were genetically engineered to administer vaccines to livestock.

Again, the idea isn’t to say that this is what we think should happen, but to inspire these questions of, “Oh, what could go wrong? Who would benefit from this? Who would lose out in this?” The idea that a science fiction story can be a really cheap way to prototype these ideas and, again, engage people from all different fields to reflect on it. That was really exciting. I think being in the museum itself and seeing that work is one of my proudest moments.

Lisa: Yes. I got the chance to explore that with you, Ruth. That was so fun. Then we actually d.schooled, so my colleagues got to do a workshop as part of it, where we helped educators and young people imagine their future descendants in an interactive way. The thing that I really appreciated that I know you had a heavy hand in is really ensuring that exhibit was human-first and empathy-first. You can imagine that the Smithsonian might have done a souped-up version of the Computer History Museum. Just looking at technology for technology’s sake.

It was just so thoughtfully curated to be invitations to explore our agency. I’m just so delighted to know about that work, and that your stories had such a lasting impact on all ages. Smithsonian is the largest research museum complex in the world. Again, validating this work, that it’s important. That’s what makes me a little sad that it’s not a permanent collection, but we’re going to share it. We’re going to keep it permanent.

Ruth: I love that you brought up that human element, because I think that’s also one of the really strong, powerful points about it being a story, is that the story talks about science, it talks about the technologies, it talks about the context, but ultimately, it puts the humans first. That’s what makes it so special, and that’s what makes it engaging, and that’s what makes it a really great reflective exercise.

Lisa: Absolutely. All right. I could talk to you two all day long, but I want to end with one question for each of you. We’re going to share tons of links to the work you’re doing for educators, even for parents, but for folks that are listening to this and say, “Yes, I want to get started, I want to do something.” Do you have any just maybe smaller way, an invitation to start to open up a futures lens? Ruth, I’ll start with you.

Ruth: Well, I think that I would love for folks to visit the website. As we’ve been talking about, being at a public university, one of our goals is to make as many of our resources freely available. We have a link off our websites for teachers and other learning resources, the stories from Future Tense are available on Slate and now Issues. If you have trouble finding something, reach out to us. I want to echo what Ed has said earlier about we see our role and the work that we do as an invitation to engage more.

If something we have said is thought-provoking, if you have ideas, if you have ways that we could be doing things better, we invite you to email us and reach out, because also, I think a theme of this conversation is that we very much welcome input, we welcome the emails, we welcome the collaborations, and that’s how we do the work that we do. I think that we work a lot with teachers and educators and the importance of working with young people. Very much, please reach out if you have thoughts or ideas or would like to learn more.

Ed: That was great. The one thing I’ll share is, we put a lot of our things online for free, as Ruth said also. We have this huge archive of books and projects, but we also have some videos. We did a video series, a couple of years ago, called The Imagination Sketchbook. That’s a playlist on YouTube. We made a few little activities that go along with it, so you can do an imagination inventory, you can think about the science fiction feedback loop and how stories about the future change the future that we actually get, and do a little futures timeline. Those are some very short, accessible activities if you want to learn about how your own imagination works. That’s a nice way into the way we think about all of this stuff.

Lisa: I love it. Such an abundance of options. I will share one of my favorite projects that we didn’t get a chance to go too deep in, was your Science Fiction TV Dinners. Just even maybe having a dinner conversation to say, “Hey, what story resonated with you?” No story is too small, or whether even it’s a comic book. Just the idea that you’re just shrinking the gap between what we can all do and what’s out there to help spark our imagination. Listen, I’ve yet to really see an AP test on imagination or expression in these expansive ways.

I just really want to thank you so much, Ed and Ruth, for spending time with us today on How We Future, and really for the work that you’re doing to really lift up a global community of practice, starting as young as kindergarten, to flex our great human gift of being prospective, being expansive, being capable of imagining and shaping better futures. Thanks so much for being here.

Ed: Thanks for having us. Kindergartners are great at imagination.

Lisa: So good.

Ed: We can all learn from them.

Ruth: Exactly. Thank you so much, Lisa.

Lisa: If you were inspired by this episode with Ed and Ruth, here’s something simple you can try this week. Notice what futures you’re consuming in TV shows, movies, ads, or books. Do they leave you feeling hopeful or hopeless about the future? Just noticing is the first step towards choosing different stories. All of CSI’s resources are free and available on their website. Check out the show notes for links to some of their amazing materials, like Future Tense Fiction, Climate Imagination, and so much more. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thanks for listening, and I’ll see you next time on How We Future.

Are you being a good ancestor?

This episode of How We Future features public philosopher Roman Krznaric, author of The Good Ancestor and History for Tomorrow, to explore how we can break free from short-term thinking and start planning in generations, not quarters.

Roman argues we all have two competing forces. The marshmallow brain seeks instant gratification. The acorn brain enables long-term thinking, the kind that built sewers in 19th century London for a much larger future population. History shows what’s possible when we activate that capacity.

Roman shares practical steps to become better ancestors, from giving children your vote to building social cohesion through community action. He offers examples of things that went right in history and the importance of recognizing what we should repeat, not just what we shouldn’t.

In this conversation, you’ll learn:

• Why long-term thinking is wired into our brains and how to activate it

• What it takes for real transformative change to happen

• Why social trust matters more than technology for our survival

Roman sees signs of change, from the EU creating an Intergenerational Fairness Index to educators teaching students to think like futurists, not just historians. The future is ours to create together.

Links from the episode:

• Roman Krznaric Site

• Roman’s new online course: Long-Term Thinking for a Short-Term World

• Book: The Good Ancestor: A Radical Prescription for Long Term Thinking

• Book: History for Tomorrow: Inspiration from the Past for the Future of Humanity

• Book: Empathy: Why It Matters, and How to Get It

• TED Talk: Lessons from History for a Better Tomorrow

• TED Talk: How to be a Good Ancestor

• New View EDU podcast for school leaders with Roman Krnaric

• Long Now Talk: Roman Kzrnaric and Kate Raworth

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today.

This week’s guest is public philosopher Roman Krznaric, whose work focuses on asking the important question: Are we being good ancestors? Roman is the author of The Good Ancestor and, more recently, History for Tomorrow: Inspiration from the Past for the Future of Humanity. He spent years studying how we think about time and why we feel endlessly trapped in the tyranny of the now.

In our conversation, we talk about why our brains are actually wired for long-term thinking, what we can learn from history’s bright spots, and practical ways to stretch our time horizon, including a great story about how Roman “gave” his vote to his 11-year-old kids. This is a conversation about slowing down to see further and remembering that the choices we make today echo across generations to come. Let’s jump in with Roman Krznaric.

Roman, thank you so much for joining us today.

Roman Krznaric: Oh, it’s a pleasure and a privilege, and I’m looking forward to the adventure of our conversation.

Lisa: Fantastic. We are going to go through many temporal zones, going back in history, going forward. I can’t help but think of the irony in some ways, Roman, that I am calling you from Silicon Valley, where this is like the tyranny of the now on steroids, like faster time zones, move fast and break things, let’s get it out, let’s ship. You are joining us from across the pond, where you are helping put out ideas in the world that are asking us to take a longer lens.

I can’t think of a more perfect juxtaposition to talk about right now, about what it means to actually slow down and take a longer lens. I wanted to start with really where I first got connected with your work when you wrote the book The Good Ancestor. I wonder if we could just talk a little bit about how you came to that framing about why it’s important for us to think about being a good ancestor.

Roman: Sure. That book, The Good Ancestor, grew out of a sense of frustration, really, a frustration with the politicians who couldn’t see beyond the next election or the latest opinion poll, and that’s still the case, the businesses who can’t see beyond the quarterly report, with myself looking at my phone and clicking the Buy Now button, with the nations sitting around international conference tables and arguing with each other while the planet burns and species disappear. There’s a frustration there with the tyranny of the now, the chronic short-termism of our age, which we know permeates all realms of life.

In a way, this is not a new problem. As you know, in a sense, it goes back to the invention of the mechanical clock in the 13th century in Italy, where that was when we started slicing time up into hours or quarter hours, and by 1600, most clocks had minute hands. By 1800, they had second hands. Now we’ve got the nanosecond-speed share trading of the stock market or TV programs like The Bear, which I’ve been watching the last series recently, where, what has it got up on the wall? “Every Second Counts,” which in a way is the catchphrase not just of the TV series but of our whole culture, at least of Western culture.

All that led me into the idea of The Good Ancestor. Then, of course, the great question asked by Jonas Salk, the immunologist who developed the first polio vaccine back in the ‘50s, where later in life, in fact, in the late 1970s, I came across this incredible question of his, which is, are we being good ancestors? I remember when I came across that, literally, the hair stood up on my arms. I suddenly thought, “Oh, my God. This is the question.”

I’ve only slowly, in a way, come to realize the profundity of it. Part of it, I think, ultimately, is that we can talk a lot about future generations. That can sound quite abstract, whereas being a good ancestor is about me and you, and it’s about us, and it’s about our responsibility. That’s why I think the language we use here is really so important for helping us bridge across time to enable our minds to perform the temporal pirouette that we’re so capable of.

Lisa: I love how you brought up the language because I have to say, when I read your book for the first time, we were just coming out of the pandemic, and I also felt like the hair on the back of my neck stood up because of exactly what you’re talking about, which is the framing of it. I’ve been doing futures work now for decades, and it can be very abstract, out there, removed. Your book is really an invitation to lean in and to take responsibility on some of these huge, complex challenges that can feel out of reach. Increasingly, I’m really focused on what can I do to help people move from this feeling of anxiety to action.

I think your book, The Good Ancestor, and your more recent one, too, about history for tomorrow, gives us on-ramps. It serves as a bridge to try to make some of those connections and to hold up a mirror and say, “Wait, what are you doing today in order to help future generations to come, and how we might activate some of the things that are uniquely human in us, that we are all capable of having a longer-term perspective in spite of some of the short-termism and the tyranny of now that’s coming at our way. I just really want to thank you. I know sometimes you talk about being a public philosopher, and I think we need more public philosophers to challenge us, to say, “We don’t have to accept this status quo.”

Roman: It’s really interesting to think about all the different ways of going at this issue of trying to, in a way, rupture the domination of the present tense. Of course, I try to do it through books, and that’s just one way. In fact, recently I just installed on my kitchen wall a new clock made by a radical horologist called Scott Thrift up in Vermont. He sent me this clock, and it’s an amazing clock. It’s called The Present. It looks like a normal clock, but it’s only got one hand. That one hand takes a whole year to go all the way around.

When it’s pointing upwards, it’s pointing at the twelve o’clock position is the winter solstice, so December the 21st. Then it goes around to the spring equinox, the summer solstice, then to the fall, and then back up around. In a way, it’s a symbol of the challenge that we face. How do we recognize the wild clocks of the cosmos, all these different kinds of time, so exactly that we can think on these longer perspectives and break out of the rupture of chronic short-termism? I’d love that clock to be on the wall in every parliament, every business, as we’re making decisions, trying to think about the choices that we make.

Lisa: It’s such a great concrete reminder of the fact that we are capable of thinking about different time horizons. Of course, you and I are very involved with an organization based out here called the Long Now Foundation, which has been trying to help us think about millennia, even increments of 10,000 years, by creating a concrete mythic project like a 10,000-year clock that’s been in the works and is going to be completed soon.

Even that example that we don’t necessarily need a 10,000-year clock, but we can actually put a different kind of symbolic clock in our kitchens, or the Long Now asks us to put a zero in front of the year. We are not in 2026, we are in 02026, just to remind us that there are many thousands of years to come. It can be a powerful reminder that we don’t necessarily need to respond to every ding, every click, every distraction that narrows and shortens our focus. We actually have the ability to take a longer view on how we think about our days in the context of years, in the context of thousands of years.

Roman: I think also, it’s a very human thing to do this. I think we keep telling ourselves this story that we’re short-term thinkers, that we like immediate rewards and instant gratification, and the algorithms are all built on this to keep us scrolling, to maximize the eyeballs. Actually, if you suddenly just think about your own life, let’s take the year that your grandmother was born. Then, if you happen to have children, you might imagine the year that your grandchild might die. There is a span of probably 200 and 250 years. That’s just on the very personal level.

I remember when I realized that. It’s such a simple thing. I was thinking, actually, about my daughter. I suddenly thought, “My God. She could be alive in the year 2100.” To recognize that that future isn’t science fiction, but it’s something intimate, it’s an intimate family fact, really shifted my thinking. To know that, look, if I care about her life, I need to care about all of life, really, because she’s not alone in that future in 2100. She’s embedded in communities. She’s embedded in the living world, the air she breathes, the water that she drinks.

Just in a very practical sense, I’m talking, for example, to politicians. Not long ago, I spoke in front of the Dutch Senate. There, I’m speaking to people from parties across the political spectrum, from the left to the right, to the Greens, to the others, whatever. They’re caught up in the immediacy of the political crises, whatever the next one they’re going through. I’m trying to talk to them about how to take a longer view of public policy, which is cathedral thinking view, the kind of thing that both of us have been thinking a lot about and working on, how do we get our societies, our economic and political institutions thinking longer?

When you’ve got the senators in the room with you, I’ve found one of the best ways to really open their imaginations is to go in at that personal level to talk about the children, or the grandchildren, the nephews, or the nieces, because wherever you are in the political spectrum, you are an intertemporal being in some sense. You’ve got a legacy with meaning that stretches across the landscape of time. I think in practical way, we need to work with that. While I love the Long Now Foundation, things like the 10,000 Year Clock, because I’m a Long Now research fellow and on their new board, but I think we need, in a way, multiple ways of trying to break out of the now.

Lisa: I totally agree. In fact, your book, I’m not even sure you know this, but I shared your book with my colleagues at the D School. I think we got 50 copies for everyone. One of my colleagues, Louis Montoya, is a brilliant learning designer. He was so inspired about this idea of making the long-term more concrete that he developed a maker’s workshop based on the portrait of a descendant. Works a lot with educators to watch your incredible TED talk on being a good ancestor, which we will link in the show notes, just to set this mode, start to, as you were saying, establish the language of what we’re capable of, that we’re not just in this present moment, we’re also thinking about ourselves as good ancestors.

Then he has them imagine their descendants’ descendants’ descendant. Just as you were saying, basically my child’s grandchild or my grandchild’s child, but in a very personal way. He has them really envision it. Then he has all these materials out on a table and has them actually build out what the portrait of that descendant might look like through these scaffolded questions.

Roman: Wow. That sounds amazing.

Lisa: It’s incredible. Very much based on this incredible Maori experience that you talk about in your book of Whakapapa, of this notion of that we are connected to generations that have come before us and generations that will come, but in order to really establish that connection, to visualize it, and then to make it. The frame represents if they were to look out the window, what might they see, their identity, who they are in the world.

Then that final part where the artist writes a statement to these descendants’ descendants’ descendant. It is transformative. We’ve had the opportunity to do this at South by Southwest. We did it at the Smithsonian Futures Museum. I just really want to thank you for the seed of how we could allow more people to essentially narrow that gap between now and the far future.

Roman: It’s lovely to hear that example. Of course, it’s certainly not only my doing. I’ve drawn on indigenous wisdom. I’ve drawn on writings of thinkers in the 18th and 19th century on all this kind of stuff and thinkers like yourself. I think design is a particularly interesting world to explore this in because design has this multidisciplinary approach, which is absolutely necessary because time is everywhere and it’s in everything.

It’s the kind of invisible sea that we’ve lived our whole lives in. How often do we actually stand back and think about what our descendants’ descendants’ descendants might actually look like? Of course, in these exercises, in a way, it doesn’t matter if you can’t really picture them. The whole point is to try and get us to see where we are now, and that maybe it doesn’t have to be this way, and that our minds and our institutions could be just that little bit different.

Lisa: Absolutely. Even just triggering that, “Wait a minute, whose time is this? Why am I behaving in this way? What else could I do to try to extend a longer span of how I’m thinking about a challenge or an issue?” I love one of the notions of Danny Hillis, one of the founders of the Long Now, who says it is much easier to imagine solving complex problems over a longer time horizon than the short now, which can feel so chaotic and responsive.

This idea that all of us, as humans, and I think you really talk about this and I want to spend a little time talking about it, are capable of that long-term thinking, that we all have the, I think you call it the marshmallow brain and the acorn brain, and that’s within all of us, not just for a select few. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about the difference between the marshmallow brain and the acorn brain.

Roman: Yes. I do think we all have wired inside us these two different forms of thinking. Of course, there are many ways to dissect the human brain, but at least one of them is to recognize that on the one hand, while we do have short-term drivers, the dopamine responses, the marshmallow brain, of course, named after that famous 1960s marshmallow test where kids were offered a marshmallow, they can resist it for 15 minutes, they’re rewarded with a second one.

Though most kids did snatch the snack in that famous experiment, it’s not the whole story of who we are because we also have wired into our dorsolateral prefrontal cortex at the front of our brains, an acorn brain, as I call it, that part of our neuroanatomy, which is about long-term thinking and planning and strategizing, because that is what enabled us to build the Great Wall of China or the sewers of 19th century London, which were built twice as big as they needed to be for the population at the time, and that’s why they’re still used today. It’s the acorn brain which has enabled us to voyage into space.

We’re always, though, of course, in a struggle between the marshmallow and the acorn. Do we party today or plan for our pensions for tomorrow? Do we upgrade to the latest iPhone, or do we plant a seed in the ground for posterity? I think what’s really important to remember here is that we’re actually pretty good at this. Other animals do plan ahead a bit, like a chimpanzee that strips the leaves off a stick to turn it into a tool to put in a termite hole, but they won’t make a dozen of those tools and stick them aside for next week, which is exactly what human beings do.

We’ve got to nurture this capacity for long-term thinking and always be remembering what we are capable of. That’s partly why I love history so much, because when you look through the past, you can see all these incredible examples of long-term vision. I’m about to go to Barcelona in a few days. They’ve nearly finished building the Sagrada Família Church, the Basilica, begun in 1882, almost completed 150 years later. Let’s do a bit of that, please, when it comes to dealing with how to wean ourselves off our carbon addictions or to deal with the risks of AI and genetic engineering.

Lisa: Oh, I’ll be so excited to hear about that visit, because I do think there is something about-- Listen, you don’t have to be Gaudi to be the one to imagine La Sagrada Família, but just to even notice it, to have awe for it, to realize that somebody had the wherewithal to think about a cathedral that would take decades or generations to build, an urban plan that would take a long time and just noticing and telling those stories about those visionaries that were willing to plan for long futures is, I think, so important to widen our imagination.

I really appreciate when you talked about Daniel Kahneman’s work Thinking, Fast and Slow, that our brains are capable of both, that we also need to be thinking about short and long. Roman, I don’t know if I’ve ever showed this to you, and those of us that are just listening can’t see. I think your book is one of the most dog-eared, lined book I have. As I was reading it, in the back, I started to think about, “My goodness, what if we actually had a mandatory class on long-term thinking or even just time? I’ve been talking to actually Kevin Kelly about this for a while. What if we taught fourth graders, that’s about 10 years old in American schooling, what if we taught them how to think about time, long and short?

Roman: I absolutely agree with you. If you think about kids even younger than that are taught to do this thing called tell the time. What are they really taught? They’re taught about a very narrow form of time, which is time on a clock, 10 past 3, and a quarter to 9. It’s a very abstract and strange thing, even that. Why not teach long-term thinking? Why not make that normal? Because we are capable of it. We develop that capacity even at a very young age to start dreaming about the future and about the past.

That’s why I remember going to see Star Wars as a kid in 1978 or something like that. I was dreaming, though it said it was set in the past, a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away. Actually, my mind, of course, it’s about a future. We all have this capability, but it’s not part of how we’re taught. Of course, you’ve been doing this work at the Stanford Design School and stuff, trying to embed this thinking that’s so fundamental because it needs to spread like a good virus, let’s say, into the minds of a whole generation.

Lisa: Absolutely. It starts with the scaffolding. A lot of times when I’m thinking about helping more students think of themselves as futurists, not to predict the future, but to have agency and making choices that can shift markets, shift our societies, not just for now and not just for a quick return, but over the long term, it is this dance between helping change their mindset, which sometimes starts with a provocative question like, “Are you being a good ancestor,” and also scaffolding it with other experiences that help them notice, “Wait a minute, somebody else made this. Why couldn’t I make this?”

What are some examples of what else could happen, which is, I think, so important and embedded in your work that you don’t just name it. It’s certainly in The Good Ancestor, you’re talking about the time rebels that are taking what’s available to them today and trying to reimagine and ignite different conversations about what could be. Certainly, when you were writing about this, I think Greta Thunberg is a great example of a young time rebel that was willing to say, “Wait a minute, why are you destroying our planet and really starting with a small movement, but then quickly, as a young person, found herself in front of some of the most important influencers at Davos and others and really launched a global movement.

Roman: Yes, absolutely. I think we need to remember the power of those kind of movements, the disruptive movements for change, we do need the time rebels on the streets. We also need peer-to-peer inspiration, which I think is a very important form of change. If you think, for example, the way some of the new economic thinking has been emerging, for example, the idea of Doughnut Economics, a kind of economics not based on constant growth, but an economy that can thrive within the limits of the planet that began in Amsterdam a few years ago.

Then once Amsterdam city council says, “Yes, we’re going to take on this new model,” then Copenhagen says they’re going to do it. Then Barcelona, then somewhere in Colombia, then in Canada. I think, though my natural instinct is to look for historical examples of where we’ve been longer-term thinkers, we’ve shifted our systems, we can also find them today in that kind of peer-to-peer inspiration that’s so vital.

Lisa: I’m so glad you brought up Doughnut Economics because it gives me a chance to talk about one of my favorite all-time long now talks, which is you in conversation with your brilliant wife, Kate Raworth, talking about what history can teach us about Doughnut Economics. It is one of the singular most brilliant talks I’ve ever heard, let alone a power intellectual couple like you sitting at your kitchen table just like having a Sunday evening dinner. [laughs] Actually, maybe we could jump to that. What was that experience like to have that conversation with Kate? Is that just like what you typically talk about on a Monday night?

Roman: Definitely not. In fact, that was, I think, probably the first time we’ve ever sat down and did a real event together or a conversation together for a public audience. It was really fun, actually, because, of course, over the years, our work has got closer and closer together. We’re not always talking about it. Sometimes we’re just talking about whose turn it is to do the washing up. Because she’s developed the Doughnut Economics theory, and it has become a global phenomenon. In my own work, I’ve been thinking most recently about the lessons of history, my new book, History for Tomorrow.

It was really interesting to think about the confluences. Just to give one example, something that she’s worked on a lot is the idea of how do we create genuinely circular economies, which are reusing, repairing, refurbishing materials, which is so fundamental. I can’t see how we can have a deeply sustainable long-term society without that. From my perspective, it was great to talk to her about the things which I’ve been starting to look into for this book, History of Tomorrow, like how in 18th-century Japan, they basically had what today we’d call a circular economy.

That was partly because in the city of Edo, today’s Tokyo, which was a huge city in the 18th century, far bigger than London or Paris or LA at the time, wherever, they also had a circular economy where they did reuse, repair, refurbish everything. You’d have a kimono and use it till the cloth began to wear out, which you’d then turn into pajamas you’d wear at night. Then you’d turn that into diapers, cut it up. You’d then turn it into cleaning cloths. You’d finally burn the precious cotton as fuel. They partly did that, interestingly, actually, because they had shortages of precious resources like wood and cotton, because they weren’t trading much with the outside world.

They’d also chopped down all their forests, their old-growth forests. They had all these strict regulations on rationing of wood, for instance. That was something we ended up talking a little bit about in that Long Now event because of the really important lesson, I think, to learn from history is that we can be innovative within boundaries, that innovation isn’t just a boundaryless phenomena, but it can happen within limits of certain kinds. If you think that in Japan in that period, they created a thriving culture and economy out of limits, and they innovated in terms of circularity and recycling, reusing.

Equally, pretty much at the same time, but earlier, we had Mozart was composing on a five-octave piano. We know Jimi Hendrix played on a six-string guitar. I think we shouldn’t be afraid of limits. Of course, this is obviously a Silicon Valley issue too. I was recently reading Marc Andreessen’s Techno-Optimist Manifesto, an accelerationist tract, which is giving the opposite message of that. Actually, I think the historical lesson is actually one where we have thrived within in limits. Let’s embrace that in a positive way when we’re thinking about dealing with tech risks, for example.

Lisa: Absolutely. I love that you are focusing on history and been really enjoying your latest book because, while I think it’s the famous Mark Twain quote, “While history doesn’t repeat itself, it rhymes.” It can feel so overwhelming any day you wake up just to read the headlines, experience the poly crisis. They seem to be getting more complex, more rapid. You say, “I don’t know what to do. Let me give up.” I think so much of your work is to say, “No, don’t give up. There are models to look at. It may not be exactly what it is, but there’s so much to learn.”

What I often say is there are no facts about the future, but we can visit the future. Part of that visiting of the future is understanding our past and where some of these patterns might have played out to give us hope. I think infused in all of your work is an invitation for radical hope, not based on magic, but based on a different lens or a set of lenses that we can look at what is available to us today, and that includes history. I will say, I do think history is having a moment. It gives me a little hope. I recently discovered The Rest is History podcast, and I have been devouring it.

My family is very funny. They’re like, “Are you spending any time in the present right now?” Of course, my gosh, it’s been around for these two British historians for the last four or five years. They have over 800 episodes at this point. They’re like rock stars in the UK. What I love about what they’re doing is they’re not just telling history in a dry way. They’re, in some ways, teaching us to be anthropologists, to be contextual understanders of different moments in time. I find that incredibly helpful as a grounding for how to interpret this moment and what’s to come. I’m very hopeful that we can actually learn from history, and I think your book is a huge part of that.

Roman: Yes, thanks. I love that podcast, too. The Rest is History is brilliant. When I go on long train journeys, like I’m going to be going tomorrow to Spain and to Germany, I’ve been listening to downloaded episodes of the history of the Titanic and the history of the First World War, and history of Cleopatra, and all sorts of interesting things, because all of those things, whether intended to or not, I think they open our imaginations. We wouldn’t drive a car without looking in the rearview mirror. It’s very important to learn from history.

The way we tend to learn from history is to think about everything that’s gone wrong, captured in that famous aphorism that those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. We do need to learn from the stuff that’s gone wrong, from colonialism and fascism, and those issues really still are playing out today in politics. We also need to learn from what’s gone right, from the positive examples where human societies have managed to rise up and create change and overcome crises, and deal with challenges. That’s what I’ve tried to do in History for Tomorrow.

I’ve gone through the last 1,000 years, which is about as far as my brain could go back, and try to, in a way, curate examples to tell us that the current world doesn’t have to be this way, and you don’t have to be utopian to think of something different. The idea of being a futurist or think about the future needs to be grounded in the past. Of course, futurists often say, “You need to look at least twice as far back as if you want to look forward.” I think we need to go even further than that. Let’s go back 10 times as far, or as long as the records are still of good quality.

Lisa: Absolutely. I agree with you 100% that while our brains are wired to pick up on the threats, which is why we tend to over-focus on the negativity, that putting bright spots out there can also-- It’s actually critical to really help more people realize that they are capable of imagining new futures, as you say, and bringing them to life. One of my favorite questions I ask my students in the beginning of a class, whether I’m teaching Inventing the Future or a new class I just started called View from the Future, where we bring in people that are actually living on the edges of their fields in order to help our students think about their career path, their opportunities, not just over-indexing on the past, but getting a glimpse of people, what I call living in the future.

Roman: That sounds brilliant. What kind of people come along?

Lisa: We intentionally have all kinds of disciplines there to really inspire people to think beyond what they thought they were going to do. We have architects come in that talk about how they’re reimagining the built environment using sustainable materials. I don’t have any architects in my class, but helping them realize that, wow, there are people that are thinking about this in a holistic way, that that’s really valuable. We’ve had people talking about the future of media, where we get our information, what it really means to create. We’ve got a guest coming up talking about the unkillable newsroom.

How do we reimagine business models that actually allow us to have an informed civic politique? We have folks that are coming in talking about the future of fashion, even exploring what does it mean to actually create a moral imagination within a society that seems to be dictated by influencers. This is an incredible executive that has reimagined a cosmetic company that actually has social impact at its core. She said, “Most cosmetic companies are sending influencers to fancy places to take pictures of themselves.” She said, “I send them into disaster areas to actually have them do the work-

Roman: Wow.

Lisa: -and just to model that we don’t need to live in these narrow-minded ways, that we can actually have broad impact.” Again, it’s not about, “Oh, therefore a student will exactly go into that,” but it’s to open up their perspective and the surface area of, “Wow, where else should I be looking? What questions should I be asking? How might I be a part of inventing new futures?” It’s just been so exciting to see what’s possible when you just entertain conversations with people living in the future. I want to talk to you about a few more concepts in your book, History for Tomorrow, particularly around this idea of the disruption nexus, this notion that when we are in the middle of a crisis, it takes a number of different ingredients to find our way out of it.

Roman, this has been something I feel like we’ve been living in the poly crisis for the last five years. One of the things I try to say, not only to students I work with, but leaders, is that we can’t expect the world to just get more simple. We have to change. We have to adapt. It’s folly to think that “When we get over this hump,” I think even recent history has said there is no getting over, there’s only more. If we can’t expect the world to change, we have to change. By looking at history, I know you’ve noticed some patterns about what it takes to get out of these crises. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about it.

Roman: Sure. I don’t know about you, but I certainly get frustrated by the fact that we can have all these crises, we can have melting ice sheets, we can have financial crashes, all sorts of things, and yet still our societies and governments don’t tend to change very much. There’s so much inertia. Occasionally, there are moments where we will enact change at the speed and scale required during a war or during a pandemic or something like that. Outside those very extreme occasions, how do we get rapid transformative change? That’s the question I started asking myself.

The pattern I noticed in history, and this is not like an iron law, it’s more like a rule of thumb, which is that three things really need to come together. It’s a model that you mentioned there, which I call the disruption nexus. Three things need to come together. First, you need some kind of crisis to be happening, financial, economic, ecological, technological. The second thing you need are new ideas or innovative ideas that can replace the old system, which is in crisis. The third thing you need are disruptive movements, which can amplify the sense of crisis.

There are many, many examples of this through history. If you think about why did the Berlin Wall fall in 1989, the collapse of state socialism in East Germany, you had those three things come together. There was a crisis in the leadership of the East German government. They’re all arguing about how to respond to Mikhail Gorbachev’s reforms. Then you had the ideas around freedom of movement, freedom of association, many growing out of the works of the great Czech writer, Václav Havel. Then you had the movements, the people on the streets in Leipzig, and then in Germany in November 1989.

There’d been protests for years in East Germany, but nothing had changed. What happened in 1989, November, was this confluence. I think it’s really interesting to ask yourself as a changemaker where one sits in these three corners, the different parts of the disruption nexus. I think some of us feel at ease with being on the streets, the people who are engaged in direct action. Others feel more comfortable being in the realm of ideas, working in think tanks or in education, which is sometimes bridging the two. I think what the historical story is, is that it’s quite risky to try and create change without the disruptive movements, particularly.

I know people often don’t like them, but people didn’t like Martin Luther King Jr. He was hated in many ways by the white liberal elite. Again, even those basic civil rights legislation wouldn’t have happened. It would have taken a lot longer without the disruption. I think what’s really interesting today in a historical sense is that some of the more radical ecological movements, nonviolent movements like Extinction Rebellion or others in different parts of the world, they get demonized by the press and criminalized by the police.

That’s a failure to recognize the importance of these disruptive movements in history. Going back to slave rebellions in the Caribbean in the 19th century or the movement to overthrow British colonialism in India. Again, I’m not a natural rebel of that kind myself, but I have found myself engaging in some of that more political action because I can’t think of a better way to be a good ancestor.

Lisa: I think it’s so important to point out that you need all of these things. Certainly, the crises seem all around us every day, and we are seeing a lot of movements, certainly protests of various nature. That third part, though, is the part that really captures my imagination, which is the idea part, that reaction and pushback is not enough. It’s critical, but not enough. This idea, and again, why I’m so excited about what Kate is doing with Doughnut Economics as an alternative model to traditional capitalism, to say, “You know what? You can have growth, and you can do it in a way that doesn’t exploit and extract our resources for future generations.

Part of what I am really trying to do in my work and even in How We Future is to surface more ideas and to encourage people to be more bold in their imagination because just reacting is not enough. We can do that at every level. Again, both of your books and even in your other work, and empathy is another huge part of what it will take to come up with ideas to be empathetic for the future, to really think about what are things that we can do right now.

I want to maybe close with some of those more tangible actions that we can do right now to spark that imagination and to spark agency. I know one of the things that you talk about is this idea of getting your children more involved with making decisions about the future by engaging them in voting and participating in the discussions about what’s happening in policy and parliament right now. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about that, and we’ll talk through some more examples.

Roman: Yes. Actually, a few years ago, my partner and I decided to give our votes in the UK general election to our kids, our twins, who were then 11 years old. We sat around the kitchen table and debated the manifestos of the parties. They told us where to put the X on the ballot sheet, and they still have our votes. They’re 17. Soon, we’ll get our votes back. It was a very practical example of trying to recognize that the way our decisions are made are not taking into account the voices or interests of those generations of tomorrow. I think that’s one thing one can do. That’s a very practical thing.

I think a lot of this is about escaping from the limits of individualism, actually. It’s about doing things together. They can always take very, very different forms. Yes, you might want to block a road in a climate protest, but you might work with your parents from the local parent-teacher association to put solar panels on your roof. It might be about being involved in a community garden or farmers’ markets, all sorts of different kinds of things. I remember once the great environmental campaigner Bill McKibben being asked by someone, “What should I do as an individual?” His reply was, “Be less of an individual.”

I think there’s a fundamental truth in that, that there’s something very important about social cohesion to help us survive times of turbulence, the poly crisis you were talking about. I know this is going to sound obscure and not practical, but it is practical. In the 14th century, there was this Islamic historian called Ibn Khaldun, and he wrote a book called the Muqaddimah. The Muqaddimah was about the rise and fall of civilizations. There’s a word that occurs over 500 times in that book, and it’s asabiyyah. Asabiyyah is an Arabic word meaning collective solidarity or group feeling.

Ibn Khaldun argued that what made a civilization survive through time and thrive was strong asabiyyah, strong social trust. Those societies which crumbled were those that had weak asabiyyah, for example, because of great wealth inequalities that created polarization. Ultimately, the secret, I think, to longevity of a society is social trust. You build that through conversations, through doing things with other people, as well as, of course, doing things like having future generations commissioners in your local county or whatever it is. Let’s try and escape from the inheritance of 20th century individualism and see if we can work out what we can do together to flip that me upside down to become a we.

Lisa: It’s so powerful, and it really echoes a lot of the themes from the conversations we’ve had with past How We Future guests, which is that the future doesn’t necessarily or shouldn’t be dictated by technology. Again, that feels very interesting to be saying that here, sitting in Silicon Valley, but it’s really about the bonds of trust and connection and affection that we build today, the slow way.

We’ve had conversations with Dana Cowin, who is the former editor of Food & Wine for 20 years, that has been on a mission to ignite social cohesion through what she calls progressive hedonist dinner parties, which are essentially potlucks that honor the kind of food we can eat that is plant-based and also builds joy, this idea that we can connect via joy. We’ve had guests talking about the power of play. Jill Vialet started a national nonprofit that has helped children, millions of children learn how to build trust and connection through their recess, this idea that recess, the time between classes, could be the most important time.

We’re really just trying to help elevate these concepts as being core to what it actually means to build a thriving, long-term future society. What I hope for, and I want to maybe end with some things that you hope for, is that we can learn how to talk about these things in ways that get measured for the long-term. Nobody applies to college really and says, “You know what? I’m the greatest social cohesion creator ever. That’s just not a thing. It could be. We need, again, more language to describe it, more ways to talk about why it’s so critical, or even organizations. There was a time when, oh, everyone was talking about not shareholder value but stakeholder value, but we didn’t really do that deeply.

We didn’t really say, “Hey, let us mark you on the good ancestor scale, company XYZ. When you have your earnings reports, here’s how you’re going to talk about it, or in your key performance indicator, of if you’ve been a great employee over the year, how are we going to measure that invisible way that you’re contributing to the culture, to the social fabric, to the trust? I think we have a long way to go, but it’s work like yours and conversations like this that I hope are opening up others’ minds about more holistic ways of thinking about the contributions that we’re making towards a better future.

Roman: What that actually makes me think of very much in brief, though, is at the European Union level, I was recently contacted by them because they’ve decided, partly after having some of their people reading the book The Good Ancestor, to create an intergenerational fairness index to measure the long-term impacts of public policy across all the European nations, which is great, but let’s now take that also into companies as well.

What would the equivalent of an intergenerational fairness index look like that goes beyond just ticking a few ESG boxes but actually is much more embedded in the kind of vision that the Long Now Foundation and others like yourself are thinking about to really enable us to be able to say with a kind of deep truth that we are being the good ancestors that future generations deserve?

Lisa: That it’s possible. I feel like the case studies of good companies to talk about have to be more than just Patagonia. [laughs] What else can we talk about, and how do we get as fluid talking about them as we do with some of these other companies that feel like they’re destroying our future generation? Really bolstering up our vocabulary and the heroes that we look towards, rather than the ones that feel like that they’re getting all the airtime.

I just think it’s absolutely critical, and it’s one reason, Roman, why I continue to be so grateful and want to do what I can to support your work in the world, to support more educators creating exciting and immersive experiences like A Portrait of Descendant, like the one we talked about. I should share one more example. I’ve been working with a number of schools and their civic teachers that used to have capstone projects of thinking like a historian, that there are now also including thinking like a futurist to make the connection between the past and the future, to really prompt that sense of agency.

It’s going to take all of us. We’re so grateful for your time today, so grateful for your work. I look forward to more opportunities to explore how we can support more people, more leaders, more of our next generation becoming good ancestors.

Roman: Oh, thank you so much for the conversation then. We are all just little boats in a great flotilla floating towards a different future. Let’s all do it together in our own ways, and let’s create a plurality of possibilities for a different world. Thank you so much.

Lisa: Thanks for listening to this conversation with Roman Krznaric. If you’d like to try out Roman’s philosophy, here’s something you can do this week. Notice one decision you’re making. Then ask yourself, what would a good ancestor do? It might be small, but it might change everything. If this conversation resonated, please share it with someone thinking about legacy, leadership, and what we owe the future. Check out Roman’s TED Talks and books. They’re full of ideas worth exploring. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thanks for listening. We’ll see you next time on How We Future.

The future is a paradox we have to learn to hold.

In this episode of How We Future, Lisa Kay Solomon is joined by Pascal Finette, Co-Founder of radical, an organization that offers strategic advice to help leaders build organizations that strengthen under stress instead of breaking. Over nearly three decades, Pascal has led transformations at eBay, Mozilla, and Google, and he brings refreshing honesty about what it really takes to navigate uncertainty.

The conversation centers on a simple question Pascal asks thousands of executives: “The future is ___.” How you fill in that blank reveals everything. Some say bright. Some say terrifying. Pascal argues we need to hold both views at once because the future genuinely is contradictory. He and Lisa talk about the danger of the “official future,” that narrow path organizations and people lock themselves into that leaves them brittle when inevitable shocks arrive.

In this conversation, you’ll learn:

• Why holding opposing views of the future at once is essential

• Why curiosity is the most important muscle for navigating change

• What anti-fragility means in practice and how it differs from resilience

Pascal encourages listeners to ask more meaningful questions about their role in society rather than just focusing on quarterly profits. The future, he reminds us, is ours to create.

Links from the episode:

• Radical Briefing

• The Heretic x GYSHIDO

• The Official Future Trap

• Pascal’s Disruption Mapping Exercise

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▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today. Today on How We Future, I’m joined by my fellow futurist, Pascal Finette. Pascal has an uncanny ability to spot what’s coming next and, just as importantly, translate it in ways that actually help people think and act differently.

Pascal has spent years working with leaders around the world, helping them navigate uncertainty without getting trapped by a narrow version of what the future is supposed to be. He’s the author of Disrupt Disruption, a book that asks the question, how do we stay human, curious, and adaptable as change accelerates? In this conversation, you’ll hear why the future is full of paradoxes, how curiosity is a skill we can practice, and why learning may be our most important capability right now. Thanks for being here. Let’s get into it with Pascal Finette.

Pascal, you live in the future. You’re one of those people that is always on the edge and thinking about where things are going and then translating it back to leaders and learners everywhere to help them follow you into the future. I’m just thrilled to be having this conversation with you today about your own practices of how you see the future. I thought, appropriately, I’m wearing my futures curious shirt because Pascal Finette, you are one of the most futures curious people that I know. Thank you for being here.

Pascal Finette: Lisa, thank you so much for having me on the podcast. It has been a while. I’m so stoked for having this conversation. I’m really stoked that you have this podcast now.

Lisa: It’s inspired in part by all the great work that you’ve been doing and the work that we have been exploring since meeting many years ago at a place called Singularity University, which we’ll talk a little bit about. I also really want to talk about your fabulous book that came out a little while ago, called Disrupt Disruption. You have this wonderful opening that I want to start our conversation with, where you say, “The future is...” Pascal, sitting here today, how would you finish that sentence? The future is?

Pascal: That’s a really good question. I think the future is a pretty crazy place at the moment. If anything, the current moment we’re finding ourselves really powerfully demonstrates Stewart Brand’s quote that what is today was once the unimaginable future is true in so many different ways. It also demonstrates very powerfully that the future is this incredible wide cone of possibilities.

Some of those we like, some of those we don’t like, but it’s surely more than what is famously known as the official future, this very narrow path of what we define as our future or imagine our future to be. Because I’m pretty sure, regardless where you are on the political spectrum, on the economic spectrum, what we are living through today might have not been in your books maybe a year or two years ago, as in this is the future I imagine for myself. I do believe that there is a strong part of that in there.

Lisa: What I appreciated in the book, when you talk about “the future is,” and you mentioned that you’ve asked this question to literally thousands of executives and leaders around the world, that you always get different answers. Future’s bright, future’s dark, future’s scary, future’s now, future’s far. I’ve adopted it, by the way, and I bring it into my classes, and I ask my students. It’s always interesting.

By the way, a side note, my students tend to be a little bit more optimistic on the whole than executives, which I think is a good thing. We want our young people to be optimistic. You talk about this notion that the future is all of those things. In fact, it’s a paradox. This notion that we have to live with the complexities. That it is both exciting and scary. It offers possibility and threats.

You say, “the future is truly a paradox, encompassing seemingly contradictory positions, nonexistent but already here, unwritten but visible in signals all around us, a source of hope, but also anxiety.” What I want to do today, Pascal, is talk through these paradoxes because you are one that seems to navigate them beautifully, being both generative and discerning, having a broad future and focusing on the now.

Maybe I’ll start with our origin days together of meeting each other at a place called Singularity University, which was all about helping executives around the world learn about emerging exponential technology in order to have outsized impact in the world. It was a very exciting place to be for a while, filled with promise and possibility on the future.

It introduced me to a chart that was probably like the center of every bingo card in every program and every talk, which was that great conversation captured between Astro Teller of Moonshot and Thomas Friedman in the Thank You for Being Late book, where they have the exponential up and to the right in the curve and the linear. You talked about this is the path of exponential technology, but this is the path of linear adaptation. I wonder if you could just talk a little bit about how you see this paradox of the future being both exponential and linear.

Pascal: When you start to unpack this, I think there’s a couple of things in there which are important, I think. One of the reasons why I love this question so much is it allows you to reflect on your own answer, as in, what is my natural predisposition? Because the question is so quick, the future is blank. Then I ask people, it’s like, “What’s the word which pops into your head?” It’s pretty immediate. It gives you a good indication of where do you actually see the future?

What I also like to point out with that particular question is when you then hear other people and their responses, you can check in with yourself a little bit about the discrepancy between your worldview and theirs. When you talk about the future as a leader, particularly when you talk about the future of your company, the vision you have for it, you do need to acknowledge the fact that people might have a very different starting point, even thinking about the future, than you do.

I think that’s a really important dichotomy sometimes, particularly when you’re on far extreme ends of the spectrum. When we were both at Singularity University, I think Singularity University was overly optimistic about the future, and everything will be solved by technology and abundance everywhere, which I think we can take with a grain of salt and say, “Well, maybe it’s a little more complicated and a little bit more complex than that.”

I do think it’s important to start there. As in, where do I actually see myself in this world? Then the other piece is, there’s a quote, I think it goes back to Fitzgerald, who said, “The sign of true genius is to hold two opposing views in your head at the same time.” I think the challenge I see with a lot of people when they look at the future, into the future, is that they tend to only can hold one view of it. Either the super optimistic everything will be fine or, oh my God, we are doomed. This is the end of the world.

AI is a really good example for me, where on one hand, it’s like the hype camp. Artificial intelligence is coming. It’s beautiful. On the other hand, it’s like the Terminator side, where Skynet becomes real, and then we’re all done. I think the really important bit is for us as leaders, for us as humans, is to be able to hold those two thoughts in your head at the same time because they are both true to certain extents. We need to navigate this. I think this is probably the one thing I really, really want to get people to really understand that the world is not black and white. It’s not just gradients. It’s all these colors. We need to see all the colors to actually get a comprehension of it.

Lisa: It’s such a thoughtful way of both understanding the power of different perspectives and how do we lean into them and learn from them, and also checking in with our own biases about why we might be holding ourselves back from seeing that or even just making ourselves more aware that there’s not one future. That where you sit is where you stand in some ways when it comes to the future.

One of the most important things we can do is start to be curious about that and start to check in. Wait, why do you see this as so positive? I’m so nervous about this. Rather than defend our positions, can we actually turn towards each other, as Margaret Wheatley might say, and learn from each other about what’s giving us both great hope or what’s causing us tremendous fear? Pascal, just say, there’s so many things I admire about your work.

One of them in particular is your ability to understand technology and be able to talk about where the future is going, and yet hold the human heart so closely in who you are and how you connect with others. That you never lose sight, no matter how optimistic we feel about technology and what it can do, that fundamentally, it is the human psychology, the human heart, the human persona, the human connection that we have to hold on to. Maybe that’s just a place to build on. How do you balance those?

Pascal: I think technology for the sake of technology. I grew up in tech. My whole career, my whole life was tech. I was very fortunate to be at some of the more influential companies, which have really laid some interesting groundwork of the world we’re living in today. I was part of eBay very, very early, which really laid the work towards the abundance of e-commerce we now have. Later, I was part of Mozilla, which co-built the internet to a certain extent.

I think the most important thing to understand is tech is here to serve us as humans. I have a very visceral reaction to people who are tech for the sake of tech. There’s a lot of that at the moment, particularly, again, when it comes to AI. I think there’s a lot of AI for the purpose of AI. I think we really need to get back to the human factors. I think that’s number one.

Number two is over the years and decades, I have just seen too often the promise of technology and the reality in the world. It is because humans are messy. It is because our social systems are complicated, and they’re often unjust and built to favor certain particular demographics or certain groups. Thus, I really think if we want to leverage technology and thus create a better future, we have to do this from the perspective of how does it serve the people, the human, because otherwise, we dehumanize ourselves, which is a terrifying thought.

Lisa: Yes, we sometimes talk about with technology coming at us faster and faster, if we’re not mindful of our own stance and our own points of view and values, we outsource our imagination, and then the future’s happening to us. I think it can be very hard when we’re at this crazy clip of change, where every day brings disruption, new versions that make the other one obsolete, it can feel so unnerving that, as my colleague Scott Doorley likes to say, our creative director at the d.School, our nervous systems are nervous. How do we do that?

You’re right. Not everybody holds onto the idea that we have to really focus on technology serving humanity and not technology for technology’s sake, and holding onto that. Throughout your work in both your programs and your writing, you’re constantly reminding us of putting humanity first and not allowing maybe used futures of what futures used to be trap us into thinking that there’s only one way of doing it. I know we started to talk a little bit about it earlier, this notion of the official future and how that can be a trap of maybe the choices that we make, and therefore, the futures to come. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about that.

Pascal: Very generally speaking, the concept of the official future it’s fairly popular in the futurist community, but the idea is that the official future is the future we’re telling ourselves. The very narrow view of this is how it’s going to happen. In some ways, this is helpful and serves us. For example, take an athlete. If you are a track and field runner and you have a specific goal in mind, that becomes your official future. You want to beat that.

It is helpful because it focuses all of your attention towards this singular goal. It becomes very, very inhibitive and a trap when, for example, an organization tells itself a specific version of the official future. What then happens is you allocate your resources toward this specific future. You’re in this interesting flywheel of trying to make this official future happen. Now, the challenge is we’re living in massively interconnected systems with huge disruptors happening to us.

COVID was one. The geopolitics at the moment are another one, like terrorists, for example. It very easily can derail your official future. Then, when you have your systems and your attention and all your money wrapped up in a particular version of the future, you can very easily find yourself being in a very, very bad spot, very derailed. I think it is dangerous. It’s dangerous and problematic for companies, organizations, but also for us as leaders, as individuals, as well as society.

I think the really important bit about the future is to think more expansively about the future. This notion of the cone of uncertainty, this idea that the further out you go, the wider your spectra becomes, the wider your possibilities about the future become. I think it behooves us to, at the very least, consider these futures, create plans for them, as in, well, if this doesn’t go this way, but that way, what does this actually mean? What are my contingency plans? What is my plan B, C, and D so that when this future hits, you actually have a chance to navigate this and not fall into amygdala screaming at you, fight or flight, and as Scott mentioned, getting your nervous systems all riled up.

Lisa: Yes. I often think the crisis is not the time to do your first planning about the future because you’re in a state. You’re in a state that is wired for reaction and defense and protection when we need generative, responsive, imaginative thinking. The time to do it for the first rung, and I love that you brought up an athlete metaphor, is not during high-stakes competition. You got to practice well before you’re in that final championship moment.

You’ve spent a lot of time working with leaders to get them to flex those muscles. I think that it can be very hard to even realize that you’re operating within an official future within a certain way, let alone to pause and break out and be like, “Oh, yes, we should allocate time.” At a time where I feel most crunched to do, I need to pause and think or imagine. What are some of the ways that you get executives, leaders more comfortable that this is actually a better investment of where they’re spending their energy, rather than the pressure to just go, go, go?

Pascal: The first step, I think, is just acknowledging the fact that you have an official future. One of the things I love to do is I just ask people, what’s the future of your company? Where do you see it? What’s the vision? Often, you find that there is a very clear, very well-articulated version of the future. Then these executives tap themselves on the shoulder, which is amazing, and they’re like, “Oh, my God, look how aligned we are.”

We all say the same thing. That’s fine. Alignment is great. I also then point out to them, it’s like, “Okay, so great. If this is your future, what happens if the following shock happens to your system? What do you do?” Then you see the cogs in their heads spinning and turning. A way I like to phrase this up for people is I like to actually go one step earlier and talk a little bit about how can we actually see, spot the future?

I always like to point out to people, in hindsight, it was very obvious that, for example, mobile phones have taken over the world and we’re all on mobile devices now. Smartphones are everywhere. In reality, it’s actually interesting because when you go back in time, you could have seen that future decades before it unfolded. A lot of executives, if you’re old enough, you remember the Palm Pilot, the original personal digital assistant.

Lisa: The OG.

Pascal: The OG, exactly. I recently bought one on eBay because I wanted to have one again. I used to have one way back then, but I wanted to have another physical device. It cost me only $5 US. The interesting thing is, you look at this device, and it looks exactly like an iPhone. It’s the same form factor. It has this full screen display. It has apps on it. The funny thing is, this thing came out a good 12, 13 years before the iPhone was even launched.

There’s this really interesting piece in there, which is when you look at these crummy versions, early versions of what the future could be, we have this tendency to look at the future and ask ourselves, what is it today? It’s a personal digital assistant that doesn’t really do anything, whatever. I can put my address book on it, and that’s about it. Instead of asking ourselves, what could it be in the future?

Alan Watts once said, the problem with humans is that we don’t look at things, we overlook them. I think it’s so interesting and so powerful. There’s a reason for this because we tend to reason by analog. We like to look at stuff and compare it to the things we already know. It makes sense because it allows us to make decisions really quickly. Jeff VanderMeer, he’s a science fiction author, once said that the challenge is that, “By reasoning by analog, you miss the future because the future doesn’t look like the thing you already see.”

He has this really beautiful line. He said, “A circle looks at a square and sees a badly made circle.” That’s exactly what happens to us. We look at squares all the time. You can see the future, but we want them to be circles because that’s the thing we expect and want. To your question about how do you see more of the future is, you mentioned this earlier, I really like this notion around curiosity.

I think that is the most important muscle you need to stretch when you want to think about the future. Become curious about the future. Then, yes, there is tools and frameworks on how you do this more systematically and whatever, but the moment you become curious and just sit there, and you’re like, “Huh, what could this mean? What could it look like? What are the implications of that?” Once you start doing that, you see so much more of the future.

Lisa: You have so many wonderful ways that you share the future with others, including newsletters and Substack. I love the section in the radical briefing that says, thin whispers of tomorrow. You’re basically handing. You’re like, “This may not be on your radar yet, but this is what’s going on.” One of the things that you and our dear friend and your colleague Jeffrey Rogers introduced me to years ago, years ago, plural, was the idea of digital humans and Little Miquela and what was happening with Little Miquela as really a thin whisper of tomorrow.

Of now the conversations that we are having that’s creating strikes in Hollywood and has actors all up in a tizzy. You saw that. You could have imagined that. I wonder, for those that don’t know about Little Miquela, can you talk a little bit about Little Miquela and why she represents really a thin whisper of tomorrow that many people, I love that, overlooked?

Pascal: Yes. Little Miquela, I have to admit, I became pretty obsessed about her. She’s like the OG. A little bit of a background, years ago, literally five, six years at least, a marketing agency based out of LA called Brood created a digital human, young female, 19-year-old, eternally 19-year-old female, and started putting her on Instagram. She is very human-looking, so there’s very little of that uncanny valley effect to her. She looks very human.

If you look very closely, you can see that she’s rendered, that she’s a computer animation, but she looks very human. Then they started making, essentially, fashion photo shoots with her, placing her into the classic fashion photo shoot backgrounds, and put her on Instagram. She amassed some 2 million followers on Instagram. Phil believed a good chunk of them don’t even know that she’s not real, that she isn’t physical.

Lisa: She does seem to have the best life.

Pascal: She has an amazing life. She also has always perfect skin, I just want to point that out. She never ages. For the last seven years, I’ve followed her for six years, she has not aged a year. What is fascinating about her is when I first came across her, I had this moment where I was like, wow, isn’t that interesting? This is so weird. It’s weird because A, a lot of people follow her. B, she’s churning out content.

Then she started, or the agency behind her, she isn’t real, but they started getting sponsorship deals. She showed up with fashion brands, wearing specific fashion brands in her shoots. She became a spokesperson for Pacsun. She made a very, very, very funny short appearance as a spokesperson for WD40, which is a lubricant.

Lisa: Oh my gosh.

Pascal: An engine lubricant, I should say, because she admitted that she’s a robot, and as a robot, that’s her skincare practice. Very funny. Yes, the funny thing is, again, you saw this six years ago. The point I made about this is, just think about it, first of all, what it means for the fashion industry and fashion models, because Little Miquela doesn’t age. Her skin is always perfect. She will never complain about working 24-7.

She can be in 15 places at the same time because she doesn’t need to physically travel anywhere. She can be replicated. You clearly can tune her to whatever liking and cultural context you want. Then we make the connection to, so imagine these were static images, but imagine what this will look like when she becomes really animated, and then you get into movies. That is what you mentioned now, Hollywood going nuts about what we see with OpenAI Sora AI generation video model.

Before that, even, we had a Korean pop star, Kitsune, who’s also computer-generated, but commands tens of thousands of people going to stadium tours looking at a screen of a computer-generated artist. It is fascinating to see, and it also brings up interesting questions going back to the humanity, as in, what does this actually mean for us in terms of our arts, of what we value, how we consider art, what is art? Lots to unpack there, but yes, goes back to the point of you can see the future if you look carefully.

Pascal: You’re willing to look beyond the official future. If you’re a traditional ad advertising and you’re seeing that, you’re thinking that’s a fad. That would never happen because. A lot of times, when I run futures workshops or scenario planning with executives, I have very few rules. One of the most important rules I say is you could never say that would never happen because. You have to train yourself to say, what if? What if that happened?

I know you, and I spend a lot of time scaffolding that for executives. One of our favorite activities to do is to look at the future’s implication wheel, to take something in plain sight, like digital humans, like Little Miquela, and say, “Okay, if this is happening here, then what could happen? Then what could happen? Then what could happen?” Pretty quickly, with just asking that question, you get into some very fantastical futures.

It really starts with curiosity. Are you willing to go there? Versus shutting it down to say that would never happen because. One pattern that I have found, and I’m curious to hear your perspectives on it, because I’ve run that exercise with lots of different audiences, the more senior folks tend to stop out at the second-order implication. They just can’t go.

If you take a middle schooler or even elementary school, no problem. I’m getting to fourth implications, maybe I’m getting to unicorns, maybe I’m going somewhere else, but they’re just much more fluid in their willingness to go to places that are uncomfortable. I wonder if you could share some patterns that you’ve seen and how maybe we can rewire ourselves to get more comfortable with those outer edges.

Pascal: I’ve seen the exact same thing. I used to be on the digital advisory board for Pearson, the world’s largest learning company. We had these long conversations about learning and the future of learning and so on. One thing which stuck to me was one of the leaders there made this comment saying, “The thing is, when you look at children, kids, they have curiosity in abundance.” That’s how they see the world. That’s how they operate. They always ask why and what if, and to the extent that if you are a parent of a young child, it’s annoying because they’re all the time.

Then the unfortunate reality is we sent them to school and literally beat it out of them because our schooling system really is, and I can’t blame anyone for it, but the schooling system really is about don’t ask questions, find the answer. What you and I and all of our colleagues in this space do is we go back to people and say, “You need to be curious. You need to start asking questions instead of finding the answer.’ I see the exact same pattern.

The more senior the person is, the more somewhat, and this is overgeneralization, but the more narrow they tend to be in their worldview. The other thing I find is particularly when we do this implications wheel, or we call it a disruption map exercise, where you look at a trend, a disruptor, and then you ask yourself, what are the implications? Then you go from there and say, what are the implications of those implications?

In my setup, I always, and I’m really curious to hear how you do this, I always tell people, when you get to the outer edges of this, like the moment you get to the second, third, fourth order implications, it’s interesting because you don’t actually even need to go back anymore. It’s only forward. You ask yourself, if this becomes true, what does this world look like?

I find that particular business-minded people have a hard, hard time of not tying it directly back to the business, directly back to the original line. That limits you in what you can see and what is possible for you. The thing I love about this exercise and I highly recommend it to people to try this out. As a matter of fact, we actually have a fully self-run free course on our website, so you can check that out.

Lisa: I will definitely link that.

Pascal: What I love about this exercise is I really fundamentally believe that once you’ve done it maybe twice, maybe three times, it rewires your brain. You can’t go through the world without asking yourself, what are the implications of the implication? I’ll give you a simple example. I was recently in Bentonville, Arkansas. This is the home of Walmart. It’s a small town in the middle of the US. I flew into the airport. It’s a relatively small airport.

I saw a robotic barista in the airport. One of these, literally robot arms making your coffee. I was flabbergasted. I stood in front of that thing for 10 minutes. I was like, “This is so weird,” because this is Bentonville, Arkansas. It’s not Silicon Valley. The only other place I’ve seen that thing is in San Jose Airport. That was my first thought. I was like, “That’s so weird.” It’s like, “What’s going on here?”

Then my second thought was like, “Hey, wait a second. If we have these things here, what does this actually look like?” Then you get into this crazy world, as you mentioned. My first thought was like, “Oh, man, if you run concession stands in the airport, if you are the person who runs the concession stands in the airport, you have a problem,” because currently, if you have a Starbucks in there, that’s like, I don’t know, 500, 1000 square feet. That thing is only 20 square feet. It’s tiny. Number one.

Number two is I was like, “Oh, my God, who is the barista today?” It’s a student who’s pays off his student loans. We don’t need baristas anymore, so no more student loan payoffs. Then I thought about Starbucks famously claims the third space. Starbucks being the third space, homework Starbucks. These things are clearly not the third space. We lose the third space. All these implications.

Then you can think about what are the implications of that? Again, I stood there for 10 minutes. My head was exploding. I think everybody just looked at me like I’m a complete weirdo. Then the weirdest thing happens. While I’m standing there, there’s a human who comes to the machine, who services the machine. What the human did is he opens the back and pulls out the trash. He pulls out the spent coffee beans, essentially. I’m sitting there, and I’m like, “Oh, my God, is this the future of humanity?” The machines make the barista Starbucks coffee for us, and we as humans are there to pull the trash out.

Lisa: Oh, my gosh. Oh, my God. There’s so much to unpack in that example. One is the fact that you even noticed it at all. It’s hard to notice if you’re walking through the airport with your head on your phone just looking at your text. One is the noticing, which I think you are just unbelievable at, observing, noticing from anywhere, use everything. The other is then pausing to question. I wonder what this means. Could this mean this?

Then the third is then the implications of this, the synthesis. What’s going on? The human is servicing the robot. We’re taking this small example, but what could that look like at scale? Of course, that’s a question everybody’s asking right now. What is the future of work? How do we think about the skills and the jobs of the future?

What I appreciate in just that small example is that we’re all capable of imagining it, of just starting with what we have and where we are, giving ourselves space and time to say, I wonder what that means, and then going and using that as your research agenda. Who else is doing it? If we’re doing this for coffee, is that also happening with bartenders? Yes. Yes, it is. Is it also happening with caregivers, maybe in an area that’s more desperate to service that market, like in Japan, that’s having a demography crisis? Yes, it is. That’s the birth of emotional robots.

What I like about that is that while there aren’t answers, it is advancing your understanding of it through the questioning, and it’s connecting it, and it’s a process. Listen, Pascal, I have great memories of, again, being back at Singularity, and you used to facilitate this week-long program for executives to come in and basically get cliff notes to the future. That’s how I would describe it. It’s like, “Hey, you want to understand where technology is coming, you can either hire a very expensive research firm or create a staff position, or you can come for a week and go touch the future and then bring that back.”

You were the master facilitator doing that. One of my favorite aspects of watching you do that is that every morning you would come in with some new, going back to thin whispers of tomorrow, and you would have the deadline while you were sleeping. It was mind-blowing because you were modeling, again, that cycle, observing, questioning implications. Now’s my chance to ask, how did you do that? How did you do that? That was incredible.

Pascal: Good old days at Singularity. Before we get to the how did you do that, I just want to make one comment. Because I think it’s, having reflected back at my time at Singularity, and I was at Singularity for, I don’t know, five years or so, it was a decent chunk of my professional career. Clearly, the two of us had this amazing fortune to meet each other there. I will never forget the moment we actually met.

We were sitting in the back of the room. You were being introduced to me as like, “Oh, here’s a new faculty member, facilitator.’ You gave me a copy of your book. Never forget that. The one thing I found interesting about Singularity now in hindsight is that, funny enough, Singularity presented you a version of the future. Really interesting. Singularity had a very official version of its own future, which was very techno-driven and very advanced.

There was lots to like about it and lots to learn from it. I think what we failed to do was to give a much broader spectrum of possible futures rather than just the, and this is how it’s going to be. Someone much smarter than I am once mentioned to me that if someone gives you a future, they always have something to sell to you. You always should ask yourself, what are they selling?

Now, that aside, a thing I did there, and I loved doing this, was literally while our participants were in the classroom and then also in the evening, I just scoured the web and looked for what are the headlines literally for this day. When you start doing that, and you’ve got enough sources, and to this day I read hundreds of blogs and news sites, et cetera, and I don’t really read them, I skim them. I don’t spend all that much time on them, but I skim them.

It is very easy to find, honestly, every single day, something crazy, amazing, weird happens. Some new breakthrough in robotics, something in chemistry, some bio experiment run wild. Now, clearly, every day there seems to be a headline about AI. I loved pulling those out and just showing people, listen, within only 24 hours, all of this stuff happens. The reason was less about the individual item. It’s really never about this particular item.

It’s about two things for me. One is trends. As in, if I see a lot of stuff happening in, I don’t know, a specific area of robotics, I know that there’s heat coming. There’s some steam, there’s pressure evolving, and there is something happening in this area, so it behooves me to look closer to the area itself. The second one is really, for me, was just to get people to get a bit more of a practice of just continue to look at the internet.

My personal practice is, like when I wake up and have my first coffee, I spend a good 20, 30 minutes just going through my headlines. At least for my brain, what happens is the more I see something, so when I see a specific headline, a specific thing, if it reoccurs, if I see it multiple times, multiple sources, it just indicates that this is not just like flash in a pan, but it’s something I should pay attention to. For me, it’s the best way to see the future. I can outsource it. This is the nice thing. I don’t even need to do the hard work. I can just have tons and tons and tons of people do the work for me, and all I need to do is synthesize it.

Lisa: Yes, it’s such a brilliant practice that is so available to us right now that we could do if we allocate the time. Of course, our attention is the thing that is most valuable these days, so the attention to pay attention and to go wide as a part of your practice, I think, is such a valuable takeaway. It reminds me, Sam Wineburg, who is a professor at Stanford, came up with this idea of historical thinking.

He’s been doing a lot of work around civic reasoning, and he talks about lateral thinking, which is what I hear you talking about. He said, “When Wikipedia came on the stage,” which I know is something you’ve thought about around open source information, spending a lot of time at Mozilla, ‘Teachers are like, don’t go to Wikipedia. That’s terrible. Don’t go to Wikipedia.” He is like, “Go to Wikipedia,” because it has already collected lots of different bits.

It’s basically allowed you that first place of seeing where a lot of sources come together, and then go to the bottom and decide to go deep. It is that blend of lateral thinking. This is what he says good fact-checkers do, versus anchoring too deep on one expert only to find out that one expert was, in fact, no expert at all. I think that’s just such a valuable way of making sure you are touching the future, but doing it in a way that doesn’t consume you or overwhelm you.

It’s time-boxed, and you’re doing it in a way that fosters curiosity. It reminds me, you have such a great quote in your book from our friend Kyle Nel, who used to be the head of innovation of Lowe’s, who said something like, “You don’t want to be overwhelmed, and you don’t want to be underwhelmed.” You just want to be whelmed. I thought that, how do we get into that state of whelmed?

Being open, being generative, being willing to take in information, but not so triggered that we go into a defensive stance where we are rejecting it. I think that’s both an internal practice and also an organizational practice that we can think about. I want to use that as a question for you, Pascal, about helping organizations become more adaptive.

I think you talked about helping organizations become anti-fragile as a way of not future-proofing, which is like-- ugh, I can’t stand it when people say that. There we go. I just said it. I said it out loud. I can’t stand it. Because it’s not one thing. It’s a series of behaviors and practices, and even culture. I wonder if you could share a little bit about what that means to you.

Pascal: Yes, there’s a lot to unpack there. For me, the whole notion around anti-fragility is really anchored in this idea that you hear a lot of companies do-- By the way, this is my trigger word, which is resilient. You hear a lot of companies who are like, “Oh, we need to become resilient.” There’s nothing wrong with resiliency. The challenge is resilience allows you to absorb a shock, but you only absorb it.

I find it really fascinating how do you create systems and organizational structures which actually allow you to grow, triggered by shocks, like changes. Nature is full of it. Our whole ecosystem, everything is full of it. If you break your bone, the place where your bone reattaches and regrows is stronger than the surrounding bone tissue. If you go to the gym, it’s a good example. It’s like you actually exert micro tears to your muscles. You overexert your muscles. You actually damage your muscles so that they can grow back stronger than they were before.

In organizations, we tend to not do that. There’s lots which has been written by, for example, Taleb, who wrote the book Antifragile, which is an excellent book. He looks at it from the macro. I really like to look at it from a very practical, like what do you actually do as a company? For me, it has a lot to do with understanding that, first of all, you need to acknowledge the fact that there’s a good chunk of your company or organization which you have to run with minimal risk.

You need to protect it because this is where you get your cash cow from. This is what pays for everything. Then the other side of it, you need to actually take some extreme risks. The stuff in the middle is actually really stupid. You have some risk, but it also doesn’t really pay off. Go out and try things out. Then this, for me, has a lot to do with your willingness and your ability to try things out. Failing.

You had the amazing Dan Klein on this wonderful podcast, who talks all about how do you actually fail better and forward and positive. I think that is so incredibly important for organizations to embed and become better at. I think that’s the first step you want to get to is how you actually can do lots of small experiments, learn from them, create this learning culture inside of your organization. I think that’s the initial starting point.

Lisa: I love that. It reminds me of an earlier conversation I also had on this podcast with my mother who was the first chief learning officer that I ever met. Of course, to meet her as a mom, where we would have dinner conversations that were about the conversations, the learning that mattered, it gave me a lens that learning was the most valuable skill that you could learn and that you could help create in your cultures and for others.

Increasingly, I’ve been thinking about that the chief learning officer is also the chief futures officer. We cannot have an antifragile organization if we really don’t have a learning organization. Of course, it was Peter Senge in the Wayback Machine that helped us understand the power of systems thinking and the power of the learning organization, and why that’s so important. I maybe want to close with just a question for you about what’s exciting you these days and how we can all become a part of that learning journey with you.

Pascal: This is a really good question. First of all, thank you so much for the bouquet of flowers you just handed me. Trust me, you don’t want to have a Pascal Finette in your organization. First of all, I think I’m unemployable by now. I’ve just worked for myself for way too long. Secondly, I don’t think any organization needs any more white, bald dudes in their leadership position, so please don’t. Hire more women and people of color. You want diversity.

What really excites me at the moment, I think, is that given the overall situation we find ourselves in globally, it feels to me that this is a really fascinating moment in time where we have maybe a reawakening for people. I see so many more people just in the last six months, basically, coming to me and talking about much more meaningful topics, as in not how do we increase our quarterly profits or what’s the next technology, but really asking thorny questions about, what is the role of my organization in society? How do I support my community? How do I support my people?

I do believe that there’s an interesting glimmer of hope for us here. Again, regardless of where you stand, I don’t care, and it’s globally, for us to reimagine what the world should look like for us in this particular context, in a context where we live alongside and with technology, which is just getting more powerful by the minute. I’m very hopeful about what the future will hold for us.

Lisa: I love that. It reminds me of the last line in your book, which I turn to again and again, where you say, “Let’s dream, disrupt disruption, and build what matters; the future is ours to create.” Thank you, my friend, for providing that clarity amid the ambiguity that we find ourselves in, and for bringing the humanity forward in such a beautiful way. Thank you for being here.

Pascal: Lisa, thank you so much for having me. That was an amazing conversation.

Lisa: I’m so glad you got to hear this conversation with Pascal Finette. He inspires me to ask new questions, and I hope he’s done the same for you. Maybe this week, you’ll have one conversation where you ask a genuine what-if. Maybe it’s at home, at work, with a friend, and resist the urge to shut it down or to solve it right away. Let’s keep our minds open. If you found this episode valuable, please consider sharing it, leaving a rating, or writing a review. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thanks for listening to How We Future, and I’ll see you next time.

The best way to unstick the present is to think further into the future.

In this episode of How We Future, Lisa Kay Solomon sits down with Aditi Juneja, Executive Director of Democracy 2076, to explore how thinking 50 years ahead can break down current obstacles and make seemingly unrealistic hopes feel very possible. Democracy 2076 helps us plan democracy not for the next election cycle, but for the next 50 years, all the way to America’s tricentennial in 2076.

The conversation reveals how the media we consume shapes our perception of what democracy looks like. From Scandal normalizing election fraud to The West Wing making some viewers think our government is running smoothly, Aditi’s research uncovers how TV shows and movies are quietly teaching us civics.

You’ll also hear:

• Why a 50-year timeline makes change feel possible instead of impossible

• What happens when people sit down to design constitutional amendments together

• Why we need to give people a menu of possibilities, not just ask them to imagine the future

The episode closes with practical advice for staying resilient in noisy political times. Thank you, Aditi, for joining How We Future!

Links from the episode:

• Democracy 2076

• Report co-authored with Harmony Labs on how media shapes people’s attitudes about the problems facing democracy

• The Long-Term Futures Work of Building a Better Democracy

• A Constitution for 2076

• Pro-Democracy Political Coalitions for 2076

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Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow, starting today.

What if the future of democracy is something we deliberately design? This week, I’m talking with Aditi Juneja, founder of Democracy 2076. Aditi is thinking further than the next election cycle; in fact, further than many election cycles. She’s asking us to imagine democracy 50 years from now, and then work backwards to figure out what we need to change today.

We explore why expanding our time horizon can remove the constraints of making us feel stuck, how the media we consume, from Scandal to Star Wars, shapes what we believe is possible, and why different audiences need different narratives to imagine a democracy that works. Aditi shares advice on how to stay resilient in noisy political times, why being a doer beats being a news consumer, and how to push for 50-year visions instead of just four-year plans. Let’s jump in with Aditi.

Aditi, I am so happy to welcome you to How We Future. We met last year. You’re one of those people where I learned about your work, and I was like, “Wait, what? I want to put everything under my pillow immediately.” You’re doing what, in what way, for what reason? Amazing. We are going to tap into all of that and really give more listeners a chance to learn about you and your work because I think it is just so powerful the way you are trying to reframe democracy. Welcome to How We Future, and we’re so glad you’re here.

Aditi Juneja: Thank you so much. I’m so glad to be here.

Lisa: Let’s start with your organization, audaciously called Democracy 2076. That is not around the corner. That is in the far distance. I wonder if you could just talk a little bit about what the organization is and how you came to start it.

Aditi: Democracy 2076, the goal is to try to help us reimagine democracy for the next generation. The reason we named it Democracy 2076 was because I kept finding that when I would try to talk to people about big, audacious goals for the future, they would say, “That’s not possible. You can’t do that. There are all these constraints.” I found that when I said, “Well, what if we try to do it over 50 years?” they were like, “Well, anything can happen over 50 years.” It was really about trying to expand people’s imagination of what is possible, which feels desperately needed in this moment.

Lisa: I love that. I often hear in futures work that expanding the time horizon is actually a liberating force as opposed to a constricting force. In fact, it’s sometimes easier to imagine bolder solutions in the longer term than immediately, but our attention is focused on the immediate. We’re trapped in this cycle of the urgent overtakes the important sometimes. I think even the framing of it gives people, first of all, intrigue, like, “What? What is happening?” Also, an opportunity to move beyond the “Well, that would never happen because,” which is the killer.

Aditi: If you’re stuck in “that will never happen because,” when the thing changes that you think is the because, you don’t know what to do. If you’re thinking, well, we could never pass constitutional amendments because Republicans wouldn’t allow X thing to happen or Democrats wouldn’t allow Y thing to happen, and then suddenly Democrats change their position on X or Republicans change their position on Y, you’re flabbergasted. You’ve never thought about a future where these constraints didn’t exist.

It makes you a lot less adaptable as well if you’re really only imagining and planning within a very strong set of constraints. Whereas if you’ve thought about a broader range of possibilities, then as the context shifts and the circumstances evolve, you’re much more agile, which isn’t about visioning and imagination and the woo-woo of it all. It is a very tactical, pragmatic approach to being a better change agent in the world.

Lisa: I totally agree. One of the things that I really appreciate about what you’re doing is that you’re stretching our belief around what could be, and you’re also building the capacity of the people that you’re working with. You don’t do this solo. You’re very much a coalition builder and someone that is trying to do this collectively that stretches us, but also has the relevance of now. I wonder, again, if you could talk just about your approach around balancing those two things of being so pie in the sky that it’s like, “Okay, this is fantasy land with Aditi, but I really got to get back to my real work.” How do you think about those two things?

Aditi: It’s interesting that thinking 50 years into the future feels like fantasy land to people because when you ask people about 1972, that doesn’t feel like fantasy land. It’s the same distance from the present. I’m very often in conversations where people are making references to the Civil Rights Era or to Reconstruction or to the Gilded Age, but somehow thinking that far into the future feels just impossible to people. It’s just an interesting thing about the flexibility of our minds. Civil Rights Era, that just happened, but 2076, that’s a fantasy far in the future, which is just an interesting thing about the human mind.

For us, it’s not that I naturally love coalitions. Anyone who’s run or worked in coalition knows that there are frustrating aspects about it. There’s the old adage that you can’t go far if you try to go solo. For the types of changes we’re talking about, the scale of things we’re talking about, it is a field-wide, society-wide effort. I think that is paralyzing for people. When you talk about constitutional change, people are like, “That’s two-thirds of Congress. That’s 38 states.” I’m like, “Okay, so let’s bring together leaders from across the 50 states and build a strategy.”

I think a lot of people hear two-thirds of Congress, 38 states, and just stop, as opposed to thinking, “Wow, that’s a lot of people. That’s really hard. What would you need to do to make that happen?” Then what we found is when you start naming what you need to do, the things that feel impossible start to feel possible. We had a gathering last year where we brought together national and state partners to think through the strategy for amending the Constitution. What are the activities you need to do 15, 30, 45 years? Put a dollar amount on it.

From the start to the end of the convening, people’s confidence that we could amend the Constitution went up 30%. Just sitting down and taking the time to try to make a plan. We didn’t give them any guidance on how to make the plan. We didn’t know the answer either. Being able to do it with other people is really powerful because we all have a piece of the puzzle. It doesn’t matter what you’re doing. Whether it’s policy or advertisement or marketing, whatever your realm is, you just can’t do things alone. If you can come to it with your piece of the puzzle and others can come to it with theirs, it’s much more than the sum of its parts.

A lot of our work I see as coordinating and catalyzing, where we’re coordinating a set of actors who are all holding a disparate piece of the pie. Then we’re catalyzing where we’re beginning to see gaps. Where we’re like, oh, there’s no one working on this, but there’s someone who’s well situated to do it. Can we go to them and say, “Hey, would you consider stepping into this type of role?”

Lisa: I love that research that even our mindset can shift. Even if we didn’t land at an answer, by just engaging in it, it changes our stance towards agency and our posture towards possibility. Unrelated but kind of related, we recently had Chip Conley on, who is really focused on learning to love midlife. He has this reframe that we should not be thinking about midlife as a crisis, but as a chrysalis. He brings in research from a Yale professor that says even just changing our mindset towards aging improves our lifespan by seven and a half years.

There’s this interesting thing that just even by engaging with the frame that we can improve the probability that we can make a difference, which is so critical in this moment where we feel so powerless and lacking agency. I would just add one more thing to that. I love that catalyzing and curating is that you’re framing. Yes, it’s audacious, but you’re shrinking it in a container that makes it manageable. Specifically, you have three big, I would call, frames or projects. There’s one around the constitution, 2076, that you just mentioned, one around imagining 2076, which I really want to get into — I just think that work is fascinating — and one around coalitions, 2076.

Maybe we’ll start a little bit more with the constitution, 2076. I think that was your first effort to try to really interrogate what is possible if we take a longer timeframe. Maybe you could just share a little bit more about that project.

Aditi: It originated actually back in 2019 when I was still at Protect Democracy, and we were having conversations about how we got into the authoritarian crisis. There are two things that are a little bit unique about our constitution. It’s the oldest constitution in the world. Most other countries have had to rewrite their constitution in the 20th century after World War II, either because colonization ended or because of World War II. Ours is the most enduring one. We have two big problems with it. One is there’s inbuilt minoritarianism. What that means is that democracy is supposed to be governance by will of the majority, but we have systems and structures that make it anti-majoritarian.

The Senate is an example of that. The Electoral College is an example of that. The Supreme Court is an example of that. There are these ways where the majority of Americans’ voices are not heard. Often when I think about legislation, for example, where 80% of Americans across the political spectrum agree, there is a compromised position on abortion that most Americans agree on. There is a compromised position on gun rights that most Americans agree on, but it doesn’t get through Congress. Why is that? It usually gets held up in the Senate, which is a minoritarian institution. That’s one problem.

Then the second is our constitution only has negative rights. The framing of our constitution is we have our rights from God. We are endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights. The government is not allowed to infringe on those rights. The government will not infringe upon our freedom of speech. It’s a lot of shall not. Constitutions go through trends, and in the 20th century, it became much more trendy to have positive rights. Then constitutions became social contracts. It became an answer to the question of what do we owe one another. We owe each other a right to education. We owe each other a right to vote. Our constitution doesn’t have any of that.

That can feel like a theoretical exercise, but for your ordinary citizen who feels frustrated about healthcare subsidies or with their SNAP benefits ending, they don’t have recourse. They can’t sue their government and say, “You’re supposed to provide me food. You’re supposed to make sure I have access to health. You’re supposed to make sure that I can vote.” You don’t have that recourse. A lot of these processes end up being lawyers filing lawsuits about process issues. Process issues feel very disconnected from people’s everyday lives. It feels confusing that surely I pay taxes. Doesn’t the government owe me something? That feels like a gap in our constitution.

As I said, we brought together organizers from across the country to begin running a strategic foresight exercise, looking at different possible futures and asking the question, what do we need to change between now and then so we can have a representative, responsive, and effective government so that no matter what happens, whether it’s climate change or another big technological boom, that we can be adaptive and meet the needs of our citizens.

Lisa: I love that reframe. Again, this idea of we’re here today, this is built on this history. Does it reflect our preferred future? How might we change elements of it without blowing it up, having a total revolution to get closer to where we are today? How do we maybe take the best of the enduring elements, but also not be afraid to question the things that are not serving us? I love the framing. This, in some ways, gets to the next project that I want to talk about around Imagine 2060, which is, I mean, fascinating. I can’t even believe you took on a third project after this one because there’s so much to unpack there.

One of the biggest takeaways of that was, where do we learn civic education? This idea even that the constitution was built on shall nots, I don’t think most people know that. I wonder if we could talk a little bit about imagining 2076, which was really about civic awareness, civic education, storytelling and narrative and where it shows up in our daily life, and some of the insights that that fostered around just-- well, I would say no fault, but there are systems in place that are essentially not prioritizing us to be an informed civic body. Where do we even get our information about what we believe to be true or not regarding what democracy should be doing or not doing?

Anyway, maybe just start with talking about Imagining 2076, and I’ve got so many questions about it.

Aditi: The origination of this project, which I think is worth sharing to answer your question, was after the 2020 election, as the big lie took hold, I was really struck by the fact that one of the most popular shows on TV for the six years prior was Scandal. On that show, the president stole an election by altering a voting machine, killed a Supreme Court justice, and killed a reporter to cover it up, and then won reelection. It really sparked a question for me of, what are we normalizing? When Trump goes on Fox and says Dominion Voting stole this election, you can’t actually do that.

It’s not possible to alter voting machines in the way that they were describing, but everyone says, “Yes, it is. I watched it for six years on ABC. It was the most popular show on Thursday nights.” When I watch Scandal, as someone with a lot of civic education and a lot of experience, I know where they’re pushing the boundary, and this is silly, versus where it’s real. Most Americans don’t know that. Only about half of Americans have had any civic education, and if they have, it was one time in high school. About 42% of Americans actively avoid political news. They’re not reading the paper. They’re not even seeing politics on their TikTok; they’re scrolling past it. They’re actively trying to avoid it.

That means where they’re learning it is in entertainment media. It’s in the TV shows they watch, it’s in the movies they watch, and they’re not all scandals. I heard yesterday that people watching a Black president on 24 might have been the reason we got Obama. It’s a really mixed bag. I think that in the democracy space, culture and pop culture in particular is really undervalued. We did a set of research with Harmony Labs that came out earlier this year to really understand what depictions of democracy and government look like in film and TV.

Then this year, so it’ll be out in January, we did another set of research to really understand what are the stories that help different audiences feel a sense of agency and imagination for the future, because the stories we tell ourselves are just everything. The stories you tell yourself about middle age affect your lifespan. Surely, the stories we’re telling ourselves about our democracy and whether it can improve and whether we can do something to improve affect whether we vote, affect whether we think it’s worth participating at all, and affect how we choose to participate, because do we even know what we want to change? Do we know what we’re trying to get to?

Lisa: I just think it is so captivating. The futures nerd in me, when I saw and heard about that research that you’re doing, thought about this concept called The Image of the Future that comes from Fred Polak, who is a Holocaust survivor. He’s a sociologist in his 20s, was saved by a Dutch family, and then in the ‘50s actually came to Stanford to try to understand how did Nazi Germany get this idea socialized of the destruction and cruelty and mass killing and death that they did. One of the conclusions he’s had was that the image that a society has about its future will dictate its behavior.

If you believe that a society is thriving and growing, then the culture will follow. The reverse is true, that if you see that the image is in decay or dystopic array, that will also then dictate just a decay of society. It’s so powerful, but it’s in the air. It’s not talked about enough. Your study was one of the most powerful and recent examples of really taking a look at this. How do the stories that we’re consuming influence our belief around what can be and what should be? I’m dating myself, but I’m certainly longing back for The West Wing. Let’s get The West Wing back. That was one of the first shows that really popularized discourse debate.

Again, I’m sure there was a whole lot of license taken, but it was a much more productive look at thoughtful individuals trying to be in public service in a different way than I think some of the certainly Scandal, the dystopic narrative.

Aditi: What’s interesting is we looked at West Wing in our research. It’s one of my favorite shows as well. What we saw is West Wing only moves to values-based audiences. There’s one who actually moves backwards on questions of democracy. For people power who like insider transformers, they have the attitude that you have about The West Wing. For people whose primary value is community, they approach it the way you did. Even for people whose primary value is order, they watch The West Wing, and they’re like, “They’re good people who are trying to return a system to order,” and they really like insiders.

For people who are more outsider-oriented and want to restore the system, they watch The West Wing and they think there are no problems in our democracy. The system works. Why do I need to do anything to change it? That’s why doing this type of research, I think, is really important because the stories I tell myself that inspire me for the future of democracy are really different than the stories you might tell yourself or the stories your average voter might tell themselves. We see this in all kinds of messaging. For anyone who’s done political messaging, you know the people who are worst at predicting what messaging resonates with voters are experts. You know too much.

If you work in this space and you think about democracy all day long, you’re like me. You watch Star Wars and you go, “This is a movie about democracy. It’s so great. Why didn’t anybody tell me?” Most people don’t watch it and think that. Most people don’t go to the Barbie movie and leave going, “Man, why did they have to disenfranchise men at the end? Why couldn’t it be one person, one vote?” That’s not most people’s reaction. This type of research is really important to understand how different audiences need different stories, because the stories that work for me do not work for Trump voters. They are different stories.

Particularly in a moment where we have authoritarian crisis, it’s really important for us to understand for the people who are susceptible to authoritarian appeals that exist in our politics right now, what are the stories they need to be able to imagine a future of democracy that works?

Lisa: Yes, it’s such an important point. Thank you so much for naming it and calling it out. The research also similarly seemed to suggest that, like Maverick’s, people working outside the system also had an appeal. Whether it was-- I think you talked about richer or white-collar folks that had a more rebellious side of changing the system. That that was actually a strong motivator towards action than, as you said, defending the status quo or just suggesting everything is fine here, nothing to see.

Aditi: The White Collar one actually really sparked something for me because it’s about an outsider changing the system, but that outsider can also be a criminal. That really made it clear to me why Donald Trump’s 17 indictments bounced off him like Teflon because there are people who watch hours of TV a day, whether it’s The Sopranos or White Collar, where an outsider criminal is improving the system. It fits a preexisting narrative that they have about how change happens.

Similarly, there are these them-versus-us Maverick stories about war, like Top Gun Maverick is an example. If you’re telling them-versus-us narratives, that really lands for people. They’re crime procedurals. That’s some people’s primary understanding of our government and our democracy. If you’re watching that, someone talking about what’s happening in Chicago or Baltimore, that all lands for you. It really struck me that Donald Trump intuitively really had an understanding of three of the four quadrants. He was talking to three of the four audiences at all times, whereas I think Harris and Biden really were only talking to one audience.

Lisa: Such an interesting way. For everybody listening, we will put a link to the full report, which is not only so rich in its insights, it’s also beautiful. It’s really fun to read and look at, and has fantastic graphics that situate the reader in these different quadrants. No political degree required in order to go and check that out. Aditi, I read that, and I was like — with no background in teaching civics, although as you know, I’ve tinkered and we can talk about that in a minute — I want to rewrite a new civics curricula that has Star Trek, Star Wars, Black Panther, White Collar, Top Gun, Barbie.

As you said, there’s so much to learn about what’s in there instead of the way that we tend to teach it, which is now go memorize these three branches and study what they mean, and then they forget it. One of the ways we first got connected was, I think you had heard about a program that I started back in 2019, ahead of the 2020 election, with-- again, I was a government major many years ago, but that’s it. I didn’t have, but I was like, what might design and futures offer young voters to help them feel more empowered to be engaged?

We have this very pervasive, and I think false, narrative that young people are apathetic. They don’t vote, the voting is low, low turnout, they must be apathetic. I just wanted to question that. I was like, “Is that true?” I don’t think that’s true. Maybe they’re undersupported. Maybe they feel like impostors. Maybe they feel put off because most of the civic information and systems are really hard to navigate. They’re poorly designed. I created a experimental class called Designing the President, which basically was around inviting young voters to think of themselves as hiring managers. Forget the whole you got to vote, shame, guilt, blame.

It was like, hey, when you turn 18, you become a hiring manager. That means you have power. That’s so cool. What are you going to do with that? Anyway, I went through then a process to help them deliberately think about, wow, if I’m a hiring manager, what am I hiring for? Where is the job of the president? Where does it live? Oh, there’s a job description. It’s Article 2 of the Constitution. That got us into a much more productive conversation about leadership qualities that would make someone good at this.

All of this is to say I think that your approach of deconstructing where we think about the future, how we think about the future of these democracies, that there’s so much more for us to take a look at than just what the pollsters or what the experts want us to view.

Aditi: Yes. I think there’s certainly a way of thinking about how you use pop culture to design civic education curriculums. Another way to think about it is when everyone is talking about a pop culture moment, how can you participate in the conversation that’s already happening? In an attention economy that we’re living in right now, it is so hard to get people’s attention. If we can be in the conversations that people are already having, talking about things they’re already interested in, helping them make connections, I think that’s really powerful.

Anne Helen Peterson has this quote. She says, “We talk about celebrities to talk about ourselves from a distance.” I’m butchering the quote a little bit. The idea is when we’re talking about-- when you’re like, “Why is everyone so obsessed with the Kardashians? Why are people online deconstructing the Wicked movie and whether it’s okay to support Elphaba? Should you feel bad for Glinda or is Glinda an accomplice?” That was a real conversation people were having after the Wicked movie. That’s a powerful conversation about your responsibility as a bystander and as someone who gets wrapped up into a system.

The conversation about Glinda is, is she a victim or is she a perpetrator by virtue of being an accomplice? That is not a conversation about a movie. That is a conversation about 2025 politics, but people are having it through the lens of this movie. If we’re not showing up for those conversations, we’re seeding them to the people who are.

Lisa: I love looking at that as an invitation to have it and an invitation to learn, as opposed to where we are right now, which is, I think, fleeing to the extremes and getting very uncomfortable when something doesn’t fit within our worldview. It’s in some ways similar to what we’re talking about. Stretching out the timeline to 2076 allows you to have a different conversation than what’s going to happen in the upcoming midterms or somewhere else. It changes the frame dramatically.

In my background and scenario planning, it’s one of the big benefits. It’s just much easier to agree in a longer timeframe. It’s much easier to have a thoughtful conversation maybe about Glinda and Elphaba, as it is about something that’s a little bit hotter at the moment. It gives us practice. It gives us flight hours.

Aditi: Yes, totally. You reach a whole different audience because 42% of people who are going to scroll past your political TikTok will sit and watch your TikTok about Wicked. It’s about who you can even reach because, again, we’re in an attention economy where the algorithms are controlling everything. If you’re trying to draw people to your conversation, that’s not going to work. I also think that, to your point on the longer timeframe, yes, you’re having a different conversation about the future, but that also then enables you to have a different conversation about the midterms.

Around healthcare subsidies, for example, I had a conversation with someone who works in health policy about a right to health, like a constitutional right to health. They were expressing to me this frustration that we go from the ACA is working to it’s trying to be torn down and we’re just going between those two polls, and we’re never moving past the ACA. I said, “Well, you don’t have to get into that trap. Instead of talking about subsidies and defending the ACA, you could be advocating for a right to health.” The response was, “If people don’t want the ACA, surely they’re not going to want a right to health.” I said, “Well, you don’t know that.”

The ACA has been very politicized. People like the ACA and hate Obamacare. There’s been so much information and polarization around this topic, but most people haven’t really thought about a right to health. It’s not a polarized, politicized issue. Wouldn’t it be worth finding out if you could have a different conversation? I’m not magic that that occurred to me. It’s that I was thinking about over the next 50 years, ideally, what do we want for our constitution? Which means then when we’re talking about an ACA fight on healthcare subsidies that shut down the government, I’m thinking about that in a different way. To me, that is the value.

The value is not, oh, Aditi will be prepared for 2076, so the rest of us don’t have to worry about it. The value is, can we do the present better?

Lisa: Absolutely. Can we expand the surface area and the optionality of what we’re looking at as possible levers rather than get caught in a conversation that somebody else framed? A couple of quick things come up. We also had a great opportunity to have a conversation with Dan Roam, who is the author of Back of the Napkin, how to solve complex problems with simple pictures. He is really a visual thinking guru and really talks about why visualizing the problem enables us to solve the problem. Again, I’ll call out that because of the visual way in which you are sharing your research, it is inviting different conversations, which I so appreciate.

He had this great story from when the ACA was in development, where it was like a 1,300-page bill with no pictures. It was causing all these debate like death panels and this and that and polarized. First of all, I’m sure nobody really read the 1,300-page bill. He locked himself in a room with a healthcare expert — he was not a healthcare expert — for a week to go through it. They drew something like 33 pictures to describe. Within a week, he put them up on SlideShare, which was like the slide-sharing moment. Within a week, it was the most downloaded SlideShare presentation ever. Then he was invited by the White House to come in.

My point is, this is the idea of when we feel stuck, maybe the answer is not retreat or just try harder, it’s look for different ways in. Look for ways that are inviting, that allow us to grow together, that allow us to have a different kind of conversation. It may just be The Hunger Games is the way in, or Elphaba or however. It reminds me also one more thing I’ll share. Last year, I created a gathering at the Stanford d.school called The Future is Happening, which was trying to do something similar to what you were doing around what if democracy goes right? How do we spark our imagination, not in a way that feels unrealistic but is built on bright spots of today?

This idea of why don’t we gather democracy makers, movers, and multipliers to learn from each other? Makers being innovators like you — you’re really all of them. Folks that are trying something new, whether it’s Amplifier art or Athletes Unlimited, which is this incredible new professional sports league that honors civic life. Movers being teachers, educators, and multipliers being networks and funders. What could we do if we learn from each other, taking a positive frame towards the future? The coalitions and the conversations and the experiments that follow just blew my mind just from changing the frame.

I just want to call out a specific finding in your work where you say seeing the future helps inspire imagination, just inviting them to see the future.

Aditi: When we look at the baseline numbers, over 70% of Americans across demographics understand there’s a problem. Less than half feel like they know what they should be doing about it, and less than a third feel like they can imagine the future. You were talking about having an image of the future and how that shapes our actions in the present. We see that in the exit polls from 2024. Americans who felt like America’s best days were ahead of us voted for Harris, and Americans who felt like our best days were behind us voted for Trump. Being able to imagine the future is so core to wanting to work for it. In the absence of that, it totally makes sense that you would be looking to the past and trying to figure out how to get back there. Or you’d be like, “I don’t know what it should be, so let’s just burn it all down anyway,” because you’re not clear on what you want to burn down and what you want to drive forward. I thought in the Constitution work, it was really interesting. There were people who came in with a burn-it-all-down mentality. Having to sit there and think about the long-term future and the institutions they would need, it actually was a really moderating force for people. That they were like, actually, free speech, good. Separation of powers, good.

There’s some of this stuff that we don’t like or some things we think we’re missing, but 80% of this is good. Forcing folks to get really clear on their vision for the future actually, in a lot of ways, moves you away from the whole system is rigged, it doesn’t matter what I do, we have no power, and allows you to be really precise about the changes that we need. When you have precision, then it’s not overwhelming. Then you have a tactic that you’re trying to achieve. People even said that to us about the Constitution work. “We do visioning exercises, but it feels like it’s all over the place. It’s so overwhelming.”

With amendments, there’s a clear process. Even if it’s a hard process, at least we know what to do. At least it’s concrete. I think that’s the other value of it. I think sometimes people think doing futures work is unwieldy, but I think it can actually really have this focusing effect, where you realize how much is working. You can become much more specific about what you want to keep, what you want to change, and what’s missing.

Lisa: I so appreciate that. You actually foreshadowed — ever the futurist — the question I was going to ask, which is that not everybody listening to this is deep in the political conversation as you are, or as I sometimes dabble in. I wondered what you’ve learned from applying foresight in this very real, very meaty, adaptive, wicked problem of sorts. What have you learned about the foresight practice, and maybe what others who are in organizations or trying to figure out how to help their teams or their companies have a longer lens? Just curious what’s come up.

Aditi: There are just some very basic principles of foresight that I think I found to be very important, which is that it really matters to have multiple futures. That is part of the foresight practice. I think that often when you’re doing visioning or projections, you are only thinking about one future. I think that makes us less resilient. It also makes us scared of the future. I also find that often people don’t want to have a conversation about the future because they’re scared about what might happen in the future. You need to be able to hold a thoughtful container for it. Often the way I invite people into that conversation is by simply saying what we’re doing right now is not working.

I’m not making promises of how I can fix things. I’m saying we need to experiment with other stuff. Let’s try this. I think for someone who’s inside of a company or an organization where there’s reticence, not trying to sell people hopes and dreams, but simply saying, “Hey, thinking on a two to five-year timeline isn’t working. Shouldn’t we at least try to find out if it changes something to think longer term?” Let’s find out. Let’s learn. I think that also of not overselling it, and it really being a practice.

Then I think the third is giving people a menu of options for the future. What I’ve seen in the constitution work, but I just came from an exercise on campaigns, is that people don’t have the innovations in their head already. Especially if you’re trying to bring together power brokers who have the power to make the changes, they are very ingrained in existing systems. If you’re at a company and you’re trying to think about how you can do direct-to-consumer marketing differently, the people who currently work on that team are not going to have the innovations in their mind.

I found having a menu of options from people — from other companies, other countries, other states — is actually really helpful in expanding their imagination. It gets people away from that’s not possible because it is possible. They do it in India, they do it in Georgia, they did it in ancient Greece, being able to give people a menu of possibilities. Not that they have to pick from those menu of options, but it helps just expand the range of what is possible. I think that in the absence of that, people can very clearly name what they don’t like about existing systems and processes, but really struggle with the alternative. You need a menu of alternatives in order to spark more conversation.

Lisa: Aditi, that is such gold insight for so many reasons. One is we often ask people, so what do you want in the future? They don’t know.

Aditi: They don’t know.

Lisa: Or they tell you what they think you want to hear, which is why I think from a research perspective, surveys can be so problematic, because they give this false sense that we know what people want when we really don’t know what they want. Giving them something to react to, to try to elicit what’s really going on, and to try to learn, as opposed to present or convince. It is such a different switch. Then that other piece that you said, which I think is so powerful, is creating a space where they can learn and try. You didn’t say the word psychological safety, but I think that’s absolutely critical because of the work that I do that spans design and futures.

I, as you might imagine, get a lot of requests to do a futures boot camp, much like we did a design thinking boot camp, to help spark ideas and innovation. I think you can get a lot of value out of having an episodic moment where you explore the future, but it’s not enough. At the end of a design or design sprint, sometimes you hear like, “Oh my gosh, I’m so creative. I didn’t think I was creative because I couldn’t draw. This is amazing.” With futures, sometimes you get a little bit of that, like, “Oh crap, this is hard. We got a lot to do. We have more vulnerabilities than I thought. We got to get much more serious about what’s robust.”

You don’t have that same adrenaline cortisol shot because it just suggests that there’s more work to do, there’s more learning to do because, of course, the future isn’t a given. I think those are really great suggestions, particularly around having some options for people to respond to.

Aditi: I think if you don’t have next steps and a way for people to take action from what they’ve learned, doing futures work can be unkind because you are exposing people to the fact that we’re not taking big enough swings in the present. That was a big impetus for me for Democracy 2076. I was like, it can’t be that the pinnacle of democracy reform is open primaries. That can’t be the biggest idea we have. Like, “The system is so broken, we need more.” If you don’t have a plan or you don’t have a next step of like, “We’re going to come back together next year or in the next month,” and actually build a strategy to achieve it, then you’ve now given people all of these ideas of things that are possible.

I worry, actually, that might lower their sense of agency and optimism for the future because they now know more is possible and no one is even trying to get there. Not everyone is the kind of person who’s going to say, “Oh shit, I need to be the person who gets us there.” Most people need some support and a container to do that. I think making sure that if you’re bringing folks together, thinking about the next steps is important.

Lisa: It’s a responsibility for sure. The whole premise behind How We Future really stems from my very first year working on a political campaign as a 21-year-old. I went to Washington, and I was working for a senator from my home state of Pennsylvania. I was like, “Okay. Well, they’ll teach me how to do this.” What I learned in that year that has shaped the rest of my career and even this initiative is there is no they. You are the they. We are the they.

Going back to something you’ve said a few times around the attention economy, we’ve got to scaffold some different ways that people get involved, because if not, then it will get outsourced for us. It’s getting increasingly harder, which to me means that this work is ever more important.

Speaking of scaffolds, I want to maybe close out talking about your latest project that scaffolds five different scenarios of what might unfold in our future. Tell us a little bit about Coalition 2076.

Aditi: If we’re talking about imagining what the future in our democracy might look like and we’re thinking about the structural parts of constitutional change, an obvious question is, how do you get the politics to get that done? That’s a very obvious next step. It’s interesting to know that in the United States, our political parties realign every 30 or so years. What we mean by a realignment is while the party’s names don’t change, what they stand for changes, who is in them changes, and the ideology that drives them shifts.

That’s why the 2024 Democratic Party that spanned Bernie Sanders to Dick Cheney would have seemed totally crazy in 1994. That would have seemed like such an odd-- If you had told someone in 1994 who would be endorsing the Democratic nominee, you’d be like, “What the hell? That’s not real.” The idea and the insight that drove this work was if you can track those changes in real time, then maybe you can actually shape them. After the election of Donald Trump in 2016, there was a lot of conversation about what was happening. Why did this happen?

It was in 2018 that a book came out called Identity Crisis that was talking about how non-college white voters began leaving the Democratic Party after the 2008 election. Which means by the time the book was written, and the research was done, it had been 10 years since that had been happening. A whole cohort of voters had moved in that time. Not that no one was trying to intervene, but it wasn’t a widespread national story that this was happening. The question we had was, how do you observe those changes in real time, and who’s going to have that information?

It’s not going to be the data scientists and the pollsters because, to your point earlier, they only know to ask about an existing set of options. They don’t know to ask a set of questions about what changes might be coming. We brought together a variety of membership-based organizations and asked them, “What are the changes you’ve seen over the last 30 years, what are you currently seeing, and what do you think you’re likely to see?” We also did look at a lot of the research and the data, and we identified 17 emerging spectra, emerging wedge issues that are reshaping our politics and scrambling left and right, and then we utilized them to project out over the next 30 years.

What might that mean for our parties? Really trying to understand, how do we get to a scenario where both political parties are pro-democracy, but also understanding, what might it look like if both political parties are authoritarian? How will we know what the steps are to know if we’re getting there? Because something I often hear in the space is, this is like not a two or a five-year process, right? This is like a generational fight, but how do we know if we’re on track? Being able to map out where we’re going and then understanding what are the steps to getting there so we can track if we’re on track for where we’re going.

Lisa: It’s such rich research, and I love that it’s ongoing. We’ll have a link in the show notes to the interactive tool that you created, which is so cool, so everybody can participate. Again, to do it with the mind of a scientist, of being curious about this, as opposed to judgmental, which is just so key, and just a wider-range time zone or timeframe to think about, knowing that great piece of data that you put out, which is like maybe this isn’t such a blip, right? Maybe there’s some cyclicality around what’s going on here that’s wider than a single election cycle or even a week’s worth of news that could feel like, oh my gosh, so overwhelming, a lifetime’s worth.

I love how, again, you are framing it in history, and you are offering it up as another option and another perspective on how to engage in this moment because we’re just foundationally under-trained. We just are.

Aditi: Yes, and it feels really scary, right? In a week’s worth of barrage news, how do you know what to pay attention to? How do you know what is an anomaly and not something to really be worried about, versus what is actually a really bad sign of something to come? How do you distinguish that so it’s not just your own fears, and it’s not just a projection of your own anxieties? Doing it in a collective process like this, again, we don’t all have to know all the things, but we can be wiser when we’re in a collective. Very importantly, I think a lot of futures research misses out the application. What should you be doing based on this?

We didn’t leave that to people’s imagination. In this report, for each scenario, we had recommendations for the field in places where we saw that people are underinvested. Where is there not enough work happening right now?

Lisa: Oh, so valuable. 2026, no doubt, is going to be a very noisy political year. I wonder if you have any advice for people to hold on to that longer frame, besides, of course, reading your research and getting involved, and just for their own resilience and their own health and wellness. How to have a longer-term perspective while also making choices that feel agentic and right in this moment.

Aditi: The answer I always give to this question is that we have a lot of political hobbyists, people who consume a lot of news, and very few people who actually do political work. What I would say is stop reading the news and find something you actually want to change and devote your time to that. Your highest impact is going to be at the local level. It’s going to be in your community, on your school board, for your local election. Find something you actually want to do and focus on that. If you’re doing something to change our culture, you will feel more optimism about the future.

If you are stocking shelves at your food bank, it will give you optimism to see your neighbors coming together to help one another because you’ll be surrounded by doers. Being surrounded by doers is very empowering.

Lisa: I totally agree. I accidentally fell into the civics work that I was talking about. What I found is that I didn’t always know what I was doing, but at the end of every day, I felt more resilient. I called it my personal resilience strategy. That was enough to feel like you are engaging, you’re doing, and not just worrying. That shift alone can be so helpful to people. Again, I just want to say it aligns with what Howie Future is all about. Howie Future is starting with the doing. Starting with the doing.

Aditi, thank you so much for talking with me today, for sharing your incredible work. Maybe I’ll ask if there’s anything in particular, besides folks that are already engaged in this work, for whether you’re an educator or you are one of those people that wants to get involved, is there something about your work that you would invite people to investigate?

Aditi: I think in this coming year, we’re going to be sharing a lot more. You can go to our website and sign up and get updates from us on an ongoing basis. I think we’re going to be trying to be out talking a lot more in this coming year because I would really love to see over the next few years, as we move towards the presidential in 2028, my ideal for that race is to have the candidates across the political parties articulating visions for the future of democracy. I want to hear not a two-year plan or a four-year plan, but I want to hear their 50-year plan. We are all voters. We are all citizens. I would really encourage us to be pushing.

When we’re feeling stuck where it feels like we only have two options, I think asking ourselves the question, what would happen if I looked a little further? By the way, this is not just about politics and futures work. There was a time earlier this year where there were 10 crises happening in my family. Someone was sick, someone had died, someone was injured, all at the same time. I literally sat down and wrote when they were all going to be over. When is this injury going to be healed from? When is the funeral? Just to really name and to remember that the future is coming. It’s coming whether we want it to or not.

If you’re feeling stuck or down, to remember that something is going to change. With a lot of agency, I think more than we realize, in deciding what that’s going to look like.

Lisa: What a great place to end, Aditi. I couldn’t agree more. Thank you so much for all the work. We’re really excited to share this with a lot more people.

Aditi: Thank you again so much for having me.

Lisa: Thanks for spending time with me and Aditi Juneja. Here’s something to try this week. Pick one thing that feels impossible in our democracy. Then ask, what would need to be true for this to happen in 50 years? That shift from never to what would it take can open entirely new possibilities. If this sparks something, share it with someone who believes democracy is worth reimagining. Check out the show notes for abundant links to Aditi’s research and the work of Democracy 2076. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thanks for listening. I’ll see you next time.

In this episode of How We Future, Lisa sits down with Franzi Sessler, the co-founder of global design agency Kreatives, to explore how design, storytelling, and creativity can shape better futures.

Recently, Franzi and her team have made stunning sports explainers for the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Games. Their partnership with Allianz and the International Paralympic Committee started in 2024, when her team created animated explainers for all 22 Paralympic sports, helping millions of viewers understand and enjoy the amazing athletes and games.

The conversation also touches on projects like All Vote No Play and Futures Happening, revealing how design can activate civic imagination, build momentum, and turn uncertainty into possibility. Throughout, Franzi shows what’s possible when constraints are treated as creative fuel and when imagination is taken seriously.

In this conversation, you’ll learn:

• How design can close the gap between confusion and connection

• Why constraints often unlock the best ideas

• What it takes to design with trust, empathy, and impact

Links from the episode:

• Kreatives

• Milano Cortina 2026 Paralympic Sports Explainer Videos

• Milano Cortina 2026 Olympic Sports Explainer Videos

• Franzi’s favorite Paralympic Disciplines to Design for: Boccia and Swimming

• Paris 2024 Paralympic Sports Explainer Videos

• Franzi’s All Vote No Play designs

• The Team

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today.

This week’s guest, Franzi Sessler, has been part of my life for over a decade. So many of the ideas I brought into the world started with a phone call to Franzi. When something feels ambitious, a little wild, or deeply important, she is the person I call first.

Franzi is the co-founder of Kreatives, a global design studio built on the belief that creativity can be a force for good. She brings strategy, design, and storytelling together in ways that both look beautiful and move us towards a better future. In this episode, we talk about what it really means to design for impact, and it’s fitting that we’re releasing this conversation at the start of the Milano Winter Olympics.

You’ll hear how Franzi’s work helped bring Paralympic sports to millions of people around the world. It’s an incredible story of how design and storytelling can break down barriers and bring us closer together. You’ll also learn how she turns constraints into creative breakthroughs, and how she builds teams and cultures that make space for experimentation, play, and trust. Get ready for a conversation about imagination, fun, and what’s possible when we choose to build futures with intention, purpose, and care.

Huzzah.

Franzi Sessler: Dah, dah.

Lisa: We’re off. Dah, dah, dah. Franzi Sessler, we’re so excited to have you on the How We Future podcast because you’ve been there from the very beginning. We’re just so grateful to have a conversation with you about your work, how you and the Kreatives are shaping better tomorrows by the storytelling, design, and relationships that you’re building, and just a chance to hear a little bit about the magic and the intention that goes behind everything that you do. Thank you so much for joining us.

Franzi: I’m so happy to be here. I feel like we’re having a conversation like this every other week, and now we’re getting recorded while doing so. This is amazing.

Lisa: I know, and the reason why it’s every week is because you’re usually my first phone call when I have something absolutely wacky, ambitious, important to bring to the world, and then you help shape it, and you help give it form. That’s the way we’ve been marching through life for pretty much the last decade. It’s absolutely awesome to share your genius with everybody else in the world. Maybe we’ll start there, Franzi. Tell us about the work you’re doing at Kreatives. I want to start at your current place that you’re shaping the future. What is Kreatives? What kind of work do you do?

Franzi: Amazing. Thank you. By the way, that’s the best calls one can get. A wild idea. Let’s go. My co-founder and I, we started Kreatives almost a decade ago with truly the belief that creativity can be a force for good. We really set out with the belief that we can utilize our creative capabilities to really shape on where we can go in the future. This idea was really rooted a long time ago. I was trained as a graphic designer. I was working in advertisement like many other creative people, because that’s the only career path that is shaped for you as a creative person. You become an artist, or you become a designer in some sort of an agency.

I was on the latter path, and I found that a lot of creative people are trapped. A client comes in with a crap idea, and you’re then there to color it in, make it green, make it blue. You’re not really asked to be part of the, “What should we do? Why should we do it? For who should we do it, and what else could we do?” Which is where creative people are actually used at their best, I would say.

Fast forward, our studio today is really focusing on bringing strategy, so why, how, for who, all of the things together with the design. Then what does it look like? What does it feel like? What else can we do to enhance experience and touch all senses? Then we do storytelling. The best ideas die sometimes in a PowerPoint deck in the strategy world, and in the design world, in a bin because there are so many ideas that we trash. Storytelling is really what brings out the meaning and gives us the ability to connect.

That’s really what we do, strategy, design, and storytelling. Because it’s a lot of work to bring all of that together, we cherry-pick the clients that try to do something better for this world. We would not just take a project for money’s sake. We take projects with people that want to push the world forward. That’s how we choose our clients, and that’s the fun work we get to do every day.

Lisa: It’s fantastic work. It’s clear when you look at your projects and your case studies, and we’re going to talk about some of them, that it is beautiful work, but it’s emotional work. When you see your work, you feel something. I think that’s what makes for great storytelling, is that it moves you at the very human level. It’s emotional. I want to maybe start there because, Franzi, we are going to be airing this right around the time that the Winter Olympics are going to be kicking off and talk about moving people. Sports moves people. The Olympics gets everyone together on the international stage, something that we need right now.

You’ve been working with Olympic athletes, and particularly Paralympic athletes now, for a number of years to tell their story. It’s one of my favorite examples of how design and storytelling can change the world. Of course, I’m wearing, for those of you watching, my sporty outfit to honor that work. Maybe tell us a little bit about that project. I think it’s such a great example of what you were just talking about.

Franzi: One of these cherry-picked clients of ours that we have is the world’s number one insurance brand. They’re called Allianz. You might have heard of them. They’re based in Europe, where we are based as well. They really, for a couple of years now, are already an official partner of the Olympic and the Paralympic movements. Specifically, in preparation for Paris, they were trying to look for ways to enhance their impact on the Paralympics. Because of the Olympics, everybody is throwing money there already. The world is looking at the Olympics. For the Paralympics, there’s still a lot of lifting to do to really get the best out of it.

Allianz is really invested into that. In fact, 2026 marks their 20th anniversary for their official partnership with the Paralympics. They were the first-ever global corporate partner that believed in this movement, which I think is just so special. They were looking at ways to really engage the audience in a new way for the 2024 Paris Olympics and Paralympics. They looked at the data, looking at, what could we do? We started looking at data. They found that 90% of the people that watch the Olympics, they don’t watch the Paralympics. 90% of the people that watch the Olympics don’t watch the Paralympics. Of course, any good designer would ask, why? Why is that happening?

We also looked into that. Allianz did very deeply look into that. Together with the Paralympics, we found, of course, people don’t understand what’s actually happening in the sports. When you have watched the Paralympics and are a bit familiar with it, to make the games fair, they use, even though it might be a similar sport like basketball and wheelchair basketball, they might use same methods and same principles of the sports. The equipment is different. The rules are different. The classifications exist to really make it fair. To give access to people with many different levels of abilities to really compete on a fair level.

When you watch it on TV or in a stadium, you might not understand what’s going on, and after 30 seconds, disengage and switch off because what I watch, I don’t understand. Allianz really had the idea to bring out the best and invest in helping the public out there understand Paralympic sports. As simple as that. How might we make the people understand Paralympic sports?

That’s where we were brought in. The first idea was actually an infographic series. Starting with plain infographics that explains each of the sports with little call-outs, things. I will never forget our first prototype that we had was this printed-out magazine-size sheet of a wheelchair basketball player. It was a black-and-white picture. We added all the details, things that we made up. At that time, we had no idea how wheelchair basketball actually works. We were really invested into going all in and trying to explain this. We needed to learn ourselves first. None of the people on our team were Paralympic athletes, obviously, so we needed to start from zero.

First prototype was an infographic. Even though we worked with one of the best infographic designers of the world that was trying to make this thing work with me on my side, we both looked at it and said, “This is not doing the trick. If the goal is to help people understand, how do we get this thing into more hands than somebody that happened to open this page in this magazine?” We said, “We need to go into the 21st century and make this thing moving. We need to try to engage and use time and storytelling as a way to get there.”

We pitched the idea. I think some of the people at the Paralympics and Allianz also had that conversation in the past. How do you use video to make that happen? We came together and articulated the idea to do a video series to explain Paralympic sports. How hard could that be? [laughs] How hard could that be? We started, and we did the first prototype. We tried to understand the first sport, brought it together, and then, how do we actually do this? How do we make this? It turns out 22 sports to be explained with a short timeline until the Paris Games is not that easy.

Doing that with one illustrator, which is still the haptical way to draw all the frames and then you animate it together, even though we can use digital tools and AI on all fronts. The hard labor of putting artwork out there is still done by humans. Just one illustrator doing that for all sports is not possible. We were faced with the technical challenge that we could embrace doing multiple illustrators. We sat there for this moment, if we do multiple illustrators, all of the videos will look different. Some of us are like, “Oh, we can’t do that, we can’t do that.”

Then one brilliant mind, again, the design lead on our team said, “What if they all look different?” We made it part of the storytelling that we’re bringing the world of illustrators together. As diverse as athletes are that come together for the Paralympic Games, we bring together diverse illustrators that have their different styles in their different artwork. We added a little cherry.

Because the games were happening in Paris, we added a reference to Paris art or French art, because the first Olympic Games that happened in the last decade in 1924, so exactly 100 years ago, was kind of cool. We played on that, and every sport got a designated French artist’s masterpiece that the illustrators had to reflect as well. We turned what was a challenge into the magical part of this project. Woo-hoo, here we are. Fast forward, 22 sport explainers in all formats and languages you could imagine later. We’ve done it. We explained all sports.

Lisa: It’s incredible. Thank you for that overview. I think it beautifully describes why I’m so passionate about design as a method of moving the world forward. You created something that didn’t exist and it was a process of diverging and converging. First, how might we explore bringing the sports closer to people that don’t understand them? Not taking the assumption at first blush that, “Oh, they’re just not interested.” No, it’s not about interest. It’s about lack of understanding. How do we shrink the gap so that they get invested in these athletes and the sports and they understand?

Our job is to help explain and then realizing that after an infographic, that first prototype, it wasn’t doing that emotional job of what you wanted to do, so going back again. It’s a process of experimentation and discovery back and forth, that diverging, converging, getting information. The last piece, which is just so extraordinary that I really hope our friends listening take away, is how do you take a constraint and turn that into an opportunity?

This constraint that, “Oh my gosh, this is a huge ask, 22 sports, one illustrator, how might we do this?” To, “Wait a minute, why don’t we turn that constraint into a possibility and turn it into a feature? Make it a series honoring illustrators and their different styles from around the world.” I wonder if you could share, Franzi, a little bit like what happened. These had enormous impact. How did they go?

Franzi: First of all, I want to go one step back to the process that you just described, Lisa, and just add a little nuance. The tough things about designing for the future, really, nobody’s ever done it before. This was truly one-of-a-kind project that none of us has done before. Not the clients, not the Paralympics, not Paris, not us. Nobody knew how to do this. We truly had to embrace figuring out how to do this together and trusting the different expertises, doing an experiment, sailing with it, and doing it again.

I just wanted to celebrate all these partners involved in here for leaning in. It’s not easy to do when you have to do reporting and all of these things to just lean in and try something completely different. I think that’s so important.

Lisa: Can I just add a little bit?

Franzi: Yes.

Lisa: One of the things that I think you are so brilliant at is being a strategic translator. Having to, first of all, build the trust that says, “Hey, listen, come with us. We’re going to do something ambitious. We don’t exactly know how it’s going to play out, but you’re going to trust us.” Building that relational trust. Then along the way, being able to interpret and experiment what you learned, how it’s still advancing, even though you haven’t gotten there yet. It speaks to the comfort with ambiguity that I think design demands that we have. I think so many more people need to practice. They’re like, “Just because that first one didn’t go, we’re going to get there. We’re going to try. We’re going to keep at it.”

We’re going to stay focused on something you said earlier around the why. If we have clarity on the why, then we can iterate on the how. I think that’s so important to distinguish, because it gives you that north star to keep going when frankly it feels crappy when you haven’t nailed it. You’re like, “Oh, we’ve just spent hours and hours and hours and we’re still not there and they’re not happy.” You really have to pull through. When you have that clarity of why and you have someone at the helm who’s able to translate between the visuals, the motion, the artist, the impact, the value, that is just invaluable.

Franzi: Absolutely. Building on that, looking ahead to where we are now, post the Paralympic Games from last year, I think there’s a couple of moments that made us really proud looking back at that work, which is, one, we reached over 23 million people, which is an incredible number for the Paralympics. They have not seen numbers like that. Just like that, in that way. Nobody knew how these videos would turn out, so nobody made any promises during the process.

In the end, while the games were happening, people were scrambling to get them on the TVs because we need to show them in the stadium on the TV. Broadcasters wanted to use them. They’d seen them and they needed to get it into German TV now. The momentum started building, and that’s when you do something great, you feel the momentum start happening. For me, there’s two highlights here. One, these were the most watched Paralympic Games in history.

Lisa: Oh.

Franzi: Most watched Games in human history.

Lisa: Incredible.

Franzi: I think we played a small portion into that huge milestone for the Paralympics. They do so much wonderful work, and you got to check out their social media. It’s just so brilliant what they do in storytelling. We had a small piece of helping them get there. Then the second part was-- this is a very personal moment. We got to get to the village, the athlete’s village. One of the wheelchair basketball athletes wheeled up to me and asked if she could buy a printed version of some of the frames in the video from us that we could maybe even sign because she felt so seen in these videos.

Usually, when they’re shown in media, et cetera, sometimes the disability isn’t the focus. “Look what they can do even with their wheelchair.” That’s not what it’s about. They’re freaking athletes and they work hard. It’s a fun game to watch. That’s what we need to show. They felt so seen and heard. That moves me to tears just thinking about that because that’s, in the end, why we did this work. We wanted to shine light on a otherwise marginalized portion of society that shouldn’t be like that.

Lisa: It goes back to when you tell the story in ways that honor the humanity and the strength and values that you’re trying to bring forward, what it can do at every level. Even that beautiful story, and I think we can all visualize what that must have felt like. Here you are working, working, working weeks, really just trying to get it right. Then there’s that moment of impact when the person that you’ve really been designing for has the chance to tell you what it meant for them at that micro level, that individual level.

Then moving out to say what it might have felt like for the team, what it felt like for the fans that were there. I know before every game these videos were played. They were played in these enormous stadiums, which just must have been incredible to see your work.

Franzi: Right under the Eiffel Tower. It was so cool.

Lisa: Oh my gosh. It’s incredible, right? Again, didn’t exist. I think you and your partner have a name for this, the idea of dream storming. You’re just really pushing out how far. Then the impact that it had on social media. That’s, I think, the courage and the boldness of saying, “We don’t know exactly how we’re going to do this, but if we have that clarity about what it is that we’re trying to do, how we’re trying to tell these stories, maybe there’s no limit to what we can do.” Just extraordinary. Franzi, real talk here. 22 sports, was one harder than others to get the story right or illustrate or really honor?

Franzi: The hardest one to do were the ones where there’s not a comparison. There’s some sports that you don’t find in the Olympic sport roster. You can’t watch a, “How does nah, nah, nah, sport work? Then see how you can figure out how to tell your own story, which humbled us. We really had to go back to the IF, so the International Federations and really go to the root of, what is the origin of the sport? Why are we doing this? Really help tell the full story.

One example of that is boccia, which is one of the only sports in the Paralympic roster that includes all abilities and disabilities. It’s a full-on inclusive sport. It has the most beautiful-- I encourage you all to watch it, the most beautiful rules of helping each other out on performing the sport, which was really cool and hard to draw as well, in an elegant and respectful way as well.

Lisa: Oh, we’ll definitely link to it in the show notes. I love the appreciation of what is it about the sport that we want to highlight, that we want to emphasize. Each of the videos are less than two minutes. They’re vibrant, they’re animated, they’re beautiful. They’re really extraordinary. It reminds me of something I know we talk a lot about when we’re using design to bring forward new ideas in the world in concrete ways is that a lot of times there are no metrics that exist. We have to invent the metrics. That is part of the design process, which is to say, this doesn’t have a comparison, but we’re going to pioneer a new way. Then all of a sudden, we set a new standard of how we talk about it.

Franzi: I want to add one more favorite, just if we’re adding links here. I think one of my favorites is also a model of taking a challenge and making it the best it can be, which was para swimming. One of the hardest things to do in the world of animation is to do full-on cycles of movement, especially in fluid way. I imagined that in water. Doing that is really, really hard to draw and to animate. We had very limited resources, shortest timelines, so we really had to figure this out. I think the team here did a wonderful job in getting to that level of excellence, so check it out.

Lisa: Oh, we’ll definitely add to that. We’re going to come back to it in a little bit, Franzi, your philosophy about how you build teams and your culture. I think it is one of the just extraordinary ways that you lead that inspire me so. I want to really get into that in a minute because I think a lot of people are really struggling to figure out, how do I put a team together right now amid all the complexity? You’ve just done such a beautiful job.

I want to stay for a second on the athlete theme. You and I have done some work, again, in the spirit of one of my first phone calls, about trying to infuse civic engagement into student athletics at the college level. I just want to pick up on that thread of, how do you meet people where they are and take them to new places? This didn’t exist yet. This was a project that I started working on with a basketball coach named Eric Reveno, who following some of the uprest in 2020 leading to the presidential election, following the murder of George Floyd, he was coaching down in Georgia. His basketball team felt very distraught, we were in pre-pandemic, about what they could do to ignite change.

He, in a team meeting, was trying to encourage his team to get more active. There was a senior on the team named Malachi Rice who said, “Listen, if we all care about the future, how many people here are registered to vote?” Nobody raised their hand. At that moment, Coach Rev basically had a midlife crisis on the spot and said, “Oh my gosh, I’m probably one of the most important adults in these young students’ lives. I’ve never thought to encourage them to vote and be active.” He got on Twitter and said, “Hey listen, as coaches, we should encourage our athletes to vote on Election Day. We should cancel practice and play, #AllVoteNoPlay.” It became a national movement.

The NCAA turned it into an annual legislation that they would not practice or play on Election Day, not just 2020, but days to come. Incredible idea. Really incredible idea. A log of momentum around 2020. After 2020, the movement died. He called me up and said, “Listen, I hear that you know how to design things that work. Can you help me make this a national movement?”

Then I, of course, called you immediately and said, “Franzi, we have some work to do. We need to together design some materials that speak athlete, that encourage them to build on what they’re already doing in ways that are exciting and build momentum, as opposed to your eat your beats approach to civic engagement.” That’s just a little bit of context for the project that I want to now turn to about your leadership in helping bring what has become a national movement to bear around student athletes acting as courageous citizens. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about what it was like to work on that project.

Franzi: Oh, absolutely. First of all, I want to say that really speaks to my core, because I grew up in a war-torn family with a dictatorship. We all know about World War II and the past decade behind us. I strongly believe that when you have a chance to shape democracy and have your hands in shaping society, that gets really exciting. When you, Lisa, called me and talked about this, “You haven’t heard of this thing yet. Are you willing to say yes to yet another crazy adventure that is around democracy and athleticism and really activating student athletes?” I was, of course, jumping up and down.

When you explained the concept of All Vote No Play to me, and really having that one day, that started really as one day where we designate the practice time to doing civic activities, such as voting or other things moving forward, it was really, really, really inspiring. Also, All Vote No Play has such a catchy ring to it as well. Of course, you can’t just show up on a pitch and say, “No, we talk about civic and enthusiasm and engagement.”

Lisa: Especially to athletes.

Franzi: Exactly. You really needed to go to the essence of what would speak to an athlete. I think one thing that we identified very quickly is democracy is a team sport too. We need to work together, and we need to figure out on how we can have fun and really learn how to build on each other, and what really the qualities are that we’re looking for as well. We had to build this brand around All Vote No Play that had a bit of this nuance of being a good civilian in the United States while also speaking to athleticism and sports and active and let’s go attitudes so we are keeping people engaged. That was super fun to work on.

Lisa: It was just incredible. By the way, award winning. We won a number of awards for that incredible interpretation of, again, I think honoring the strength, the movement, the vibrancy, really changing the way we might think about how civic engagement is taught. Just foundationally different. I want to call out-- There’s so many aspects of that project that I loved working in partnership with you. One was this idea that came from a former student of mine who was a basketball player at Stanford that said, “Look, we need a rallying call. We need a civic tailgating party.” He said, “I’m going to make it happen.”

He personally reached out to Dr. Condoleezza Rice to get her involved, Coach Tara VanDerveer. He got all these great athletes from Stanford and from around the country. Steph Curry was involved. These student athletes were interviewing these greats and goats of sports athletics. It was still pandemic land. We decided to have a live streaming of it around the country and have civic tailgating parties across just hundreds of schools and teams to bring people together. We got it catered by Pizza to the Polls. We were using it as a team bonding.

Then, Franzi, your team, of course, part of every step of the branding of what it looked like, turned around probably the best two-minute video I’ve ever seen, capturing the highlights. I just, again, want to honor that a big part of the storytelling is synthesizing and creating narratives in different forms to help people feel a part of what happened, even if they weren’t a part of it. Again, I want to invite you to talk about your team and what that was like for you to be a part of it.

Franzi: For sure. It was very hard, of course, to build a movement in COVID days. It’s already hard to step on a pitch and get people activated and let’s go. It’s even harder to get people to log into a Zoom. It started already there with the storytelling and the engagement we had to do. It started really with the branding and what it looks like and feels like, the way we talk, the way we address things, the way we frame things. Then, really utilizing video as a way to draw people in and also capture these magical interactions. As you mentioned, there’s Condoleezza Rice and Steph Curry. You’re their first semester student, basketball or whatever other sport.

All of a sudden, you’re on the same call, on the same eye level with other people that are modeling already what the future can hold. There was so much hope and inspiration in that that had to be captured. Really, our team here had a very easy job to cut together the best of so that we can tell that story and really maximize the impact from the people that were live with us. We saw right away that just having this live moment is not enough. We need to scale it and bring it to more people so that everybody can organize their own parties as well and engage more students. That was really the goal.

Lisa: That helped kick off a fellowship that is still going, that’s growing, almost doubling every year of student-athletes that are engaged year-long in doing that. Again, it’s because I think that highlight reel inspired them. In fact, just this past week, I saw one of the students that was a part of that hasn’t been at Stanford for four years. He just reposted what that experience was like for him to interview Steph Curry.

These moments are more than just moments. They are really pivot points, I think. Transformational opportunities for particularly young people that didn’t even know it was possible to feel how they felt, to be seen the way that they’ve been seen. I think it is because of your ability to observe, to listen, to try to understand that empathetic work that, again, when done well, design is so good at, and translate it. It’s not even a mirror. It’s like a prism. It’s like, “Listen, we see you, and now we are going to shine the light even brighter.”

Franzi: I want to jump in here quickly because I think I just noticed, I know you for so long, but I think I’m just noticing really a big parallel in both of our work. As designers, it’s our job to look at this prism from all angles and bring things together. I believe in these experiences such as All Vote No Play when we had everybody together in that Zoom call. The way that you orchestrated the type of people that need to have a conversation together that otherwise wouldn’t is just so magical. That’s like our designers bringing together ideas that would’ve otherwise not existed. We’re shaping, really, and creating what could be by assembling things that were otherwise not connected.

Lisa: Absolutely. I’m a huge believer. I think Steve Jobs even said this, that creativity is about assembling different parts and creating the conditions. I think that another part of that you do so beautifully is recognize that part of is to reduce the temperature of the anxiety and fear when we’re going into something new and increase the belief, increase the interest, the intrigue. Those are subtle choices that really make the difference.

It’s a good segue, actually, to one final project I want to talk about that we’ve worked on together that just, again, remains such a highlight, which is The Future’s Happening, that we architected and designed at Stanford in 2024 to really ignite civic imagination. Listen, it’s not an easy time for democracy in general. I think that there’s a lot of reaction and worry and response and fear to what’s going on, and rightfully so.

I think you and I had an instinct that said we also need to fill our conversation, our communities with positive possibilities, not Pollyanna, but bright spots about what could be so that we’re not just spending our energy responding and reacting, but we are diving into our human capability to imagine and to collectively imagine. We worked on The Future’s Happening, and it was for democracy makers, movers, and multipliers, which was an idea to honor the makers, the folks that were doing innovative work. The movers were teachers and folks leading communities that had the ability to share some of those ideas, and the multipliers, the funders, the networks that could spread this widely.

To do it at Stanford where we could craft the conditions at the hub of the makerspace, so it was really from the beginning, not about fixing legal issues or regulatory issues which are important, but just not the lane we were playing in, and to invite people to dream together, which was a big ask in 2024. I want to really talk through this project a little bit, specifically around some of the smaller choices that we made in order to quickly get people to lean into the possibility and not to have their defense mechanism up.

I think one of the most important things were the welcome, the way that we created a makerspace honoring all of those folks that were pushing the envelope, whether it were professional sports leagues that were infusing civic engagement into their program like Athletes Unlimited or Citizen University that is all about trying to ignite a civic renaissance. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about what it was like to work on that project, and specifically some of the design choices that you helped bring to life to create what was, I think, one of the most powerful 24 hours for many people in that whole year.

Franzi: Yes. The beginning of this project was similar to the Paralympic project, to be honest. It started with a hunch, an idea, there’s a challenge out there, how do we figure it out? Elisa, you had this roster of people in the US that were doing wonderful things in order to shape our communities, our society, our democracy. You witnessed firsthand that some of them are doing wonderful work, let’s say in Colorado, on the East Coast, wherever they were, and they might feel even lonely in their pocket. Bringing them together in one space to just have an exchange, it had never been really done before like that. There was this question of, what would happen if we brought people together?

To set the tone right, to welcome people into the space, you created this idea of having a display for each of the people that were participating. We created these posters that had a visual and a little descriptive text that explained what’s behind that and what impact this organization has been creating. Some were really big organizations that everybody knows, and some were really small. There’s just a two-people team trying something new. They were all equally leveled, lined up on these massive boards at the entryway of Stanford’s d.school. If you have been there, you know there’s this beautiful atrium at the stage.

Just leading up to the big stage, we had left and right these cool posters that just welcomed people. You could see in every coffee break, every moment we had, people were gathering around them and scanning-- We added a little QR code so you could connect and find each other as well. It was really, really cool to see how-- There was new bonds shaped with just a design asset that was put there on a wall. This was really the seeding ground for new friendships, new connections, and new possibilities, really.

Lisa: Again, I think there was a huge theme of honoring. The other thing, Franzi, that I think you helped inspire is rather than just say, “Here’s the Urban Library Council,” it was, what if libraries could become the public hubs of civic engagement? Turning that opportunity into an inviting question to get people to lean in, to want to learn more. That QR code was there in the descriptor to help proactively address the likely response in that moment. Which was, “That would never happen.” Oh, but it’s happening.

Franzi: It is happening. Look at it.

Lisa: It’s happening. This idea-- Look at it. By the way, Shamichael Hallman is here. Go talk to him. You mentioned Warm Cookies of the Revolution. Just even hearing that name, you want to know about Warm Cookies of the Revolution. Of course, they’re doing incredible stuff out of Colorado, in the rural areas of this country. Again, like, “Oh, that would never happen,” but it’s happening. It’s happening. Go find them. Go meet them. The most incredible collaborations happen because I think the design laid the foundation for trust. We honored people in the room.

As you said, much like the Paralympic Explainers, how do we hit at that micro level, but also encourage people to dream big, even when they’re feeling a lot of pressure? To me, the thing that I continue to come back to, and why I love working with you, I think we’re such a good pair, is that we both believe that design can have outside influence. This is very much what I’m trying to teach with my students, that if you can learn to spot an opportunity and then bring it to life in a concrete form, in a visual that gets us emotional, in a story that wants us to move from where we are to where we could be, it’s like one of the most powerful levers that you have.

Franzi: Our common friend Nathan Shedroff always defined design, really, a good design being things that trigger the right response. I believe that makes us all designers. In the end, we all want to trigger the right response. In this case, we really wanted to spark that moment of connection. With that twist of, let’s make this an optimistic festival. Let’s model the bright spots. Let’s show that there’s goodness out there and that we can shape and have an impact on that future ahead of us.

Lisa: Thank goodness for you, Franzi, because as we were putting it together, I can’t tell you how many naysayers were whispering in my ear. “Lisa, we don’t have time for this. Lisa, this isn’t important right now. Lisa, we got to fix what’s broken.” I’m personally grateful for your friendship and support and belief in this. We have to create a little bubble around us as we’re prototyping forward. My gosh, did it take a lot of prototyping.

Then I just want to say one more piece about this project that I just found to be so incredible because we couldn’t have planned for it is that we had a relatively small gathering at Stanford. It’s not a huge space. There was about 100-plus people there. We were sharing it online. Then I remember I got a note from the First Lady of Albuquerque. It also happened to be a futurist. She said, “Wait a minute, we need some of that civic imagination. Can you figure out a way to get it to our community?”

Then you and I basically spent the entire summer following that event creating a playbook for civic imagination, a Futures Happening playbook to allow anybody, teachers, school administrators, boys and girls clubs, to take pieces of it that would fit their local community to, again, just shift it a little bit from the reaction to a sense of possibility and possible and positive futures. Again, it’s this like, we put things out there and then new emergent opportunities. What do you do with that? How do you take that in? It’s one of the projects I feel most proud of and could not have done it without you.

I want to maybe talk a little bit, Franzi, now as we close up this conversation about some of the design choices you make with your own firm. I had the great opportunity of visiting you recently in Munich in your headquarters. I was just blown away by the details of your space. For a long time, I’ve known about how much you think about culture. Really building on that great definition that Nathan talks about around design is about making choices that trigger the right responses.

Here you are, you’ve got a team that you’ve got to try to encourage to push boundaries, be creative, extend their craft. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about how you think about that internally. I think a lot of people listening to this might take a lot of inspiration from some of the choices that you make.

Franzi: If it’s never been done before, that’s a reason to do something. Our studio really started in our living room. We convinced our early clients that in order to be close to the community we’re designing for, we need to be in their environments. This is why we’re designing in a living room. That was really the reason. Everybody loved it so much as a concept that throughout our studios, we’re now in our third studio, we kept that feeling of feeling at home, living roomy, because we felt that’s where we do our best work. If I want to be in a space and I feel inspired and I can co-create and I can drop something and nobody cares. That is a great place to be when you need to create something really, really hard.

That’s a fundamental principle in our studio. I’ll start talking about the physical space before I go into how we work together. The physical space really informs how we interact. We have an area in our studio that we call the playground. For our nine people, small little design boutique team here, we have a massive studio. The reason for that is because we feel the need and we see the need out there to co-create and create this space for people to come together in one space and create and do and try and try again and try again. That’s why we have the playground. Sometimes it’s a photo studio, sometimes it’s for workshops, and sometimes it’s really to dream up the wild next thing.

We physically move into the playground when we need to do things where we don’t have the answers to. Maybe you have a mental place where you go, the playground, when you embrace yourself. I don’t have the answers, and that’s where you create. I think that is a great anecdote of our studio because it also shows how we work. We create pockets for what do we know, what do we not know, and then for the what do we not know, what do we need to do to figure out until we know.

This is also how we started our team. We started with, what do we know? We know that there is a need for strategy and design to come together, so we hired strategist designers. We tried, and it worked. We added the storytelling angles because that was missing. We really looked for diversity of crafts in our team, and that just happened to be a diverse group of people from all around the world where people don’t even speak German, even though we’re in Germany, and that’s a no-no here. Like, “Oh, if you’re here, you need to speak German.” We don’t care. We want the best of their crafts and bring their best selves and their best work, and magic happens. Look at the Paralympic project.

Lisa: Incredible. I love the idea of just we got to go to the playground. We recently had Jill Vialet on who wrote Why Play Works, and I think she would agree with you that play is the place to discover, to push boundaries, and to take a risk. Even when you got this latest space, knowing we need a bigger space. We have to be able to do our work and push boundaries, and we’re going to need the space to do it. There’s all these great signs everywhere. There’s a sign that says something like 13 ways to increase talent. Tell me about that sign.

Franzi: 13 things that require zero talent, [chuckles] which is really to get the basics right in our team. Being on time, showing up, being prepared, all of these things that really don’t require talent, but set each other up for success. Just an easy entry to be part of a team.

Lisa: Just even, again, putting out the expectations, the standards, but doing it in a lighthearted way. Not being like, “Listen, you better, or you’ll get fired, or you’re done.” Like, “Hey--” I think you said that’s the most photographed. It’s hand-drawn. It’s a flip chart up there. Throughout the whole office, there’s just invitations to be playful. There’s so much humor. You do some serious work.

We don’t have time to get into some of the work that you’ve done with the UN on food security. A lot of very, very serious projects that we’ll make sure to link to on your site. It requires that humanity and recognizing that we don’t have to take ourselves so seriously to do this important work. I just think that there’s a consistency and a congruency with the way that you lead that I just find to be so inspiring.

Franzi: It’s really rooted in this belief that we have an impact. We’ve collected the proof points. We can have an impact. Let’s do it and let’s do it again. I recently listened as well to the Dan Roam episode of How We Future. He’d be very pleased to see that we have a massive whiteboard that we completely wipe as a process that we do before big ideas need to happen. It’s a ceremony to clean the whiteboard. Then we start mapping out the most complex things. The gnarliest problems, the most complex issues, you can start simplifying and start making sense of it together. With the belief that you can do it, I think, in a space that allows for it, the world is your oyster.

Lisa: I love that, Franzi. Maybe a great place to end this conversation, but certainly not ending our incredible work together because I honor so much who you are and what you do. I’m so grateful that you are doing the hard work of meeting people where they are, even in these difficult times, and believing that the future can be better than it is today if we lead into our humanity. We continue to show up with care, with humor, with empathy, and with courage. Franzi, thank you so much for being a part of How We Future, for the work that you do. As always, I leave our conversations more excited for what’s next. Thank you.

Franzi: Thank you, Lisa, for creating this podcast format because that was yet another thing that didn’t exist before. Thank you for creating this format for all of us. Really excited for the next episodes to come. I would just love to invite everybody here because that’s still my mission. Watch the Paralympics. They’re starting. You should see the videos coming up leading up to it too. Be a fan. Be a fan of the Paralympics. They’re so cool.

Lisa: Yes, absolutely. Be a fan. Share with others. Now you know the story of how they happened, so you’re brought in. Not just be a fan, be an ambassador. Thank you, Franzi. I’m so excited. Can’t wait to see them, and we will share them with the world.

Franzi: Yay.

Lisa: Thanks for spending time with me and Franzi Sessler. There’s so much to learn from her passion, joy, and belief that tomorrow can be better than today. Here’s a simple challenge for you this week. Notice a story that moves you. Maybe it’s an Olympians journey to the Winter Games or a colleague’s breakthrough at work. Pay attention to the moment that the story turns a stranger into someone you’re suddenly rooting for.

As Franzi reminds us, there are no others in this world. Only stories we haven’t heard yet. When we choose to listen, we turn a stadium of strangers into a community of shared human effort. If this episode sparked something for you, I’d love for you to rate or review How We Future or share it with someone who believes creativity can move the world forward. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thanks for listening, and I’ll see you next time.

“Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”

For our first-ever live audience recording of How We Future, Lisa Kay Solomon sat down with architect and author Chad Oppenheim at Book Passage in San Francisco.

The conversation centers around Chad’s book RIDE: The Iconic Wheels of the Silver Screen and the vehicles that became emotional anchors in film history. From the Back to the Future DeLorean to Ferris Bueller’s Ferrari, these cars were modes of transportation, meaning, and possibility.

Chad shares how childhood Matchbox cars sparked a lifelong fascination with design and storytelling, and how those early influences still shape his architecture today. This live episode explores the importance of imagination and why the things that once made us feel limitless can still guide how we build the future.

You’ll hear:

• Why movie cars function as emotional characters

• How nostalgia shapes creative vision

• Chad’s favorite movie car

This week, take Ferris Bueller’s advice and slow down. Revisit a movie that meant something to you as a kid.

Ask yourself:

• What did this story, or this machine, make me feel back then?

• What part of that feeling do I want more of in my future?

And if you’re up for it, share with us: What was the iconic ride that changed how you saw the world?

Links from the show:

• Oppenheim Architecture

• LAIR: Radical Homes and Hideouts of Movie Villains

• RIDE: Most Iconic Wheels of the Silver Screen

• Watch 1 minute Trailer: RIDE

🎧 Listen now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today.

This week’s episode of How We Future is a special one. It’s our very first live audience recording, captured last week at Book Passage in San Francisco. I’m joined by my friend, award-winning architect and author Chad Oppenheim, for a joyful conversation inspired by his new book, Ride: The Iconic Wheels of the Silver Screen. We talk about cars as emotional characters, childhood wonder, and how imagination shapes the futures we want to build. I can’t wait for you to hear this conversation with Chad. Let’s dive in.

[applause]

Lisa: All right, Chad.

Chad Oppenheim: Let’s do it.

Lisa: We’re going to have a good time. How We Future Live. This is a milestone event. This is just so exciting. Elaine, thank you and your team, Zack and Karen, for believing in this collaboration. For those of you that are new to the How We Future podcast, it’s really about having conversations with people like Chad that are imagining new futures and bringing them to life.

The goal, as Elaine said, is to put some positive bright spots out there for us to learn from, not Pollyanna, not toxic positivity, but ways that we can all learn to maybe reframe, ask different questions, and get inspired. My gosh, Chad, do you inspire me. Thank you so much for being here.

Chad: Oh, thank you. It’s amazing.

Lisa: We’re going to talk about cars. We’re going to talk about movies. One of the things that’s great about both of those is that I think we all can relate. What I thought we would do to get a sense of the people in the room is I want you to think about your favorite car, like the car that you dream of or that you thought of as a kid that just stuck with you. On the count of three, I want you to say that really loud. Okay? Everyone have one? All right. One, two, three.

Audience: [crosstalk]

Lisa: Oh, my gosh. So good. So good. Energy for cars. Okay. I think I heard “Batmobile.” I think I heard “Thelma and Louise convertible.” I know we have some outlaws. We’ve got some good car buffs in the room. That’s amazing. Chad, as Elaine said, you are a world-renowned architect. Chad actually was just a guest in my class today, View from the Future, that I teach at Stanford.

You could literally see our students’ jaws just drop when Chad started to show these gorgeous buildings that blended with nature. In your spare time, you decided to write an incredible book about cars and movies. We’re going to talk about all of that. I just maybe want to start with the why behind this gorgeous book.

Chad: I wrote another book called Lair. We have a little mini version here. There’s a new mini-Lair that just got released. To Elaine’s point, it is very expensive to make these books. They’re passion projects. That idea of that book was about why movie villains all have the most incredible homes and things that inspired me as a child. My mother always complains when I speak about this. Growing up in central New Jersey, there wasn’t much immediate excitement around me, so I kind of reverted into movies. A lot of them have shown up in my architecture in some ways. I only realized that after I wrote the book, that I was inspired by these James Bond lairs and things like that.

Then after that, I had other ideas. This is part of that series. The next one is Ride, which we see here, and that’s all about the cars and vehicles from films. Before I wanted to be an architect, I originally wanted to be a car designer. I would really just draw cars all the time. I think as a little boy, seeing all these exotic cars in movies and things, it just really blew my mind. That’s where this book comes from. That love. The immediate love of a child seeing a Lamborghini for the first time in Cannonball Run. I was like, “What?” [chuckles] I still have the same excitement.

Lisa: That’s amazing. You talk about in the book that when you were younger, your grandparents used to bring you one of those-

Chad: Matchbox cars.

Lisa: -Matchbox cars. Yes.

Chad: Yes, every week, they would come, they would drive from where my mother grew up in Bayside and bring me a Matchbox car. I don’t know where I was more excited, to see them or get the car. I had hundreds and hundreds of these cars and made little chase scenes going on in the house. Everything fit. I don’t know if it’s like a marketing ploy, but like the movies, the Matchbox cars, it’s like you just want to get a car and drive and the freedom and so forth.

Lisa: Oh, I just love it. They really open up imagination. You get this small artifact, but it’s not the artifact. It’s what it represents.

Chad: Right. Exactly.

Lisa: You remember we put those tracks around.

Chad: Totally. Yes.

Lisa: Different cars winning just because you want them to. Right?

Chad: Exactly.

Lisa: Yes. I was struck by something you said in the intro. You said, “It was my love of cars that opened me up to design and how it can invoke feeling.”

Chad: Yes, and I can still feel-- I didn’t love the car, but the symbolism, I guess. My father started his own business, and times were pretty tough financially. Then when he finally started to make enough money, he bought a new car. It was this Cadillac Seville. I remember the smell, that new car smell. My father was so proud. He was so precious with the car that he never took out the paper mats that came with it.

Me and my sister had to take our shoes off. I just remember the car so well and the pride that he had with being able to buy that car and drive around, not that I love the car, but just that symbolism of I can afford to transport my family in style. Yes. Maybe more like pimp style and the like.

[laughter]

Chad: I don’t know, but it was--

Lisa: No, but it was such a meaningful display of status and mobility. Again, throughout the book, really, this is like a book about emotion. You feel it. You say, cars in film represent more than just mobility. They embody freedom, power, and possibility. They’re reflections of our desires and extensions of our identities. I think that really captures that.

Chad: Oh, for sure. My father would always tell me stories about cars, like how he used to drag race when he was a kid, and how he borrowed his father’s car and his friends were provoking him to take this turn really fast, and how he went off the road and his father was going to kill him because that was his car that he earned enough money to make. It was always this notion of this precious status symbol, but at the same time, inherent connection to this incredible vehicle.

Lisa: There’s so much about your work, Chad, even just hearing that story about your childhood memories that then became the future that you are now living and continuing to shape. I know we’re not talking about Lair, but I do want you to share the story about, again, another ritual you had with your father growing up on Friday night and how that led to a whole other path.

Chad: Yes. Once again, the boring New Jersey story that my mother, I hope, is not listening to this podcast.

[laughter]

Lisa: She’s definitely not listening. No way she is.

Chad: Well, edit that out. My father and I would watch Miami Vice growing up, and you would hear that music at the beginning. It was just so exciting. I don’t know if it’s because-- I guess if I was living in Miami, it would have been rather exciting, but I was living in suburban New Jersey. That music and Michael Mann, the director, put together this--

I think it was really the first show of its kind. It was almost like a movie every Friday. It really changed television, and just all the attention to detail, the car, the Ferrari Daytona, the clothes they wore. It’s embarrassing, but I wore a deconstructed linen suit to graduation thinking I was Crockett in suburban New Jersey. I was surprised that it wasn’t best dressed. I had espadrilles. I don’t know. I just bought into that whole Miami Vice vibe and just every detail that Michael Mann accumulated for these things.

Subsequently, he’s actually in the book. When he filmed the movie, he came to Miami. This was really, I would say, one of the greatest moments of my life in architecture was-- he’s like, “Your architecture represents the new Miami because living in Miami--” then we became fast friends because anyone who compliments my architecture is a very close friend suddenly.

He was telling me how he was going to Moderna to pick out the color of the Ferrari for the movie. He was just so into all these incredible details and the music. It was just like a total sensory experience, what he created in Miami Vice and the architecture. That’s really how I ended up in Miami because of all the cool architecture.

Then I went to go work for the architecture firm who designed a lot of the architecture used in Miami Vice called Arquitectonica. I have a lot of full circles in my life, Michael Mann inspiring me, meeting him in Miami. He’s in the book. He’s actually in both books. We interviewed him for Lair. We have an incredible interview with Michael about the movie, Ferrari, which he made, and his passion for these cars and the attention to detail is spectacular. There’s some really interesting nuggets about Michael’s experience with Ferrari.

Lisa: Did they actually film part of the movie, the new Miami Vice, in your home?

Chad: Yes. In our house. Yes. He wanted to shoot in our house, and he ended up-- there was a murder scene. Yes. It was interesting. He ended up building a new kitchen, putting it on exposed to the living room in a different way, and then had someone murdered on the floor with a ton of ketchup or something. I don’t know what the blood was, but I knew we were there. He was like, “No. That’s not gory enough.” He was squirting all over the place.

[laughter]

Chad: It’s amazing to see these films being done and how many people for just this one scene, which literally was five seconds. There must have been 200 people. SWAT teams. The real Miami SWAT teams were outside waiting to charge. It was pretty amazing.

Lisa: Oh, my gosh. That sounds incredible. That same attention to detail, Chad, is throughout this gorgeous book.

Chad: Thank you.

Lisa: One of the things I appreciate most is the way that you organize the book. It’s not by model or year or chronological. It’s about emotion. You really are celebrating the character of these cars. You have cars that are the speed machines that are really the high-octane movies, the heroes of the cars that save the day, the outlaws, the rebels on wheels, possessed, sci-fi, futuristic, fantasy rides, comedy, and music. When you read them, you’re getting a little portal into these cultural zeitgeists that are just extraordinary. How did you come up with that?

Chad: I think it was just the categories of the films and the way-- I think a little bit-- We had 50 cars in the book, and we had to cut it down because it was 700 pages. It would have been many multiple times more expensive, or maybe we’d do volume two if it does well. I still remember watching-- One of the movies that got removed, although I’ll speak about it, is the movie The Car. Has anyone ever seen that movie? That car was this possessed demon car, and it went after everyone in this town. That just scared the living heck out of me as a kid.

I had to have a possessed portion. There’s also The Wraith, which is a cooler car. That’s one of my father’s-- My father, I think, one of the things he’s shared with me many things, but he knows more about TV and movies. [chuckles] He just loves watching all these films. He showed me that, and he loved that. That had a Dodge Interceptor that was a concept car. That was very clear.

Then, of course, the hero cars, like Batman, was a hero, and his machinery, and James Bond is a hero. Then The Outlaws had cool cars. It just kind of-- I wouldn’t say it wrote itself, because these things never do, but it just was evident how they would be organized and the chapters that moved me in terms of the way these cars operated.

Lisa: Well, I love in the book, you also brought in two collaborators that I think really added a whole other level of depth and complexity. You have Matt Stone, who’s really into the cars. He was the editor of--

Chad: The car driver, like part of-- Yes.

Lisa: A judge in the Pebble Beach. We also have Chris Nashawaty, who is a film critic in Entertainment Weekly. For each car, they each give commentary. Matt goes deep in the technical, like what’s going on.

Chad: Under the hood, every detail.

Lisa: You’re really like, “Oh, I could be a car person. This is amazing.” Then Chris is giving the “This is the significance of this moment in this film.” Talk a little bit about that collaboration.

Chad: This is really an incredibly collaborative project. The real glue of it is my wife, Ilona, who’s the publisher and the one who made this all possible. She actually did watch every film, all 50, actually, captured everything, bought special Blu-ray discs, and all these things to capture all these images, did all the graphic design, coordinated with Matt and Chris and myself, a bunch of circus clowns. These guys just brought an incredible amount of knowledge and depth.

There’s so many layers. We have such incredible artwork in the book, too. There’s a company from Paris that did many of the drawings and the maps and the diagrams. There’s just layer upon layer. I think the part that I really am most excited about are these interviews. We have the Michael Mann interview, which is incredible. We have Michael Bay, who’s in the book for two movies; Transformers and Bad Boys.

Michael and I ended up doing Michael’s house, two houses for Michael, but he was last-minute. We have, like, “Michael, this book’s going to print. If you’re not having an interview right now, you’re out.” He came through at the last second in a typical Michael fashion, and just delivered an incredible story from his heart about how he was a boy and how he loved cars and how many of the things that happened in his life turned into the Transformers.

His father brought him when he was going to look for a car, his first car, to a Porsche dealer. Then they’re pulling in. Michael’s like, “Oh, my God. Oh, my God. It’s my favorite.” Then he’s like, “Nah,” and diverted. That’s actually in the movie Transformers where the father takes-- He also spoke about how he had a business washing cars. They’re really touching stories. Here’s one of the most successful directors of all time telling about his childhood and revealing his love for cars. In order to buy his first car, because his father said he would pay for half, he had a car washing company. The car washing company was like Nice Boys That Do Nice Work.

[laughter]

Chad: Which is so funny. Michael’s talking about everything. He’s revealing everything. You don’t see the side of many of these people because they’re really important in their industry. It was going really well. He was making a lot of money washing cars with his friends. Then, his grandfather-- Michael was adopted actually. He speaks a little bit about that. His adopted grandfather got him a buffer to help him wax the cars, but it turned out not to be a car buffer. It was something else. Some guy brought in a Rolls-Royce, and he buffed all the paint off of the Rolls-Royce. That was the end of Good Boys That Do Good Work.

[laughter]

Chad: That became Bad Boys, and then the movie-- No. Joke.

[laughter]

Chad: Yes. It’s just incredible, the stories about his first car. We have that about so many people, like Marc Newson, who, along with Jony Ive, is designing the new Ferrari. Marc Newson is regarded as the goat of industrial design. He speaks about his favorite car, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, which blew my mind as a kid. I could still watch all these films over and over again, and how-- He loved that car because he grew up in Australia. His family had a shop, and they used to tinker and make soapbox derby cars. That reminded him of how Chitty Chitty Bang Bang was reassembled from all these parts. Really, I realized, doing these interviews is so much fun.

Lisa: It’s so much. They’re incredible. Stephen King is in there.

Chad: Stephen King. I didn’t interview Stephen King, but that was Chris-

Lisa: Talking about [crosstalk].

Chad: New [crosstalk].

Lisa: Yes. Possessed.

Chad: John Landis.

Lisa: Incredible.

Chad: There’s so many. It’s really great to speak with these people who are your heroes.

Lisa: I know. They didn’t just land in films, too. So many of the films were starts of other movements. Such a great chapter on the The Blues Brothers, which wasn’t even supposed to happen. That was a thing on Saturday Night Live. Lorne Michaels was like, “No. This is going to be terrible.” Here it is, this blockbuster movie.

Chad: Right. “On a mission from God.”

Lisa: Yes. Incredible. Incredible. Getting that detail really helped me see how these directors saw cars as characters to be casted.

Chad: Totally.

Lisa: It’s when you talk about the fact that you need the right car for the right character, and then it’s not even that you find the right car, you have to costume it. I thought that was amazing. You’ve got to soup it up and do all these things.

Chad: Right. Modifications inside and out. Even in Bullitt, they removed the grille on the front of the Mustang. It was just like-- but you see, there’s something like-- it’s a subtle move, but it makes a difference when you see it. It has a grittiness, like Steve McQueen, very cool and unique. Of course, it was filmed in this great city of San Francisco.

Lisa: I think you have a map of it. Right? The drive?

Chad: Yes. That’s so cool, too. There’s so many layers of information. There’s actually a map of the chase-

Lisa: It’s so cool.

Chad: -scene of where it is. Same with Easy Rider. There’s all these incredible layers of information that you just-- you watch these movies, and I think what’s interesting is you read the book, and then you watch the movie again, and it opens up many other things that you just didn’t understand or think about or know.

Lisa: One of the things I love is that you’re really giving some heft to these characters that often go overlooked. As you also say in the book, it’s really the congruence of the story. It elevates the story in ways that you may not even realize. It just brings a whole other polish to it. We have to talk about the DeLorean.

Chad: Yes. I was just going to-

Lisa: I mean, we have to talk about the DeLorean.

Chad: -think about the DeLorean. Interestingly enough, the DeLorean wasn’t the first, let’s say, vehicle thought of for the time machine. Does anyone know what it was?

Audience Member: Fridge.

Chad: Bingo. A refrigerator was actually-- that was the original idea for the time machine.

Lisa: Can you imagine? Back to the Future, just in case anyone doesn’t know what we’re talking about here. Back to the Future.

Chad: It’s very difficult to get a refrigerator to go 88 miles an hour, unless you drop it out of a plane or something. Apparently, Steven Spielberg, who was producer on the movie, thought that it was very dangerous to have a refrigerator be the time machine because he was afraid that kids would lock themselves in their refrigerators and not be able to get out and probably disappear until they open it up frozen.

They opted for the DeLorean. That car was just very impactful. There was a lot of history about the car. We didn’t really speak about John DeLorean and his tainted past but just the idea of that car and the modifications and the flux capacitor and the professor. It’s just an incredible story.

Lisa: I think it’s why it’s lasted 50 years, almost? 40 years?

Chad: It inspired the Cybertruck finish of Elon.

[laughter]

Lisa: Yay.

Chad: Is that a bad one?

[laughter]

Lisa: Even that detail about Stephen King, having the vision to be like, “Wait a minute. This is going to be something that inspires people to do other things.” Again, just trying to make the connection, like, “Where do these futures come from?” They come from somewhere. They come from someone having an imagination about a story that’s going to be sticky, that’s going to stick in our minds, and have the wherewithal to be like, “Fridge. No go. That is not the move.”

Chad: It’s funny. The one thing that sticks in my mind, speaking about the future, is when Doc comes back at the end, and the DeLorean is there. Then Marty’s like, “Well, how do we--? We don’t have enough road to--” He’s like, “Where we’re going, we don’t need roads.” That line, I use it all the time.

Lisa: It’s such a great line. It really is a line that invites you to dream, like status quo behind. “We don’t need the road.” “We’re going somewhere new.” “Come with me.” They’re like, “Yes.”

Chad: What’s crazy about that is that actually, if you think about the time when that future was, I think it was two years ago, that future, I think it was 1985. Then it went to 1950 or ‘60, and then it went--

Lisa: It went to this 2025 or something.

Chad: Yes, ‘25 or something. You’re like, “Where the hell’s the flying cars?” We’re still waiting. Maybe we’re actually very close. Very close.

Lisa: Yes. Hang out here.

Chad: I know.

Lisa: We are in Silicon Valley. There’s definitely a hovering. They’re figuring it out. I also love that you have this great forward from Jay Leno who had a lot to say about [crosstalk].

Chad: He did. He did. He did. He was a little perturbed. He writes honestly from the heart, which I think is really good. He was very excited about a bunch of the cars. Then he was disappointed that we put in Lightning McQueen and other cars that you can’t drive because he’s really a car enthusiast. We were going to go back to him and be like, “Hey, could you be a little more positive?” He loves the book. He said this book is all about emotion, excitement, nostalgia, but also sometimes anger because he was pissed at Lightning McQueen. I forget what other car. He was like--

Lisa: There were some physics details. I don’t know how to put that one.

Chad: Yes. [chuckles] It’s like the person who watches Star Wars and like, “Why are there laser sounds? Space, it’s a vacuum, and sound--” “There should be no laser sound. It should be like a silent movie. “You’re like, “No. Those laser sounds make the movie when they shoot.” Anyway, I love Lightning McQueen. I got one of the most amazing opportunities to collaborate with Pixar to do a hotel in Shanghai. I’m a huge Pixar fan.

My late friend, who became a friend through this project, he helped work on a lot of the production design of Pixar films. It’s just an incredible honor to include Lightning McQueen. I do think-- and it’s interesting. We also interviewed Jeff Gordon. You guys know Jeff Gordon, one of the most celebrated NASCAR racers in the world. A lot of these people I interviewed, they’re friends through architecture. Michael Mann reached out to me because of architecture.

I did Michael Bay’s house. Jeff Gordon, I met because he called me to do a house for him. We hung out. He was driving us in this off-road vehicle. They’re all super nice to actually contribute. Jeff Gordon was in a really incredible story as well of how he became one of the greatest racers of all time. He was one of the voices in Cars 2. He wanted to be in Cars 1.

If you think about it, those movies probably inspired more kids recently than any other movie about cars. NASCAR people should be kissing Pixar because of the amount of fans and people and Lightning McQueen. We really wanted to make this book for everyone. It’s for scholars. It’s for enthusiasts. It’s for film. It’s for car experts. Even a kid could look through it and just be like, “I want that.” [chuckles]

Lisa: No. There’s this incredible connective tissue to it. The interviews are so special. I think, Chad, one of the things I’ve gotten to really appreciate about you is how you build relationships. It’s how you go through life. Again, one of the things we talk about in the How We Future podcast is how do we have outsized influence when it feels like there’s so much happening in the world around us that feels out of our control.

I think you really model such both curiosity and generosity when it comes to learning from others and wanting to understand what makes them excited and then offering, well, “How about we do this?” All of a sudden, there’s a totally different relationship, different kind of collaboration. I just love how you’re building homes for all these great movie makers and giving them the dreams that they want.

Chad: Thank you. I would say the same for you even more. I enjoy very much engaging in the universe that you’ve created with all these great thinkers. Thank you for making me part of it.

Lisa: Oh, my gosh. It’s been incredible. We’ve talked about these cool fantasy cars and even Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. We have to talk about some of the non-perfect cars that are equally powerful, starting with the Ecto-1 in Ghostbusters. I wonder if we could talk about that, or coming up with the van and Stripes as an unexpected contribution.

Chad: No, it is. I think Ghostbusters is maybe more obvious. It’s just like a car that people really connected to, if you will, that movie, the humor, and the cars. It was really just assembled with parts from a hardware store and painted. That was pretty interesting to hear those stories and uncover how something that looks so high-tech was just really low-tech. I’ll talk a little bit more about Stripes just because it’s one of those in the book where people are like, “Really?”

I don’t know if you guys have ever watched Stripes. It’s actually a really funny movie. There’s something about that vehicle that is super cool because it was actually like an RV that GM had. GMAC, I think it was. How they modified it, and they turned it into this assault vehicle. There was a lot of discussion. “Let’s take this out when we were editing from 300 down to 100, down to 50.”

We made the book with 50, actually. We have all the content, drawings, all the images, all the graphic layout. It was really at the end when we’re like, “Oh, my God. This book’s 700 pages, and it’s going to be $700.” We cut it all down. That Stripes one, I don’t know. I fought for it. I don’t know. It was really impactful to me as a kid that this RV could become this armored assault vehicle. I don’t know. There was something really funny in the way they operated it and things like that. It’s a cool car. It’s just really interesting.

Lisa: So unexpected that it takes the time that it does.

Chad: I know. There’s some really cool drawings about that.

Lisa: It’s incredible. Okay. I have to ask about another one that has also just become a meme, which is National Lampoon‘s Vacation. We can all picture that moment in time. We’re like, “Station wagon, here we go.”

Chad: Yes. The Family Truckster. In Lair, it was also about editing. I’m not very good at editing. I’m not very good at coming up with a lot of ideas. The editing part was specific. In Lair, it was about what has inspired me architecturally. It wasn’t like, “Okay. It’s just a bad guy who has a house.” It had to be a bad guy that had a house that inspired me or developed me as an architect in some interesting subconscious way.

The Family Truckster was not really a cool car. It was the most uncool car that you could possibly find, and that was its charm. It turns out, a friend of mine, who was one of the founders or the founders of Vrbo owned that car. He was telling me about how him and the office, and he showed me a picture of them when they first started. I think he started HomeAway, and then they acquired Vrbo or whatnot.

It’s just like it’s such an iconic car because it’s so awkward, with the grandmother up on the roof and the kids. There’s one scene in that movie that I think is-- there’s so many memorable ones, but there’s one scene where everyone, the whole family is asleep, he’s driving, and Christie Brinkley pulls up in a Ferrari, and her hair is blowing. She was such an incredible beauty.

In the car, you’re like, “Oh, my God.” I think he goes off the road or something. I forget exactly because he’s so busy looking at her. That’s just a funny scene that is so memorable. He’s in this, the most dorky car. One of the features that I didn’t even notice when I was researching is it has multiple stacked headlights, which is interesting. I don’t know.

Lisa: Like you do if you’re Knight Rider?

Chad: Yes. I don’t know. That was like a funny car. It had to be in there because everyone’s always like, “The Family Truckster.”

Lisa: We used to picture the wood paneling on the side. I mean [crosstalk]--

Chad: Totally. My parents had a Wagoneer with the wood paneling. That was our little family. We called it “The Family Truckster.” It was funny.

Lisa: Yes. Absolutely indelible in our memories.

Chad: Totally.

Lisa: Speaking of which, once I read about it in the book, I have, of course, been listening to now the soundtrack of Grease, which is like the total iconic Grease Lightnin’ car movie of the ‘80s. We all wanted to be either living--

Chad: You got the jacket.

Lisa: I mean, I have the jazz.

[laughter]

Lisa: We got the Pink Ladies. Talk a little bit about cars and even music and even like that.

Chad: Yes. I mean, Grease Lightnin’. I had this vision as a child that I was going to do some incredible dance number in front of the school like John Travolta-

Lisa: Yes. Yes, you were.

Chad: -and impress everyone. It never happened. I even wore the suit vest that he wore to school. Anyway, I became like a big John Travolta fan. Many of you know, he probably even started before that with Welcome Back, Kotter, which was just an incredible cast.

Lisa: Gabe Kaplan. You

Chad: Gabe Kaplan

Lisa: Yes. It’s amazing.

Chad: John Travolta. Then he shows up in Grease, I think, sequentially. This guy is just so cool. Then the car, and it was like this jalopy, and they fixed it up. It kind of lost something when it started flying at the end, like, “What was that?”

Lisa: Yes. That was such a [crosstalk] out of nowhere. Out of nowhere. Unnecessary.

Chad: Yes. I know. It’s like I’m believing it, and then suddenly, they’re like up in the air.

Lisa: It was like my high school, and then it wasn’t.

Chad: Yes. Exactly. Like Olivia Newton-John with her coat, how he molds to her image, and then she molds to what she thought he wanted, then they’re like opposite, and like, “The one that I want.” Anyway, it was so great. The car and the race scene in the LA River. They’re racing for pink slips. It made me think of my father and him racing as a kid.

Lisa: I know, and the friendship?

Chad: Oh, yes.

Lisa: “Will you be my second driver?” Then he drives. Oh, it’s awesome.

Chad: It’s so much emotion.

Lisa: He wants to see all these [crosstalk]--

Chad: There’s so much emotion, so much emotion. The car is super cool, too. That one was a little tricky because we weren’t sure. Do we use the one that they made and raced, or do you do the one that was kind of like the fantasy version with the glass hood or Pyrex hood? We kind of used both.

Lisa: Well, thanks for not using the flying version.

Chad: Yes. [laughs]

Lisa: I thought that was a bizarre end, and how Grease 2 had the motorcycle.

Chad: The motorcycle. Yes.

Lisa: There are, by the way, some awesome motorcycles in there, including some sci-fi ones, the Tron.

Chad: Yes.

Lisa: Oh, my gosh.

Chad: Oh, yes. The Lightcycle.

Lisa: The Lightcycle.

Chad: I have a funny side story on the Tron Lightcycle. The Tron Lightcycle is-- we used both. We used the original one from the original Tron and then the new one that was done. The one time my mother ever really got super mad at me was we were at a Chuck E. Cheese in Maryland, and I was visiting my camp counselors. We would always go there for this teacher’s conference break. It was in the fall.

My mother’s like, “We got to go.” We’re at Chuck E. Cheese, and I’m playing Tron with the Lightcycles. I’m like, “Mom, I’m getting a high score.” She’s like, “We got to go to the airport.” We were flying People’s Express. I don’t know if you remember People’s Express. I think it only flew to Newark or whatever. You paid on the plane with your credit card. My mother’s like, “We got to go.” I’m like, “No. No. I’m getting a high score.” I’m with the Lightcycles and Tron. We missed the plane. I did get the high score.

[laughter]

Chad: I got my high score, at least, which was probably nowhere near the real high score. That Lightcycle got me in a lot of trouble. It’s just so interesting. That was the first time, actually, that computer graphics was ever used in a movie, or the integration of live action with computer graphics. It’s really an interesting story.

Lisa: It’s also interesting that a lot of the movies that you picked are now being remade. There’s a new Tron coming out. By the way, I heard that they actually interviewed Fei-Fei Lee as part of it. She has a part who’s an AI iconic researcher.

Chad: Incredibly talented, those guys, the way they used, as architects, the way they used the computer to tell stories. Really beautiful.

Lisa: Oh, I know. A couple of things. One is F1, the movie that just came out.

Chad: Incredible.

Lisa: Unbelievable. We definitely need a sequel.

Chad: Totally. Yes. I know. We were thinking about doing that, including that, but it was just like, “Can we get Brad Pitt? Can we get Joseph?”

Lisa: That story about technology is an awesome segue to some questions I’ve collected ahead of time. This one comes from someone who is actually with us tonight, my dear friend Nathan Shedroff, who is the founding dean of the MBA in design strategy, a visionary, an author in his own right, particularly writes a lot about design and science fiction.

Nathan wants to know. Technology and science fiction have had a symbolic relationship for a very long time. This came up in some of the research that he did in his own book called Make It So, which is fantastic. He’s curious about your thoughts about the relationship between technology and cars and how they’ve really influenced science fiction, influencing science facts, and just the relationship between that book in particular.

Chad: There’s a lot to unpack there. My work as an architect is very inspired by a lot of science fiction that I read, including Three-Body Problem that inspired a resort that we did on the Red Sea in Saudi Arabia. In terms of cars, the technology that I think inspired me was things like the Lotus Esprit Turbo and how that car just turned into a submarine. That was one of the ones that I had the Matchbox car for. That was in the bath every night. That thing was like my sister. It was through her legs.

It’s funny because we found the car. My mother saved all these cars. I think she gave it to my son. Then my daughter was like, “I want one.” We had to order one. Now, you can find everything on eBay. That type of technology, like Q-Lab, it was just so incredible. Then there’s something I’ll speak of. Of course, the technology of the assault vehicle in Stripes.

Of course, the DB5, which really set off. I wasn’t there when it happened, but my parents, and speaking to them and other people who grew up at that era, to see that Aston Martin, when you’re seeing all American cars growing up and whatnot, that just blew. Then the ejector seat, the oil spray, the machine guns, the license plate. It was just like, “Gee.” That’s unbelievable.

Of course, we could have done a lot more. James Bond cars, which also in Lair, we could have done many, many more. James Bond. I think the car that most inspired me technologically, and if this book sells, if you guys all buy one, we might do the-- but it’s the cars of television. That was the next book. At one point, we’re like, “Should we merge them?” Then we’re like, “No, because the movies are one thing, but--” Kitt, Knight Rider, was like, the one that-- that was another thing I watched with my father religiously, it was David Hasselhoff, Germany’s most sexy man alive.

[laughter]

Chad: The French love Jerry Lewis. The Germans love David Hasselhoff. Nevertheless, Kitt and Knight Rider, just that light and the sound. [onomatopoeia] The dashboard. I want to know who the voice of Kitt was. That’s an interesting-- because that voice was like, “Michael, we have a problem.” [chuckles] That car, technologically-- I was in the Waymo last night, I’m thinking, “This is not too far from Kitt.” We’re waiting to do the cars of television, which there are a lot of really good ones.

Lisa: Again, I think it’s like we see these images, and they have a huge impact-

Chad: Totally.

Lisa: -on us, whether we realize it or not. A big thing that we’re trying to do with the podcast and with my class and anything that I can write and share is to help us imagine better futures so we can build them and not just react to the futures happening to us because it’s just so critical to pay attention to that. There’s a lot of people that want to know what your favorite car is.

Chad: Oh, my favorite car?

Lisa: Two things. What is favorite car in the book, and your favorite car or favorite ride you’ve ever been in?

Chad: I would say it had to be the Lotus Esprit in the James Bond film, just because it was just so cool. The shape of that car, it’s like this really elegant wedge, and then it turned into a submarine, and he pulls up on the beach, and he’s like-- Roger Moore was my James Bond. My mother grew up, she’s like, “Roger Moore.” Like, “Sean Connery, come on, this guy’s like a clown.” I’m like, “Roger Moore is so cool.” He’s so quirky, and he pulls up on the beach, I guess it’s in Sardinia, and he has a fish, and he drops it out of the car. There’s just something about that that I love. I guess, real cars, even though that was a real car, but you couldn’t get those options at the dealer.

Lisa: [chuckles] Not yet.

Chad: It had to be the Lamborghini Countach from Cannonball Run. Just seeing that, and we have an incredible section about Lamborghini and the design and the sketches and so forth, but just seeing that car, it was mind-boggling.

Lisa: I think that answers another question, which was very curious. Lamborghini, Ferrari, where do you sit? I think we just forgot [crosstalk]--

Chad: Well, it’s interesting. Today, I don’t know where I would sit, but growing up, it was definitely Lamborghini just because it was so exotic. Although once again, another car movie, cars from the TV show Magnum P.I., the Ferrari. He was just so cool. Tom Selleck driving around with the Hawaiian shirt and the Ferrari. If you just think about it, a lot of these shows and movies, they really made a tremendous imprint in all of us. It’s like the nostalgia, the excitement, and the choice of that car. The choice of all these cars are very specific and very important.

Lisa: Important.

Chad: Casting.

Lisa: It is. The casting and the congruency to the story, and to really get you to-- It’s amazing to think about, set aside everything for two and a half hours to be in a movie theater and take in a narrative.

Chad: Totally.

Lisa: You think about that. Are we going to get there? The Fast & Furious franchise.

Chad: I think I’m more Ferrari now than Lamborghini.

Lisa: Oh, sorry. You switched? You can [crosstalk]. You can [crosstalk]

Chad: Lamborghini became like Crypto Bros show. I’m more about handling. Kit, who’s a friend of mine here tonight, we used to race cars together. Now I’m more about handling and speed than looks-

Lisa: Yes, getting into the functioning.

Chad: -and flash. Yes.

Lisa: I’ve got a great question here that we also crowdsourced from folks not here. This comes from Gabrielle, who is an eight-year-old in Canada, who is a huge Fast & Furious fan. Her mom said she had a lot of questions. “How do you make flames come out of the back? Are they really driving? How do you make it so exciting?” What she really wanted to know was how does one select a particular car for a certain character, particularly for the girls in this series? There’s definitely a lot of male energy in there.

Chad: Yes. For sure. It’s interesting. In the book, I also interviewed Dennis McCartney(ph). He is the one who designs and builds all the cars for Fast and the Furious. I don’t think he did Fast and the Furious 1, but he did pretty much every other one. He’s built 100 Fast and the Furious cars. We had to pick one. We picked the original car from the original film and then a modified off-road version, which was my favorite.

I also wanted to include, from Tokyo Drift, some of the Japanese JDM, or the Japanese Domestic Market cars, and then some of the cool cars in other films. I forget which one where this Japanese girl that was so spunky. She had this cool pink JDM car and stuff like that. Dennis McCartney is incredible. His showroom is in-- not showroom, but his workshop. He has some of the cars there.

Basically, the way they cast him is they give him a budget, and he just picks the cars for the characters, which is interesting. He’ll be like, “Oh, Terese needs this car.” He’ll like, “The Mercedes with the six wheels,” or whatever. There’s so many interesting stories that he has in the interviews of how he selects the cars for the characters and makes them, which is even cooler. They’re all modified, too, for jumping.

Lisa: Yes. You give some beautiful shout-outs to people in the industry, which is also some of the questions.

Chad: These people are just hidden, and no one knows about it.

Lisa: Yes. There’s a whole industry, and that was incredible. I think you were saying for Blues Brothers, there was 400-

Chad: Exactly.

Lisa: -cop cars that were-

Chad: We were talking to John Landis-

Lisa: -destroyed especially.

Chad: -because he came to the opening party that we did in Los Angeles at the Peterson, but he went to the after-party. He was reading a lot about that, and he was talking about the amount of cars. Even the hero car, there’s always a bunch of them. Michael Bay tells the story of the car from Bad Boys, the Porsche. There’s a lot of really funny stories. Michael’s incredibly descriptive in a lot of these things.

Originally, he said-- That was his first film. He used to do commercials. He did the Got Milk? commercial. Somehow, Jerry Bruckheimer gave him the opportunity to do Bad Boys. The production guy, I forget what. “He didn’t believe in me. There wasn’t really a big budget. They wanted me to rent a Mustang for $500 a week.” He was like, “I’m not doing that.” He owned that Porsche, and he had it shipped over from LA. They used his own car in the movie for all the stunts and everything and whatnot. He was like, “Oh, my God.” Fires exploding. He’s racing.

At any rate, I guess it was like he said something like a couple thousand dollars’ worth of damage, and they fixed the car. Then later, I don’t know, it was like after, he sold it to one of the production assistants for I think $30,000 less than he paid for it. Then that guy sold it ten times what he paid for it. Then that guy sold it for like-- the car ended up selling for millions of dollars. Michael’s like, “I’m such an idiot.”

He always gets the cars in the Transformers. He buys them sometimes. He tells a really funny story about the Camaro in the Transformers and how he basically helped make that car into production. It wasn’t going to be produced, but he went into GM. He saw it. He’s like, “This would be really cool for the movie.” He modified it, worked on the design, and then it became the Camaro.

In Transformers, anyone know what the original car in Transformers was? Bumblebee? That’s easy. What would be Bumblebee? Volkswagen Beetle was in the comic and the cartoons. Yes. He changed it to this Camaro, which wasn’t even in production. Then the movie did so well, the car went into production that he helped tweak. He says he made GM billions of dollars for the sale of the car. When we designed his house, we put Bumblebee in the lower level of the house, where there was a prop museum on a turntable, because he said Bumblebee paid for the house.

Lisa: Chad, your stories are incredible. You’re giving an already vibrant book even more life, which is just so joyful. Of course, I have to close on a final question, which is like, what is next? We’ve clearly seded(ph) potentially Ride TV Edition.

Chad: There’s seven different ride books. One is Airwolf and cool planes. Another one is ride intergalactic, like spaceships, Star Wars stuff, like Landspeeder and stuff like that, because some of that was going to-- All these other versions, because they were in the book, and we had to edit them out.

Then there’s another book called Wear. I don’t know. I like the four letters. It’s all about the costumes. It’s all about the costumes of films because all these things, all these ingredients, if you take them all together, the architecture, the vehicles, the spaceships, and then there’s another one called Gear, which is all about the gear, like lightsabers and this stuff like that. Anyway, there’ll be none of this if these don’t sell, so please.

[laughter]

Chad: Please support Tra Publishing in there. [chuckles]

Lisa: Right. The Tra Publishing, Book Passage, all. Yes.

Chad: Yes. Thank you so much.

Lisa: What about Eats?

Chad: Eats? There actually was a talk about the food in movies.

Lisa: Yes. It’s huge.

Chad: The recipes to make that food, but yes, it could be. We’ll do that with you. Yes.

Lisa: Yes. It’s also worth saying that Ilona, who happens to be here with us tonight, which is amazing-

Chad: There she is.

Lisa: -is also a cookbook author herself.

[applause]

Lisa: We need to bake some of those. Chad, there’s so many more stories we could have talked about-

Chad: Oh, my God. Yes.

Lisa: -including one of my all-time favorite, of course, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and-

Chad: Oh, my gosh.

Lisa: -The Cider and all the rest.

Chad: Oh, my God. If you have the means, definitely pick one up. There’s just great lines. Of course, I don’t want to carry on too long, but Porsche, we mentioned Michael Bay in Bad Boys, but Risky Business. I still cringe as that Porsche goes into Lake Michigan. I’m like, “I can’t look. I cannot look.” I think that movie honestly made me never take my father’s car when they went out because I was like, “If any of this stuff happens, I’m in trouble.” Anyway, Porsche plays a big part in the book as well.

Lisa: Oh, huge. Well, I want to end with one of my favorite quotes from Ferris Bueller where he says, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you may miss it.”

Chad: That’s true.

Lisa: With that, I want to say thank you for stopping around and making sure that we are not missing the finer details in the movies -

Chad: Thank you.

Lisa: -that we love, in the buildings that you design are so extraordinary. Elaine, I want to thank you again for allowing us to be here, and your team-

Chad: And crew.

Elaine Petrocelli: Our pleasure.

Lisa: -Zack, and our team that made this happen; Kaela, Erik, Alex, Franzi, Tony. Just incredible. Thank you for giving us a magical evening where we could both reminisce and imagine more boldly. Thanks, everyone.

[applause]

Lisa: A huge thanks to Chad Oppenheim, Ilona Oppenheim, Elaine Petrocelli, and the entire Book Passage team, and to everyone who joined us for this special night. If this conversation reminded you of a favorite movie, a beloved car, or a moment of childhood wonder, I invite you to hold onto that feeling this week and notice how it might be pointing you towards what you want to build next. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thanks for listening to How We Future.

Sometimes the fastest way to clarity is to start drawing.

In this episode of How We Future, Lisa Kay Solomon sits down with visual thinking pioneer Dan Roam to explore how simple sketches can bring clarity to complexity. Dan, author of The Back of the Napkin and five other bestselling books, shares how visual thinking strengthens problem-solving, communication, and our sense of agency in an uncertain world.

In this conversation, you’ll learn:

• Why drawing helps us slow down and make sense of complex problems

• How Dan’s “six by six” framework supports clearer thinking and communication

• What visual thinking has to do with personal agency and influence

• Dan’s philosophy on AI and its impact on storytellers

Lisa and Dan trace the roots of visual thinking back to how our brains naturally process the world, then bring those ideas into real life. The conversation also looks ahead as they reflect on what visual thinking means in an era of generative AI, and why human judgment, ethics, and curiosity still matter deeply.

Links from the show

• The Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas by Dan Roam

• Blah, Blah, Blah: What to Do When Words Don’t Work by Dan Roam

• Show and Tell: How Everybody Can Make Extraordinary Presentations by Dan Roam

• Napkin Academy

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today.

Today’s guest is Dan Roam, someone who has had a huge influence on how I think about clarity and communication. Dan is the author of six international bestselling books, including one of my favorites, The Back of the Napkin. He’s worked with leaders across all industries and geographies to help them tackle complex problems with simple pictures.

In this episode, we talk about the power of visual thinking, why drawing isn’t about talent, and what it means to think clearly in a world that feels increasingly complex, especially in the age of AI. If you’re hoping to make sense of messy problems, change your outlook, and see more clearly, then let’s get started with Dan Roam.

Dan Roam, my dear friend, thank you so much for being here on How We Future.

Dan Roam: Lisa, thank you so much for inviting me. Every time over this last decade and a half, two decades, when you’ve asked me or presented me the opportunity to do something with you, it’s always been delightful, so I get to do it again, makes my whole day.

Lisa: Me too. You know what? I’m glad that you said decade and a half because I was curious when we first met, and I was able to trace it to an exact date. Which is because, secret to everyone listening, if they don’t know me, I may seem very-- why I’m organized, but I find everything interesting, so I save everything. Dan, my dear friend, I went back to one of my handy white binders that I have on visual thinking, and I returned to notes that I kept from the VizThink conference.

For those people that are not looking, this is 2009. This was the VizThink conference, the very first time I encountered your work on The Back of the Napkin on visual thinking. I felt like I had one of those moments where I was like, “I’m not going back. I’ve just seen Narnia. I’ve just seen color.” Everything just exploded for me, and so much clarity, and you were incredible. I remember saying to myself, “We’re going to be friends, and I’m going to keep learning from this extraordinary person.” That’s the date.

Dan: You pursued it, and we did become friends. If I’m doing the math correctly, we’re talking 16 years ago, which is a while, and we’ve had many adventures along the way. To be able to take this time, Lisa, and update each other on where we have been, but more importantly, where we think this is taking us, is just utterly fantastic for me.

Lisa: I’m so excited. In that time, you’ve had at least five books, many, many projects, new educational endeavors. We’re going to talk about all of them. Dan, in honor of our speaking, I brought my own whiteboard here to the party.

Dan: Yes, you did. Perfect.

Lisa: For those, again, that are not seeing it via video, this is a Venn diagram that articulates the overlap between our work. On the one hand, I have a circle, which is dedicated to me and my work, which is helping more people find agency in the world amid ambiguity, how do we build those skillsets, and your circle, which is around visual thinking and communication. I have this overlap, because I know you love to mark things in red, in black, of where we intersect.

The truth is, as I look at it, Dan, it’s almost-- This isn’t even accurate. It’s like the overlap is so much bigger. That’s really what I want to talk about with you today, which is your incredible work on visual thinking and how it helps all of us become, first of all, better thinkers, which I think is critical, and better communicators, which means connecting with others. A lot of ground to cover. Maybe we’ll start with just even visual thinking and defining it and making it more accessible to more people.

You and I have spent a lot of time with innovators and designers and entrepreneurs. My humble hope is that anybody listening to this, regardless of what they do and who they are in the world, will walk away from this conversation feeling more ready and inspired to pick up the pen, to make sense of their life, to figure out how they can influence a better tomorrow, because that’s what we’re trying to do here at How We Future. Maybe starting with visual thinking and what that is and why it’s not just about drawing.

Dan: Yes. Lisa, perfect way to set things up. The fact that you pulled out your whiteboard and you showed us a little Venn diagram, so two overlapping circles, and I understand that there will be a lot of people who are listening, so they’re not able to see our visuals. That’s okay, because we’ve been doing this for a while and realizing that this notion of visual thinking does not require any artistic talent whatsoever. In fact, it’s not really visual thinking, even about your ability to draw.

What visual thinking really says is the human brain is super highly optimized to be a visual engine. Roughly half of the entire human brain, if you think about the 70 billion neurons that are in the average human brain, roughly half of those have evolved to help us simply process vision. The idea that there is a visual, structural, colorful world around us, that we are navigating our way through, and every part of that goes through our eyes, every part of that, what we see, what the colors are, what the edges are, what we see moving in front of us, the shadows, all of it, the shapes, the people, everything occupies so much of our brain.

We do a tremendous amount of incredibly sophisticated thinking, often at a very subconscious or unconscious level, about how that entire visual world around us is impacting us and what’s unfolding in front of us. We do that without the use of words at all. Now, I love verbal thinking. Lisa, you mentioned, yes, I am a writer. I love reading. Words are fantastic. As a mechanism, as you and I are using right now to communicate an idea, words are absolutely extraordinary. To push the analogy, they’re not the whole picture.

There is far more of our brain that is actively processing the visual world than is processing the auditory or verbal world. What I’m trying to do, and what many, many people have been doing for a long time under this notion of visual thinking is say, you can be smarter, you can be more creative, you can have a much stronger sense of your own, Lisa, to your word, your own sense of personal agency when you make a little bit of effort to understand what it is that you’re seeing in the world, how you might record that in order to make things that are overwhelmingly complicated more clear.

Then by virtue of having created some visuals, some simple sketches, some drawings, you now have something that’s very clear to share with someone else. You’ve now completed the whole loop, that sense of the world is confusing, but I look at it. My mind helps me make sense of that based on what I’m seeing. I can decode that. I can record that. I can clarify that. Then I can play it back in a dialogue or a conversation with someone else, and now we’re seeing literally the same thing. That’s how it works. Does that make sense?

Lisa: Oh, it’s extraordinary. It’s so powerful. First of all, that we’re all wired that way. This notion that our human brains, we are first wired to take in the world visually. We learn to speak because we practice it, but we naturally take in the world through our vision. That we can learn practices of using that natural ability to see more in order to become better problem-solvers, in order to become more capable of sifting through all of the noise to get to the signal, and to then be able to communicate that with others. It’s so powerful. Every time I hear your work, Dan, and hear you talk about your work, I get so excited.

Then I’ll just be honest because we’re friends here. Then I get a little mad. I get a little mad, not at you, Dan, but I get mad at our systems. I get mad at our schooling. I get angry that we essentially communicate to our youngest learners and leaders, probably by the age of second grade, that if they’re good at drawing, they should be relegated to art, and that the visual thinking tools that you share in your wonderful books and programs and presentations can be practiced earlier on. We would all be so much better for it if we had facility and fluency in some of the visual thinking methods that you bring forward to the world.

Dan: Lisa, can we take a second and just ground this in examples, just make it very, very real for people? Again, I want to use your word of agency. To be fair, I didn’t know that was going to be your kickoff word today. I love the fact that it is agency. How do I, individually or as part of a group, find a way to make my message clearer or more understood or be able to make decisions about what I need to do or we need to do, often in spite of an overwhelming number of forces that seem to say, “No, you don’t have the ability to do that”?

I want to give a very good example, just riffing off of what you’d said. I want everybody to picture back when they were a young kid, probably kindergarten, first grade, to the ability that you can. The best way to think about that time is when you were in school and think maybe you hated going to school, maybe you loved going to school, but for the most part, school was aimed to try to be fun. It was trying at that young age to try to encourage us to be curious and to have nice structures and frameworks and tools that would help us embrace this wild world that we now found ourselves in.

I want you to picture yourself back at that time, and the critical element would be before you knew how to read, before you knew how to read and write. As you mentioned, Lisa, you’re dead-on right, typically, there’s a lot of alphabet work done in kindergarten. By the time you’re in 1st Grade, you’re doing your ABCs, and maybe you’re starting to do some reading. Second grade, you’re encouraged to do more reading. Think about it. You spent a lot of time in school before you could read and write, still learning.

One of the most amazing tools that happened for all kids was you drew. You drew simple little cartoon stick figure-type things with crayons. Yes, Lisa, again, to your point, especially for the younger kids, there isn’t yet a sense of “I’m not good at this.” It hasn’t been burned into you yet that even that drawing that you made of a dog that doesn’t even look anything like a dog, you don’t yet know usually that that’s terrible. Until about second grade, a teacher comes along, or a friend, sadly, or a colleague, a classmate, and they say, “That’s the worst dog I’ve ever seen. That doesn’t look at all like a dog,” and now you give up on the drawing.

This is kind of the example. You’ve lost agency in wanting to communicate, in this case, about a dog. Now you say, “Okay, I’ll wait till I can learn to read and write about it.” Then the teachers get very excited because they say, “Okay, kids, now we’re moving on from our drawings. We’re going to put away our picture books and we’re going to move to chapter books. We’re going to purge our education of the visuals that have gotten us this far.” Lisa, I agree with you. Get mad. Why would we do that? It is insane to throw away the very frameworks and tools we used to become communicators to say, “Oh, we don’t need them anymore. They’re juvenile. Leave them behind.” It’s wild.

Lisa: It’s wild. On the flip side of that, again, your work is so accessible and empowering. Your very first book, The Back of the Napkin, which is really about how to solve complex problems with simple pictures, has this opening framework of six different ways to better understand a problem and to better then communicate a potential solution for it. One of the things I learned from you early on was this notion of, once you know the problem, you can draw the picture. Again, that’s a very empowering stance of giving you a wider set of tools to take in whatever problem is coming your way, and not just stand there, fight or flight or freeze, but be able to say, “Wait, let me go through it. What kind of problem is this?” I wonder if you could talk about your six by six.

Dan: Oh, absolutely. It is the critical framework for how do we convert these simple pictures into thinking. It’s really interesting, Lisa, because this little tool-- We’ll talk through what the six by six, the six pictures is in a moment. What’s really interesting about it is it’s simply a model or a framework that works both ways. You just said if you can define the problem, you could draw it. Here’s a set of tools that help you say, “I’ve identified the problem. Now I’m going to break it down into its component elements to clarify it.” Let’s call that direction A to B.

What’s also interesting is the very same tool works the other way around, from B to A, meaning, I have no idea what problem I’m facing right now. Something is overwhelming me and maybe I’m trying to address it over here on this side and it’s not working at all. What would happen then if we took a pause and say, instead of identifying the problem first, what would happen if I just started drawing the very discrete elements of what is coming at me and let the problem emerge from the pictures that I’m drawing? What’s beautiful about this little tool, which we’ll talk about right now, is it goes both ways.

I know the problem and I want to communicate it to someone else. I’ll break it down according to these six very different types of pictures that I can very easily draw. Path A, or I have no idea [chuckles] what’s coming at me, but I know I need to try to take it apart so I can address it. I’ll draw it first and then the problem will emerge on the other side. Super abstract. Let’s talk about this six-by-six tool. Lisa, I’m so glad you brought it up as the starting point.

Let’s go back in our minds to when we were that kid back in school and now let’s move on to maybe third, or fourth or even fifth grade where we’re starting to get much more advanced writing. Every one of us will remember at some point in our writing class, in our English class, a teacher said to us, “I’m going to ask you to write a five-paragraph essay. I’m going to ask you to write a piece, and it’s going to talk about a topic that’s of interest to you. What I need you to do is I need you to make sure you cover the who, the what, the where, the when, and the why.”

Your teacher may or may not have said, and the reason why those are important, is because if any of you grow up to become journalists and go work for the New York Times or the Washington Post, I can tell you right now that your editor is going to say the story is not complete if it doesn’t include in the first graph or two, the who, the what, the where, the when, the why. In fact, if that’s all you tell, then someone will be able to understand your idea pretty clearly just based on those underlying elements.

Guess what? All I did is realize in working through the research of others, standing on the shoulders of giants, many, many people, especially in the cognitive sciences, especially in the visual cognitive sciences, who had started to map out this miracle of vision, this engine that we have that occupies half our brain, how does it actually work? What is it really doing? If we take a step back and just kind of abstract out what vision is, vision is the near miraculous, at least, magical process by which our brain converts light into meaning.

All vision is, is billions, trillions of photons of light that are coming from the sun, that are reflecting off of objects in front of us, or if we’re indoors, the same light is coming from a light bulb or artificial lighting. Fine, but our brain is going through burning enormous amounts of calories, doing all kinds of crazy calisthenics and exercises, turning light into meaning. In our first example, turning light into a dog. Well, that’s one thing. Now, imagine I keep watching that dog for a while and I realize that that dog is chasing a bird. Then I start watching that bird.

Then I realize a whole story is starting to unfold in front of me, no words necessary, of watching the dog, reflected light, chasing a bird, reflected light, over time as the dog and the bird dance around in the playground or wherever they are, until finally the bird flies away and the dog is so upset because he didn’t get what he wanted. A whole story has just played out. How did our brain do that? Here’s where the pieces are going to start to weave back together.

What our visual system has evolved to do, at kind of a mechanical level, and this is true for all people who have vision, so 95% of the population of the planet right now, people who are not visually disabled, people who are not blind, so all the rest of us who have vision at all. What our brain is doing is as light comes in, right away, our brain is trying to identify what are the objects that I’m looking at? “Oh, I see that shape over there or those colors or those edges. That’s a dog.” Now, to be fair, it’s only a dog in English.

If I spoke a different language, that same object would have a completely different name, but to all of us, the dog, the shape, the color, the edges, the movements look the same, regardless of what we call it. We recognize that. That’s only one of the pathways in our visual system. The neurobiologists and the cognitive scientists name that pathway literally as the “what pathway.” One part of vision is just identifying what I’m looking at. If I was to draw a picture of that, before I got any deeper into my story of the bird and the dog, I might just draw out, sketch out a little dog, a little icon of a dog. Okay, I’ve seen a dog. Beautiful. I note, “Then I saw a bird,” so I might say another one, a bird.

Now, imagine again, we’re looking at this scene, we’re sitting at the park and the dogs and the birds are chasing each other around. There’s more than one. There are actually multiple dogs. Maybe there’s a dozen dogs and maybe there’s 100 birds. Maybe there’s a dozen dogs and only one bird. Even just using those simple pictures, imagine a dozen dogs chasing one bird. You have a scene in your mind. Now, imagine a dozen dogs chasing 1,000 birds. Same dogs, same birds. What’s changed is the quantity.

It turns out there’s another pathway in our visual mind that works really, really well in identifying, not the objects, but how many there are in front of us. This is pathway number two.

There’s another pathway and this is building. You can see this process of vision. This is why it takes so many calories and it takes a moment for our brain to kind of catch up. Another pathway is literally called the “where pathway.” Now, that one is our visual engine, not recognizing the dog, not recognizing the bird and not counting them.

That job’s already been done by other parts of the brain, but saying, “Where are these objects? Where are they in relation to each other? Even more interesting,where are they in relation to me? Is the dog at my feet or is the dog way, way over there on the other side of the park? Then, are the dog and the bird in the same place? Are they immediately next to each other or are they very far away?”

This is another pathway. I know I go on, Lisa, but what I hope people are able to imagine as you’re just listening, this is the process by which our brain mechanically, structurally converts light into meaning. It identifies the things that are in front of us. It identifies how many there are. It identifies their location relative to each other and relative to us. Then it does something really amazing. We’ve got basically a cast of characters, we’ve got their numbers, and we’ve got their positions. We haven’t applied a word yet.

Our verbal mind has not even begun to describe the situation to us at this point. This is all visual. In fact, this is all pre-verbal, everything that I’m describing. Now our visual mind makes a giant leap and it says, “Based on what I’ve just seen, I’ve seen a dog in motion which seemed to be triggering a bird to move in a particular way.” This played out over time. I can start to draw out some models of cause and effect in my mind. I’m now seeing the how. How does a bird and a dog interact?

That’s number five. Then it takes us to the last one, the last of the six, which is why. What my mind is trying to do, what my visual engine is trying to do is make sense of the world in front of me. That’s why as infants, although our eyes are open and we’re beginning to process the visuals, they don’t yet make sense to us. We need to see them over and over and over and over again, millions of times before our brain is able to say, “I am now understanding how the world works based on what I see,” and that gives me the why.

Why does any of this matter? Why might I use this to my advantage? Why is this consequential? Why can I play a role, or how and why can I play a role in that story? Lisa, I went on very long. I hope that the verbal description landed. How does this make sense to you?

Lisa: Oh, it makes so much sense. Dan, I’ve heard you’ve been talking about these ideas for a long time. It’s getting me to rethink about the importance of breaking down what you’re seeing in these ways in a world that seems to be speeding up more and more. When I hear you describe them, what I hear you saying is, in a moment where we feel overwhelmed by fill in the blank. Whatever crisis or poly crisis is coming your way, instead of just getting flooded because you don’t know how to make sense of it, can you pause and break down and say, “What is happening here?”

“Which of these pathways can I utilize to my advantage to better understand what’s going on? Is this a who problem? Is this a when problem? Is this a how much problem?” Your earlier statement that you may not necessarily have the solution right away. In fact, we as designers absolutely love, and in fact, almost demand is a strong word, but urge that we are--

Dan: We demand it.

Lisa: Okay, we demand.

Dan: We demand it, Lisa. Let’s have some agency here. We demand.

Lisa: We demand to better understand the problem before solving the problem. If we’re solving the problem too quickly without going through these, at the very least, six questions around who and how much and where and when and how and why, then we might be solving the wrong problem. When I hear you describe it, I hear you giving people an opportunity to pause even for a second to ask different questions to ensure that, first of all, they’re not getting a solution handed to them that leads to a future that they didn’t want, and that they can be a part of at least participating in understanding what’s happening right now and how to come up with something better.

Again, it gives me huge excitement for people to hear this and be reminded, as you said from the beginning, we are wired this way. There are forces at play that are taking this away from us. A, as we said earlier, we haven’t been practicing enough. It hasn’t been made available to us. B, our tensions are getting spliced like crazy with technology and all the rest. C, the level of complexity of these problems demands that we are more fluid in knowing how to experiment along the way. We’re expected to be masters. We’ve never had a chance to practice.

All this is to say, I’m so thrilled we’re talking today-- Again, this sounds abstract, but just to make it concrete, particularly when you were talking about the where pathway and maps, I have this instant reminder that whenever we go to a new place, we need the map. You are here. You are here, the world is here. You are here. The fact that we are so ungrounded right now, we don’t have maps for this moment, that alone makes us feel so unnerving. Even if we have the capacity to just acknowledge, “I’m missing the map, that’s why I feel so ungrounded right now. That’s why I feel so unsettled. Could I draw the map?” That’s a gift.

Dan: When faced with an overwhelming problem, which, not to stretch the metaphor too far, but our visual system, the thing that we’ve been describing, is always overwhelmed. There is simply too much information in the universe around us for us to process it all. At the same time, what our brain has done over millions and millions of years has essentially figured out how to be a really good information triage machine. Of all the stuff that’s coming in, I don’t necessarily just want to revert to the basics of fight or flight.

That’s my brain doing its most limited emergency crisis response. We may or may not take good action at that point, but it certainly will not be thoughtful action. When faced with what feels like an overwhelmingly complicated problem, I agree with you completely, this notion of visual thinking and this six-by-six tool gives us a way to pause and go back to first principles of storytelling or first principles of cause and effect.

Is the thing that I’m witnessing that seems so overwhelming actually the thing that is happening, or is it intended as a kind of a diversion, or is it intended as a scare to throw me off my game? Am I seeing things that are truly overwhelming, or are they positioned to be overwhelming so that I will take action which maybe isn’t as thoughtful as I would otherwise do? The ability to be able to say, “Pause for a moment.”

In a crisis, it’s very hard, but it is worth the moment to say, “Okay, let’s go through the six one more time. Who are we actually talking about? What are they actually saying, or what are they actually trying to achieve? What are the measurements or the metrics by which this thing can be proven or disproven in a rational way?” Let’s get some numbers going in. Humans, we’re good at logic. We’re good at math. Maybe not all great at quadratic equations, but we’re pretty damn good at being able to say, “There’s a lot of this thing and there’s very little of this thing, and that has meaning, and I might want to try to balance it out or overwhelm the smaller one,” whatever it is.

Then I want to say, where are they actually? Are these things that are being thrown at me in positions that I can truly see? Are they hiding their position? Is their position intentionally obfuscated so that I’m not able to take thoughtful action? Once we do those, if we could draw, and the piece we missed, Lisa, as we were talking through the six by six, I was describing at a high level what is the nature of each of these pathways.

What you picked up on and I did not yet share is that when you’ve identified that you’re thinking about who and what, or when you’ve identified that you’re thinking about how many, you get to draw a very different picture. We drew a dog to symbolize a dog. We might draw a chart, something that you would generate out of a spreadsheet, how many dogs versus how many birds over time. Then if we want to talk about where they are, you nailed it, we would simply draw a little map, and it doesn’t have to be anything more complicated than the Venn diagram you kicked this show off with.

It was a map that showed there’s two different ideas. There’s visual thinking and there’s agency. For the purposes of our conversation, we’re going to put them in the same place. What do they have in common? We could have a very different conversation, Lisa, if you said, “I really want us to have a conversation of agency, completely independent and far removed from visual thinking,” and that would be a different map. The picture that you draw for who and what is a little icon.

Think about it as a little emoji or a simple icon or a little portrait. The picture that you draw for when you’re thinking about how many things do I have is you draw a simple little chart, a little bar chart. This is how many dogs I have, and this is how many birds I have. When you’re thinking about where they’re located, you draw a simple map. The dogs are over here, the birds are over here. When you’re thinking about that when, you draw a little timeline, step A, step B, step C, step D.

When you’re thinking about, okay, how do they interact? What’s the cause and effect? Now you amp it up. You draw a little bit of a flow chart. We start with dog over here, goes over here. If dog sees bird, dog runs to bird. If dog does not see bird, dog doesn’t move. Sort of a cause and effect diagram. Then the last one, the sixth one, the why, is actually the simplest picture of all. I like to think of it as, using our mathematical terms again, as a little visual equation. Something very simple, just a couple of symbols that might say, “Dog, heart, bird. Bird, not heart, dog.”

In the end, I’ve spent all of these calories, watched all these dogs and birds, and I’ve come away with this operating principle, the why dogs love birds, but birds don’t love dogs. Now I’ve got a good why model that I can take with me into the future. Again, it’s simplistic, but the process that we are describing can literally, and I mean that literally literally, be used to describe anything that the human brain has the ability to conceive of. Anything. You want to talk about quantum mechanics? We can break it down. You want to talk about political shenanigans? We can break it down. You want to talk about economic variables? We can break it down.

The beauty of it is, once we’ve started to create a set of our simple line drawing sticks and arrows and boxes and stick figures and circles, we start to create a library that we can begin to amplify and begin to describe increasingly complex problems or opportunities or scenarios using the same elemental building blocks. You talk about agency, you talk about education. We have those simple visual artifacts shared among us, I would argue that in many ways they’re even more powerful than a shared language of words to make sure that we are cogitating on the same thing.

Lisa: I totally agree with that. I want to make this even more concrete for folks in one of my favorite stories about you, Dan, which I think dates back to the Obama years when Obama was trying to pass the Affordable Health Care Act. As many large policy changes happen in the real world, in Congress, they end up with bills that are hundreds if not thousands of pages long. You did something extraordinary in that time to try to make that bill, which was causing huge political division at that time, more accessible to more people using these tools.

I wonder if you could share with us that story because here we are, fast forward to what is causing a huge schism right now in our government, 2025, health care. It doesn’t have to be health care. Can you just share a little bit of that example of what you decided to do to use visual thinking tools to break down what was at the time hotly contested, hugely emotional, and very divisive policy, and what happened as a result?

Dan: It’s a great story. It’s very timely, Lisa, that you bring it up now because some of the debate that is going on now in the Senate has to do with legacy items coming out of the same drawings that we were making 16 years ago. You can make a nice-- If we were to draw a timeline of some of the political shifts that have taken place, a driving force through many of them would be some of the same things we were working on a decade and a half ago. The simple version of the story is this.

When President Obama came into office in 2008, the first thing he had to deal with was the 2008 financial crisis and the bailout of the government. It shouldn’t have been a surprise to anyone that the first thing the new president’s going to do is allocate some funds to try to repair the fundamental economics of the nation. Then the second thing, which also shouldn’t have been a surprise because it was one of the things that he’d been promising to do when he was running for office-- again, this is ancient history for many of us at this point now-- was to try to reform the healthcare system in the United States.

He was not the first president to try to do that. Going all the way back to Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, believe it or not, of the Republican Party, they had back in the 1970s tried to take a swing at reforming the American healthcare system in very similar ways. What was happening 16 years ago was as the Affordable Care Act started to make its way into the public, it started to be debated. The media, rightfully, would pick up on this debate and talk about it in lots of articles.

I was not employed by any of the parties at that time, not the political parties, nobody in healthcare. I was working as an independent contractor on completely other industries. I was personally interested when I would read the news stories, I noticed that they would amplify the political divisions being surfaced by the debate around healthcare, but they didn’t talk about what the reform bill actually said. There was almost nothing that I could find, not in any of the usual suspect media, big-time media, that said, “If the Affordable Care Act passes, here’s what’s going to change. Here are the levers that are going to be pulled.”

I and a friend of mine who does know the healthcare system very well, Dr. Tony Jones, a Johns Hopkins MD and Harvard MBA, we said, “Let’s go into the bill itself and do the thing that traditional media isn’t doing. Let’s describe what is actually being discussed.” We did, and it’s a 1,500-page government bill. Then I took and drew a series of very simple pictures. Just like, Lisa, what we’re describing now. For those of you who can see my whiteboard, it’s very simple things, just circles and say, this person is a doctor, and I’m drawing a little bottle of a pharmaceutical product here, so I’ve got a doctor and I’ve got a pharma thing here.

Pictures no more complicated than that. Just drew some arrows between them and was able to map out the fundamental architecture as it existed at that point of the American healthcare system, and the key players that were in that system. To be fair, there were only three of them, so it’s easy to draw out. There were the doctors and the hospitals, basically the people called the providers, people who make money off of keeping us well. Then there are the payers.

These are the insurance companies, people who make money off of managing the flow of money throughout this financial system. Then the third character is just us, the people who are paying the taxes and are getting the healthcare. It’s not hyper complicated. There’s only three main players. I drew them out. I showed this is the way the system works now, and if you really break down the Affordable Care Act, here’s the way the system will work in the future.

We don’t need to talk about the details of how it shifted, but what was important was it became so clear over this series of very simple drawings. I took this handful of simple sketches that each one had a written narration with it, so it was one sentence and one drawing. It probably took something like 30 of those, but it was very easy to read. You could read through the whole thing in maybe three minutes. I posted it online. In those days, you might remember, Lisa, there was this thing called Slideshare.

Again, ancient history, but it was a way to post your PowerPoints and slideshows online. What was remarkable is here was a PowerPoint presentation about healthcare reform, which you’d imagine is really boring, but we got 2 million downloads within the first month and then 5 million within the next few months, and it truly went viral. For a moment in time, back again in the past, this series of drawings became the most downloaded PowerPoint on healthcare in Slideshare of all time. I got contacted by Fox News in New York.

Fox News, mind you, Fox. They said, “Dan, based on what you’ve drawn, clearly, you’re one of the leading thinkers in healthcare. Would you come on air in New York and explain to our viewers how the Affordable Care Act is actually structured?” I came home, and the next day I was contacted by the White House, who said, “Would you be willing to come over to the White House Office of Communications and share with us effectively what magic trick did you do to decomplexify things we’ve been working on for years and make it something discernible in a few minutes?” That led to an engagement working with the White House Office of Communications, and it was fabulous. Incredible experience that had impact.

Lisa: Huge impact, which goes back to why that Venn diagram of visual thinking and agency, I think, is so powerful, Dan. Here you are, with great respect, one of the most talented communicators that I know, not with an MD in the back of your name, that is now getting heralded as one of the most influential health experts in the country. Invitation to go on Fox at the time, hugely powerful vehicle for reaching millions of viewers, and then you get a call from the White House.

One of the things we’ve been exploring on How We Future is this idea of figuring out how some of the conversations we’re having with our wonderful guests can help expand our circle of control to be more powerful on our circle of influence to have a positive impact on our circle of concern. That story just captures it all. You were not paid by a client to do this. You had a concern. You noticed that, wow, the conversation about this critical issue called our healthcare is not going that well. We’re not actually having debates about the thing itself.

We’re getting caught off and manipulated and distracted by, remember, the death panels and all of the hyperbole of what was going on. Here you stepped up and said, “Wait a minute, maybe there’s a better way to understand this.” Now we’re dealing still with healthcare, but we’re also dealing with so many complex issues. Dan, we could talk for hours, but I would be so remiss if I didn’t fast forward to just hearing some of your thoughts on where we are today where we have this incredible technology called AI that seems to be doing a lot of the visualizing for us.

I’m going to make a big leap here, but I really just want to make sure I hear some of your perspectives around what we’ve been talking about, which is visual thinking as a thinking prompt, not just visualizing where are we going on the future of visual thinking in a world where we just type a few words and boom, the thinking seems to be done for us and the visual seems to be done for us.

Dan: Lisa, you’ve introduced the 800-pound gorilla, and I am prepared for this because I appreciate you setting it up this way. I realized two years ago, this is coming, this tool. I have a choice as a creative person who makes my living off of essentially drawing pictures and telling stories. I have a choice. I could choose to say, “No, I don’t want to engage with this new tool because it has elements that I don’t like,” or I could choose to embrace it and say, “Before I start maligning this tool around which I know so little, maybe I should start to work in it,” or some hybrid in between the two.

Being the enthusiast that I am, I decided, hell, I’m going in. I have spent lots and lots of time playing with generative AI, and I want to be very specific. I am referring to an area that I’m starting to learn about, which is specifically within the field of generative AI, so the AI receiving a prompt of some kind and using that prompt to then generate a new piece of art. I’m specifically also focusing on visual generative AI. You could go into your ChatGBT, or you could go into your Cloud, and you can have a lovely conversation with the robot, and it can tell you all kinds of interesting things.

Hopefully, you go and you fact-check. Hopefully, you don’t offload your thinking to it, but as a research engine, my gosh, what we have available to us is remarkable. I’m not referring to that in the work that I’m interested in. Those are interesting pieces, but I’m more interested in what happens when we work with the robot to create the pictures. It is an incredibly rich landscape that has incredibly powerful good things and incredibly powerful bad things. I do need to bring some judgment to it. We’ve been here before, and you said a moment ago, it feels like a world without a map right now.

We feel rudderless because this is also new. We have no maps. My reaction to that, by nature of who I am, is to seek out maps that have been drawn in the past that smell something like what we have now. I’m going to dust off an old map where something that feels similar to today’s stirrings may have happened before. It’s not the same as the past, but there are valuable maps that we can look at from the past, conceptual maps that lend themselves towards giving, in my mind, some structure to where we are today.

One of the maps that I want to bring to help me avoid panic around AI is to take a pause. Same thing we did a moment ago. Go back to first principles. Say, we’ve seen this before. I was mapping this out in preparation for the call. I’m going to walk through a picture that, to me, helps ground why we don’t need to be as terrified of AI as it sometimes feels like we should be. I don’t think I’m explaining away the scary parts. I think I’m contextualizing them in a way that makes sense to me. I’ve got something drawn on the whiteboard.

I’m going to walk you through it. It’s a bit of a map. It’s a bit of a timeline that is a reflection of my personal history. All my life, I have been involved and engaged and interested in visual representation of things. As a kid, yes, I drew. Then I learned how to paint. Then I learned how to build models. I have always been, I guess you might say, a hyper-creative. I’m always making something. I’m not hyper-creative when it comes to writing. I’m hyper-creative when it comes to creating visual items, paintings, drawings, sketches, napkin notes, models, dioramas, you name it.

To me, they’re all various expressions of trying to convert what my eyes saw in the world into a recording of it to help me make sense of it. I started out, my first job was in graphic design because as a young 17-year-old illustrator, the only place I could get a job where I could earn some money to work my way through college was doing graphic design. It was a trade. I know it’s hard to see on the board, but I can shift this around a little bit. What I’d like to remind myself is there was a time in my life where there were no digital tools available to us to do any kind of visuals at all.

You used to do graphic design with pen and paper and glue and scissors and cardboard and cameras and film. We didn’t know it, but everything was analog. Everything was done essentially by hand. There were certainly industrial processes out there, but the prep work was done by hand. There was no option. Then we had a revolution in about 1984 where the Mac and the PC came out and they gave us something called a digital desktop. Wow, I now am working not on a piece of cardboard, but on a computer screen.

It can’t draw pictures, not very well, but it’s interesting because it can do some layout tasks. Then we got digital layout. For anybody who’s familiar, and forgive me for like the history of Silicon Valley right here, you had applications like QuarkXPress and you had digital fonts. For the first time, if you were a designer who’d been used to working with photographic plates and hand-drawn fonts and Letraset, rub down letters, and now you had digital fonts and digital layout, this was a revolution.

I want to make the point that one day, I’m in San Francisco, I was working for a newspaper in the late 1980s, it ages me, where our job was to digitize the newspaper. We were a small independent newspaper, but we were bleeding edge. We had people coming up on Silicon Valley, myself among them saying, “Hey, we’ve seen what you can do with computers, we could start to make the efficiency of the newspaper layout more digital.” We went from digital layout to then, whoa, blow us away.

I’m working for newspapers now, so photographers around us, they saw the first versions of Photoshop and digital cameras and were very upset. This is going to change. You can now manipulate images. Oh my gosh, what are we going to do? Then we shifted in, the technology advances, and now you start to get the very early versions of desktop 3D software, CAD/CAM software. You’re moving away from slide rules, you’re moving away from pantographs and hand-drawn tools, you’re starting to do 3D CAD/CAM, which then starts to bring us into advanced 3D, Autodesk, and things like that.

Then you start to get into CGI, computer-generated imagery. Then we now have AI. The point I want to make here is that we’ve been here before. Every evolution of the application of technology to the creation of a visual has brought with it new opportunity and new terror. I’m comfortable with that. I’m comfortable with the fact that is the way the world moves. I don’t necessarily like it, but it is the truth. That’s what is happening. I don’t know how your audiences are going to respond to this notion, but I find some reassurance in saying we’ve been here before.

By the way, anybody who’s been in the business world for a while knows that there’s been a parallel evolution of technology. Not just the arrival of the PC, but then the arrival of the internet, that changed everything. Then the arrival of cloud computing, that changed everything. The arrival of mobile computing, this changes everything. Now we’re seeing AI come in. Forgive me for going on and pontificating. I find this map. What did we learn from the arrival of transformative new technologies in the past that we can apply to now? I think we learned some really interesting things. I don’t know. How’s that land, Lisa?

Lisa: Well, a couple of things. One is oftentimes when we think about the future that feels unknown, we get untethered because we don’t have models for it. There’s no blueprints. I think what you’re saying is that actually history can teach us a lot. We can learn from patterns and we can try to become more informed about what has happened when not necessarily the exact thing. AI was not 40 years ago, but a disruptive force that fundamentally changed the rules of how things were done happened. What can we learn from that?

It reminds me of the great Mark Twain quote, “History does not repeat itself, but it rhymes.” All that is to say that it is a source of data that we can then use to try to become more informed about what is unfolding, to try to shape the future where we want it to go, to try to minimize some of the perhaps terror or threat responses by being curious. Another frame that we have talked about, and we spoke about this with one of my close colleagues that does a lot of future’s facilitation where he’s trying to help more executives and leaders have the kinds of thoughtful conversations that we’re having right now that they often don’t feel like that they can because they’re just racing against time, this idea of reflection in order to inform prospection.

Reflecting on what has been in order to inform where we might go, both good and bad, to try to get away from it. Again, what could be better than drawing it versus words, words, words, words? As you often have said, can we literally see the same thing at the same time? I see what you mean. Get alignment. Otherwise, we’re always, again, to add another visual metaphor, the seven blind men and the elephant. Somebody is looking at one part while somebody is looking at the other because they haven’t taken the time to lay out the map and to try to understand.

I think it’s so helpful. I think it’s often overlooked, and understandably so, when they feel so crunched for time. It’s just really helpful to hear someone who has been doing this for so long whose industry, visual communication, has gotten disrupted by that pathway you said, that yet on the other side, it’s not complete panic. It’s how might we be measured in thinking about where we’re going next. Importantly, let me lean in.

I have two choices. I could either say, “Oh, I don’t want anything to do with this,” or I can choose to be curious and lean in. I really appreciate that fantastic history to this moment. I know we are slowly running out of time here, Dan, but I would love to just hear that other part that you had said around where you think it’s going or how are we going to create visuals with the robots?

Dan: A couple of top-of-mind thoughts, and I really appreciate, Lisa, you giving me the extra time to share this because the story that you seek to tell is your story. Do not offload that to the robot. The robot doesn’t know your story. The robot doesn’t care about your story. The robot doesn’t actually know anything. The robot is basically a very, very fancy mad lip that’s filling in the blanks saying, “Based on the prompt that you just gave me, of the trillion of other prompts that I’ve read, the most likely probabilistic response is going to be this.”

The robot doesn’t know anything. What it is diving into is probabilistic behavior in the vast array of everything that it scanned on the internet, which is important to remember the story is yours. You have to tell that story. That’s point number one. Since you gave me permission to pontificate, I’m going to give another point. Point number two is there is great fear among the creative community that AI is going to put us out of work. The fear is not unfounded. There is legitimacy behind that fear, but I would like us to take a step back again and say, for people who are creative innately, whether you get paid for it or not, it doesn’t make any difference.

Look, I could probably train an AI to eat my dessert, but why would I do that? I like to eat my dessert. Just because there is a robot that can draw a picture does not in any way mean that I can’t. It’s taken nothing from me. In my ability to continue to create, there are severe issues around IP. Who owns the ideas that the robot has been trained on? The courts will decide that. I have my own opinion. My opinion is as someone who is incessantly creating something, simply knowing that there is a tool that is capable of creating something that looks like what I create, this takes nothing away from my ability to continue to create it.

I’m here to do what I’m here to do, and I enjoy the fact that there’s an increasingly broader rate of tools that allow me to do that in new ways. That’s point two. The last one, Lisa, and then I will stop, and I know this is one that is passionate to you, is it all comes down, every one of these terms, is it comes down, there’s no better word for it than ethics. You individually, your sense of agency, what do you choose to do with the capabilities of the tools that are now presented to us?

There’s nothing beyond that. Any one of these tools, Photoshop. I remember 20 years ago sitting with a Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer of the Associated Press, and we were talking about digital cameras. He was saying to me digital cameras will never take hold because it’s too easy to manipulate the image. Someone find me a film camera today. Images have been manipulated by regimes since the beginning of visuals.

You go back and you look at the history of photography, you will find doctored images, illustrations that are not representative of the facts. There’s nothing new there. What is eternal, the map of comfort, the map that gives us some comfort, is ethically what you choose to do with the tools that are available to you. Thanks for letting me share that.

Lisa: No, thank you so much. Your voice is so critical at this moment. It reminds me, Dan, I’ll just maybe tie a couple of things together of incredible work you’ve done that may feel like in the way back machine, but feels as important today as ever. One is this idea of don’t outsource your problem-solving ability just because you can’t. Again, going back to one of the very first lessons I learned from you: the person that picks up the pen can solve the problem. At the time you said, “And gets the money.” I’m going to annotate that and say, “And can make a positive difference.”

If we can pick up the pen, be courageous, start with simple pictures, using, at the very least, that six by six that you shared with us to give us a way of being a critical thinker in a space of creative problem-solving, that’s foundational. Person that picks up the pen, solves the problem, can make a positive impact in the world. Then the second that we’ll make sure to link to is the three rules that you wrote about in one of your amazing books, Show and Tell, where you talked about this idea of rule number one, getting back to ethics, tell the truth.

If you learn how to pick up the pen and tell stories, tell the truth. Tell the truth about it all. Two, tell it with a story. We’ll also talk and link to some of your incredible maps of how to tell different kinds of stories. Three, tell that story with visuals. We’re at an inflection moment across many different challenges that we’re facing at our societal level, at our organizational level, even at our family level. Learning how to communicate more effectively through stories and visuals in order to create meaning and make tomorrow better than today, I think, is one of the most important leadership and human and citizen skills we can learn. I just want to maybe close, Dan, with how I think about this podcast, which is filled with gratitude.

Your contributions to the world are so foundational. I am so grateful for all that I have learned from you over this 15 years of cherished friendship and the kind of learning I get to do with you. My great hope is that everyone that listens to this picks up the pen and starts to say, “I have agency, even though the world feels overwhelmed. I know how to draw the picture. I know how to think more critically, and I know how to communicate in ways that other people can get.” I thank you from the bottom of my heart and from the bottom of my soul, Dan, for you and all that you do. I so appreciate your time being on How We Future.

Dan: It’s beautiful. Thank you, Lisa. I love the way you summarize it. Thank you.

Lisa: I’m really grateful for this conversation with Dan Roam, especially because of how grounding his work feels. There’s something calming about being reminded that we can slow down, look more carefully, and create our own clarity just by drawing stick figures. As you move through your week, here’s something to try. The next time a problem feels tangled, grab a pen and give yourself permission to think out loud on paper.

Don’t aim for perfect, aim for visible. You might be surprised by what you notice once the idea has some shape. If you found this episode useful, please consider rating or reviewing How We Future or sharing it with someone who’s navigating a complex decision. That small act helps these conversations travel further. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thanks so much for listening, and I’ll see you next time.

In serious times, play can be one of our most powerful tools.

In this episode of How We Future, Lisa talks with Jill Vialet, social entrepreneur, author of Why Play Works, and founder of Playworks, about why play belongs at the center of how we lead, learn, and navigate complexity. Jill covers her journey to building an organization that transformed recess into a source of connection, trust, and resilience for millions of kids.

Their conversation explores how play helps people regulate their nervous systems, build relationships across differences, and see new possibilities when problems feel stuck. Jill shares lessons from Playworks, why trust is a prerequisite for learning, how unstructured play supports emotional growth, and what leaders can borrow from playgrounds.

You’ll hear about:

• How play helps us navigate chaos and uncertainty

• The connection between play, trust, and feeling safe

• How small, unexpected tweaks can unlock entirely new futures

This episode proves that creativity, empathy, and experimentation often emerge when people feel safe enough to engage. If you are leading through uncertainty or looking for new ways to bring people together, Jill offers practical insight and hopeful perspectives on how play can help us move forward.

Links from the episode:

• Jill’s personal site

• Jill’s Substack, “Workswell”

• Jill’s Tee’s Shop

• Why Play Works by Jill Vialet

• Play: How it Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul by Stuart Brown

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today.

Today’s guest is Jill Vialet, and I could not be more excited to share this conversation with you. Jill is an award-winning social entrepreneur and the founder of Playworks, an organization that has helped hundreds of thousands of children across the country experience recess as it should be: joyful, welcoming, and full of possibility.

In this episode, Jill and I talk about the surprising wisdom on why taking play seriously might be one of the most effective ways to build resilience, learn across differences, and even strengthen our democracy. I left this conversation feeling full of heart, humor, and the kind of grounded hope I think we could all use right now. Let’s have some serious fun with Jill Vialet.

I just want to say, Jill, it just feels like we are in such serious times right now, and boy, do we need play more than ever. I am so grateful to have you here to talk about how play and incorporating play can make us more resilient leaders, can make us more adaptive, can help us think about solutions that are not necessarily in our immediate purview because we’ve allowed ourselves space and time, to let our nervous systems relax, to let us feel joy, experience connection at the human level, in service of these difficult problems. I’m thrilled, Jill. Thank you so much for being on How We Future.

Jill Vialet: Thanks for having me.

Lisa: Jill, let’s start with play, which has just been a huge part of your career, your life, who you are. I’d love to start. When did you realize that play was so foundational to the work that you wanted to do in the world?

Jill: Yes, it’s funny. I think when I think about a conscious realization of its role, there was definitely this moment where I was out visiting a school while I was running the Museum of Children’s Art, and I was meeting with a principal who was dealing with kids having a hard time at recess and lunchtime. There was just this moment where I just had this wash of empathy for these kids because the chaos they were dealing with was not--

I’m pro-chaos, but there’s good chaos, and there’s bad chaos. It was just really abundantly clear that these kids didn’t have the play experiences that made it easy for them to navigate the chaos in a way that helped transform potentially bad chaos into joyful, good chaos. Anyway, there was this moment where I was like, “Oh, had I been in their situation, I would not have become the human I am.” It was so much because of feeling other or different, but having play as this experience and mode of connection with others that saw me through challenging times.

Lisa: I think that story really exemplifies what I’ve come to know about you, Jill. One of the most abundant social innovators of our time is this ability to take in what’s going on, infuse it with empathy and questioning, like, “What’s going on here? Why am I noticing what I’m noticing?” and then the ability to say, “I wonder if. Let’s reframe what I’m seeing here as chaos and out of control, and maybe a missing need or a missing opportunity.”

I know your time, as you share so wonderfully in this book that you wrote that is pretty much under my pillow, Why Play Works: Big Changes Start Small, you talk about how that foundational experience led you to start in just an incredible organization, almost 30 years ago, now called Playworks. It wasn’t initially called Playworks, and we’ll talk about that.

I just want to name for the How We Future podcast and the intention that we have here about sharing stories of our neighbors, of our friends, of our inspirations that started off with noticing something that didn’t feel right and then saying, “I wonder if there could be a different path here.” I just think that story is so clearly grounded in that.

Jill: Yes. I feel like it was super serendipitous, having a career focused on play, that that is, in some ways, what you’re describing, exactly what happens when you are playing. I’m a big basketball fan, repping the Golden State Valkyries here. You watch the game, and it takes place in this court, and there are the same set of static rules. You could even watch the same players play against each other multiple times.

Within any game, there are, at any moment, all these multiple futures of what might happen based on all the variables that come in. I think being open to that and finding joy and possibility in that, as opposed to being shut down or overwhelmed by it, I think that feels just, on some level, like pure serendipity that I had a childhood that led me to believe that “Oh, there’s so much possibility.”

Lisa: Yes. I know you’re not only a basketball fan; you’re a basketball player, former player yourself.

Jill: Former, former.

[laughter]

Lisa: We’re all players. We’re all athletes inside.

Jill: Yes, but I don’t leave the ground anymore. The absence of leaving the ground really changes the dynamic.

Lisa: Yes, I hear you. The hops definitely go, but the play doesn’t. The play doesn’t. From that, you started Playworks. Would love our listeners to learn more about Playworks, what it does, and just the impact it’s had.

Jill: Yes. Started as Sports4Kids in the Bay Area, and actually started with a half-time model in the first year. I hired someone I’d played college basketball with to be the first test coach. It was very much an experiment. I’d been asked by a principal, “Could you help us fix recess?” I’d previously started an arts program. “Could you do it the way you did the arts programming?” It was extraordinary. Even in the first year, other principals started hearing about what was going on and were calling and saying, “Hey, whatever you’re selling, the chaos at recess is a need that we need help with.”

It grew over multiple years, a lot of iteration, and a lot of bringing in other humans who had deep thoughts and instincts, and a real desire to experiment with what we might do, so added components around youth leadership, which is our junior coaches program, which I think actually is probably the most distinguishing special sauce, but also playing with before school and after school, and looking at class game time, and how you might work with classroom teachers to bring the principles of play that you were modeling on the playground into the classroom.

It was this iterative process growing nationally and then working hard at getting lucky. After I became an Ashoka Fellow, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation heard about our work and reached out to us about making a significant investment in us, mapping out a path to scale. They were extraordinary partners, along with some other key funders who really, in that moment in time, were curious about how to do this and were up for partnering with us to try and, again, lots and lots of experimentation.

Lisa: Well, I think it speaks to the fact that you were demonstrating by show, don’t tell, that play works, right? The fact that Robert Wood Johnson and some of these funders, I don’t know how many social impacts are like, and then funders came in knocking. This idea of like, I know our colleague, Bob Sutton, who has taught at the D School for many years, a celebrated teacher at Stanford, he has this concept of vu jade, not deja vu, but this idea of seeing something old with fresh eyes.

I think you were one of the first that says, “There’s this thing that happens in school. It’s called recess. Let’s not overlook it as the throwaway time; let’s actually look at that as the most important time. How do we put just a little bit of structure that honors it and gives it the best chance of being as impactful as it can by letting kids do what they got to do and letting the probably most important social, emotional, intellectual development happen in that time, which is often looked as, I think, historically, is the time where teachers get a break?”

Jill: I appreciate you bringing it up, too. I do think that there has always been this funny tension between our work’s about play, and, on some level, it’s been easy for folks to dismiss on some level, like, “Oh, that’s sweet.” I think one of the things about running a business and growing a business, even if it’s about play, and then especially dealing in schools, this insight that there are these tweaks that can be made in any kind of system that have this outsized impact.

I think fixing recess, weirdly, is one of those. The other one that my work took me through, because I was in all these schools, substitute teaching, this mind-blowing impact on the whole school building with just one human in one classroom. To your point, we either see or don’t see these things that are in plain sight based on the stories we tell ourselves and the way we lead our lives. Bob’s work has always been an invitation to really look around and see, “What are the tweaks that have this outsized impact?”

Lisa: Yes. There’s a lot of talk right now about the need for systems change, right? “We’ve got to have systems change,” which is important, but it’s a very abstract construct, like a system. What I think you’ve done with Playworks, and I’m so glad you brought up Substantial, which again, it’s just models this ability to have an impact on a much larger system, starting with an observation, a single observation.

“There’s this thing that happens, which is that teachers get sick. They can’t be in their classroom every day. There’s this replacement that we have called a substitute. It’s treated like a second-class citizen.” I’m paraphrasing here, Jill, taking some liberties.

Jill: That’s generous.

Lisa: Right? “The kids feel like it’s a day off, and the substitute teacher feels totally disrespected. How might we reimagine what substitute teachers could do, not just in that classroom, but around elevating what happens within the school and within the whole learning environment?”

Jill: I think what’s fun, too, is that there are two things going on at once, too, right? As a human who is doing this work and leading into the space, there’s the paying attention to the work itself, but then there’s also this secondary, behind-the-curtain, back-officey, managing the business of doing that work. I think one of the things that’s been really fascinating to me over my career is seeing how inextricably intertwined those two things are, and still at the same time, how distinct they are.

Because you can totally become obsessed with what’s happening with substitute teaching, but then the work of building out an organization and figuring out how to navigate that work, it’s its own independent thing, which also actually is well-served by maintaining a perspective on the multiple possible futures for your organization as well. Not to get extra meta, this past June, we closed down Substantial, but Subschool, which was our biggest platform, it’s an online professional development platform, both asynchronous and coordinated for cohorts, was acquired by the National Center for Grow Your Own.

In their acquisition of that platform, it went from serving 20,000 people, which is not nothing, but now it’s been adopted by the entire state of North Dakota and the entire state of Tennessee, thanks to this other organization acquiring it. Kay, that only is possible because while we were running this organization focused on substitute teaching, we kept also paying attention to multiple potential paths for the organization itself and forcing ourselves, asking ourselves, “What possible future would best serve the humans we want to reach?”

Lisa: I love that story. It speaks to a couple of your superpowers, Jill. One is the ability to have a larger perspective around what could happen, and then also the ability to zero in on the stories that will help translate the value across different stakeholders to be able to toggle what has to happen on the backend, what has to be communicated to stakeholders, what also has to be communicated to the people that are on the front lines doing this work, and talking about impact that didn’t exist before, metrics perhaps that didn’t exist before, through stories to give people a sense of what’s possible, to invite them into a future.

Again, throughout your work, whenever I’ve heard you talk about it, the book, which we’re going to talk about in a minute, are these stories that really capture your imagination. I didn’t think that was possible, but you showed me, with a slightly different tweak, something totally different was possible.

Jill: You were actually one of the people who brought this to me about the power of stories and science fiction, all this sort of Afrofuturism. It’s so much easier to imagine a future that’s radically different from the one we’re currently existing in if you have stories that help paint that picture. That’s the brain science of it all. There it is. It becomes much more real and much more possible.

Lisa: Again, throughout your book, you’re like-- and I want to share one observation that happened, this one moment, where the school had no recess, and you had a junior teacher that was like, “God, what do you mean there’s no recess? There has to be some recess.” Basically, in that moment, convinces the lunchroom women to open up the doors to allow the kids to go out for 15 minutes, and magic happens.

The principal’s like, “What? I didn’t even know this was possible.” Then you could be like, “Okay, this happened in this school. What if every school had that?” There’s that invitation to dream, but it’s not dreaming based on nothing; it’s dreaming based on something that unfolded where people went from, “I didn’t think that was possible,” to “Wait a minute, now we have an obligation to make it so.”

Jill: Yes, I appreciate that.

Lisa: Well, I just think every story is something to hang on. All right, we need to talk about this book, Why Play Works.

Jill: I think you’ve read it more recently than I have.

Lisa: I’ll remind you, Jill, that, of course, it’s got three parts, right? That first part does this incredible heavy lift of summarizing decades of play and theory about play into some concise things and concise principles that we’ll talk about. Then it’s got 20 big changes that really brings to light how big play really is and how play might be the key to unlocking better relationships, more trust, self-esteem, connection to our community.

Then the final part, which I love so much, is, “We can do this,” which to me sounds like How We Future. “We can do this. We can do this.”

Jill: Yes, “We can do this.”

Lisa: I think the part starting with the theory and your just unbelievable concise summary of research, and by the way, which includes some critique, it’s not all universal, is just talking about the importance of understanding, as Dr. Stuart Brown, I’ve heard him say, that play is anything but trivial, play is the thing, and that it’s core to building resilience and mastery for all of us, but particularly our children. I wonder if you can share a little bit about doing that research after being a practitioner for so many years, about what that unlocked for you.

Jill: I always mock my own sequencing of events because I had launched Playworks as Sports4Kids well before I was really versed in the brain science and everything going on that actually turned out to be completely integral to what we were doing. Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good, but that was good. I appreciate you bringing up Dr. Stuart Brown, a huge influence on me and a dear friend.

I was on his board. You mentioned that one quote, the other one that he pointed out to me, and I think it might have originally been a Brian Sutton-Smith quote, but it’s all this idea that, well, one, that play has survived evolution despite being this risky behavior because it is so integral, but also just understanding play as not the opposite of work, but as the opposite of depression.

Stuart’s been this very catalytic figure in my thinking around this. When I wrote the book, right after when the pandemic hit, I laid myself off from Playworks. We had to really contract pretty significantly. We were a $40-million budget with 500 staff, 70% of which came from the schools, which all of a sudden came to a grinding halt. We contracted pretty significantly, and I included myself in the layoffs then.

Everything was happening. It was that moment of profound racial reckoning. We were locked up. It was a very intense moment. I felt like it was a moment that I would be personally well-served by writing and making sense of my experience of leading Playworks up until that point. It was, in some ways, a very cathartic thing to do. As I sat down to write it, I wrote it all out. I told the stories. Then I got to the end, and I realized it wasn’t right, which is very painful. You’ve written books.

Lisa: Oh, gosh, I’ve done that. It’s so painful. It’s so painful.

Jill: You get to the end, you’re like, “Argh.”

Lisa: “This isn’t right.”

Jill: “This isn’t right.” Then I went back, and I realized I needed the context around what we know about how play works and why play works. Then I really reorganized the stories around the truths that I had seen in terms of these extraordinary outcomes that don’t actually happen just because of play, but that play can be a point of entry into. I think in this moment, when we are experiencing pretty challenging times, the world seems on fire, and there’s this huge, it feels like tremendous schisms, and people just really, so absolutely holding opposing viewpoints.

Really, they’re feeling like there’s no bridge in a lot of cases. I’ve been thinking a lot about how there’s this effort to get people to talk. I’m like, “I don’t think we’re ready for talking right now. I think we need to spend a whole lot more time playing together and using play in the loosest sense, but experiencing being in shared spaces, building familiarity, which then can potentially lead to rapport, which can lead to trust, which is the essential preconditions for having these really hard, difficult, important conversations that I think we need if we’re going to be able to salvage our democracy.”

I know that sounds a little grandiose, but I really do think that’s where we are. First, looking at how play works, and then moving to examples of how play can be a tool for helping people have hard conversations, to resolve conflicts, address issues of racism and sexism, just to get comfortable with people who are different from themselves, it was helpful for me to break it down and all these things that I was feeling overwhelmed by. What are just small steps that we might take to move closer to where I would like us to be?

Lisa: The book does a brilliant job of doing that stretch between “Here’s why it matters and here’s how you can start small.” For each one of those, I love those truths that you have that, like “Here’s the bigger picture, and here’s how you could do it.” Maybe it starts with just a game of Rochambeau Rock, Paper, Scissors.

Maybe that’s the best way we can call a tie a tie and move on and not get grounded in this place where we just can’t move at all. It’s both a great invitation and a reminder of the power of play that will allow us to move on. I’m totally with you, Jill. You mentioned earlier that you’re wearing the Valkyries. I’m, of course, by design, wearing FC Bay, a show where the new women’s soccer team from the Bay Area played in Oracle Park to a sellout crowd of 40,000, breaking barriers and the joy.

There was a moment I just was so fortunate to be there, where I saw the wave go around and around, the up and down and up and down. Even that, moving our body, feeling a connection with others, cheering people on, and knowing that the game is going to end, but our love of sports does not have to end, and whoever has lost doesn’t mean that they stop playing, and we’re done, and they quit, right?

You and I are both athletes. We work a lot with athletes. What I love about athletes, regardless of what age you play, I’m not just talking about elite athletes, is that I think it is this great practice ground for learning across difference, having a purpose beyond yourself, recovering from failure because you can’t win everything, the discipline of practice. It’s so, so valuable.

That happens in a structured way. I think your approach, and what you go into some detail, is the value of unstructured play. Recess is about unstructured play with just a little scaffolding, and how important it is to build that into our lives.

Jill: Yes, I appreciate that. Yes, that feels right.

Lisa: Well, I want to go into just a couple of some of those 20 truths or big changes. We talked a little bit about finding connection in play, that play is not solo; it’s often done better with others. I want to really talk a little bit about that trust part that you were talking about. You have this great quote. I quoted it here. Jill, you may not remember your brilliant words, but I do.

You say, “Trust is an essential precondition for building an environment where learning can happen, providing choice and voice, the opportunity to choose the activity you’re going to participate in, and to have a say in the activities that are happening, and how they feel really stand out as a part of this.” This gets back to some of the research that struck me in the beginning of the book around the importance of play being voluntary, right?

By opting in, you feel a sense of agency. By playing, you feel that you are building something with somebody else. One more thing I’ll just call out is that, as you said, this book was written during the pandemic, 2020, got published 2021. That’s now about four years ago. My gosh, the need for trust has only gotten stronger.

Jill: Yes. I would say, too, one of the great moment was Nadine Burke Harris, who was the former Surgeon General for California and did so much groundbreaking work around Adverse Childhood Experiences, ACEs, and trauma-informed practices. She came out to see a Playworks school once, and she said, “You know what’s wild? If you were intentionally designing a program for kids who’d been exposed to a lot of adverse childhood experiences that had a lot of trauma, it would look exactly like Playworks.

“The way you handle transitions, that everything is really communicated before you, in the classroom, you say, ‘We’re going to go out.’ While you’re going through the hallways, you’re talking about this moment of transition. You get out there. You regroup up. You talk about what the options are, the choices.” There’s a lot of structure in the choices, and it’s really communicated super clearly.

Giving kids choice and voice and giving kids attention and getting to the place where we, as a daily practice, recognize that when kids were behaving in ways that were negative attention-getting behaviors, having the luxury of being the recess people, not the classroom teachers who were held accountable to all these different standards that they had to convey to 30-plus kids, we were the people who had the time and space and latitude to say, “Hey, maybe you just need positive-- Let’s figure out a way to get you some positive attention.”

Negative attention-getting behaviors are just attention-getting behaviors that, because they didn’t get positive ones, they’re drawing this route, so seeing that, I think. Anyway, I do think this whole thing about building trust and recognizing how important it is in any endeavor, whether that’s running a workplace or a school or a democracy, it’s just the sort of one of the single most important ingredients to any human endeavor.

Lisa: An earlier conversation we had on How We Future was with our other faved colleague, Dan Klein, who teaches improv at Stanford. A big part of that conversation was this notion of setting your partner up for success, that improv is done as a collaborative endeavor, and that when you have belief in your partner, how much better you both can be.

I was also struck in the book where you talk about how our default sometimes is to take away recess when kids have misbehaved, which is the exact opposite of what we should be doing. Again, it speaks to the systems component of the implications of these, what feel like small choices, to say, “Wait a minute. If you take away recess, you’re taking away perhaps the opportunity where that child could grow and could change.”

You’re making some of these initial problems more intractable if you don’t at least examine your assumptions and to look at what’s happening underneath in order to unleash the possibility of every being, every child.

Jill: I had this sort of recognition in writing the book about how reactive schools are, as opposed to being proactive. The one story was about I was once talking to a principal in San Jose, and she was saying, “Your program’s incredible. I got to tell you, I know it’s had this huge impact on our school.” I’m like, “How do you know? What’s the defining thing?”

She’s like, “Oh, graffiti in the bathroom.” I’m like, “Time out. What?” She told the story about how, prior to Playworks arriving, the kids would avoid recess because it was so chaotic. They would go into the bathroom and hide, and they would do graffiti in the bathroom. Their initial reaction was to put up a teacher in charge of guarding the bathroom.

Lisa: Oh, gosh. Right.

Jill: I was like, “Uh-uh.” Then it still didn’t really work. The teacher would get in the way. It came out sideways in other ways. She said, “And then we got Playworks, and kids didn’t go hide in the bathroom, and I didn’t have to have a teacher assigned there.” I was like, “Oh, but assigning someone to guard the bathroom,” to your point, “it’s not taking the steps to understand ‘Why are kids going into the bathroom during recess and lunchtime?’” You see that in all sorts of different societal ways.

Lisa: Yes. You’re reminding me of one of my favorite books about how change happens from Dan and Chip Heath, where they talk about scripting the critical moves in order to get towards the result that you want doesn’t mean prescribing it, but scaffolding it. The other part that they have is that sometimes you have to invent the metric that you’re making the success of the idea.

It’s like, “We have less graffiti in our bathrooms,” is actually a sign that some other things are working well. The other thing that you’re bringing up, and I’m so glad you mentioned it in your book, is work that our colleagues, Barry Svigals and Sam Seidel, did around school safety. This was a number of years ago in response to the just sad, tragic reality of more mass shootings in our schools, led to schools hardening their safety protocols of putting metal detectors and policemen at the front that served to make kids feel less safe than more safe, versus really understanding the difference between being safe and feeling safe and having to make some different choices. I bet we haven’t done the study, but I bet there’s a good correlation between the amount of play and recess and feeling safe.

Jill: And again, this really profound question about what makes us safe, because there’s a lot of play that is risky behavior. In some ways, as a parent, my children are now adults, but as a kid, I had free rein. I roamed all around Washington, DC. I rode my bike everywhere. I took the bus at a very young age; my kids, much less of that.

They had cell phones starting in junior high, when they were self-propelled around the city to the extent that they were. I knew where they were all the time in a way that no one knew. I went off to India when I was 19 and wrote home with Blue Airmail and no cell phones. Anyway, all of it, I think there is a way in which certain risky behaviors and engaging in what could be described as unsafe behaviors are actually essential to us ultimately being able to be safe and to navigate the world, or secure.

I think security is such an interesting-- You go through security in the airport, and I just think, “What makes us safe?” I wish the TSA people well. I feel badly they’re working without getting paid currently. Sometimes I wonder if it wouldn’t be better if we were spending that money on cancer research. It’s what really makes us safe.

Lisa: Those are such important points, and I love that they are continuing to be thread into not just our national conversation, but our global conversation. I just want to point out Jonathan Haidt’s great work in The Anxious Generation, where he talks about the loss of free play during early childhood, like you were saying, is a contributor to children that are suffering from mental health crisis because they haven’t had a chance to practice, in addition to just how much technology is just siphoning off their imagination and keeping them feeling lonely and isolated. Well done, Jill, in starting that conversation.

Jill: Thank you.

Lisa: I want to talk about the last part, where you talk about “We can do this and also continue it forward in some work that’s happened since,” and the work that you’re doing. You really talk about this first invitation to say, “Play yourself. We can do this.” I will say, Jill, I’m so curious. Before we got on this call, my morning was a little stressful.

There was a number of things that happened, calls that didn’t go well, and I found myself getting really tense, my breath short, so I was like, “Okay, Lisa, breathe.” I remember thinking, “You’re going to talk to Jill. What advice might Jill have about how to calm the nervous system with a little play?” Do you ever have that moment where you’re like, “Okay, I’m noticing I could use a little something”?

Jill: My favorite definition is play: any activity undertaken for no apparent purpose. I do think being open to things coming to us sideways, unexpected. It may not seem exactly like it fits the definition of play, but my go-to when I start to feel like that is to go outside. There is just a connection to nature, just a breath of air. When kids were babies and around 5:30 or 6:00, the witching hour would come, and the baby would not stop crying, going outside.

Whether it was raining or cold, it sounds a little like parental abuse, but there was a way of shocking the system into, like, “Okay, be present.” Levity and noticing yourself, it’s an indictment I have of the nonprofit world that we are so busy. It was Thomas Merton who wrote about there being almost a violence inherent in the busyness of the system. I do think when I get going like that, and I get agitated, asking myself to slow down. I will doodle. I will play the guitar, like giving yourself permission to not contribute, not ramp up.

Lisa: Yes, I like that, not contribute. I sometimes will throw an impromptu dance party and be like, “Okay, let’s just get it. [crosstalk] Let’s just get it on.” Well, I love in the opening of that part, you have a great quote from George Bernard Shaw, the one that says, “We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.” I think that’s so powerful because going back to your point about the nonprofit, I work a lot with leadership teams who have a serious issue, require serious thinking, and serious ways.

They lock themselves up in a windowless conference room to get very serious when, in fact, what they should be doing is loosening up in some ways to get out of that defense mode of fight or flight, but to get into a more generative and generous mode. I think your work really speaks to that, that it doesn’t have to be this binary, right? We would all be well-served if we could figure out a way to tap into that.

Now, I know also that for a number of years, you helped teach the Design for Play class at Stanford. Again, “You don’t go to Stanford to play, Jill,” but you’re like, “Yes, we got to reintroduce play.” Can you tell me a little bit about that class and what you took away from that?

Jill: Yes, it was Brendan Boyle’s, who was forever the toy designer at IDEO. It was a great collaborative effort. Stuart came in. It was a guest lecturer. Basically, it created thinking about the role of play in design processes, so starting with everything from Stokes and how you create the preconditions that contribute to more out-of-the-box thinking, fantastical, inviting the orthogonal thought to come in, thinking about serious things.

We used to ask our kids when they would first come back to school, “Which of your teachers would survive a zombie apocalypse?” which doesn’t necessarily sound like you’re asking your kids about their academics, but your kid, it was so funny, not coming at them hard, “How’s English?” We’re like, “How’s English?” would never get anything more than a one-word answer. “Good, fine.” “Which of your teachers would survive a zombie apocalypse?”

Lisa: So unexpected.

Jill: Right. Doing that with grown-ups, inviting, again, the sense of possibility. The class, we had all sorts of different modalities between group work. People had personal play projects where they created and designed their own thing they were going to do while being a very serious student at Stanford, but what was going to be their personal play path, and incorporating other students, and again, the way that play invites experimentation, and then really basically mapping play in ways that it might infuse and inform the full design process.

It was so fun. I swear, I’ve taught social entrepreneurship at Haas, at the School of Cal, and I’ve taught play. The way people show up if there’s a class on play is very different, and so it was a delight.

Lisa: We just had a reunion at Stanford, and I can imagine some students come back and be like, “You know what class I really remember? The Designing for Play one.” I remember talking to Brendan about how intentional he was about scaffolding and about inviting students to take play seriously. He talked about one of the rituals that he starts from the very first day of class, is that the entranceway to the door to the class was a game, and how he kicks it off with hopscotch, and one of the assignments is for students to invent their own game that marks the difference between outside the classroom and in the classroom. Again, makes me think, I can imagine if we start board meetings with a different approach that says, “This is the kind of behavior or the way we want you to show up here.”

Jill: I think to that point, I do think that maybe it’s not right to start every board meeting with a hopscotch game, but I think the bigger thought there is how we invite people into processes. You talk about doing these very serious conversations with workplaces that are having very serious-- how you even invite them to come and participate in a conversation, and not being in a windowless room, there are all these ways in which you don’t have to be silly.

You have to design play experiences the way you do anything. Honestly, that was our experience of running programs in the schools because there were kids who weren’t going to be vulnerable and feel silly. You had to figure out a breadth of options and points of entry for kids who were carrying-- they’re bringing all their past experiences around what risks they’re willing to take in terms of their peers, or whether grown up, they don’t know.

So many of the things that I do as a grown-up working with other grown-ups have been informed by things I learned about working with kids and creating conditions that really invite everyone to participate and pay attention while participating to their experience in a way, and give them choices to opt in or opt out. It’s not play unless there’s volition involved. I think that choice and giving people that level of control, it’s valuable in schools, and it’s valuable in workplaces as well.

Lisa: One thing I didn’t realize until you started to share that is this notion that kids will give you feedback so fast, as opposed to adults that will silently stew and not realize. Kids, they’ll tell you, so those reps of seeing, “Wow, I have to really think about the context here. What is the context in which I’m operating to figure out what might be a great intervention? What is the actual content? What’s the game, or what’s the offer, invitation? How do I do it?”

I think about, “What’s the craft? How do I do it in a way that connects to meaning that it’s not some throwaway thing, but it’s actually an on-ramp to where we want to go?” Jill, you’re just genius. I will say there was a couple of years ago, where we were inviting athletes to explore how they might engage civically in new ways. We had about 200 athletes. I invited you to come and talk about your work at Stanford and the Designing for Play, and, of course, all of your great history. You started off with one of the most amazing experiences I’ve seen to date. Do you remember what it was?

Jill: It’s a single-elimination Rochambeau tournament.

Lisa: Rock, Paper, Scissors, by the way.

Jill: Rock, Paper, Scissors for those that are regionally challenged by that, yes. You find a partner, you do it, and then with each person who is victorious, then the people they have vanquished become their ever-growing cheering sections. I once did it at a conference in Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia or DC, and I had 6,000 participants.

Lisa: Amazing.

Jill: Because of the magic of math, it only took seven minutes because you go half and half and half, and it goes very quickly when it came down, I think, to the former mayor of Philadelphia was playing against a high school student.

Lisa: Oh my gosh, that’s so fantastic.

Jill: Happily, the high school student won. [crosstalk] I was like, “Phew, shwoo.”

Lisa: I know, but the room is like raucous.

Jill: The room is, oh, yes.

Lisa: Again, seven minutes changes everything, all about how you feel.

Jill: Yes. Again, it’s like we started playing it on elementary school playgrounds because it’s completely arbitrary. Anyone can win. In that, there’s this moment.

Lisa: The stakes are low. The stakes are low.

Jill: The stakes are low, and when you’ve lost, you become part of the cheering section. You keep going. There is this moment when whoever has won, and everyone’s just going, “Yes, Lisa, Lisa Lisa.” It’s like, “Ah.” It’s like--

Lisa: I’m waking in a delight. Oh my gosh, Jill, I could talk to you for hours. I just want to maybe close with a little bit of the work that you’re doing now, which is taking this incredible treasure trove of experience and wisdom and belief in humans, and applying it towards helping leaders that are navigating some very complex moments of transition. I wonder if you could just talk a little bit about your work these days.

Jill: Yes. When I laid myself off at Playworks, I started really exploring this world of transitional leadership and how to transition. What do successful transitions look like, and what are the models? Seeing a lot of leaders who are also transitioning and talking to them, I got really curious about-- a lot of religious traditions have a practice where when a minister or a rabbi is leaving, they bring in someone who has their whole career as being an interim minister or interim rabbi.

In some ways, they’re like substitute teachers if substitute teachers are held up as like, “No, this is extra hard. We’re going to put our most experienced humans into this moment of transition.” They would care for their congregations as well as the organizations. It would intentionally carve out a space for people to work through their feelings about what’s come before and this present moment and this messy middle, and then to collectively imagine the future they want to move into in a way that ultimately created, when it works well, the most optimal conditions for a successful transition, as you were saying earlier, setting that next person up to succeed.

I’ve been doing a lot of work in that area, was an interim executive at UC Berkeley at the business school in the Center, and then I’m helping other groups figure out succession planning and navigating transitions in a way that’s thoughtful and loving. I actually think bringing a certain amount of love and a willingness to slow down to these processes is really key to them ultimately having the organizations that we need.

Lisa: Yes. Again, I’ll say pointing out to “What are the lever points to really having outsized impact? How can we support people that are in positions to make choices that have amplified effect?” which is, again, so much of what this podcast is trying to do is to remind people that we don’t have to have the future happen to us, that we can lean into an opportunity, a leverage point, a relationship, a choice differently, and when we do that, it really might have ripple effects beyond ones that we didn’t know.

Maybe it’s less graffiti in the bathroom walls, Jill. Maybe it’s the opening of a conference with 6,000 people, that when they go home after 2 days of conversations, what they’re going to talk about is the Rochambeau tournament that had the entire room cheering and fully raucous. Maybe it’s reminding themselves that taking a walk outside, allowing themselves to take a breath, and to reconnect with who they are and who they want to be, even amid the complexity and change, is one of the best things that they can do for themselves and others. Jill, thank you so much for being here. We are going to put so many links in the show notes, including an opportunity we didn’t even talk about, which is your new T-shirt shop.

Jill: Oh, yes. It’s always playful [unintelligible 00:43:09].

Lisa: Always playful. Always playful.

Jill: Play with cotton, yes.

Lisa: Play with cotton. Put it on your shirt. Wear it about. Remind others. Ever the futurist, Jill, thank you so much for joining us today.

Jill: Thanks for having me.

Lisa: It turns out that starting your next gathering with a Rock, Paper, Scissors tournament may be the most effective way to foster memorable learning and engagement. Play is for everyone. Here’s something worth trying. Pick a small moment in your day, a work meeting, a family dinner, maybe even your commute, and ask yourself, “What small tweak could make this feel more open, more joyful, and more fun?”

Small moments, when designed with care, can transform life. If you enjoyed this conversation with Jill as much as I did, I’d love for you to leave a rating or a short note about what stood out. It helps others find these conversations, and it grows this community of people who care about shaping a more playful, humane future. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thanks for listening, and I’ll see you next time.

Can changing your mindset increase your lifespan?

To kick off season two of How We Future, Lisa sits down with Chip Conley, entrepreneur, bestselling author, and founder of Modern Elder Academy. Chip has spent decades helping people rethink aging, midlife, and what it really means to live life to the fullest.

In their conversation, Chip and Lisa explore the idea of the “midlife chrysalis” and why the years around 45 to 55 can be a powerful period of transformation rather than decline. Drawing from his own near-death experience, his work in hospitality, and his time at Airbnb, Chip offers a hopeful and grounded reframing of aging.

You’ll hear about:

• How wisdom is distilled from experience and why it matters now more than ever

• How curiosity and energy can counter ageism at work

• What hospitality, community, and belonging have to teach us about the future

From emotional equations to regenerative communities, this episode is a reflection on learning, leadership, and designing a life with intention. If you are navigating change or wondering how to grow older with more joy and agency, Chip offers language, frameworks, and perspective to help you maximize your life.

Links from the episode:

• Modern Elder Academy

• Chip’s podcast, The Midlife Chrysalis

• Learning to Love Midlife: 12 Reasons why Life gets better with Age by Chip Conley

• Emotional Equations: Simple Steps for Creating Happiness + Success in Business + Life by Chip Conley

• Chip Conley on Lenny Rashinsky’s podcast

• Chip’s post on LinkedIn celebrating his 65th birthday!

• 10 Commandments or Commitments, by Chip Conley

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow, starting today. I can’t think of a better way to kick off this season of How We Future and my next run around the sun than with my dear friend Chip Conley. Chip has been a huge inspiration to me for years. He has an amazing talent to reframe the way we think about aging, wisdom, and possibility.

From building Joie de Vivre into a hospitality empire in his 20s to founding Modern Elder Academy in his 50s, Chip has spent his career pioneering new answers to the question, what does it mean to future well? In our conversation, we talk about midlife as a chrysalis, not a crisis, why wisdom is becoming more valuable in a world driven by speed and AI, and how joy and energy can be powerful leadership tools at any age.

This episode is full of advice to take into the new year. Let’s get started with Season 2 of How We Future.

I cannot think of a better person to kick off Season 2 of How We Future and this new year than with my friend Chip Conley, who has been a huge inspiration to me for so many years and really embodies everything that this podcast is about, around helping people find more generative and joyful ways to shape their future. Chip, thank you so much for being here with us today.

Chip Conley: Those are two of my favorite words, generative and joyful. I started a boutique hotel company based on the French term Joie de Vivre. Generative is part of what I do today. We even call it our residential communities at MEA, regenerative communities. You and I are on the same page.

Lisa: Well, I love it. You’re an entrepreneur. You’re an innovator. You’re a thought leader. Seven bestselling books. New podcast. We’re going to talk about a lot of them. The things we don’t talk about, we’re going to put in the show notes. Chip, I don’t know if anyone has ever called you a public philosopher. Preparing for this, I realized you’re so much more than all of those things.

You’re both one of the best futurists I know because when you put something on the map, you don’t just put the thing on the map; you reframe how we think about it, and that, to me, is a futurist move. Because you’re so good at naming things and then changing our frames, you literally change our relationship with those things.

Chip: That’s interesting. No one has ever called me a public philosopher. People have called me a philosopher before. I don’t know what the difference between a private philosopher and a public philosopher is. I like public philosopher because it suggests there’s an intent to not just use your philosophy to be one-on-one with people, but to actually influence, maybe societal norms and the lexicon we use.

Thank you. It’s interesting. When it comes to futurists, I was just talking to someone this morning, a young person who wants to be a futurist when they grow up. He’s 25 years old. I said, “Isn’t it interesting that all of the best-known or most of the best-known futurists in the world are 50 and up, and most of them are even older?” Futurism is a form of crystallized intelligence, being able to synthesize and connect the dots, which is something we get better at as we get older.

Lisa: We do. It’s really been my life’s mission since we met decades ago, when I was at Global Business Network, and you were one of our remarkable people. We were trying to use practices of futures to help leaders imagine a multiplicity of futures. For me, the last 15 years has been trying to shrink that gap between the futurists that are up there and thinking and all of us, our ability to think imaginatively about the kind of worlds we want to be in, and also to learn the skills of anticipation and, as you were saying, of sensemaking, about taking in a wider swath of perspective and trying to understand what they mean in order to pose a new question of what could be.

From that way, I feel like, again, you have done that again and again, right? Not just asking why, but why not? I wanted to start with your most recent chapter in the spirit of reframing around reframing midlife. In preparing for this, I realized I should really start with huge gratitude, Chip, not only for all that I’ve learned from you over the years, but in re-picking up your book, Learning to Love Midlife, and going deep on Modern Elder Academy and what you’re offering, and we’ll talk about it, I realized that this podcast, How We Future, is my midlife chrysalis.

Chip: [laughs] I love that. I love the term. Let’s explain the term for a moment. I’ll make it personal. I started a boutique hotel company when I was 26, ran it till I was 50, but in my late 40s really struggled, and friends of mine were saying, “You’re going through your midlife crisis.” I was like, “Ah, I don’t believe in midlife crisis,” but I knew I felt really awful. My life was falling apart in a variety of ways.

Then I had an NDE. I died and went to the other side 9 times over 90 minutes due to an allergic reaction to an antibiotic. It woke me up. It woke me up to trying to understand this stage of life that is the Rodney Dangerfield of life stages, which is it don’t get no respect, this midlife life stage. I came to see my 50s. I loved them. I was like, “Wow, what is this about? Why would I not like my late 40s, and I love my 50s?”

Then I found out about something called the U-curve of happiness, which in fact shows exactly that, that the low point in life satisfaction as an adult is typically around 45 to 50, and then we get happier with every single decade after that until we die. For me, that helped me to see maybe there’s a purpose for midlife, especially 45 to 50. Maybe the purpose of that stage of midlife is to liquify as a caterpillar does in a chrysalis before you can reform yourself as the butterfly.

That’s how the midlife chrysalis term came about. That’s the name of my podcast as well. I think it’s really apt because I’ve seen now we’ve had over 8,000 people go through our programs at either our Santa Fe, New Mexico campus or our Baja campus on the beach in Mexico. 8,000 people is a lot of people over the course of 8 years. I see over and over again that there’s a rough stage around midlife that’s early-ish midlife in a world in which more of us are living till 90 and 100.

How do you help people to get through that period of time to realize that on the other side of that rough patch, coming through the chrysalis, is the butterfly? That’s how I’ve experienced it the last 15 years. I’m 65 now.

Lisa: It’s incredible. It just gave me a language to talk about what felt like regenerative growth, this kind of unleashing of not only creativity, but of all of the strengths and assets that I had built up over the years. I love the way you talk about it as holistic wisdom. It’s like this thing that connected all the things I’ve done and allowing to bring it to the world in a totally new way. I’ve literally had people say to me who have not even listened to the podcast, “Lisa, you just seem so much lighter. You’re radiating.” I was like, “I know. It’s incredible.”

Chip: You’ve let go of all the Fs, I would say the F-U-C-Ks. That’s one of the 12 reasons why life gets better with age. The subtitle of my book, Learning to Love Midlife, is 12 Reasons Why Life Gets Better with Age. That’s really the main point of the book. Becca Levy at Yale has shown that when we can shift our mindset on aging from a negative to a positive, we gain 7.5 years of additional longevity, which is a shocking stat, but it’s been in place for 20 years now, that statistic.

How do we help people to see the upside of getting older? What’s the unexpected pleasure of aging? There are 12 of them that I was able to research with academics. 1 of the 12 is that sense of freedom that comes from saying, “I have no more fucks left to give.” Excuse my French. For women, it’s particularly resonant because, for a lot of women, they grew up trying to live up to some standard and people-please and do a lot of things to satisfy the patriarchy or the world in which they had to fight for growing in their career, for example.

To get to a place where it doesn’t mean when you have no more F’s left to give that you don’t care about things, it’s just you’re more discerning what you do care about, and you don’t sweat the small stuff, and you start to learn how to edit your life in a way that focuses on what will let you flourish. That’s part of the reason you feel better after age 50, Lisa.

Lisa: I’m so grateful and focused in a way that perhaps I didn’t have the judgment to have or the connection between my internal values and the choices that I make. I know you talk a little bit about that in a healthy way. Maybe it is because it’s like, “Oh, wait, we don’t have infinite time on this earth, right? I feel that my time is getting-- not that it’s running out, but I just want to be, as you said, a bit more discerning with that.” That’s an evolutionary trait that we can utilize to our advantage, versus feeling fearful about it.

Chip: Yes. I think Laura Carstensen at Stanford has a theory called the socio-emotional selectivity theory. What it shows is that the shorter amount of time you think you have left in your life, due to cancer, AIDS back in the day, due to being older, the less time you think you have, the less you focus on the future or the past, and the more you focus on the present moment.

In focusing on the present moment, we learn how to actually be happier. Actually, there’s something to be said for death. Death is a remarkable organizing principle for life, which is why the Never Die movement with Bryan Johnson and all of his minions is sort of a silly movement, because knowing that you have a finite time on this earth gives you a sense, like a catalyst, of how you’re going to use that time and what matters. The what matters piece is what you’re talking about, is you get really clear about “How do you focus on what matters, and who matters?”

Lisa: Oh, it’s so empowering in that way. I know throughout the book, you also talk about your 10 Commandments, these commitments that you have made by having a better understanding of how to reframe midlife. One of them, you talk about focusing on the eulogy values versus resume values, which I think is such a big one.

Chip: That’s my favorite of the 10. Let me just give a framing for this. I grew up with 10 Commandments, and 8 of the 10 are about thou shalt not. I always felt like they’re a little bit harsh, and they don’t change. I was like, “These are the 10 Commandments, and they’ve been in place for 2,000 years.” I have created 10 Commitments, and mine can evolve, and they do evolve. What I mean by 10 Commitments is these are the ways in which I commit my life.

One of them, the one that you just mentioned, is to learn how to live your life based upon your eulogy as opposed to your resume or your LinkedIn profile. I got to say that the first half of my life, I lived my life based upon my resume, my LinkedIn profile, and my ego. From that point, when I had my NDE, near-death experience, I really started to see, like, “Wow, I’m seeing an operating system shift in my life from my ego to my soul.”

In that shift, I got much more curious about my impact in the world, not my return on investment, but my ripples of impact, a different form of ROI, and it really helped. It helped me to recognize that the impact we have on others, it’s not about the legacy of having my name on a university building; it’s more about knowing that you’ve had an influence. This is why I love the movie It’s a Wonderful Life, which is just such a testament to one person’s impact on others when Clarence the Angel comes down to the bridge where Jimmy Stewart is and shows Jimmy Stewart what his Bedford Falls town would be like if he had never existed.

It’s that kind of, I wish we had technology. There’s lots of technologists in the world. I wish some technologists could come up with a means of helping us see the impact we’ve had on others because that’s what really makes life worthwhile.

Lisa: I love that framing. I try to live by that, actually, most days. Even when I welcome my students to a class, or when I pick something up and I just take a moment, and I say, “Thank you. “ In fact, just this morning, I had a super early medical appointment, like 7:00, 10:00, obnoxious early. Just to make it even trickier, they said no caffeine. I was like, “What? Okay, fine.”

The very first thing I did when I got there was I just looked at the technician, and I said, “Thank you so much. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much for enabling me to get this important test.” She looked at me, and she goes, “I really appreciate you saying that. Nobody pauses to say that.” I love how you’re describing impact, both at the larger level in terms of how we live our life, but also in the many moments that we can make.

I really love, Chip, that your roots are deep in hospitality. That has always been a pull for me. I don’t know if you know this. My grandfather was in the restaurant business, and so I grew up obsessed with hospitality. I went to Cornell and was always longingly I was a hotelier. I took as many classes there as possible, and I think it’s because you could get that feedback loop quicker of, “You make this choice, and as a result of this choice, this happens.” Now, I would call that design more broadly. I just love the immediacy and intimacy of those moments.

Chip: When I was a kid, they did ask me, I had to draw a picture of myself at maybe age 8, and then say, what careers do I want to be in? One of the careers I said, along with being a sports reporter on TV and a movie star, was being a hotel man. That’s what I called it, a hotel man.

Lisa: I’m seeing the cape now. It’s hotel man.

Chip: Hotel man. I will say that as I got into my adolescence and then high school and college, hotels were not my thing. I was very interested in commercial real estate, and hotels are commercial real estate, so there was a connection there. It wasn’t until I graduated from Stanford Business School at the very ripe old age of 23, I was very young, and I went to work for a real estate developer in San Francisco, and San Francisco was full of hotels.

I was like, “Wow, hotels are a form of real estate. They’re a lot more creative, more interesting.” What I realized was, serving people gives me joy. I thankfully started to study hotels at about age 25 and realized that there’s a whole new movement called the boutique hotel movement. The future of hotels was boutique hotels. I then decided to create a boutique hotel company, call it Joie de Vivre, and over the course of the next 2 dozen years, created 52 boutique hotels around California.

I loved it. I loved the fact that it’s a noble profession because if you do your job well, you make people happy, and you keep people safe. There’s something about that that feels just deeply rewarding for me. I’m also a bit of a social alchemist, which means I’m a mixologist of people. I think being a hotelier and a restaurateur and a bar-owner and a spa-owner, these are industries that often you’re mixing people together, less so in a spa, but to some degree you do.

Finding something that was very natural for me, thank God, I found it. Today, even though I’m no longer running boutique hotels, I am at a stage in my life where I’m very clearly using those skills and the social alchemy skills at the Modern Elder Academy, which we’ll talk about.

Lisa: Yes, definitely. It’s worth saying, and we’ll put a link to this, of course, that the 52 hotels, they were not the same cookie-cutter hotel. Each one had its own creative expression and personality.

Chip: Own name, own identity, yes. No one of them was the same. We were like a branding agency too because we were good at both design and creation and construction and usually renovation of hotels into-- We would take Best Westerns and Holiday Inns and Sheridans and turn them into boutique hotels, and then we would create these really unique services and amenities there as well.

The fact that each hotel had its own personality, its own language on its Do Not Disturb sign on the back of the door that you’d put on the front of the door, each one had its own flavor, that’s what made it different. Yes, I loved it until I hated it. In my late 40s, I hated it. It was partly because of the Great Recession, but it was partly because I had found a new passion, which was writing and speaking, and I really wanted to do more of that. During the Great Recession, I felt handcuffed to my desk and running out of cash.

Lisa: Again, such a courageous choice to say, “Look, I’ve built this thing, and it’s no longer working for me. Let me try something else.” Your book, Peak, which really talked about what creates great cultures and what really helps people do their best, is just a classic, and I think should be taught for anyone that is in the business of service, so yet another gift that you’ve given so many of us.

Maybe we’ll jump a little bit to Modern Elder Academy and talk about that because it is another form of hospitality. The thing I would say, going back to those unique experiences and now the unique experiences that you’re offering for more than 8,000, congratulations, is that once you’ve had an experience like that, that Peak experience, you’re a different person. You don’t go back.

I think that is so powerful. My very first job working in innovation, I’ll never forget this, was in the early ‘90s. It was a picture is worth a thousand words, but an experience is worth a thousand pictures. That’s what we did. We did experience design because the sort of pack for the punch when you really design something magical, and by the way, incidentally, gosh, you’re revealing so much about me. When I was eight, people said, “What did you want to be?” I said I wanted to be president of Walt Disney World because--

Chip: I wanted to be at Walt Disney. That’s so interesting.

Lisa: It was magic, right? That was my first real immersive experience. I think when you experience magic, and you know what it can be to feel like when you’re in that, that’s the gift you’re giving those 8,000 people and all of the people that stayed at Joie de Vivre. You want to stay there. You come out changed. You come out with a different sense of wanting to recreate that and feel who you were when you were in that environment.

Chip: Really, there’s an in-between stage here that led me to MEA, to Modern Elder Academy. After I sold Joie de Vivre, I had two years of just having space in my life to be curious about what I was interested in. That was interesting. We could come back to that if you want. I learned a lot about a few different things. I was asked 13 years ago at age 52 by the founders of Airbnb to come in and be their modern elder, someone who was as curious as they are wise.

That’s what they said. I joined them and spent seven and a half years there. That was really the future of hospitality. The first thing that Brian Chesky, the founder and CEO, said to me when he was trying to pitch me on the idea of coming in full-time was, he said, “Chip, how would you like to democratize hospitality?” When he first told me about the business idea, I was like, “Oh, that’s a terrible idea.” I was like, “No one’s going to do that.” Of course, I was sort of in this very linear hotelier mind, and then I joined.

Well, I didn’t join. I did some research and spent a lot of time with Brian, and then decided to join when most people had never heard of Airbnb at that time. What I’m proud of is to be able to see the future; that idea is William Gibson: the future is here now, it’s just not evenly distributed. For me, that helped me to see in my 50s how to be relevant and how to find a pro-aging perspective, not an anti-aging perspective, in terms of how to actually make the most of our years after age 50 so that, ultimately, toward the end of my time at Airbnb, I decided to start the Modern Elder Academy.

The reason I did that was because there’s no such thing as a midlife wisdom school. The difference between knowledge and wisdom is the following. Knowledge is something you accumulate. It’s like a plus sign, but wisdom is something you distill. It’s like a division sign. It’s like the square root of something. It’s the essence of something at its core, and the more complicated the world we live in, the more wisdom is important.

In a world in which knowledge is now a commodity due to AI, wisdom maybe has a scarcity value. I wanted to create a school that helped people, mostly 45 to 65, but we’ve had people as young as 25 and as old as 92 come to learn how to distill their wisdom. I define wisdom as metabolized experience, mindfully shared for the common good. MEA launched initially down in Mexico because I had a home on the beach.

I was like, “Oh, I like it down here. Let me start a campus here.” Sort of crazy. During COVID, when, of course, everything had to close, I said, “Well, we have to have a campus in the US.” We bought a former billionaire’s ranch estate, 2,600 acres, a regenerative horse ranch, and turned it into our second campus, which is quite expansive. That’s how MEA got started.

The reason people come to MEA is often because they’re in the midst of some kind of transition, career change, retirement, empty nest, a cancer diagnosis, divorce, moving locations, parents passing away. We specialize in something called TQ, transitional intelligence. Speaking of futurism for a minute, we live in a world in which the pace of change is happening faster and faster, yet very few of us have ever gone through any kind of school to help you understand the three stages of the transition: the ending, the messy middle, and the beginning.

That’s the number one reason people come. The number one reason people come back and why we have 56 regional chapters around the world is because of the fact that people have a deep sense of community. When you get to know people from the inside out, and you all are going through some kind of transition, your cohort stays together and has Zoom calls every month.

You also have regional chapters where you get to know other people who have a common ethos, a common point of view. What I believe, last thought on this, is the idea that mid-lifers are supposed to be like when you’re a teenager or in college, you’re supposed to refuel your car up, and then by the time you get into your 50s, you’re driving on fumes. We need a midlife pit stop that helps people to reimagine and re-engage with how they want to live their life and how they want to curate it.

Because if you’re 54 and you’re going to live until 90, 54 is exactly halfway between 18 and 90, which most people don’t think about. It’s like, “Oh, wow, I have as much adulthood ahead of me as I have behind me.”

Lisa: Again, I’ll just point back to the public philosopher sharing this for the public good. We are all going to hit our 50s if we’re lucky. That is actually not uncertain. In all the uncertainty around us, the fact that we’re going to get older and we’re going to go through life stages isn’t actually not uncertain. That is a given. Your recognition that there isn’t support for this critical life moment, where there could be, and it could be joyful, and it could be regenerative, and it could also build relationships, which are harder to do as you get older as well, in a hugely meaningful moment when you need a boost, it is so powerful to me.

Again, when you see it, you can’t unsee it. When you question, “Why do we think that all of our training around transitions only happens during the adolescence part of our life when we’re filled with counselors and teachers and support, but we have nothing later when we’re feeling more alone, more isolated, more woulda, shoulda, coulda, what do we do with all that?”

You’re giving this beautiful place for people to come and work through it and grow as a human, grow their connections, their friendships, and then be able to give back. I just can’t say enough about it. You didn’t know this, but I’m like one of your greatest unpaid advertisers and promoters.

Chip: Well, we’re going to give you one of our campuses, Lisa.

Chip: Oh, that’s happening.

Lisa: In the Peak model, the book you mentioned earlier, Peak: How Great Companies Get Their Mojo from Maslow, there’s these three pyramids. One is the employee pyramid and their hierarchy of needs. The second is the customer pyramid. The third is the investor pyramid. When it comes to the customer pyramid, the transformational nature of a customer experience is not having your expectations met. That’s the base of the pyramid. Nor your desires met. That’s the middle of the pyramid.

What’s at the top of the pyramid is having your unrecognized needs met. When a company or a service provider provides you something that is beyond expectations and desires, but is a mind reader to understand what you really needed, boy, are you loyal to a company or a service provider like that. What we’re providing with MEA is something that a lot of people don’t know they need.

They just know that they have a disquiet. I sometimes say it’s successful people quietly falling apart in midlife. What we provide is something that people needed. One of the number one things they say on their Guest Satisfactions or Student Satisfaction Forms afterwards is, “I didn’t know how much I needed that.” That’s what I love reading because when you find a service or a product you’re providing that is not obvious, there’s a lot of risk in it.

We’re pioneers. I was a pioneer as a boutique hotelier, I was a pioneer with Airbnb, and I’m pioneers with MEA. Sometimes being a pioneer, you’re like you stand up on your surfboard before the wave has arrived. I started something called Costanoa. It was seven years before the word “glamping” ever existed. It was before the wave was there. It did okay, but it did not do that well.

We had to sell it for a fraction of what we built it for. It was a failure in many ways, but it was a noble experiment, too, because I learned a lot from it. It was an example of when you want to time standing up for the wave, which I was doing this morning. I was literally here in Baja surfing this morning. You want to be able to time your standing up on the board with when the wave is there.

That’s why they’re so valuable, because if a futurist can tell you this is on the horizon and then give you a sense of “What’s the foreshadowing influences that are going to make it more likely to happen, such that you can stand up on the board at the right time?” A futurist can be the difference between you succeeding and failing.

Lisa: I completely agree. As you’re describing that, it reminded me. I teach a class at Stanford called View from the Future, where every week we bring in a guest who’s on the edge of their field to share some of those signals that you’re talking about and let the students not only percolate on what’s happening across different industries, but how they can learn to spot the signals.

Our first guest last year was Mike Maples Jr. from Floodgate, a very famous investor, and he talks about people that live in the future, the folks that are willing to see a trend but also put themselves there or build relationships with people there. The fact, for example, that you went to work with Brian Chesky at a moment where it was like, “What, I’m going to pay money to stay on a stranger’s couch? No, it’s a hard pass.”

You, because, Chip, of who you are, are so curious. You’re so willing to be like, “Wait, what is happening here?” It’s at the beginning of the sharing economy. We were just learning about how to think about new markets related to oversupply in areas that might be able to be monetized, thanks to this thing called the interweb technology. You were not a technologist, but you were an expert in hospitality. The fact that you, A, even took the call and then kept coming in, and like, “Sure, I’ll get a job” when you probably hadn’t had a job.

Chip: I had not reported to anybody since I was 26 years old. I was 52. I was not only having a job and being full-time in an industry, tech, that I didn’t understand, but also, I was mentoring my boss because Brian was the CEO, and I reported to Brian as the head of Global Hospitality and Strategy, while also mentoring him as a leader. Boy, did it take some humility and some patience. Frankly, Brian was a great student. I learned as much from him as he did from me.

Lisa: I’ve heard that. I know a couple of people that worked at Airbnb early on, and just said one of the most energetic learners ever. I think the other part that I’m trying to make, as I try to do my part of democratizing access to futures thinking, because I don’t think the future should be left to just a few futurists, I think we all need to learn these skills, but this idea of really futures as a form of learning.

My mother was a chief learning officer. I grew up really early on getting books of Margaret Wheatley. I’m 12, and Peter Senge. She was a big Deming person, so she talked about quality management and reducing variance. I was like, “Can I just talk about what happened today in the lunchroom?” That’s my weird upbringing.

Chip: Not surprised you’re an academic and a writer. You’re a thinker. Guess what? The acorn didn’t fall far from the tree.

Lisa: That’s right. That’s right. In this time of voracious change, the person that learns the fastest has the best chance of riding the wave, going back to your surfboard analogy, because we have to prioritize the learning over the certainty. Bob Johansen has this great quote. He used to be the president of the Institute for the Future, where he says the future will reward clarity, but will punish certainty.

What I see in what you’re doing is the clarity of your values, the clarity of purpose, the clarity of intent, and being open, like, “Not all of it succeeds,” but what do you do with that? How do you channel that for your next go?

Chip: Yes. I like living laboratories. I love to both learn while leading, and then I like to write about it. That’s very unusual. Sometimes, if you’re a CEO and they write a book, it’s their story, and it’s an inspiring story, but it’s their story. What’s weird about me is that I like leading and I like learning, and I like to create frameworks, like the Peak framework, and then I like teaching.

All of that together, it means being at MEA has been very helpful. The other thing that we’re doing at MEA that’s really interesting is this idea of regenerative communities. Yoga and meditation have become very mainstream, but 40, 50 years ago, they were not. 40 to 50 years ago, intentional communities were like yoga and meditation, but they didn’t really go to the mainstream.

You have communes, you have kibbutzes in Israel. Co-living has become a thing, but it hadn’t really taken off. Because we have this community of people who want to live together and be together, we built a regenerative community around a regenerative farm here in Baja, 26 homes, but now we’re doing these Golden Girls homes. This is Chip at his weirdest again.

It was like, we have all these four, five, and six-bedroom homes, and we have smaller and smaller families. The population is aging. We have a housing stock that is not being used, and 74% of the people single in the US, 65 and older, are women, and 65% of the single people over the age of 50 are women. You have a lot of women who are living alone or would like to live with other women.

In fact, talked about it in college and talked about it in their 40s. Now that’s what we’re doing. I’m literally buying, in Santa Fe, right next to our campus, homes that are obsolescent, four, five, and six-bedroom homes. With our MEA community, which is 69% women, we’re creating a new form of housing that’s scalable. Often, there’s a Golden Girls home, it’s like, “Oh, we’ll live together when we get older, and it’s just a one-off.”

We’re doing it with a community where you have a distributed community, like a village, where there’s 6 or 8 or 12 homes all near each other, right near the campus, so you get all the benefits of the campus while at the same time getting the benefits of being part of the community and choosing your home based upon, “Do you want to be pet-friendly? Do you want to be intergenerational? Is this a writer’s home where writers want to live together?” It’s really interesting.

Lisa: Again, I’ll just call back the futurist orientation of taking a look about where people are and sort of stating the Wayne Gretzky, where is the puck going, right? People want to be together, right? The research suggests that when we are in relationships, it is a resilient and life-giving thing that we can all do, right? How do we create spaces and places that nourish that in a way that’s filled with joy?

Oh, I love it. Is it too early to buy a share? I’m in. I’m down. I do want to say thank you so much for sharing some of your experiences working with Brian Chesky. We are going to put in the show notes one of the best interviews I have heard about your experience that you had with Lenny Rachitsky. That was so beautiful talking about all the really detailed things that you learned around managing someone that had tremendous energy, the founder energy, how to show up for a meeting. I’m actually going to make my students listen to it, so full stop. I just thought that was so extraordinary, that whole conversation and exchange.

Chip: Lenny is amazing. I love that guy.

Lisa: Incredible what he’s built. Just tremendous. I’ve learned so much from the conversations that he has and the way that he does it. The one thing I just want to really maybe spend a minute on from that conversation that I got was the exchange you had around energy and this notion that there is some ageism that still exists within corporations, and we can get very focused on how people see us based on that.

You had this just incredible way of talking about not only the wisdom and the experience that you can bring, but your energy and what that was like. For someone that has been labeled energetic my whole life and not always in the best way, that really spoke to me. I just wonder if you could share a little bit about that.

Chip: Yes. When I was writing my book, Wisdom at Work: The Making of a Modern Elder, about my Airbnb experience, one of the people who read an early version of it was an executive recruiter. She said, “Chip, this book is going to really help a lot of people, especially in their 50s. Because what you’re helping to show here is that ageism does exist, but the question is, what do you do about it personally? We can do some societal things about it, but let’s skip to the personal side because that’s what’s within your control.”

She said, “If you can tell people that if they can show up with curiosity and a passionate engagement for life, for whatever they’re doing, and especially if it’s a job interview, for what the company’s doing, if you show up with curiosity and a passionate engagement, people won’t notice your wrinkles; they’ll notice your energy. People are naturally drawn to energy, positive energy, but also just learning energy.”

She said, “That’s what will help you get a job. That’s what’s going to help you build relationships. Part of that energy needs to be curiosity because if the energy is just sort of, ‘I know it all,’ that’s not going to work.” Yes, showing up, and it’s also showing up against type because when someone thinks you’re over 50, they think you are closed-minded, fixed mindset, not very energetic, not interested in learning something new.

When you’re exactly the opposite of that, especially for young people, what it says to them is “This is not my parent.” [laughter] That’s actually a pretty important thing. I learned that very much. So many people would bring their parents to the Airbnb headquarters, and I’d meet them, and I’d realize their parents are younger than me. It was really helpful for me to show up in a way that surprised people.

Lisa: I love that. It’s so powerful as an invitation for people to express it. The opening frame for the How We Future podcast and Substack was a post I wrote about the importance of hope, hype, and gratitude as renewable resources, this idea that in this time that feels so hard and difficult, that it is a resilient strategy to be hopeful. In fact, we have to be in order to help advance and get out of a place that feels difficult, this idea of hype not being about toxic positivity or being a vapid cheerleader, but being engaged, being energetic, being excited, that that is a uniquely human force that we should hone as opposed to siphon off because it’s not accepted.

The other is gratitude, which is that there’s always opportunities to be grateful and that that can give you energy. When I was listening to you talk about the importance of not being afraid of being energetic, that that is actually a positive force. I was really taken with that, particularly because I know you’re spending a lot of time with our fellow midlife folks, but I’m very privileged to work with young folks in their 20s.

I will say that, particularly coming out of COVID, my colleague talked about experiencing students as having a crisis of enthusiasm. There was energy, but there was energy around outrage; there wasn’t energy around joy that felt socially acceptable. That was just not the currency of the moment. We almost had to reteach them that it’s okay to feel excited about something. I’m paying a lot of attention to that, to creating conditions to make it okay to experience positive joy.

Chip: Yes. Love that. Love that.

Lisa: Well, I know we’re getting to the end, but there’s just one more big topic I want to cover with you, which is your just tremendous book. I love this so much on Emotional Equations. Chip, I think this is a game-changer. I know you wrote this over a decade ago, but I’ve returned to those equations again and again. Again, I’ll call for just even the metaphor of using equations to talk about emotions.

It’s unexpected, but has so much truth to it; it has so much weight to it. You even talk, you open up about the metaphor of gravity, that gravity is a pull, but we have this emotional weight and this idea that when we understand our emotions, and we put them in the form of an equation, now we can play with the variables a little bit, so it’s an empowering move. I wonder if you could just talk a little bit about how you came up with that concept.

Chip: The origin story on that was after my flatline experience, which happened after I gave a speech in St. Louis, weirdly enough, I had Viktor Frankl’s book, Man’s Search for Meaning, in my day pack. As I’m flying home after they did all the tests on me to figure out what was wrong, I was reading Frankl’s book again. Frankl was a Jewish psychologist in Vienna and ended up in a concentration camp.

He had a theory, which was called logotherapy, which is meaning is the fuel of life. Then he was able to test that theory in the worst of circumstances. What came out of that, reading the book again, this time with a whole new pair of glasses because I had just died, was this idea of despair equals suffering minus meaning. It was that equation, the idea that maybe suffering, if you have a little bit of Buddhist tendencies, the first noble truth of Buddhism is, suffering is ever-present.

It means suffering is part of life. Suffering is a constant, but despair and meaning are inversely proportional. What that means is the more meaning you have, the less despair you may have. That’s at a time when I was really struggling in my late 40s. That was my daily reminder, like a mantra, of “Despair equals suffering minus meaning. Where’s the meaning in this?”

As I got further into it, I started talking to social scientists and started creating other equations, like disappointment equals expectations minus reality. Anxiety equals uncertainty times powerlessness. They’re not all negative emotions, but two-thirds of them are. The focus was like, “Okay, if you can understand the recipe of an emotion, then you can understand how to work with that emotion a little bit more effectively.”

That’s really how the book came about. Yes, it became a New York Times bestseller. What was beautiful about that, Lisa, was I wrote that book as the first book I wrote after having written three books prior to selling Joie de Vivre, my boutique hotel company. I had wanted to become a writer and a speaker even more seriously. The first book I wrote after I left was my first New York Times bestseller.

It’s not my favorite book. I’ll be honest, it’s not. It’s the book that, in many ways, helped propel me forward in terms of people saying, “Okay, who is this Chip Conley guy?”

Lisa: It’s a book I return to again and again. It helps me make meaning. Particularly, that last one that you talked about is why I started How We Future, because I just realized that there was so much anxiety that didn’t have a place to go, so this idea that anxiety equals uncertainty times powerlessness. In a world that’s moving as fast as it is, we don’t necessarily have control over the uncertainty, but the powerlessness we could really examine.

Not only can we decrease our feeling of powerlessness, on the inverse side, how do we increase our feeling of power? I don’t know about you, but I didn’t take a class on power. It’s motivating me to want to create one. I’ve had a great pleasure of working with folks, Jeff Pfeffer, who’s written about power, Eric Liu, who talks about power. I’m a huge fan.

Chip: Dacher Keltner from UC Berkeley writes about it as well, yes.

Lisa: It’s one of these things like, “Oh, it’s uncomfortable. We should shy away.” So much of, I think, the work that you do in this beautiful way is helping people find agency in their own life, which is a form of power. That is more important than ever because, again, if we look at these variables, if uncertainty promises to continue to go up, I don’t think the world is getting more simple on its own.

What can we do to support each other to build the skills, the mindsets, the way of being in the world that’s going to help us live our best lives and pass it on to our generations? Yes, well, maybe I’ll end here, Chip, with two things. One is returning to this idea of hope, hype, and gratitude, all of which I have for you. In fact, I’ve developed a new thing, I’m starting to dress for my guests.

You can’t see, but my T-shirt says, “Rebellions are built on hope.” I know your first book was all about being a rebel, but I just really want to share tremendous gratitude for you, for all that you’re doing, continuing to push the boundaries, continuing to be hopeful, and continuing to lift up energy as you do it. Thank you so much for being a part of this.

Chip: Well, I feel like I’m dancing with you because you are doing all the same things, the positivity that you have, again, with a grounded positivity. That’s really the key. There are people walking on air, but most of us can’t do that, and most of us can’t do that for very long. I just want to say thank you to you.

Lisa: Aw, it’s wonderful to have you.

Thank you, Chip, for being our first guest of Season 2. As we start off 2026, I invite you to notice where you can bring a little more curiosity, generosity, and joy into the room. If this episode resonated, please share with others and leave a review for How We Future. It really helps these conversations reach more people. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thanks for listening, and I hope you have a great start to the new year.

You can’t be a leader unless you’re a continuous learner.

In this special Season 1 closer, Lisa is joined by her mom, Dr. Bonnie Kay! Bonnie is many things: consultant, psychologist, continuous learner, competitive golfer, and lifelong inventor of her own path. Together, they revisit the choices, relationships, and philosophies that shaped Bonnie’s unconventional career and deeply influenced Lisa’s own work in futures thinking and design.

During the conversation, Bonnie shares stories from her early days as an English teacher, her leap into psychology during a major turning point for women, the “shortest dissertation ever” on gender roles and marital satisfaction, and her later career helping leaders grow through quality management and emotional intelligence.

You’ll hear:

• How “continuous learning” became her north star

• Why the circle of influence still matters in chaotic times

• The power of great conversations

• Her signature philosophies like “take the best and leave the rest”

It’s a warm, funny conversation about ambition, family, reinvention, and the lifelong practice of creating a meaningful life on your own terms. A perfect end to Season 1.

Some of Bonnie’s Favorite books and resources:

7 Habits of Highly Effective People Stephen Covey

Fierce Conversations by Susan Scott

Women Who Run with Wolves, by Clarissa Pinkola Estés

Think Again by Adam Grant (my mom literally gives everyone in her life Adam Grant’s calendar)

9 lifetime Hole in Ones, Impressive! An informal account of golf highlights by Bonnie Kay

The Rise of the full Stack Learning Organization, Lisa Kay Solomon

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow, starting today.

Today’s episode is really special because I get to sit down with my mom, Dr. Bonnie Tavlin Kay. People ask me all the time how I’ve come to do the work that I do, and honestly, so much of it traces back to what I’ve learned from her. I truly hit the jackpot with my mom, not just because of her endless love and support, but because of everything she’s taught me about relationships, learning, and work.

Then there’s what she modeled, an accomplished professional woman who somehow blended career, family, and competitive golf at the highest levels. My mom is one of the original inspirations for How We Future, someone who kept doing things her own way even when the norms around her said otherwise. Thank you for being here for the season one finale of How We Future with the best guest I could ask for. Let’s get into it with Dr. Bonnie Kay.

Dr. Bonnie Kay, thank you so much for being here.

Dr. Bonnie Kay: Lisa, I am honored to be with you. Honored.

Lisa: It’s so exciting. I often get asked about my background, like, “How did you get into this funky field of futures thinking and design strategy and helping leaders?” Almost every time I talk about my origin story, you get featured. [laughs] You are a prominent figure in why I’m doing the work that I’m doing now. And so I thought it’s really only fitting to have you on the How We Future to unpack some of the ways that you’ve futured that has inspired me and so many others in your career and in your life. So we’re going to do a slightly different format today, Mom, where we’re going to talk a little bit about your background. I’ll ask you some questions.

Then I’m going to share some of my favorite sayings that I’ve learned from you that, in preparing for this, I’ve realized are really life sayings. We’ll talk about maybe how you came to them and what they mean to you. First, I just really want to give a little bit more background about your background and who you are. You really helped teach me that you can invent your own future, that you can create a new model that didn’t exist in your different career and life choices. I want to ask you first to maybe talk about highlights of your career, starting with maybe being a teacher when you left college.

Bonnie: I think it’s important to put my careers in the context of the ages that I lived through. I graduated in 1965, where even the best and the brightest women were becoming teachers or nurses. I married my wonderful husband of 60 years on, I think, the day that I was supposed to attend my own graduation. Right away, you got it. It’s most important to be married. I was lucky enough to get a teaching position outside of Philadelphia because your father was going to medical school. I was enjoying being a teacher. I loved it. I had full access to five classes and enjoyed creating experiences. My best story is that they used to call me Special Kay. I was 21. I taught 8th grade, and they were all bigger than me. I was-

Lisa: I should say, although we’re recording this-

Bonnie: -taller.

Lisa: -you are little. Mighty might for a reason. 5 foot on a good day.

Bonnie: Still 5 feet.

Lisa: Still 5 feet. Yes. Standing tall. I will say, though, no slouch. You graduated Cornell University at a time where not that many women went. You were an English major. Brilliant. Wonderful that you could take your love of English as a student to then become a teacher. Early days.

Bonnie: Yes. I think that a couple of great things happened at that time. I taught 8th-grade English. We were a new school, and we did something like team teaching. Immediately, I got into the experience that you do a better job if you have a team. We all shared the same 125 students. It was great. For almost three years, I remember well a few of the students. In fact, my favorite story is one of them became my pet. He was so smart and so good. I decided that, and the next day, he led a walkout in my class. [laughter] Just to say.

Lisa: You never know. Ambiguity early.

Bonnie: Right. Special Kay was humble.

Lisa: Right. You were a teacher and then ever the lifelong learner, which we’re going to come back to again and again in this conversation. You decided to get a master’s in reading. You became a reading specialist.

Bonnie: I had to end my teaching because Mike, my husband, went to Vermont. We all went to Vermont for his internship. That’s where your brother was born. Then we had an interesting two years, a year of which he went to Vietnam during the war. I went home to live with my parents and with Steve. Then, when he came back, back to my career, we moved to Philadelphia, where he had a residency. Now I went back to graduate school, to University of Pennsylvania. I was taking courses in English, a master’s in English because that’s what I had taught.

Somehow that didn’t work. Somebody said, “You know what’s hot? Reading specialist is hot. They’re hiring reading specialists.” I said, “Okay.” I enrolled in a master’s in reading, which I did get. I got a master’s in reading. I actually taught at both a Catholic Montessori school and a secondary Jewish Hebrew academy. I found what was interesting about that was not being in the classroom was not as much fun when you’re just a consultant to other people who are in the fray.

Lisa: Essentially, not having the classroom, you were the person called in when extra support was needed. You were there to help out, but not necessarily, as you were saying earlier, architecting the whole class.

Bonnie: Yes. It was a time when reading specialist was hot. There were all kinds of ways to teach kids reading. I even helped write a book that Dr. Botel from U of P, he published. I wasn’t having a good time. I remember a phone call that changed my life because a friend of mine who had also gone to Cornell and was now at Penn, and loved being a reading specialist, and was getting her PhD in that. I said, “I don’t really love this, but I love the fact that I have some freedom in my time.” I don’t know when you want to introduce that I was a golf brat, aside from the fact that I had two children.

I said, “I don’t really want to work full-time. I think I’m stuck being a reading specialist.” She said to me, “Nobody really wants to work full-time.” I said, “Okay.” I took another course. The course was called Psychology of Women. It basically changed my life. Again, back to when I was a younger career person, it was the women’s movement. It was early 70s, mid-70s, late 70s. I just was different than everybody else. Very few of my friends, because we were living in the suburbs and playing some golf or stuff like that, were not working. I was always charging forward. When I took Psychology of Women, I realized it was like holding up a mirror to myself.

I said, “I’m a competitive person. I want to keep working and learning. It’s not enough for me.” I was a terrible housekeeper, by the way. Sorry, Lisa. I just wanted to do more, be excited about what I was doing in my work. After taking that, learning about psychological androgyny, which means you can both be empathetic and competitive and assertive, and you can take care of people, but you can also charge ahead, I said, “I have to teach other women that we’re on the cusp. I can make a difference.” I was going to be a feminist therapist. I actually worked at the Women’s Center at Penn and the feminist therapy collective in Philadelphia.

Lisa: I remember early on seeing you make choices about leaning into your passion. Just even hearing that story, it strikes me that one of the things that I teach in my futures classes is that this idea of futures doesn’t come from nowhere. It comes from a process of reflection to prospect. This idea of tapping into either your past experiences or your assumptions, or learning that you’ve done, whether you or at a larger scale to help inform choices forward.

Hearing you tell the story, it really strikes me that the choices forward you were making didn’t exist, that you were paving new territory to say, “Wait a minute. I’m tapping into something here. Society is telling me to take some different paths, but I’m not willing to do that because I’m not happy.” As you said earlier, you got to make sure you can play golf. It’s important, as we said in the intro, that you are still at 81, a competitive golfer, and have been playing amateur competitive golf for over 5 decades. That was really important to you. Again, no model for that. There’s no model for how do you have a meaningful career and still have time to do something that you love.

Bonnie: There are more and more models now. At that time, and I still remember this conversation, somebody said to me, “Bonnie, what are you trying to prove by going back for your PhD?” Because that’s what happened post this awareness that I was going to be a feminist therapist. I had to get a PhD. I went back to Penn and started taking courses. Lisa, you were born in intercession. You were always such perfect timing.

Lisa: [laughs] To this day.

Bonnie: It was so good. Gee whiz, Leah. I got to go back to class. I pursued a PhD, and I got it. I wrote a dissertation, the title of which is-

Lisa: I have it right here.

Bonnie: -Sexual Identity, which is a behavioral concept. How do you define yourself as stereotype female, stereotype male, high on both, the BEM inventory, androgynous, or undifferentiated? How does that correlate with marital satisfaction when both in the marriage are working? I was studying marital conflicts at the time. It was autobiographical, actually.

Lisa: I love it. Yet another way of trying to figure out how to make sense of your choices and your ambition. Here it is. I actually have the dissertation. I still have it. You got me a copy. That was so kind. I’ll also note that you’ve often said it was the shortest dissertation in history. You said, “You know what they say for people that have short dissertations? Done.”

Bonnie: Done. I have to say that the people who graded it loved it. They like reading short dissertations that are about them. I’m sure they were all struggling.

Lisa: It was really groundbreaking, this idea of exploring a marriage that had traditional, as you said, social sex roles where a woman is the more caretaker and stays at home, and the male is allowed to do more ambitious things, more competitive things. This idea that androgynous marriages were more successful or happier than those that had traditional roles. That’s huge. This is 1982.

I also want to say that while you were at Penn, you wrote and taught in a groundbreaking class called the Psychology of Personal Growth, which is extraordinary. Pre-Angela Duckworth, pre-Adam Grant, you were studying what does it mean to feel like a flourishing human that’s growing in a field that didn’t exist. I just think that’s remarkable.

Bonnie: [laughs] I do remember sitting there with Penn students and talking about career choices, and more female Penn students would say, “I want to get married.” I said, “What is the matter with you that you’re not thinking about your career?” This was-

Lisa: This is extremely unique.

Bonnie: -1979. I love teaching them assertiveness training, how to really speak up for yourself and not feel like you were being harsh or a bitch or something. Always teaching them skills. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed that very much. At the same time, that wasn’t enough for me as a career. I wasn’t going to be a reading specialist anymore. I said, “Oh, my God. What am I going to do? Join aerobics like everybody else? This is not okay.” The phone rang. Do you want to know next?

Lisa: Yes. What happened next? You have me on the edge of my seat. What happened? Who was it?

Bonnie: A wonderful future employee and friend said, “Hi, you have been referred to me by a Penn professor because I went to Penn as well. We need somebody to do a special project for welfare recipients on how to find a job.” It was a principal in a consulting firm. Gabe, let’s just call him Gabe, he actually changed my life. I said, “Gabe, can I do it on my own time?” This was a summer project. He said, “Yes, sure.”

Lisa: Wow. Before flex work.

Bonnie: Flex work. I did it, something I knew nothing about, but I wrote this program for welfare recipients on how to find a job. They liked me. They said, “We’d like to hire you.” I said, “Part-time?” They said, “Sure.” [laughter] Here I was, very interesting. I had a PhD. If you don’t mind me saying, I was making $150 a day, which was not a lot even then. They hired me to be a consultant in what was a huge movement called Quality Management.

It was based on what Japan was doing post-World War II, where they were turning out cameras and all kinds of appliances without any rework. This famous Dr. Deming was teaching Ford and anybody else like us in this consulting firm how to help the companies in America catch up, until I became a consultant in Quality Management. I have to say it was the beginning of a great career, and it was like taking another PhD. I read more books. I went to more conferences. I went to a conference with you-

Lisa: We did.

Bonnie: -on systems thinking in San Francisco. We were the only mother-daughter in 1,000 people. [laughs] It was continuous learning. I was able to put together teaching, which I love to do, with a broader canvas and ended up working with leaders in both nonprofit, government, family, Fortune 500, and the rest is history. It was, “Oh, my God.”

Lisa: I know. It’s amazing. You were a chief learning officer really before that became a mainstay title, and essentially working with leaders to help them in their positions of influence be the best version of themselves, be learning with you. I know you would say, “I’m their learning partner.” I know you’re responsible for many bulk book buys. You’d get excited about a book. You’re like, “You have to read it. You have to give it to everybody else.” I also think the language of Total Quality Management and even the processes gave yet another way to describe your passion for continuous improvement yourself.

Bonnie: I kept pushing my own learning and bringing people along. I have to say, now that I think about it, I was like a triangle. I had this PhD in psychology, and I have to say that every CEO of Fortune 500 companies loved having their own shrink. They loved that. I had a single-digit handicap. They loved that. Then I had this whole source of making their company work better, of teaching their whole leadership team to be smarter and grow better teams, called Quality Management. That was the triangle, and it was a best seller.

Lisa: Guess what? I think you’d be a best seller now in the world of AI. Who doesn’t need that now? Get back to work. Get back to work. All right. Maybe that’s a good place for us to jump off and talk about some of the maxims that I’ve learned, your philosophies that I know you’ve shared with leaders and others, and we can talk a little bit more about them because I really do think they’ve informed my perspective on agency and how to bring new things to life and really what this podcast is all about, these conversations about how we future.

One of the books that I remember you giving me early on, while you were going through probably the early years of post-PhD to consulting, to then becoming this leadership coach, was Stephen Covey’s 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. That was foundational, and this idea of emotional bank accounts. I know you were early on to emotional intelligence, tapping into that, why it mattered for leaders, and this idea of the emotional bank account and deposits and withdrawals. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about that work and how it’s influenced how you think about the human side of leadership.

Bonnie: It was very important to grow leaders personally, not just the data of measuring their systems and where the breakdowns were, and how we should run improvement cycles. That was a scientific part of it. The psychology part of it was I would try to bring models. Emotional intelligence is a model, being optimistic, being empathetic, and then being motivating to others, and so on. There was absolutely that emotional intelligence model to go along with the whole systems thinking, drawing, how the organization worked, where the breakdowns, and so on.

You had to be both. You had to be growing yourself. Continuous learning, that was the tag. You can’t be a leader unless you’re a continuous learner, constant learner, and bringing others along. Yes, we read a lot of books. I want to say, so from each book, there’s something that still works. The emotional bank account piece was if there’s enough positive in the emotional bank account in a relationship, you can forgive a lot of stuff. If there isn’t, then you’re going to cut it off. That was the emotional bank account.

The other thing that Stephen Covey did, which is still, and I would say, huge today, is the circle of concern and the circle of influence, and that we need to focus on what we have control over, because if we spend all our energy on stuff that we can’t change, we’ll be depleted.

Lisa: Yes, that was going to be my next point about that. I remember it was one of my first jobs out of college, and I called you in a total panic because I just couldn’t map how to make a difference, how to get my arms around, where I was putting my time. I remember you drawing those circles with me. I just remember sitting there, and you had this great pen. You still have great handwriting, very distinct handwriting. [laughs] You wrote a circle, and you said, “This is your circle of influence.” Then you wrote this bigger, “This is your circle of concern. What’s where? How do we focus your energy more productively?”

It was just a phenomenal conversation that really helped ground me. I think right now, when so many of us are feeling like the world is out of control, like it just feels so many of these macro forces are coming at us faster and faster, we don’t have any influence, we don’t have any agency, reminding ourselves, and this has already been a big theme in some early conversations we’ve had on the podcast, that there are things you can influence, even in your micro choices. That was something I learned from you, really, really early on. Moving on, the other thing I learned from you really early on, related to that, is the value of having great conversations.

I, as you know, wrote a whole book on conversations and can trace it back to a lot of what I learned from you because so much of the relationships that you had with your leaders, why they were willing to invite you to be learning partners, was because they trusted you, because you created a safe space. You did all this before there was, again, the concepts of psychological safety and Brené Brown’s work on vulnerability.

You were modeling all that. You made it safe for them. I know that Susan Scott’s work on Fierce Conversations was a big influence on you. You used to tell me that all work gets done through relationships and that the conversation is the relationship. Connected to the emotional bank account, how do you connect it?

Bonnie: Very good.

Lisa: Yes, I’m a good student.

Bonnie: Very good.

Lisa: I’m a good student. I’ve learned. Pay attention.

Bonnie: Excellent. Excellent. I think about our current world, which is so much Zooms. I’m so happy to see you, Lisa. Thank God for Zoom because you’re in California and I’m in Philadelphia. That was a book I was going to write, The Conversations That Change Your Life. I think if everybody who hears this thinks about conversations that have changed their life, it will give them a sense of their journey. I will say one other conversation that changed my life, or many of them. Can I talk about the one where I was going to be a therapist, and then I became a consultant?

Lisa: Yes. What happened to that feminist therapist path? What happened?

Bonnie: I was working in Villanova in the counseling center and coming home every day, and no feeling in the left side of my mouth. I can still feel it right here. Luckily, I had a wonderful friend who’s a neurologist. He said, “Come right over, sit on my couch.” He used that very expensive test called a safety pin. He went like this, “All right, fine. What else is going on in your life?”

A great question when you don’t know what’s happening to this person that you care about. I said, “I don’t think I was cut out to go, uh-huh.” [chuckles] That was the end of being a therapist, a feminist therapist, any kind of therapist, because I would say to students who came in, “We talked about that last week. Why are we talking about the same thing?”

Lisa: [laughs] Very empathetic of you. Very empathetic.

Bonnie: Right. I said, “Maybe my genius, if I have any, or my talents is not exactly in this path.” Then that’s why the phone call was so important to do a consulting project. It was better to put together the teaching that I loved with the learning that I loved with some of the psychology that I had, and move toward organizations and people who could learn without delving back into their history about why they’re unhappy.

Lisa: This gets me to another life lesson I’ve learned from you, which is take the best and leave the rest. That’s another Bonnyism. What I hear from making the connection between therapy and then going into being a leadership coach is that you took the best of the conversation and the dialogue, and you left the formality of maybe a therapeutic model, and you instead created a different kind of way for people to talk through complex or messiness in their lives in ways that were meaningful.

Bonnie: Yes. I see it first in personal relationships because everybody’s going to annoy you. [laughter] It happens, especially as you get older. As I get older, I also realize, and here’s a new one, everybody who I come in contact with and who I choose to be with has their own genius or talent. That’s what I celebrate. They don’t have what I have, and I don’t have what they have, but together we’re a better force. We are not only a better relationship, we can make the world around us better. That’s something that keeps me with positive energy. I try not to hold on to negative energy any longer than it takes to get rid of it.

Lisa: You’ve definitely modeled just an incredible spirit of generosity and abundance in how you think about your time.

Bonnie: Let’s talk about [unintelligible 00:27:36].

Lisa: Yes. No, totally. Listen, we know that Ezra Klein just wrote this big bestselling book called Abundance, but I’m going to say I think you were the original creator. Yet again, another bestseller you could have had but didn’t write on the abundance mindset. That was another huge, huge gift that you’ve given me, and I know so many others, which is to reframe how we’re taking in information to be one of abundance and not one of scarcity.

Bonnie: It goes back to my mother, who was-

Lisa: [crosstalk] I knew she’d get in here. [laughs]

Bonnie: -the source of abundance. She loved material abundance. I said as part of her eulogy, she taught me a lot of things, and one of them is, if you like it, buy it in every color. I don’t know. I love to share with my family and people I love in abundance. The way I do it is one for you, one for me. That’s how I do it.

Lisa: You really are one of the most generous givers, not because of the thing, but because of the intention. The way that you check in on people when they’re not well. The way you try to honor their birthdays or celebrations. You’ve always said to me, this is another one of yours, “A mile deep and an inch wide.” You wanted to go for the meaningful moments and the connections, and not spread yourself so thin. I think that also was a way that your energy got fueled and how you applied your genius.

Bonnie: Not big on crowds, cocktail parties, but very big on one-on-one conversations. I always learn something. I want to say that in my life, I have been blessed by having amazing partners. I’m certainly, at age 81, in a grateful mode. Starting with, I don’t know how, I was able to choose Michael Kay to be my life partner. He was 23. I was 21 when we got married.

My favorite line is, we didn’t spend that much time together because he was in medical school, I was finishing college. We met at the altar, and he looked at me, and he said, “Oh, my God. I didn’t know you were that short.” [laughter] With that humor, and that sticktoitiveness that was an amazing partnership. Because I was a terrible housekeeper, and I wanted to work at a time when we had kids. Lisa, you know we had Auntie June, who was our partner, our caring, loving person living with us when we needed it, for sure.

Lisa: Walked down my aisle.

Bonnie: Walked down the aisle at your wedding.

Lisa: [crosstalk] A big member of the family. I will say this. Like me, raising a family in California, I did not have family around. You did not have family around in Philadelphia. You had to build your family, build your village. Yet again, another concept before Hillary Clinton talked about takes a village. You build partnerships. I always saw you investing in the people around you to build a better life for everybody and doing it creatively. I will say this theme has come up.

A definite memory I have going back to the ambitious life you wanted to have that was professionally fulfilling, that honored your family, but also honored your golf. I remember you saying to me, “Lisa, I don’t work full-time, not for my family, but for my golf. There’s no serious golfer that has a full-time job.” [laughs] It was this notion, though, of--

Bonnie: That’s authenticity in its ultimate.

Lisa: Yes, for sure. It’s very authentic. It’s also, I think, this idea, like you wanted your family to have dinner at night. It didn’t necessarily mean you had to make the dinner. Dinner had to be made. There were creative ways of architecting a fulfilling life that I just think was very liberating. How many books have been written on balance and having it all?

Bonnie: Yes, really.

Lisa: You modeled a blend that was so healthy for me to see, including, by the way, striving always and still to this day of being a better golfer. There’s always the next swing to find. You’re still having lessons. Sometimes I can’t catch you on the phone because you’re going to practice on the tee and find your swing again. Worth noting, you had one of your best competitive seasons ever this past year.

Bonnie: I won things, which I actually think that when I’m competing, I do my best as opposed to party golf. I had some great chips today. [laughter] Anyway. I want to say this. Talk about partners. I have to say that, Lisa, you are my most loving, wonderful partner because I stopped working 10 years ago. If it weren’t for you, I would not be as fulfilled as a person as I am now, because you don’t let me just do nothing. You say, “Mom, look at this. I’m doing this.” I got to hang with you because you’re amazing. You bring so much to my life. You are life’s gift. Who else said that? Anybody else say that in the podcast? You are my life’s gift.

Lisa: I feel the same. We often talk about how lucky we are when we have children that we appreciate. I often say how lucky I am that I got to have the parents that I had. The model of you, the rock of Dad, the stability, the care, the shared values. You just celebrated 60 years of marriage, which was extraordinary. As you said, you were the miracle marriage.

Bonnie: A miracle.

Lisa: Modeling, respect, and humor, these are, again, I would say, things in the circle of influence, of control. How we choose to take in our partner’s strengths, how we choose to navigate areas of difference with grace, with humor. So much that you have modeled for me, and now I get to model for my children. How you work with your students, I get to bring to my students. It is a gift for me, too. It’s an absolute gift.

I want to end maybe on that note of gratitude with one of my favorite bodyisms that I’ve learned. I would remember saying to you, “Mom, there’s all these wonderful things happening. I’m getting nervous that things are going to go wrong.” Getting that anxious that the shoe is going to drop. It’s one of my favorite bodyisms. You said, “Lee, celebrate the good times because the shit always comes.” [laughter]

Bonnie: I’m telling you.

Lisa: Shit always comes.

Bonnie: I’m telling you. I want to say this. I have already learned from the two podcasts that I have listened to. The first one with Ray, when I was going through cataracts, now is not forever. I said, “All right, you’ll get through this, and so on.” Then with Dan Klein, where he says, “Every offer, if you say yes, you’re on an adventure, and if you say no, you’re blocking. If you’re blocking, you’re safe. If you say yes, you have an adventure.” I now understand how your father and I work-

Lisa: Always learning.

Bonnie: -because-

Lisa: Boom.

Bonnie: -he’s the blocker. [laughter] He’s the blocker. He just wants to stay safe.

Lisa: [crosstalk] He wants to stay safe.

Bonnie: I get it.

Lisa: [unintelligible 00:35:14] empathy for that, but he is learning ChatGPT, and that’s impressive at 83. Mom, I just want to thank you so much for fitting me in between your golf and all the other great activities that you’re doing.

Bonnie: Have to go play bridge.

Lisa: Yes, exactly. Bridge, because you’re the doable, still doing. I just want to thank you for being my best learning partner in life, and for all of your generosity and deep care, and someone who is futuring in a way that I have benefited so much from, and I hope others can now too, from listening to your life story and what gets you up every day.

Bonnie: Oh, my God. Conversations make a difference, and you are the light in my life, I have to say.

Lisa: Love you.

Bonnie: Love you so much.

Lisa: This conversation with my mom, Dr. Bonnie Kay, was one of my favorites ever, and it reminded me just how much of my own success and journey comes from what I learned from her. If our conversation sparked anything for you, maybe take a moment to reach out to someone who shaped your path. A quick text, a thank you, or even a shared memory can go a long way.

Thank you for listening to the season one finale of How We Future. I have had such a blast developing and hosting the show, and I have to give a huge shout-out to my incredible producer, Kaela Rosenbaum. I cannot wait to pick up season two with you in January. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thanks so much for listening. Happy holidays, and have a great start to the new year.

The future is being built in the spaces most of us never learned to see.

In this episode, Lisa talks with journalist and entrepreneur Jennifer Brandel. Jennifer is the co-founder of Zebras Unite, and creator of the Interstitium, a theory of the hidden connective work that keeps communities, movements, and systems alive. Jenn has spent her career naming the “in-between” roles that make change possible and giving shape to the people who do them.

They explore:

• The Interstitium Jenn’s new framework for the unseen connective tissue of society

• Hexagon people those who bridge local life and global ideas

• Sacred hospitality how to create spaces where real transformation can happen

• Why connection is the real antidote to loneliness, polarization, and overwhelm

• Zebras Unite a model for building companies that are profitable and regenerative

Jenn shares stories from journalism, civic innovation, and community building, showing how naming and noticing these patterns helps people feel less alone.

This conversation is an invitation to reconnect with each other, design healthier ways of working together, and imagine futures built on reciprocity, meaning, and resilience.

Links from the show:

• Jennifer’s website

• The Intersitium

• Hexagon People

• Zebras Unite

• Zebras Fix what Unicorns Break

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today.

Today, I’m joined by the incredible Jennifer Brandel, who sees connection everywhere she goes. Jenn is a journalist, entrepreneur, and community builder who has spent her career creating new ways for people to participate in civic life. She’s the co-founder of Hearken, Zebras Unite, and most recently, The Interstitium—a project inspired by the connective tissue in our own bodies that reimagines how we might organize and collaborate as a society. I’m so grateful to Jenn for joining me in this expansive conversation. Let’s jump in.

Lisa: I’m going to start off the podcast with a little confession. I know your work has been described in lots of different ways. I think of you a little bit like Bruce Willis in The Sixth Sense, but instead of seeing dead people everywhere, I think you see connectivity everywhere.

Jennifer Brandel: Oh, nice.

Lisa: The way that you show up to bring that to life is so extraordinary. All this to say, I am so delighted you’re here. Thank you. Thank you.

Jennifer: [chuckles] Wow. I hope that if I shave my head, I have as nice of a skull as Bruce Willis. He’s really got a good dome. Thank you for that comparison. I’ll have to rewatch that one.

Lisa: In all the best ways, in all the best ways. I think what you do is give form to things that we are feeling. That’s really what I want to talk about today, some of the different initiatives, but also your approach, because I think it’s so powerful. I want to start with the more recent initiative that you’ve been working on called The Interstitium because it literally says giving voice to the unseen and in between, the language, ideas, and actions towards a more connective future. I wonder if you could just talk a little bit, maybe let’s start there, about The Interstitium and what that’s all about.

Jennifer: Oh my gosh. I’m going to geek out. The Interstitium is a word that describes a “newly discovered organ system” in the human body. You think after being cut open for how many centuries by surgeons and researchers and doctors, we would know exactly what is inside of our bodies. It turns out, due to the way that scientists really study cells and tissue, they would do it in such a way where they would mummify tissue samples and collapse them down. They thought that they were solid, essentially.

They didn’t realize that there was this fluid-filled network made of collagen tissue. Some people who’ve done fascia work before on their bodies, whether that’s rolfing or whatnot, have heard of fascia, and they know that there’s this spongy collagen tissue under the skin and that’s wrapping around every organ, bone, nerve, artery, et cetera. Western scientists got a new microscope eight or nine years ago. When they were looking through it during a live session, going and doing an endoscope thing, putting a microscope either up or in the body, they saw these things that they couldn’t describe.

They were like, “Why are there holes here? We thought it was a solid mass.” What that did is it inspired a lot of questions of like, “What are we seeing? How does it work? What does this mean?” I was lucky enough to talk to some of the scientists and the teams and the doctors who “discovered” this fluid-filled unified network throughout the entire body. Really, to me, it was such an unlock conceptually because what it does is it connects the entire body to itself.

The way that our world has worked for so long, it’s been all about mastery and separation and studying things and categorizing them just to feel like we control the chaos that is the human condition, and trying to grasp what is reality. To me, this idea of the interstitium was like, “Oh, I have been noticing these in-between things in society as well, and I haven’t had language for it. I’ve been also working alongside other people who have been this connective tissue who don’t really belong in “organizations.”

Our language follows the framework of the world being separate and categorizable. Sorry, this is a long explanation, but interstitionaries, as we’ve dubbed them, are the people who are playing the same function in society as the interstitium is playing within our actual body; bringing information, bringing flow, helping to lubricate ideas and interactions from one place to another, and trying to optimize for the health of everything and not being stuck in one spot. That’s a long explanation, but [chuckles] that’s why it’s called that.

Lisa: It is perfect. When I first read about it, I thought, “Oh my gosh, she sees me. That’s what I do.” For a long time, I’ve thought about the fact that we are in these roles that somebody created. Somebody made up these careers.

Jennifer: Totally.

Lisa: That’s not how the world works. We are dynamic, fluid organisms that are connected with each other. It’s incredible when you allow yourself to think about it in a much broader network. It’s uncomfortable because we’re not taught to think of it that way. This gift of, “Hey, I’m going to invite you to think about how you move in the world differently. I’m not going to even just do it by making up a word, I’m going to connect it to a concept that already exists in nature.”

In doing so, you learn more about your body. Oh my gosh, wonder, awe, discovery-

Jennifer: Yes, it is wild.

Lisa: -and it invites you to think broader about what you do outside of the systems and boundaries. I know this is just your latest initiative, but I think that really represents how I’ve seen you move in the world. This idea of noticing, questioning, trying, building. We, of course, might call that a design process, but that’s another geeky rat hole we could go down. Tell me more about how this is playing out. You started working on this idea, but now you’re bringing it into the world. What’s happening?

Jennifer: It was one of those things where I was struggling for language to describe these people that I saw working in the world in these different ways. I am one of them. For a long time, I’ve been trapped within a company that I’ve created myself and not able to work as interstitionarily as I would like to, where you’re connecting those dots. I was doing it in the margins where I could, versus it being my whole shtick, which is what I really thrive in doing, is seeing the patterns play out, connecting people to one another, connecting ideas, connecting industries.

What could we learn from X, Y, Z? Trying to deseparate, connect, reconnect, and remember the ways that all of these things actually are saying similar, if not the same things, and how we can work together across silos. I did a story for Radiolab, which is a great science podcast about the world and how things work, looking at the science of the interstitium, of what happened, how was it discovered, what are its implications for cancer research, and all sorts of things, which is in and of itself, immense and wild and wonderful and continues to unfold.

It really is helping to bridge Eastern and Western medicine because Eastern medicine has long inferred the interstitium and been working with it, like acupuncture, Reiki, some of these practices that work on meridians and work on flow more than object. There’s that science part, but then what I was really interested in is what are the sociological mental models that this can help break? If we have been taught you go into school, you go to these different disciplines, and you’ve got math class, and you have English, and then you have science, and then you have to choose a career in some sector or industry, and that always felt so wrong to me.

It just felt like not only limiting, because I wanted to do a little bit of everything, but also just categorically not how the world works. This was, to me, a way of trying to break that thinking model and provide just a higher-altitude metaphor that we could work from. Me and a couple of friends who’ve just been, we are interstitionaries, we do this work, we feel it in our bones, literally, and it is wrapped around our bones, literally.

We have been trying to just figure out, off the side of our desks, in addition to all the paid projects and companies and work we’re doing, is how do we start to give language and frameworks to this so that the people who do this work are seen, first and foremost, they’re valued. They’re not only valued as like, “Oh, I respect that you do something that is hard to talk about and categorize,” but then also valued, like remunerated for the work that they do because it is so important.

Being an interstitionary isn’t just someone connecting sectors and flying around the world doing all these fun things, but it’s like the parent and the family, often the women, who are connecting all the other relatives, getting them together for dinners. It’s the block captain. It’s the person who knows what’s happening and connecting everybody that is an interstitionary. I think that role is like… it’s unpaid labor. It’s hugely important labor. It’s not recognized. There aren’t job descriptions necessarily for it all the time.

I think it’s really like we depend to solve some of these wicked problems that we’re in the midst of right now, polycrisis, et cetera. It’s not going to come from any one discipline or any one person. There’s a layer of funded, seen, networked, and connected.

Lisa: It’s so powerful, and I just personally resonate on so many levels. I have been doing a lot of civic work. It’s one of the ways that we got connected. The way I would talk about it is I’ve been doing it as my moonlighting project. Doing it after hours, between the hours, when I would wake up in the morning. It was exhausting, yes, but it was also incredibly fueling and energizing. Even though I didn’t quite have a language for it, “Is this an initiative? Is it a movement?” I knew we were putting value in the world. I knew we were putting points on the board.

Couldn’t necessarily measure it in the way that people like to measure it, but it was invaluable. I knew that I was uniquely able to do it because I understood the different worlds. I knew when to ask questions and when to ship and when to connect. Your point about this being unpaid labor, about not knowing how to talk about it, is just so powerful for the people that show up and saying, “Look, I know that the ‘we,’” which is in part why this podcast is called How We Future, “the ‘we’ need to be doing some work together in some way that is maybe outside of some of the traditional norms of how it gets done.”

This invitation to, first of all, understand what the pull is, because it is, I think, a very connected, resilient, abundant way of looking at it, a very healthy way of looking at it. We need a way to think about it. We also need some new ways to honor it and to value it. I just think it is incredibly powerful.

Jennifer: Oh, well, I’m thrilled to hear that. Honestly, it fuels me and my collaborators, Christine Lai and Ariel Brooks, to find people who resonate with it deeply. What we’re trying to do right now is connect them with one another so, one, they don’t feel alone. Two, they can start to vibe off of each other, make their own connections. Then three, we can start to learn what are the different flavors and shapes and ways that people show up in this way, so we can build out more of a vocabulary and frameworks for how people do this work, how they get paid for it, how they don’t get paid for it, and shining a light on not yet another sector, but more like a way of being that needs, I think, some cash in this moment, [laughs] to put it bluntly.

Lisa: Yes, some support in all the ways. I’ll just share one more personal layer, and I’ll be curious to get your thoughts on it. For a good chunk of my career, the way that it has felt comfortable for me to show up has been in a space of learning, connection, and even generosity. As I got fortunate enough to be on stages, I would often bring in other people’s work or showcase somebody else that wasn’t me or just to try to connect dots to uplift.

Over the years, not all the time, but I definitely got feedback that said, “Lisa, why are you giving away your power? You don’t need to do that.” I just kept thinking, “I just don’t see the world that way.” Maybe a difference between a zero-sum world and the infinite game, positive possibilities world. It was so interesting how often I heard that, and even connecting. Of course, you were saying often it’s the women doing the work. I was like, “This is not a vulnerability. This is a source of abundance.”

Again, maybe that’s just another reason why I’m like, “Yes.” A, I’m not alone, which is exactly why you were doing it. B, what if we socialized that this is actually not only a better way to show up for society because communities get strengthened, but a better way to show up for your own personal health in a moment where, yes, we have polycrisis, but we also have loneliness at such an extreme level. Neither of those are good things.

Jennifer: No, absolutely. I think so much of this just points to understanding of reality, which is that everything is relational. Everything is relational. You cannot separate things and have them make sense up into a certain point. Even our bodies, they only look like our bodies at a certain scale. When you look at them in other scales, we’re just a collection of cells vibrating. Being stuck in this one lens that we’ve been stuck in of separating everything, I think, is what’s gotten us into a lot of trouble.

It has been the source of immense innovation in many different ways, so no shade to the fact that there has been a lot that we’ve learned from this view of dissecting everything and separating it and trying to understand and control for it. That’s just not, at the end of the day, how ecosystems, reality, fields, interconnected worlds work. COVID was a perfect example of our interconnectedness at play. I think the folks who are trying to cling to control or power or containing the world in some way that they can master, I think it’s just not going to work anymore.

How do we start to organize and find ways of being together in a healthier way for the current context, which is complex, fraught, [chuckles] and ever-evolving?

Lisa: Ever-evolving, and not going to get simple on its own. It’s we who have to adapt and evolve. The way that I’ve been thinking about it is—because I’ve been doing so much work with student athletes in the civic realm and working with coaches—trying to get them to see that, by having a different model of connecting with each other, we’re playing optimistic offense.

Jennifer: Ooh, I like that.

Lisa: That is a better stance than playing defense or being in reaction mode all the time, which was, again, another motivation for putting these conversations out in the world was to help more people learn more ways to play optimistic offense.

Jennifer: Yes. I think a lot about the Two Loops theory from the Berkana Institute that Margaret Wheatley and Deborah Frieze came up with, where you have two loops going at any given time in any living system. In an organization, a group, a connection, a university, a town, whatever, those are all living systems too. They’re comprised of living things. There’s always the loop that is not working anymore, the dominant loop that, when the context shifts, it just starts to break. We see that happening all around us in our institutions and many spaces.

Then there’s the emergent loop, which is where you’re trying to figure out what works now for the new context. To me, I think of that as playing offense rather than playing defense and trying to stop the world from crumbling as quickly as it is, which we need people to do that. That is a good thing because people will be harmed if things break too quickly before the new way of doing things is stabilized. That’s not where I want to play. I want to play on offense. I want to be on that optimistic offense like you described. Thanks for giving me that language.

Lisa: Oh, I’m so glad. I’ve seen you talk about that loop as it being emergent and networked and connected, which requires, of course, a comfort with ambiguity, a comfort with, “I can’t quite give you the answer. I can invite you to join, and I hope you will. I could try to create safe conditions where you can be a part of it.” I want to build on that. You also recently wrote about hexagon people. Tell me about hexagon people.

Jennifer: Oh, yes. That’s a fun one. That was just like the muse struck, and I was like, “Let me just vomit out this idea and see if it resonates, [laughs] and it has, which is great. Hexagon people are a type of interstitionary that I’ve started to notice, and part of it has been through conversation with others and pattern matching, and being like, “What are you noticing?” This was kind of birthed out of a conversation I had with a few different folks, but one of which is John Paul Lederach, who’s an amazing international legendary peace builder.

We were talking just about the divides in the country right now and how people are conceptualizing them, and so much of it is urban versus rural or college-educated versus not. He was like, I wonder if the real dividing line of just experience right now is whether people are locally rooted and grounded, as in they need to make sense of the world and depend on things in their geographic proximity, and those who are more floaters or ephemeral, who are living in the world of remote digital life, and if they left where they’re living, no one would probably notice. The fabric of where they’re living is neither enhanced nor whatever by their presence.

I was thinking about some of the folks I know who are living these very dynamic lives at both levels, who are contributing a ton locally to where they live and helping to weave that civic interstitium on the ground, but also are working in the ether as well, in shaping industries or conversations about broader things that are not geographically grounded. Thinking about the triangulation that’s happening in all those places, when you start to triangulate enough and put enough triangles together, you get a hexagon as a shape, and a hexagon is the strongest shape in nature, or that and the triangle are the strongest shape.

We’re just thinking about what’s a name for these kind of people who are both able to do this weaving on a grounded level and also in the cloud, so to speak, or in the broader global conversation. To me, it’s an amazing place to be able to play because you can see patterns playing out at different levels and altitudes.

Then, if you’re working with other people who are doing that too, there’s a ton you can understand for what will work for different contexts and starting to build out whether that’s a vocabulary or playbook or formulas or recipes or whatever for what works in these times and these moments, and just starting to get better at it because we’re going to live and die by how well we communicate and figure out how to solve problems together right now.

If we’re separating ourselves continually and not connecting with others locally, we stand far less of a good chance of making it through. Whether there’s a climate collapse, catastrophe, school shooting, any manner of things that are already happening and coming to places where they haven’t been yet.

Lisa: I love that this came from observing and pattern matching and realizing that we don’t have to be untethered. It is, again, another response. Of course, working in design for such a long time, we’ve talked a lot about the T-shaped person that has broad and depth, or then the pie-shaped person, which has another layer. What I love about the hexagon is that they can build with each other, and that together they make a beehive formation, or that they can collect, that they’re not individual.

By identifying that now, ahead of more troubling things to come, whether it’s a climate, more climate, we’re not going to have less climate disasters. By identifying that there is an approach that can ground us, that can stabilize us, that can help us feel tethered and connected while also still exploring. I often say better be prepared for the future than be blindsided by the present. Putting this out there, I just think is so powerful for people who feel like, “I don’t know where to go. I feel hopeless right now.”

Jennifer: I completely agree that if these hexagon people are working collectively or at least in community together, they can tessellate like a tile or that honeycomb. Actually, the interstitium itself, the collagen fibers, are hexagon-shaped, and they’re fractal. At every level of the body, they are these hexagon-shaped threads going through from micro to macro. That’s how I see it societally as well.

I’m also just trying, in the work that I do, not to say I know what the hell I’m talking about, because I don’t [laughs]. Of trying to design biomimetically, how do we understand how nature has figured it out over millions and millions of years? How do we learn from her rather than trying to develop our own playbooks that are divorced from the broader context that we’re living in?

Honestly, I’ve been spending a lot of time in the garden at the end of my street that’s free and looking at the plants, and trying to be like, “Oh, how do you work with others? What’s your defense mechanisms? How do you propagate?” Just being like, all the information is out there if you can observe it. Then if you can apply it to the way that humans organize, hopefully, you shorten the learning curve because you’re building on patterns that have worked for living things.

Lisa: Ever the futurist, Jenn. I can’t help but think we’re going to have a class called How to Be a Hexagon Person. In fact, maybe we should. I think we should prototype that this year during your time at Stanford. I’m in. I’m in. I want to talk about your time at Stanford. First, before, one more point on this, because for folks listening, they’re like, “Oh my gosh, this makes so much sense to me. I want to lean in. I don’t exactly know where to begin.”

I want to pick up on a concept that, really, I think, bridges the abstract to concrete, which is this notion of sacred hospitality and this idea that we’re all capable of it, which I think could be some of the grounding. Can you talk a little bit about that?

Jennifer: Yes. I give full credit to my work wife, Mara Zepeda, who we’ve created a lot of things together. As we joke, we’ve had a lot of Google Docs over the years [chuckles]. If we print it out, the docs we’ve created, it would fill a truck.

She is one who’s brought me back to this remembering of the fact that when you bring people together, if you don’t just think about it of cerebrally, “Hey, these people are going to be in the same room, what are we going to talk about or what are we going to do?” But really what’s the experience like, and how do you honor people in their presence and the gift of their time and attention, which right now is the most precious resource that you can ask from anyone given the demands and distractions?

Sacred hospitality is really recognizing that when you are gathered, you have an obligation and an opportunity to create a meaningful experience for people and to think about it and to consider, to whatever extent you can, but the lighting, the mood, the music, what are people’s needs? How are they sitting? How might we facilitate people connecting and feeling safe and able to be vulnerable with one another so that they can come away changed from however they came in, versus just coming in, extracting some information or networking or whatever, and then leaving?

How are you creating the conditions for transformation? Food, spending time meaningfully with people, that is what happens. That’s how we learn. There’s this great word called Symmathesy from Nora Bateson, who has this amazing warm data lab and talks about the relational data, which is really hard to quantify, but is how everything works. That’s about just learning together in relationships. That’s really how most people change.

You can read a book and be like, “Oh, that’s great,” but if you’re not practicing it with people and you’re not experiencing it on a deeper level, then it just stays at the level of abstraction. To me, sacred hospitality is something I’m-- I’ve always been someone who’s naturally liked to host and do things, but Mara and others are just helping to push it to whole new levels of organizing bigger and more ambitious things that allow people to feel really moved in a soulful way and convey really important information, but not in a Sheridan Ballroom or a conference center; different approach.

Lisa: I resonate with that so much. It’s really the foundation for the book that I wrote over 10 years ago about how we can design strategic conversations to accelerate change and the idea that these conversations can be designed if you pay attention to the environment, how you welcome people in, who is in the room, and to get people into a discovering mode and a learning mode, as opposed to, again, a defending mode or a posturing mode.

So powerful, particularly when we are together trying to come up with new ideas towards complex adaptive challenges that require all of our thinking to be in the room and even taking a step or a cue from sacred hospitality. Again, Jenn, thanks for giving me language. It’s how, particularly after COVID, I’ve tried to structure our classroom or my classroom to welcome students in, back from being behind the screen, back from being protected against social media, to really try to help them feel seen and heard by an adult that may not necessarily have had a long connection with them, to remind them that people can care. It’s been transformational for them.

Jennifer: Wow. Oh my gosh. I’m so curious to know what have been the design changes you’ve made to the classroom. Is it the seating, the welcoming, how you start class? What have you done?

Lisa: Yes, all of those things. Let’s start in a circle. Let’s do something that checks in and gets you present, some sort of thing that’s connected to what we’re going to talk about, but it’s still joyful. Maybe it’s the music. I always choose thematic music, so when they come in, there’s something happening. At one point, this was closer to the return from the pandemic, I really noticed that, even though they were physically present, they weren’t present. If they were present, only part of them was present.

I started to create this moment in class where I talked about sharing some good news. “Who has some good news to share? We want to hear it. We want to hear what’s going on.” Even I knew that one of my students had just won an NCAA championship and was not sharing it. I was like, “For example, does anyone--”

Jennifer: Did anyone win an NCAA [chuckles] championship recently?

Lisa: My colleague, [unintelligible 00:26:25], had this great quote. He said, “Our students, it feels like they’re having a crisis of enthusiasm. They are not comfortable showing joy because there’s been so much trauma.” I thought, “Oh my gosh, how do we model that it’s okay to feel hard things and still be joyful? That you’re not going to get judged, you’re not going to be deemed a wrong person?”

Just scaffolding that, I was surprised about how much more scaffolding was needed. Another thing I did, I said, “Listen, you have to meet me for office hours. They’re no longer optional. You have to come. 15 minutes. Just have an adult conversation.” All of those things, I think, are what I call micro moments of connection. I like this idea of sacred hospitality.

Jennifer: I love what you’ve done there. I think the intentionality of what are we doing in the space, how do we maximize the meaning and the time we’re having together is something that a lot of people who have the gift of other people’s attention do not do. I’m very glad you’re doing it. I actually just got off the phone earlier today, had one of those random serendipitous calls with a Romanian architect, Oana Stănescu, who’s doing this incredible work and thinking about how do you design physical architectural spaces for different kinds of interactions.

I think a lot about, too, what is the space and what is the script that comes with a space when you walk into the room? If all the chairs are facing one direction, what do you do? Mara, my work wife, and I did a conference in Romania recently about the power of connection. That was the theme of it. The whole conference was wonderful, but it was speakers on stage speaking to the audience. We’re like, “Wait a second. We need the audience to speak to one another, and we need to all connect and do things.” We really pushed the envelope of what was allowed by the script in that space.

We weren’t actually allowed to physically move the chairs because they’re all connected and union rules and whatnot. We ended up ending with a dance party with the entire room and turning the lights out, and having people roll their water bottles across the floor, and all sorts of stuff, where they were like, “Whoa, you’re pushing it there. At the end of the day, everyone was able to have this cathartic moment of connection because we changed the script of what the space was telling you was possible.

Lisa: Absolutely. So much of it is finding that sweet spot. Can we stretch you just a bit? Not break you, just stretch you. Remind yourself of your humanity and make it okay. Create the conditions. That’s so much of what our book was about. It was about inviting the humanity into the room and not to go to, as you said, the typical place where you’re like, “Oh, it’s an important conversation. Let’s go to the boardroom with fancy chairs and a fancy table.” I was like, “What happens?” Status alert, threat alert, all the things that prevent you from being a generous and generative thinker.

I love that you’re doing that. That’s amazing. I want to talk about, Jenn—we’re catching you, we’re so lucky to have this opportunity before you start another chapter where you will be coming to Stanford as a JSK fellow—tell us about what you are excited to explore during your time at Stanford.

Jennifer: Oh, wow. Where to begin? I’ve been here for three weeks, and I feel like I’ve been dropped into another universe already [chuckles]. Just coming to grips with the different environment that is here, even though I haven’t even been to any classes yet, but just between the campus and the neighborhood that I’m in and the space, it’s just like, “Wow, okay, adjusting all the levels here for what it means to have this incredible resource here of this university.”

There’s a few things that I’m really excited about. There’s, on the personal level, I’ve had a hell of a last couple of years [chuckles]. Family-wise, I have a toddler who was diagnosed with cancer at her third birthday. She’s doing great right now, and thankfully, we have the amazing children’s hospital right here to go to. Then another child just came into my life through a friend, someone we both know, who passed away from ovarian cancer, so now there’s two children.

I’m wrapping up a tour of my company for 10 years and feeling like, “All right, it’s time to start a new chapter.” I’m in between a lot of things. Some of this time is really just reconnecting and being like, “What the hell just happened? Where can I be most useful going forward once I’ve reintegrated myself from a lot of these really intense experiences?” Some of the things I’m really excited about are-- The project I applied for the fellowship for was this idea of how might you create an unkillable newsroom because newsrooms are dying every day in the US from various afflictions, whether it’s political overreach or it’s defunding, economic models, all sorts of manner of reasons.

Is there a way we might create what a good local news network in its best days could do without having a lot of those pitfalls of the things that are taking down newsrooms right now? Maybe the answer is, it’s not a newsroom. You have to make an unkillable connective tissue network that is resilient and whatnot. That’s one thing I’m going to be looking at, but I also just want to take all the classes that stir my heart. Someone told me about the history of handwriting or something as a class. I’m like, “I want to take that.” [chuckles]

Lisa: Amazing.

Jennifer: Just really, I feel like a kid in a candy shop getting to have access to these classes and professors and people and folks who are focused right now on learning and integrating.

Lisa: We are so grateful to have you on campus, and no doubt we will invite you to spend a lot of time at the d.school and connect you and build our own interstitium there. It feels like you’re modeling again this idea of foundation in values and what you care about, and building on your very long career in journalism of some kind. Hearken was, in fact, the company that you started over 10 years ago, was how we first met. You were a fellow, I think, in the New Media Venture Fund.

Again, from the very beginning, this idea of making journalism more resilient, more connected, more local, more fluid between those that are delivering it, those that are gathering, who has the power to share stories. Again, breaking systems that have been entrenched on behalf of the better is how I think about it. I love that you still hold on to that clarity of vision. We need news in our civic life to be healthy, to be democratic, to be connected. The models are challenging that right now. How might we give birth to a new one?

Jennifer: Absolutely. Check with me in a year; I may have gotten nowhere on that, given the current conditions. I think there’s so much, to your point before, of students and the pandemic, and this moment of it not being cool to be hopeful with all that’s going on in the world. I feel like, gosh, it’s a responsibility to not lose hope in this moment. Not to say that there aren’t moments where I’m reading the news and going, “Oh, shit, I want to go back to bed,” or how are we going to get through this?

It always comes back to the relational. If you find other people who are jazzed about a similar question or animated by something that they’re excited about, that is how all change is made. A few people coming together, one or two, and working with one another. No one wants to hang out with a Debbie Downer, so you’ve got to [chuckles] up your energy to make some of that change if you’re in a spot in a season of life where you feel like you want to contribute.

Lisa: To do it in a way that is positive and honest, which is so much of what we’re trying to do. What I’m trying to do in these conversations is to put models out there. Not perfect, not utopia, but protopia, better than today, and also not reactive to the place where you don’t recognize yourself. I think a lot of people don’t recognize themselves because they’re feeling so distraught or overwhelmed. The question of, you know what, what is a step forward that I can take, maybe towards something bigger, but even towards making my day better and a new model?

Also, there’s just one more of the many things that you’ve brought to the world that I’m excited to talk about because, again, I read it and I was like, “This is so genius,” many years ago, where you and a few others gave birth to this idea of zebras.

Jennifer: Oh, yes.

Lisa: Zebras Unite, and that as a model of working in the world, a model of a company, of an organization that was as sustainable in a business sense, but also didn’t have that exploitative model. It was an alternative to the unicorns that were starting to pop up, these billion-dollar valuations that often didn’t have that same kind of humanity that we wanted to see. Again, I remember reading about the idea, the model of what a unicorn could be, and thinking, “Yes, this is not a reactionary fight against the machine, total departure.”

It was, again, to me, a more organic invitation to say, “How do we not get stuck in the binary of either or, and instead invite you to become part of something that’s possible?” I wonder if you could just talk a little bit about Zebras Unite, the genesis behind it, and just here you are returning to Silicon Valley where the unicorn was born.

Jennifer: Oh my gosh. Yes, that’s one of the things that I’m just wrapping my head around now, is really being in the belly of the beast at this moment of empire collapse, explosion, both. I don’t know. They’re happening simultaneously. Reinvention. Yes, Zebras Unite came out of a shared frustration that I had, along with other founders that I was talking to, people who came out of a really mission-centric place, whether or not they worked for nonprofits or not. They were just motivated by the work of trying to figure out how do you do right by more people in a way with integrity.

I remember going to this conference in San Francisco called SOCAP, which is about social capital, and the idea being that people would put in big investment dollars into companies that had a social good outcome. I was there trying to pitch Hearken, being like, “Hey, better, more representative journalism that’s original and useful and not just about conflict and blah, blah, blah.” I was like, “I can’t find any money here. This is not for me.”

Then I’m like, “Where do I go because I’m not a VC fundable proposition?” Not to say that we couldn’t be successful. We have been successful. We’ve been around for 10 years. We’ve been profitable for many of them. Trying to find aligned capital felt really hard. I went through an accelerator program in San Francisco about 10 years ago. The whole thing was designed to 10X return for people I didn’t know who had enough money to put money into a company to begin with.

I’m like, “Wait, if I’m going for this goal, but you are the ones I actually have to be responsible to at the end of the day, the people who have enough money to put money in and potentially lose it, then we’re already starting off on the wrong foot here because I don’t care about making you more money.” [chuckles] Yes, do I want to give you a return? Do I want it to be a fair transaction? Sure, but that’s not my end goal.

My goal is not for myself to 10X my life and live in a mansion in a yacht. That’s not what’s going to bring me fulfillment. Long story short, Mara Zepeda—the name that keeps coming up—and I, we were both at SOCAP, and she had her company there as well. We just started riffing on how startups just really felt so masculinely designed, and same with the unicorn idea. We wrote a piece called Sex & Startups. It went viral, and we made a lot of sex jokes like startups like the male anatomy are designed for liquidity events. It’s terrible, I know, but it was cheeky, and it got a lot of people saying yes, yes, yes. This is in 2016.

We stated our dissatisfaction pretty clearly, but we didn’t state our vision. What change do we want? It took us about a year, but we had so many people respond to that article saying, “This makes no sense. This whole unicorn game is actually going to destroy democracy and society.” The zebras came up as not the antidote, but another pattern of black and white, for-profit, for-purpose, mutualistic.

Zebras actually, they survive in society by collaborating and cooperating. A herd of zebras is called a dazzle, and that’s how they work to evade predators is they work together. They’re not unicorns. Anyway, there’s a lot more written online. It still exists. We’ve inspired a lot of people to try and figure out zebra ways of being, of keeping their values, and being able to be a profitable for-profit company, or whatever kind they want. We’ve even influenced the capitalism of Japan. The past administration declared the zebra’s ethos their new capitalism, which is crazy. Who knows what comes out of just naming and framing things. That’s what we’re trying to do in the world.

Lisa: I think it’s so powerful. I love that a group of zebras is called a dazzle, and that you have DazzleCon. Again, we’ll link to all of this in the show notes so people can learn more and come back to it. Again, it’s very much what I’m trying to do in this podcast, in these conversations, in the work we’re doing, which is to put models out there that people want to pull towards, as opposed to just push against.

In futures, there’s this concept called the image of the future. The future comes from somewhere. The question is who imagined it. If we allow our imagination to be outsourced to these models that don’t align with our values, that’s when we really feel so disconnected and even hopeless, which is the soul-sucking. Here we are, I think, just trying to say, “No, there are models out there.” We’re not saying that you have to be unable to afford your life because you’re so passion-driven.

We’re saying, how can you imagine a model where it is profitable, it is a for-profit, it is designed for growth, but for sustainable growth, for generative growth, growth that supports the community that’s not at odds, where you don’t feel like you want to go back and, I don’t know, take a shower every day when you’re like, “Oh.” That really jazzes you and makes you the best version of yourself. I love that it’s out there as a model. I think one of my favorite parts of the whole line, when you were talking about it, it’s like, “Well, here’s one thing, zebras are real, unicorns are not,” that they actually exist in the world.

Grounded in this reality that they actually exist and how to extend that model. It’s really exciting. Jenn, thank you so much for coming to spend time with us on How We Future. There’s so much more to talk about. Yes, we’re going to have you back after this year to see what you’ve learned about the unkillable newsroom and yourself. I just want to really thank you personally for all that you’ve done. You are such a bright light.

This gift that you are giving all of us to, as you say, name it, put some concrete shapes around it, give us something to move towards, it’s so positive, it’s so productive, it’s so generous. I personally am so lucky, and I know everyone that listens to this will feel the same. Thank you so much for spending the time with us today.

Jennifer: Thank you so much for having me. I can’t wait to really understand exactly what’s all on offer in this very particular and amazing part of the world that is equally concerning and inspiring [chuckles].

Lisa: It’s not going to be dull, I’ll tell you that.

Lisa: I just loved this conversation with Jenn Brandel. I hope her ideas about the interstitium, that living network between us, invites you to notice the hidden connectors in your own world. Maybe it’s a colleague who quietly keeps projects moving, a neighbor who brings people together, or even you. Holding space for connection in ways you hadn’t yet named.

If this conversation sparks something for you, please take a moment to rate and review the show wherever you’re listening.

It really helps others find these stories. I’d love to hear what kind of interstitionary work you’re doing out in the world.

Until next time, I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Here’s to building the connective tissue for a more hopeful, healthy future.

Great coaches train better people, not just better athletes.

Coach John Tanner (JT) is about to start his 29th season as the Stanford women’s water polo coach. On this episode of How We Future, JT and Lisa explore how coaching goes far beyond the pool. Over decades of leading championship teams, JT has developed a coaching style that focuses on resilience, communication skills, and the value of practice.

JT helps athletes become confident, empathetic, and thoughtful leaders. Whether it’s having his athletes make TED Talks for each other or facilitating weekly check-ins about how his team is feeling about their academics, JT prioritizes training methods that will help his students long after their athletic careers.

JT and Lisa discuss:

• How high-pressure sports environments can cultivate empathy

• Why JT integrates storytelling and reflection into his team’s daily routine

• How intentional, consistent practice is crucial to navigating the highest-pressure moments

• The mindset behind coaching for long-term growth, not just short-term victories

• Ways to translate JT’s coaching strategies into personal or professional leadership practices

Leadership isn’t only forged in the workplace. It’s practiced every day in the ways we connect, communicate, and lift others.

Links from the show:

• Coaching Citizens Athletes, Stanford Report Article

• The Coaches Wore Cardinal, Stanford Magazine

• The Right Call by Sally Jenkins (Lisa’s favorite book about sports and leadership)

• Stanford Women’s Water Polo Speaker Series

• See JT on Wu Tsai Human Performance Alliance Female Athlete Research Meeting (FARM)

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today.

This week’s guest is John Tanner, head coach of the Stanford women’s water polo team and one of the most respected leaders in collegiate athletics. Since starting at Stanford 29 seasons ago, JT, as he’s known to both friends and players, has brought his teams to 10 NCAA championship wins while helping generations of athletes grow as competitors, teammates, and as leaders. In our conversation, JT shares the lessons that stick with his players long after their athletic careers.

He talks about coaching under pressure, leading with consistency, and the importance of preparing athletes not just for matches but for life. If you’ve ever wondered what championship culture looks like from the inside or how sports can teach us to face the future with resilience, this is an episode you won’t want to miss. Let’s get into it with Coach John Tanner.

I am so excited today to be talking to one of my personal inspirations, Coach John Tanner, or JT, as he’s affectionately known to his players and fellow coaches and the water polo world more generally.

JT, thank you so much for being here with me and everyone today on the How We Future podcast.

John Tanner: My pleasure, Lisa. It’s great to be here with you.

Lisa: Well, JT, it’s so exciting to talk to you as you’re about to start your 29th season coaching the women’s water polo team at Stanford, and just have an extraordinary track record of not only producing 10 NCAA championships, many, many Olympians who have won many, many medals, hundreds of All-American All-Stars. You are doing something very special with this team. I’m thrilled to talk to you today about some of the choices you make in creating conditions for these athletes to be the best version of themselves.

There’s obviously something happening in your locker room and, of course, the pool. I will say just right off the bat, as an East Coaster, I barely know how to swim, let alone play water polo, which, for anyone who has watched water polo, is like just a marvel to see these athletes in the water trying to drown each other, but also trying to shoot the ball in the net. Maybe I’d love to start with just what got you into coaching women’s water polo to begin with.

JT: First of all, water polo is an entirely distinct sport from anything else. I think it provides the opportunity for developing the best possible teammates. It’s a team sport. It’s happening in the water, away from coaches, referees, anyone else who’s not actively participating in the actual game itself. It’s also really hard. You mentioned drowning. That is a very real risk or a fear. We feel it if somebody’s holding us underwater, which happens occasionally. Between that potential for panic and that real fear that goes on, and our sense of responsibility to our teammates and our distinct medium that we compete in, it is the greatest team sport of all.

I feel a bias toward team sports over individual. Don’t get me wrong, someone who’s playing golf, who’s having to solve problems on their own, has an amazing capacity to thrive in the world beyond that. In team sports, yes, I just feel like it’s the best conditions for developing teammates, developing great citizens. That was a big part of how I got into it. Honestly, I started coaching because I had hoped to become an Olympian myself. I made the US national team, but I was cut within about three weeks. I lasted not long at all, but I’d gotten myself pretty well-rooted into coaching.

For the first part of my career and 12 years as a Division I college coach, I was coaching men’s water polo and also men’s swimming at University of the Pacific. Coming to Stanford was my first experience coaching women’s water polo. That was my path. A very distinct sport, but one that I got into, hoping to pursue an Olympic dream that turned out was a pipe dream.

Lisa: Well, yes, and maybe an opportunity to say, “Hey, here’s a sport I still love. How else can I make an impact with it if it didn’t exactly reach your dream,” which I think is totally resonant with everything we’re trying to explore here on the How We Future podcast, which is how do you take the events that unfold and continue to turn it into something positive, something that maybe you didn’t initially expect, but really proactively even creating more impact. I had not thought about the pool creating that separation of conditions that really solidify a team.

That’s such a cool way to think about it. I will say that we got introduced by a fellow mutual friend and coach, Eric Reveno, who will also be a future guest on How We Future. He said, “You just have to meet JT. He’s exceptional, extraordinary.” He had me at hello. The real moment where I knew something super special was happening was when I had one of your students in one of my classes. She said, “Lisa, I’d love to take you out to coffee or just spend more time outside the classroom.” It was actually during COVID. I didn’t even realize she was a water polo player because during COVID, we’re all just seeing each other on these little boxes in Zoom.

I was so happy that when we were able to meet in person, we did. I said, “Tell me about your experience as a water polo player.” She said, “Playing for JT, and playing on the Stanford women’s water polo team, more than anything, it’s a masterclass in leadership development. This program has helped us become the best leaders we can be. And, not quite incidentally, along the way, we’re playing world-class water polo.” I had never heard of an athletic endeavor described that way. I was so intrigued. That led me on a journey to really dive into some of the details of how you do this.

This isn’t just you put up words, “We’re going to be developing teammates and citizens. Oh, and by the way, playing at the highest level water polo.” It’s in these micro decisions that you make. I wonder, again, going back to maybe from the beginning of your roots, sounds like you entered it as an athlete yourself. At what point did you say, “Wait a minute, I actually have the conditions here to do something so much more than just helping these athletes win games?”

JT: Well, there was a part of it that was always there. To be transparent, I wanted to be in academia. I wanted to be a college professor. I didn’t have that discipline to sustain the effort required to end up in that place. I always wanted to have an impact as an educator first. That was always on my mind. As my career evolved, it became clear that water polo, and I talked about it earlier, just being a distinct medium, it really is about self-determination. There are so many problems that happen during the course of a game. In any sport, period, there are so many decisions that have to be made in real time, but to then to have to communicate them across an entire team.

When you play water polo, you can’t hear a thing. There are a few voices that stand out, but it’s almost comical when people in the stands yell because it all just blends together. To be able to communicate what is happening really relies on leadership development within the team. These problems have to be solved quickly and in the pool. As much as on the deck, I think they are attuned to my voice and can respond, there are so many times where it’s non-verbal, it’s happening out of practice, out of rehearsal. I just feel like it lends itself to this kind of leadership development.

As it unfolds, it becomes easier for me to put these things together. When you’re talking about our future and how we envision our future, I envision my future being a faculty member in a position like you, but ended up where I am. It’s the same mentality, but it’s a different view of the future. Whereas for you, it may be a longer-term thing of where you want to land, a class you’re looking to develop. For me, it’s the urgency of the actual season. Every season is a lifetime. Every season is an opportunity to teach leadership in the new context of this team.

Lisa: I love that also because you’ve reimagined what does it mean to be an educator, not necessarily in the classroom, but through the practice time that you have and through the constraint of the seasons. I remember one time, JT, you were playing the NCAA Championship. It was so close. You got out, and they asked, “How did it go?” You said something like, “The women knew what to do in the pool.” It was the culmination of all of that practice, that real-time decision-making skills, dealing with complex information happening so quickly, that’s what they’ve been practicing for.

You were just honoring that they had earned this. It wasn’t because you were on the sidelines coaching them to do this or that, that the decision-making that was happening real-time was a result of all of the, I would argue, educational minutes. Even though you may not have been a professor in that way, I would say you actually spend more time with your players than any one faculty does. I just think that’s an extraordinary reframe of thinking about the power of coaches to change lives.

JT: It’s an authentic assessment that we have to go through on a daily basis. We have to get them to prove their learning in order to win. We can’t win at the end of the year if they haven’t mastered these communication skills and decision-making in real-time. We have confidence because we’ve designed these problems for them to encounter and overcome, so we’re confident at the end of the year that they have the skills they need to coalesce and to solve whatever problem might come along in real time. That’s all that confidence is, just that comfort with the uncertainty and the unknown and the unknowable of a game.

When I give that interview, people look at me and say, “Wow, you just look so calm,” but there’s an equanimity that you can develop when you’re looking at 10 years farther down the line and knowing that, okay, great, they solved these problems during the course of this water polo game. It’s a few thousand people who are watching that interview, but there could be a lot more people watching when they’re having to lead a big organization in a big moment down the line in their career. Knowing that I’ve done what I can or that we have done as a group what we can to help launch people toward those careers, it’s a lot easier to keep your focus beyond just the photos with the trophy.

Lisa: Absolutely. I think one of the unique things about your coaching that I want to get into a little bit is that you present your players with a diversity of experiences to develop that confidence in the unknown or in at least something novel to them. I want to be specific. One of the things I learned early was that you take precious minutes from being in the weight room or in the pool during practice time to have your players deliver TED Talks to each other.

This is actually getting them to present, literally present, not in the pool, not in the weight room, about a topic that’s not necessarily related to water polo as part of their practice of learning how to be a good teacher. Can you talk a little bit about that component of your training and why that’s so important?

JT: We’ve had times we’ve done it with faculty members or other visiting scholars in the room. That moment, I think, helps prepare them for championship moments in competition, but it also helps us develop an understanding of the journey they have traveled, the path they’ve traveled to get to Stanford. Help us understand the richness of their experience and more about their genius, because we all know about one another’s genius as athletes. It’s on display every day. To understand a person’s genius beyond that and to see a facet of them, we develop a much fuller appreciation for them as people.

It helps us just to step back. That perspective shift is a vital part of being a great athlete. The greatest athletes I’ve ever coached can make that perspective shift in real time. They seemingly can see the game and make decisions as if they’re gathering information from a drone above the pool from an angle where the referees are, where the coaches are, where all the other players are, so they can read intent in opposing players. That perspective shift is really valuable. Whether in the audience listening to those talks or preparing them and delivering them, those are vital skills.

Of course, storytelling is everything. They become really great storytellers during the course of their time there. Even when we have recruits come to campus, they will get up in front of the group and talk. Incoming freshmen, and to see them evolve over the years, is really a rewarding experience.

Lisa: I think it’s symbolic of so much of your values and what you do, JT, where so much of it is just in life, not even in water polo, but the pressure of the short-term performance. No, we can’t possibly take time away from shooting practice to go listen to a TED Talk. Here you are talking about this long-term perspective of helping these players become better learners, helping them develop a wider perspective and sense of how to look at things because they’re listening and they’re learning.

I’ve also heard you talk about the fact that when you become a teacher or responsible for teaching something, it helps you become a better learner. Therefore, you’re a better teammate. So much of this is steeped in a point of view that it’s not just about this week’s practice or today’s practice, but it’s developing over the long term.

JT: I think we win because we do it, not in spite of it. I don’t believe there’s a balancing act here. I think if it’s done in a way that helps to develop teammateship and maybe replicates that championship moment, we will all be more comfortable with fulfilling our tasks and with the environment that we’re going to incur.

Lisa: I have to ask, do you have, over years of doing this, any talks stick out with you, any favorites, something that you learned that, like, “Oh my gosh, I never knew that,” or “That was so surprising?”

JT: Yes. There are a lot of them that are like that, but some of them are as simple as bicycle mechanics and people telling a story about a bike accident that happened because their derailer froze or they had some issue with bike maintenance, and they’re out somewhere far away and had to figure it out. Bike maintenance is a big part of being a college student. Something as simple as that, but with the story connected to it that draws everyone in. We all have stories of bike failure during a school or a trip or at some point, we all have that common experience.

It can be something just as simple as that. We had another talk that had to do with human trafficking of a high school teammate. That was really stunning. The speaker was able to connect it back to a flyer in an airport bathroom because we had all just finished the trip, we’d gotten back, and we’ve all seen those flyers. To have that resonate personally with someone and be able to go back and tell that story was a really powerful experience and changed how we traveled, how we thought about a lens through which we view interactions with people.

Lisa: It’s so powerful to give space for people to let themselves be known, to take some risks, to share something vulnerable about themselves, particularly in a world where a lot of these players have just grown up with social media, trying to get them to perform and be perfect and connect in a certain way. Here you are opening up space for them to be fully seen and to share something. I imagine that it’s just profoundly powerful for all of them.

JT: Well, I think it induces a little fear initially, but it is pretty low stakes when it’s just our team. Kim Kruger, who was one of our assistants the last three years, also just raised the stakes on all of this by providing a lot of feedback and then requesting follow-up from them. They had to ask somebody else to watch and evaluate, give them feedback, share thoughts, and increase the stakes a little bit, but also the impact.

Lisa: You can imagine, obviously, your players don’t stay playing for Stanford forever, that, as you said, they go on to join organizations to be leaders. Having gone through this process, I imagine they’re that much more comfortable when they’re engaging in their first meeting and ultimately running teams themselves. They have this to pull on. It strikes me that one of the most powerful reframe we can all have in the How We Future, how do we go about this world that’s filled with more ambiguity and complexity, and uncertainty and disruption is being willing to shift your perspective of the finite game of winning and the infinite game of being a great teammate, a great citizen, a great leader regardless of your conditions. It strikes me, JT, that so much of what you do is giving them an opportunity to practice for that infinite game of life.

JT: There are several things, several responses to that. I think so many times, coaches are so committed to the process of winning and losing, and that self-evaluation rather than looking at it long-term. By looking at it long-term, you provide clarity that this is about you and your season as a team and about you and your four years, not about me, because I’m more interested in what happens later. I’m more interested in that call that I get from you about you being thrown into a really difficult position. How you fell back on things we had worked on as part of Stanford Women’s Water Polo.

We had one who talked about giving a going-away presentation and telling the story for a group of primarily male engineers in India. At age 26, having to give this speech that resonated with people. Beyond just the speaker series, we also asked them to get up in front of groups. It might be every time we’re together with family members, where they get up and tell a story that relates, maybe to their family. They’re constantly having to do that. It is a training that removes me from the immediacy of winning and the fact that I am thereby able to get them to understand that this is their mission, this is their journey.

They have crafted it, and they are living into it, and they are going to solve these problems in real-time in those championship moments, which makes it, I hope, a more powerful experience for them.

Lisa: It reminds me of one of my favorite quotes about the future from Bob Johansen, who used to run the Institute for the Future, where he says, “The future will reward clarity but will punish certainty.” You don’t exactly know how this is going to unfold. You don’t, but that clarity of purpose, that clarity of values, that clarity of perspective, long-term being a good teammate, learning how to perform amid unexpected events, in the pool, out of the pool. I remember once, JT, coming back from one of your wins, there was a small welcome party when the bus pulled in.

We had red pom-poms, and we were cheering you on. The players, they were so confident and thoughtful in how they got off that bus and greeted their small but mighty fan base. I remember hearing, “Yes, we practiced that.” It just blew me away. I wonder if you remember that moment at all and what that was like.

JT: I remember hearing something about Jim Valvano and his famous speech in 1993 at the ESPY Awards. He had harkened back to the 1983 team that made him famous, and the story that at the beginning of the year, they actually practiced cutting down the nets. I would never, ever do that because to me, that is just going to the joy of actually winning, and it’s a fantasy rather than a reality of what is it like to be in that championship moment in the uncertainty, not the certainty of knowing how it ended up. It is a powerful thing to just immerse yourself in that moment of that championship game, that championship day, and feeling confident that you can solve anything.

The basket in that 1983 championship that won it, it ended up being sort of an alley-oop pass, but the shot was from straight on, and then it was a strange angle, and the technique used in it might be different from what they had done any other time during the year, but they were able to solve that problem. I absolutely agree. You want to have clarity about what that day will look like and what that big moment will look like, whether it’s that woman in India giving the going-away speech or somebody on that final play to win an NCAA championship.

Lisa: One of my favorite components of what you do in your program is something I’ve had the personal pleasure of joining a few times, and every time just fills me with pure awe and inspiration and wonder, which is your favorite faculty dinner. Can you talk a little bit about your favorite faculty dinner and some of the components involved?

JT: At the end of week one, we often will ask our students, “How are your classes going? What do you think of them?” They’ll give a quick summary of each class and talk about some facet of it, maybe a story of getting lost trying to find the classroom on the first day. The follow-up question is, “What are your professors’ names, and who do you like most in that group?” After week one, they can’t remember the prof’s name.

That’s concerning to me. We start with that and then look ahead to this favorite faculty dinner and start thinking, at the end of the year, you’re going to need to invite a faculty member, your favorite faculty member, and here you are, a freshman, who would it be right now if we move that dinner from April to October? Who is your favorite faculty member after week one? To get them now in week two, thinking, “I better know my prof’s names because I’m going to be quizzed on that, and I better start thinking about what it is I like about them, and maybe I’m going to need to start developing a relationship.”

Again, it’s the futuring of, at this dinner, you’re going to have a really nice dinner. It’s over in the sports cafe. It’s casual setting, and it’s a place where you’re really comfortable, but you’re going to need to get up in front of these world-class profs, and you’re going to need to talk about your relationship with this professor, what he or she has meant to you as a student and as a learner, and how they have inspired you. That process probably needs to start now.

I want them to engage more with their faculty because, really, I think a lot of our students, as they get through school, sure, there’s a lot of curriculum they need to cover, especially in technical classes, but there are also a lot who will choose their classes based on their profs. I know you have a huge following. Once somebody takes one class from you, they want to keep coming back and being around you. Even if it’s just coming to your office hours, they want to engage. That’s why you’re a perennial guest at our favorite faculty dinners.

We do end up having a lot of people that will be asked back each year by each successive class. Yes, it’s a gathering at the end of the year. It’s dinner, and it’s introductions where they talk not about where somebody got their PhD, what they did their dissertation in, but a little bit about what they’re doing in research, but how it has inspired each of our athletes as a learner, as a student, as a member of the Stanford community. It ends up being a really powerful experience, just the process of inviting people because they’re really nervous about how that’s going to go.

They get the slightest lack of response, maybe, and they don’t want to follow up. It makes them really nervous. Some of our most powerful moments at the favorite faculty dinner come from the repeated rejection. Somebody will be turned down two, three, four times, and we’ll tell them, “You got to have somebody. You’re going to have to introduce someone.” Then they just go ahead and take a long shot. Like inviting John Levin to come.

Lisa: That was amazing.

JT: He has been at the last two favorite faculty dinners, and this last time he sat throughout the whole thing. There are students up there talking about their favorite faculty member and just talking about how much of an impact that person has had on them as a student, as a person, and their development as a human being in front of Stanford’s president.

Lisa: It was extraordinary. It was like a full display of all these principles that you have in motion, where I didn’t realize that you set the expectations so early on for them to pay attention, to don’t just move through your classes transactionally. Start to think about the kinds of relationships you want to build. Start to think about the kind of connections and opportunities for personal development. One of the things I’ve certainly noticed over the years, particularly since COVID, when we all were behind the screens, disconnected, is how uncomfortable our younger leaders and learners are in reaching out just to build a relationship.

If there’s not a transactional thing that they have to do, they won’t do it. Yet some of the good stuff happens when you’re just reaching out to learn about someone else, to be curious. I am always blown away by the poise and the joy that your players have when they’re getting up there introducing their guest. They could be a Nobel laureate. They’ve authored multiple books, these professors. They get up there without notes, without their iPhone, and for 90 seconds, they’re delivering a personal introduction that would make you cry. The few times I’ve been there, I think like, “Is anyone recording this?

This has to be on my daily playback,” because it’s so heartfelt, and it’s clear they’ve put so much energy, and everybody benefits. It’s like we are lifting all boats. I loved seeing the president of Stanford there stay the whole time and get to experience at a very, very personal level, the impact of what these professors and how these professors have influenced these students at this personal level. I remember the opportunity to meet with your players after to give them some feedback on the impact that they created. I said, “What do you think he’s talking about at the board meeting?

Do you think he wants to talk about how difficult it is to be the president right now of a higher ed institution, or do you think he wants to talk about how cool it was that the water polo team got to welcome and talk about the personal impact that’s created on a daily basis?” It was extraordinary, and I think it really represents, JT, something that you haven’t shared, but I’d love for you to talk about, which is your overall purpose, the mission, if you will, of what you’re trying to instill into your players. I wonder if you could share that.

JT: Well, we’re trying to instill teammateship because really, that’s what it’s all about. Getting into Stanford is really an individual sport. We’re being assessed individually. We need to have people, hey, look at me, I will contribute a lot to your community, whether it’s the water polo community or the Stanford community. Much of it does feel like it is individually driven, but success at Stanford and after Stanford is a team sport. It’s absolutely collaborative. It is helping them make that transition and to launch them into that future. I want to go back to our speaker series and to the faculty dinner.

These are not one-off events, and as I’ve tried to clarify with the faculty dinner, that starts in Week 1 of the fall. It’s an ongoing thing, and the actual introductions that they do, it’s not the first time they’ve done them, and a couple of days before, they’ll be cold-called to present their introduction. These things aren’t happening accidentally, and there is a lot that goes into it. I think in the age of AI, there’s so much talk now about how do we get these kinds of assessments so that we can be confident that people are mastering things, that they are going through these cognitive changes that are impacting their development as human beings.

We’re assessing them constantly, we’re quizzing constantly, and that might be about tactics, or it might be about the introduction they’re going to be giving. It’s the same thing with when they give their speeches, their TED Talks. They’ve gotten up in front of groups over and over and over. It’s just by getting almost daily reps on all this, whether it’s summarizing how things went in practice, speaking in a timeout during a game simulation, whatever it might be. It’s always about the bigger picture, but starting with that outcome and then working backwards to what are the steps we’re going to need to move to that spot.

The biggest challenge is that while I see it as a class that we’re running, it’s not one quarter, it’s one season. It’s one full school year, and our season more or less mirrors the school year. Our first practice is the first day of school, and our championship game has traditionally been Mother’s Day, which is toward the end of the season, and the end of the school year. It’s also about the four years, and it’s about far beyond that. I feel like the fact that I’ve been here a long time doing this has helped me fail enough that I can more reliably set up a vision and help them craft how they want the season to go, and then fill in along the way.

Lisa: I’ve had a lot of conversations with your players after the faculty dinner. “What was it like to get up there to give the talk?” I’ll even say, “What was more nerve-wracking for you, giving the intro to the faculty dinner or playing in the championship of the NCAA?” Every hand went up to say that doing the intro for the favorite faculty dinner was way more stressful, way more anxiety-producing than playing in their championship game. I did hear that in the lead-up of the cold calling, there may have been some moments that didn’t quite go the way that they hoped to, but that’s all in the spirit of building resilience, building grit.

We talk about these words that matter, but you’re actually architecting opportunities for them to feel it, for them to grow, for them to recover, for them to learn from it in a safe way that still has consequences. It’s not getting up there and introducing the president. It’s not something that’s so extreme that our national security is going to falter if you don’t do it well, but you still feel some real nerves. I love that opportunity for them to practice the stuff that matters in life. I think so often we expect ourselves to be masters at something or brilliant at something without actually architecting that deliberate practice.

Then we put all this pressure on ourselves, and guess what? It doesn’t go well. Then we turn critical, like, “Oh, I guess I just don’t have it,” versus really architecting the season, the years, to ladder up to where we want to be. I just think that’s so important. The last thing I’ll say about this particular experience, as it sits within the overall toolkit or opportunities that you offer your players to grow, is that it’s not expensive. It’s not precious. You’re not requiring technology or something really fancy, or only unique to Stanford. You’re taking an evening, and you’re setting it as an opportunity to create connections within the sports cafe over a dinner.

I want to hammer home that point a little bit because I think so often we think like, ‘Oh, I don’t have the resources to do something special, or I don’t have the budget, or I don’t have the permission.” You invented this, and you used what was available to you in order to architect the special moment that I imagine your players will talk about until some of their very last days. I just wonder if you could share a little bit about how you see this opportunity or opportunity space to be available even when you don’t necessarily think it is.

JT: You mentioned it earlier about the feeling of things being life and death when they are. That is what is wonderful about athletics. It provides a life and death experience or a sense that it’s all or nothing and that everything is on the line. Then again, we’ll play again a week from now. Even if our season goes poorly or great, however it ends up, we’ll still get to do it again next year. We get these new leases on life, these new opportunities to start over. The urgency and that sense that this is a lifetime, this season is a lifetime. A week can even feel like a lifetime as you’re preparing for a big moment.

To then take the big moment and then work backwards from there and find those little opportunities to practice for that practice. Because really, even playing in a championship game or introducing your faculty member at our favorite faculty dinner is really just practice for something down the line. We will practice over and over and over for that practice. That, to me, is how you do things on a budget. That dinner, don’t get me wrong. I think there’s steak and shrimp.

Lisa: Oh, yes. It’s delish, yes.

JT: It adds up. It’s free to practice doing the intros. It’s free to talk about who one’s favorite faculty is in the moment. Some of them will give updates during the course of the year on who is your front runner, who are your top three, who do you think you’re going to invite this year. It creates a lot of conversation. It’s just that engagement and the integration of what we do in school and what we do in the pool that helps us understand one another better as teammates. It helps me connect with life across campus drive, so I don’t get stuck in my world because it’s easy to do that, especially when we’re in the middle of season.

The more that opens things up for me, it also allows me, and I think everyone on our team, to realize what a cool opportunity we are in the midst of experience. That appreciation, the gratitude for what we have, is a great reminder when all that’s on our mind is our power play tactics for a game coming up on the weekend.

Lisa: Learning from you, JT, I’ve developed this concept of playing optimistic offense. This notion that we can proactively create conditions and practice what it means to practice in order to shape the kinds of future we want to be a part of, we want to help lead, because it gives just an ongoing sense of agency that at every moment you can create something. At every moment, you’re capable of doing something that you didn’t even think that you were, not just individually but within a team. That sense of purpose not only gives us hope for what’s possible, it actually builds resilience.

It’s actually better than the defense, which is once you’re in a place that you have suffered a setback or something, you’re having to repair. You’re building in that sense of renewal at every time, like, “Hey, we have another game to play.” Again, you can rely on that you can get up and you can learn from it. I think that’s so powerful. I want to go back to something you said around this idea of each season is a lifetime and a new beginning. We are having this conversation just weeks before we kick off a new season. What are some things you think about in those early days to set the conditions for what the experience is going to be?

I’m so curious about how you do this, knowing that you have players that have been returning and coming back. You have Olympians that have performed at the highest level, and you have incoming freshmen, where this is the first time that they’ll be playing necessarily at this level with this group. I think that it’s so important when we think about the opportunity to really not just say inspiring words, but make choices that help people really understand what they’re doing. I’d love to hear some things that go through your mind around some of those early days as you’re connecting and building that psychological safety within your team.

JT: Well, we don’t start on day one. We’re doing things before that. It’s happening individually and in small groups. There’s a lot that goes on before we get to day one. Even though officially it launches the first day of school, there are things that are happening before that. One of the things that is evolving about college, athletics, and college in general is people are changing schools a lot more often. They’re joining new communities. We’re putting a lot of emphasis on onboarding. I think every organization, it’s a really vital part of it.

Younger people are switching jobs a lot more often. You’re joining new communities rapidly. There’s that element of let’s get started before we start. Then the most important thing early in the season is them sitting down and deciding as a team how they want the team to look and how they want it to feel to be a member of the team. Project ahead, how do you want this team to look and feel at the end of the year? Where do you want to end up? We’re not even really clear on where we’re starting, but we will have started before we start. Once we gather, everything has a purpose.

No gathering without a why. We’re constantly connecting with purpose. Focus on the onboarding. In 28 years, 29 years now, this will be the 29th freshman class that will help move in. We feel really strongly about being there from the beginning, actually, before the beginning of the women’s water polo season, that we’re there when they arrive. It’s an ongoing thing that starts before we start. I think now, even more than ever, that is a vital part of being a college coach.

Lisa: I think all of us can learn from the start before you start. Don’t hope for something magical to happen. Really think through those conditions. It’s something I coach a lot of executives on when they’re holding a big board meeting or conversation where they just try to get all the pieces in place. They’re like, well, something important is going to happen almost by magic, like facilitator pixie dust. To me, the design or mentality is, no, no, don’t leave that to chance. Design ahead of time.

Think about not just the mechanics of where you’re going to meet and how you’re going to meet, but the feeling, empathetic understanding of what has happened to any individual before they get into that meeting, before they get into your practice room, and to try to design it in a way that allows them to show up as their best full selves. In whatever context that is. For you, it’s learning how to be a great teammate, learning how to perform in the pool. For, I think, any leader or anyone working within a team, it’s setting their partner or the people in the room up for success by doing that work ahead of time.

That takes a lot of work. That was so much of what I wanted to cover with you today, JT. I want to end with something you just said about there’s no gathering without a purpose. There’s always a why. What I have heard you say about the bigger why of Stanford Women Water Polo is that you’re trying to inspire Stanford to inspire the world. The opportunity to be at Stanford, to work with these extraordinary athletes, these extraordinary leaders that, as you said, have done amazing individual things, to come together and experience what it looks like to actually come together, compete, and to be at that level, is just extraordinary.

I think it’s not just something that’s good for the water polo program, for the athletic program, for the Stanford community at large, and for the world. I just really want to end by saying thank you. Thank you for inspiring me to be the best version of myself, to think more deeply about the small choices I’m making, that ladder up to the bigger why, to the long-term perspective. It’s just such an honor to be in your orbit and to get to be in those stands cheering on your players each and every game, each and every season, and to learn myself while I’m watching them learn.

JT: Thank you, Lisa. You know I love coming to your world and being a part of it because even though I love when people come to watch our games, and the fact that we have faculty come is amazing, but for me, it’s incredible to be able to gather at the D School because that really is where global inspiration is happening. The proof of that is the people traveling from all over the world to be in that space. I feel blessed to be a part of it. I’m really grateful to have had the opportunity to be a guest.

Lisa: Thank you again, JT. So much fun to talk this morning.

JT: My pleasure. Thank you, Lisa.

Lisa: Thank you for listening to this episode of How We Future with Coach John Tanner. I hope you’re as inspired as I am by his dedication to practice, building long-lasting leadership skills, and learning to be an effective teacher and teammate.

If you’ve enjoyed this episode, please make sure to rate it and comment on How We Future. It really makes a difference.

I hope you’ll tune in next time for more conversations on shaping the future optimistically, practically, and intentionally.

I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and I hope you have a great week.

Pleasure isn’t the enemy of sustainability. It might be the path to it.

Today, Lisa Kay Solomon is joined by Dana Cowin, longtime Food & Wine editor-in-chief, storytelling innovator, and founder of Progressive Hedonist, to talk about how creativity, curiosity, and continual reinvention shape a meaningful life.

From leading one of the most influential food magazines in the world to uplifting underrepresented voices and sustainable culinary practices, Dana has spent her career expanding our understanding of what “good food” means.

You’ll learn:

• Why reinvention is less about starting over and more about listening to what excites you now

• How Progressive Hedonism helps us rethink pleasure, connection, and long-term well-being

• The role sustainable food practices play in shaping a healthier future for people and the planet

• What Dana discovered when she left her “dream job” after 21 years

• Why curiosity is the engine that keeps creativity alive

Together, Lisa and Dana dive into the idea of being a Progressive Hedonist: the belief that pleasure and responsibility can coexist. Dana shares how eating deliciously can also mean eating ethically, and how sustainability becomes far more compelling when it’s rooted in joy rather than guilt.

This episode is a reminder that pleasure isn’t frivolous, it’s fuel. And when paired with intention, it becomes a powerful force for shaping a better future.

Links from the show:

• Progressive Hedonist manifesto

• Are you a Progressive Hedonist? Take the quiz!

• Learn how to throw your own Progressive Hedonist dinner party!

• Check out Dana’s book: Mastering My Mistakes: Learning to Cook with 65 Chefs and Over 100 Recipes

• Dana’s TED Talk: How ugly, unloved food can change the world

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite change makers about shaping tomorrow, starting today.

I’m so delighted to welcome Dana Cowin to How We Future. Dana is a culinary visionary. She’s the former editor-in-chief of Food & Wine and the founder of Progressive Hedonist, a platform that celebrates connection through food and gathering. During her two decades leading Food & Wine, she championed emerging chefs and new voices, transforming the way we think about food culture.

Now, through Progressive Hedonist, she’s turning that same creative energy towards building a more sustainable future, one rooted in community, pleasure, and purpose. In this conversation, Dana and I talk about how food can be a force for the future, from mushroom potlucks and rescued flowers, to a theory of how small actions can fill a reservoir of hope. It’s a conversation about creativity, courage, and finding optimism in shaping a better world, one meal, one gathering, one choice at a time. Let’s get started.

Dana, I am so excited to welcome you to the How We Future podcast, because there are few people that I would rather talk to about the future than you, given what you’ve done and given what you’re doing. I know this is going to be such a fun conversation. Thank you for coming.

Dana Cowin: I’m so excited to be here with you, because you’re my favorite futurist. [laughs]

Lisa: Oh, that’s great. Already, we’re in a delighted place, which is very aligned with your brand of what you’re doing around being joyful and making change, and we’re going to get to all that. Dana, we got together because in part of your absolutely legendary career in food and tenure at Food & Wine for over 20 years, where you really shaped how we talk about food today, how we think about food, how we think about our connection to where we eat and who’s preparing our food. I want to maybe first start our conversation with the origin of your passion for food. Where did this come from?

Dana: So many times, people’s origin story with food is their childhood and their parents, and that’s not my story. My story is all about getting a job. I got a job as the editor-in-chief of Food & Wine Magazine. I liked food. I was excellent at making reservations, and I really, from my background in media, had learned a lot about how people want to surround themselves with beauty and experience pleasure. I had been in Vogue and House & Garden. I applied those ideas to food, and it’s like, “Oh my gosh, food is the most transformative, most incredible way to interact with people’s lives, and really just brings so much pleasure.”

I arrived not knowing a whole lot, but as you can imagine, over 20 plus years, I learned a lot, and I had my own ideas about the ways in which food would change us and shape us and shape culture, and who those culture shapers would be. I was really interested back in 1994, which just seems incredible now. In 1994, I was very interested in the emerging chef culture. The earlier chef culture had been very focused on Eurocentric chefs, so mainly French, but also some Italian ended there.

In America, there were chefs who were in that bridge zone of American and French, but pushing towards experimentation, and really influencing how people thought about ingredients, exposing people to so many new ways to cook and eat. I just thought it was the most exciting thing in the entire world. That’s where my love of food came from, just being inside of the experience of trying to find out what people would eat next, what would be delicious and exciting, and from there, I fell in love.

Lisa: I love that. I can almost feel the magic now that you’re describing so many years ago. I think it really embodies what I’m hoping this podcast is all about, which is making our understanding, our mindsets, our approaches to shaping the future more accessible, more available, more known. When I think about you coming to Food & Wine at that moment, you weren’t after like, must shape the future, must be an innovator. It sounds like, filled with wonder about what was happening, and asking these opening questions about, “Hey, why do we have this version of chefs? What would it look like to celebrate our version of chefs? How can we get up close and personal? How can we tell their story?”

You really invented the whole culture of celebrity chef that we take for granted for now, but you were doing this futuring thing just because of your appreciation and willingness to notice what was going on around you.

Dana: I think it was two things. It was partly just this sense of curiosity, but I had worked at both Vogue Magazine and House & Garden, and at House & Garden, we featured the stars of the house world. Those were designers. I applied that logic to the chef world, and asked the questions that you just said, which is, “How do these people who are at the core of this world shape the way that we eat? How will that look in the future?” The other advantage that I had was that I knew nothing, that I wasn’t imbued in the world of food magazines.

I wasn’t connected to the chefs, I wasn’t connected to home cooks, I wasn’t connected to the cookbook authors, I was a clean slate of curiosity, someone who just wanted to eat better. When you talk about accessibility, that’s where I think Food & Wine really was quite special. My approach as someone who doesn’t know, I do know now more, didn’t know a lot was quite helpful, because the test kitchen would recreate a chef’s dish and they would say, “This is really easy,” or “This is really available,” or “This only takes three hours.” I would say, “Wait, hold on a minute. Only takes three hours, those words don’t go together,” or accessible at what market? What market are you going to that you think has oxtails?

Happily, as time went on, those questions were answered differently. Food is not static, the world is not static. What started out, the questions remained the same, but the answers changed substantially by our pushing the limits and saying, “You’re not going to make a three-hour meal every week. This is cool and exciting.” Maybe you’ll try it on a weekend, and maybe it’s going to expand what’s possible for you. I think hitting on that note of accessibility is quite important, and just general curiosity as a way to create any new future.

Lisa: One of the things I really appreciate in that is that the curiosity stays, but the conditions evolve.

Dana: Yes.

Lisa: One of the things I’m trying to share both in my classes and through these conversations is that having an approach to the future is not a talent anointed to you. These are things you can learn, and you can grow, and you can be intentionally aware of. We’re just wildly underdeveloped when it comes to talking about what it’s going to take to have the skills to create something that didn’t exist before by being curious, by using what’s available to you.

Another thing you shared is this idea of using an analogous example, like, “Hey, this didn’t exist yet in the chef world, but it did exist in the interior design world.” What might it look like, and how do we take some of the best of what that process offered or that category and try it here in a different way?

Dana: 100%. I think that in regard to in the moment, thinking about the future, that turns out to be very tricky. I do it, I think, genetically. I am inclined towards this idea, which you were saying you don’t have to be, but because I am, it’s something that I notice about myself. What is that that makes me interested in leading towards the future? In that notion of leading, you need to understand the steps between where you stand and where you would like to end up.

That, I think, is the process that I’ve been inside of, both for Food & Wine, and when I was working with Women in Hospitality, and now with Progressive Hedonists, that what is a distance away, a walking distance that you don’t know the path, you just know you need to walk to get there. When I think about it, I like to think about the small steps and the things that are joyful, because anything that’s too hard or feels like a bramble or a rosebush, or something thorny that gets in your way, then it’s really hard to think about the future.

Pessimism makes it hard to think about the future. Cynicism makes it hard to think about the future. Being surrounded by people who inhabit those two qualities. In order to be a futurist, you do need this open mind, but also protect your mind from the brambles and the harsh edges of people, places, and ideas that are inhospitable to a better plan.

Lisa: I totally agree. I think the other thing that gets in the way is fear, and we all have a lot of it right now. In fact, that’s really fueling why I’m doing this, is to try to elicit more stories to break down the fear, the fear of the unknown, the fear of taking a risk. Particularly for our young people that are so fearful for being known, and not being perfect on social media. That’s why I’m so passionate about sharing stories like yours, and your journey of both creating new futures within an established institution like Food $ Wine, and then on your own. This notion of being able to, not with certainty, but having an instinct that says, “We don’t have to stay where we are.”

You alluded to this briefly, but maybe we could talk a little bit about it, is that after Food $ Wine, you noticed that women in hospitality were not getting the kind of support they needed. Their stories weren’t being told. They weren’t being elevated. That didn’t exist, and you imagined a platform or medium or just the need to share those stories more broadly. I wonder if you could share a little bit about that.

Dana: Yes. There’s also a connection between the way that I found my purpose at Food & Wine, the way that I found my purpose with Women in Hospitality, and the way I found my purpose with Progressive Hedonists, which is I looked at the world and said, “What is missing?” Not what is there that I can amplify, which is also a powerful thing to do, but it’s not my path. At Food & Wine, as you had mentioned, no one was highlighting chefs in the path that they were taking. With Women in Hospitality, there were becoming more voices.

In fact, when I stopped doing Women in Hospitality six years later, it was because I did a speaking tour all around the country, talking to women in hospitality groups. I’m like, “Okay, I think my work is done.” Not that I created them, but that there was a moment where there was broad recognition that extraordinary, talented women were underrepresented. There weren’t as many stories, and that needed to change. I had a piece of it, but Cherry Bombe did an incredible job. There are places all around the country, locally, women chefs and restaurateurs, I could name so many of them, which were really great partners to me.

It did start with this feeling that their stories had not been told. There’s a really great example. There was a chef in Boston who had been left out of a picture. She was in the article, but out of the picture that was taken of the great chefs of Boston. She’s like, “If you can’t see me, I don’t exist. Why would I be left out of that?” For a number of us, we were trying to rectify who’s in the picture and what stories are told. That continues. It wasn’t only women, but it was women of color. It was not just stories of people in America, but people in America who were third-culture kids and trying to recognize the tremendous diversity of voices that also hadn’t been heard. Many of the women, not all of those being women.

Lisa: It brings up another aspect of thinking about the future, which is visualizing it. If you cannot see the future, then you cannot build it. Even if seeing it is in your mind’s eye, in your imagination. You were doing two things. One is noticing what is missing. What would it look like if it wasn’t missing or if it was somehow attended to? Then, along the way, you’re creating paths for others to see the future that wasn’t necessarily available to them. I just think that that’s a thing we don’t talk about enough is noticing, okay, where are we now? What’s missing? What would it look like if it were better on that front? What was it like when you started to put these stories out there?

Dana: I think just to build on that for one second, there’s also recognizing that problems or holes can be filled. I left Food & Wine when I felt like this era is actually over. We do not need to continue to have chefs lead the way. I’m interested in something else. It was the same with Women in Hospitality. We made progress. I think it’s really important to give credit to the fact that progress is made. It’s not like the future is infinitely ahead of us. It’s not that as we walk, we’re always 20 feet from the future. We can walk and meet the future, and then we change and we continue our journey, but with a different mindset, with a different goal set.

I think that’s important to recognize because the idea that the future is always out so far ahead can be very intimidating. Why do I want to do it if it’s always going to be 20 feet from me and I’m never going to hit the goal?

Lisa: One of the things I try to tell people is that we all have the capacity to think about the future. We do it every day. We want to stay on this idea of futures that are too far and futures that are closer in. If you have planned a meal for yourself, you have thought about the future.

Dana: Exactly. Or you went grocery shopping.

Lisa: Grocery shopping. You had to do some planning. You had to do some vision. You had to do some kind of analysis. What do I have? What do I need? What do I want to be building with what I’m going to get? I think that is one of your gifts, my dear friend Dana, which is your ability to keep the human part of it alive and central. This empowering notion of, we can do this. We don’t have to let this narrative come over us that it’s so far out or that we can’t shape it or that we’re always going to have to have a pessimism mindset. I think you are doing, I did not coin this phrase, but what I like to bring forward, which is this protopia, making it better. Protopia.

Dana: I love that word.

Lisa: We are capable of making it better. That food is such a concrete way to talk about it because we all eat. We all know what it’s like to get pleasure when we are enjoying not just the nutritional things we’re putting in our body, but an experience that is something totally different.

Dana: Yes. Food is great because it is in itself pleasure. Although some people, as you say, just use it for fuel, and I don’t understand those people, so I can’t talk to that. In and of itself, food is pleasure, but it is such a great conversation point. It’s not just that we all have to eat, and we do, but it’s that within what we eat, we can shape the world. How amazing is that? We shape how healthy our body is and our mind is, but we also shape the future because the choices that we make, whether we’re eating buckwheat or ultra-processed food, those are radically different choices about the future. Both of them, perversely, can give us a certain kind of pleasure.

Ultra-processed food is very short-term pleasure and very unhealthy. Buckwheat, [laughs] I don’t know why I picked buckwheat, but buckwheat soba, buckwheat groats, buckwheat pancakes, these are all things that lead to a delightful and better future because buckwheat, the plant, is regenerative. I love that food can be the message, the joy, and the change agent.

Lisa: I just want to say for the record, I love buckwheat crepes. They’re my favorite.

[laughter]

Lisa: I will take them over savory crepes anytime.

Dana: That’s great.

Lisa: I think you’re capturing something bigger here that’s connected to, again, the theme of the podcast. Why I love what you’re doing so much, which is that we don’t have to accept the binary choice, that either it’s good for you and it’s awful, or it’s horrible for you.

Dana: Exactly.

Lisa: It’s destroying the planet. You can make good choices that are things that are enjoyable, things that connect you with each other and build community, and are also good for the planet. I think that’s a great segue for you to describe Progressive Hedonist because it is just so fun. First of all, to say the words, and then even especially when you learn more about what they mean.

Dana: That’s funny because Progressive Hedonist, it turns out that H is very hard to say. I have a really extraordinarily delightful 95-year-old mother who’s quite forgetful. I have to tell her many times that the name of my organization is Progressive Hedonist, and she will say Progressive Etonist. I’m like, “No, it’s not Progressive--” Anyway, Progressive Hedonist. The idea underlying is that pleasure is important to our soul, but the only way to be truly filled with pleasure is if you’re doing right by the planet and by other people.

With that in mind, I’ve held gatherings all around the country, lots of potlucks, lots of collabs with star chefs to bring people together to both build the connection between the people, which is extremely important. To also build the connection between people and what they eat so that people are eating and consuming mindfully, but also very happily. I like to think of it as there’s hope in hospitality. There’s hope baked into these meals that we share with each other.

I love the fact that people come to these events knowing that they’re there for a potluck for the planet or a feast for the future or whatever. I’ve got a couple of different names that I should narrow down. They leave filled with delicious food, but also the ideas of what they can do as individuals to impact the future. I think that one of the greatest challenges at any age, particularly now, is to feel like you can make a difference. The idea that many people have shared with me, which is, what does it matter what I do?

I’m beginning to call it the thimble metaphor. Someone says to me, “It’s like you’re taking a thimble and trying to fill a reservoir.” I say, “Yes, but there’s a million thimbles. My reservoir is going to be overflowing.” We are all the thimbles here. We are all able to fill that reservoir of hope, but never if we think we don’t count. This idea that the individual, anyone who’s listening, you matter. You matter in every way. You matter as a human being. You should have joy and connection with friends, but you also matter in any problem you’re trying to solve that’s larger than you.

The problem I’m trying to solve that’s larger than me is around the environment. I have an environmental calling, as Krista Tippett calls it. Maybe your calling is something else. You, whatever you are doing, whatever you are studying, whatever you care about, you’re the thimble that can fill the reservoir.

Lisa: It’s a beautiful perspective and a joyful approach that I think we don’t hear too often. Often we hear the, “This is really important, let’s be very serious, let’s not allow ourselves to have joy in it because it is so serious and so urgent that we have to double down and just get our way through it.” Yet you’re saying, “Wait, why do we have to make that choice? We could have both.” We could be joyful and connect to each other, and do something that feels good on behalf of the planet and, therefore, on behalf of generations to come.

I wonder if you could get concrete for a moment and describe the beautiful Progressive Hedonist dinner that you and I shared together in San Francisco, because that was really an eye-opener for me. It was just so special.

Dana: It was put on by Lucy Duckworth, who’s a student, and she decided to host it on the farm, get ingredients from the farm, which couldn’t be more Progressive Hedonist because it’s very local and you’re supporting your farmers and you’re sharing their story. She cooks the food herself, which is so giving and so generous. She chose how she wanted to express that generosity with the other guests who were there by being very particular about who she invited, which is also critical to a Progressive Hedonist event. Who’s in the room? In her case, she wanted students, grad students, and faculty, which is a great group of people to connect to each other in a casual setting.

Each person had to apply for their seat. It’s not that they paid. They just had to really understand the purpose to participate. I thought that made the evening more meaningful because everyone cared that they were there. She added an element that I have in all the Progressive Hedonist dinners, which is inviting a speaker. Someone who can talk to the topic with a little more expertise, but not bore people, which I think is very important because not everyone wants to learn so much about all the Progressive Hedonist ways. Having that speaker was so special. It was freezing cold, which I think actually also made it special because we were all huddled together.

Lisa: Unusually cold. It was so cold.

Dana: Then it was so joyful because people felt chosen. They felt so cared for because they had students cooking for them. The evening felt like one of one, one of a kind, and the experience was a 10 out of 10. It was a great event. It hits all those Progressive Hedonist points, which is you have to have a purpose for your gathering. You have to be thoughtful about who’s inviting and be sure, depending on what your goal is, but open people’s minds and solidify. Create and broaden a community. In this case, it’s across generations, if you will. I always love working across generations.

The food itself is delicious, proves the point, and at the end of the day brings so much joy because of being together, eating well, and you’ve learned something. When you leave, you leave with leftovers. There were a couple of leftovers. Some people got to bring food home, which I always think is good, so there’s no waste. I connected with 10 people after that event, all of whom, because of Stanford and because of the way this was curated, were extraordinary human beings who I hope I’ll know for a long time.

Each event that’s part of Progressive Hedonist has some version of that, where you leave feeling like, “I want to know you forever because you were chosen, you are joyful, and you’re part of the solution for the future.”

Lisa: There was so much goodness that came out of that experience. I loved how you articulated the ingredients behind it because I think anybody listening could say, like, “Wow, how might I turn my dinner party or next gathering?” Add a little bit more purpose or a little bit more thoughtfulness, some of the attention, the detail. It actually reminds me of the book I wrote about how to design strategic conversations, but here we’re designing joyful gatherings. Just that same level of intentionality that rises above. It’s like, what’s the thing you’re going to talk about a week later, six months later?

I think it was going to be that dinner, and I just want to even take a step back in the spirit of Howie Future and honor Lucy Futuring because here’s a senior. She’s finishing up her last few weeks at Stanford. She had a million other things to be doing with her time. I said, “Listen, Lucy, I know you have a passion for food. I want to let you know this food icon is coming, and I really want you to meet her.” She said, “Oh, I’d love to meet her.” She’s got one conversation with you. Then she says, “You know what? I see a bigger idea here.”

“I’m not just going to have a conversation with Dana. I’m going to use this opportunity to generously, generatively, joyfully gather others that share a passion for food, hence the application part, just really aligning that everybody there has some kind of connection in different ways, and we’re going to break bread together.” She cooks this vegan delicious… I’m still thinking about the meal, six months later. It was so delicious. We were, as you said, felt cared for.

I think the other thing that you started to touch upon is this from a future’s lens, it opens up your neural pathways for what’s possible. Just another thing that I took away, among others, from that dinner was, as you mentioned, the guest. Besides you, Christopher Gardner. Dr. Christopher Gardner is there. He is also a legend in reimagining sustainability. He teaches at the med school, but across Stanford. He shared another futuring story.

He talked about how he has been cultivating partnerships with the Culinary Institute of America to get them to train institutional chefs that are teaching on campuses, in schools, even in jails, or places where they serve lots of people to cook plant-based that’s also delicious. Again, I think about that little shift of like, hey, what if we get out of the binary, it’s either going to be delicious or good for the planet, but wait, delicious and good for the planet, and empower them to make choices for themselves. What a huge impact that can make. Once I saw it, I couldn’t unsee it.

Then, of course, there’s this new Netflix. I don’t know if people have been seeing it, a series now, and he’s the feature…. I mean he’s one of them. So you can’t unsee these things.

Dana: He was a very special guest to have and so fascinating to me, because we have a lot of touch points and overlaps. Whereas I focus on the individual, having someone like him focus at institutional scale is so important. I work with an organization called Food for Climate League that does very similar work. It’s so powerful to say, “How do we write recipes and influence people to do more food that’s good for the planet?” Generally, vegetarian-focused. I don’t excise meat entirely because I think there is a proper role for animals in our food system, but generally, vegetarian is better.

Anyway, it was so exciting to have him there and to be able to share that, and for everybody to hear from him, because it’s like God walks in the door and you’re like, “Oh.”

Lisa: He still needs to eat. What do you think he’s talking about? That’s the thing. It’s this gift that keeps him going. Let’s not connect while I’m no research expert here, just talking earlier with a colleague of mine about the research that’s come out around loneliness and around longevity and well-being, and that one of the most important factors is the relationships that we build. This plants the seed, to your point of now you’ve got 10 people relationships.

Also, there was a business school student that also blew my mind who was working before he joined the business school. He was working consulting– 8:00 in the morning until 6:00 PM. Then he would do a night shift, working at a restaurant, and now he’s working on a new idea to serve higher-quality quality sustainable food to construction workers.

Dana: Yeah, brilliant.

Lisa: It was brilliant.

Dana: He was amazing because he was working for one of the country’s best chefs, José Andrés. I just love that he transformed that dining experience into something that’s much more accessible. When I talked to him in New York City, where I live, construction sites are 50 people max. I was like, “How do you scale this?” He’s like, ‘Oh, no, no. In California, it’s like 1,000 people.” It’s, “Oh, this is so interesting.” He’d done the work to understand how big the market could be and how helpful it would be to all these people to eat healthy food when they’re working so hard.

Lisa: It’s amazing. I know that not everyone has the opportunity to go to a Stanford farm or attend one of these celebrity chefs. You’ve also done them in people’s homes and particularly around, I know, a big passion of yours, which is mushrooms.

Dana: It’s funny because before talking to you, I was talking to someone about yet another mushroom dinner. I feel like I’m going to end up the mushroom queen soon enough. I do believe that these events, because they’re potlucks, in general, they’re not all, but mostly potlucks, they are very accessible to anybody. The idea of a potluck hits on so many levels. I’ll get to mushrooms. The idea that you don’t have to pay for everything yourself it’s less time-consuming, it’s much more efficient, but the effect is still super powerful. I think that’s really important to know.

I’m always interested in what is the lowest barrier to hosting and potlucks allow for that low barrier. It also could be a breakfast or it could be in a restaurant. I feel like it’s really important to say that setting the parameter, this could happen anywhere, as long as it’s easy for you to do. I fell in love with mushrooms, deeply in love with mushrooms, because they are not only delicious, but they are phenomenal for the planet. They are great as a metaphor. They are great as just something to eat.

In terms of what mushrooms do for the ground and the lifecycle of living things, I’m sure many people who are listening know this already, but mushrooms are decomposers. They actually live by destroying and eating other things that have died, which is very important and powerful. They connect through mycelia underground and give the energy to other living things in their ecosystem. The mushrooms, because of their ability to decompose and then share the energy, create a balance. They decompose and create energy. As you know, I’m sure that the mushroom that we eat is actually the fruiting body of this thing that happens underground.

You can forage for mushrooms and find them. Of course, there’s also cultivated mushrooms. I love thinking about the metaphor of mushrooms, which is how do I achieve balance in my life, which is important to the future? How do I detoxify and decompose things? Not only think about building, because they’re actually-- They build soil, but they build through decomposition. How can I be more connected to every living thing? That’s why mushrooms are a particularly great Progressive Hedonist party source. I have had many mushroom parties.

I did a writing workshop where I took people to Martha’s Vineyard Mycological MVM. They have wild harvest shiitakes that grow on logs under tents, and the farmer, Tucker Pforzheimer, talked us through how he grows them, how you develop the spores, how they fruit, how you harvest them. Then we came back to my house. I made a meal of foods that had all been grown within 20 miles of here, except lemons and salt, of course.

Then I gave people the prompt, “What in your life needed to die in order for you to live more fully?” People went off, I’ve set up desks with little flowers all around the house. No one’s out on desks. They’re like on couches, on floors, sitting close together, which I never thought anyone would want to sit next to somebody and write. Anyway, they wrote for an hour and wrote the most beautiful, moving things about grief and rebirth and divorce and childbirth. That memoir metaphor with mushrooms is very powerful.

I’ve also hosted a mushroom party at home. This is where you’re like, “Yes, I don’t know who’s going to replicate this, Dana.” I invited the woman who has GUS mushroom planters to come. She sells the planters and you would buy the mushroom insert. She grew mushrooms for this party. We hid the planters under the table and around my house. At the end of the evening, people went with scissors and snipped mushrooms to take home from the GUS planters.

We had a woman who came and brought her mushroom kombucha. I had some extraordinary women from San Francisco paint different mushrooms, which we created as mushroom art. People got to take the art of the mushroom home. I could go on and on because, yes, I went all in on mushrooms.

Lisa: It makes me think like, why are we coming to dinner parties with flowers or chocolates? We should be coming with mushrooms. What a gift.

Dana: Sometimes people will come with flowers, but they’re flowers that are rescued. There’s a woman in business in New York. The business is called Flower Aggregate. She’ll take flowers that have been used for galas or parties that would have been thrown away, which end up in landfill, which is just awful. Instead, she repurposes them and makes beautiful arrangements, or flower designers can come and use them so that they have a second life. Flowers can have second, third, and fourth lives.

Lisa: That is so powerful. Rescued flowers. That’s amazing.

Dana: Exactly. Rescued flowers.

Lisa: I’ve also just heard you talk about when you have a Progressive Hedonist dinner party, perhaps in your neighborhood, that these connections are made. Then people are actually building relationships around bartering. In some cases, we now have people that have farms. They’re little gardens, really. They want to exchange what they have, so these different kinds of relationships grow and flourish.

Dana: I love the idea of the barter system and being able to build that into these events. My next event is going to be just a hang on the lawn, where I’m going to put out cookbooks for people to take and bring. It’s not barter, but they can just exchange cookbooks. Very low-tech. Bring your own beverage, take away a cookbook, hang out with your neighbors.

Lisa: Who doesn’t love a great cookbook and discovering a great cookbook? Dana, I’m so grateful for your time. If people want to learn more about Progressive Hedonist and how they could bring this into their lives, what are your recommendations? Where should they go?

Dana: You can follow me on Instagram at Progressive_Hedonist. It has an underscore in there, Progressive_Hedonist. Take a look at the website. There’s a really fun quiz to see how much of a progressive hedonist you are. I’ll be making announcements on Instagram for events that I’m doing that are open. What I really encourage is people to DM me if they have any questions at all, and say, “I’d love to hold an event. Can you help me out?” I’m more than happy to. Anything that I can do to spur more people to host events and then to feel more empowered to do something to support your local farmer, to buy secondhand flowers, to not waste food. I’m here for all of it.

Lisa: I love it. All of that with a smile. Being a thimble with a smile, and maybe the thimble becomes a measuring cup a little bigger.

Dana: Exactly.

Lisa: It really all adds up. The fact that you’re doing it at every level. You’re doing it at this upper echelon with these celebrity chefs and honoring particularly the ones that are leaning into these practices without, again, sacrificing the experience and flavor, but perhaps enhancing it. At the lowest level of connecting with your neighbor and sharing a meal, or exchanging a cookbook. I think I’m going to try to do that in the next couple of weeks.

I’m so grateful for everything you’re doing. I’m so grateful that you’re willing to share it with everyone on How We Future. I’m going to continue to learn from you and cheer you on. Just really, truly, I’m grateful and appreciative of all that you are bringing to this world. Thank you so much for being here.

Dana: Thank you. I just love these conversations because it’s a reminder to everybody that we create our own future and that of everyone around us. Thank you, Lisa.

Lisa: What an energizing conversation with Dana Cowin. She reminded me that joy and progress aren’t opposites, they’re partners. If Dana’s ideas spark something in you, maybe start small. Host a meal with purpose, shop from your local farmer’s market, or simply notice how the food on your plate connects to the world around you. Those gestures matter more than we think.

If you enjoyed this episode, please take a moment to rate How We Future and leave a comment. Your reflections help new listeners discover these conversations and maybe find their own way of filling the reservoir. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thank you for listening. May your week ahead be filled with good food and even better company.

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The science of a good day is also the science of a better future.

This week’s episode of How We Future with Lisa Kay Solomon features Caroline Webb: leadership coach, behavioral science expert, McKinsey Senior Advisor, and bestselling author of How to Have a Good Day.

Caroline’s work sits at the intersection of neuroscience, psychology, and practical leadership. She shares how we can prepare for chaotic times and gain agency by understanding the ways our brains handle uncertainty, stress, and decision-making.

You’ll learn:

• Why attention is your most precious resource

• A simple three-part framework (“Know. Be. Do”) that helps leaders navigate chaos

• How naming what you’re feeling instantly reduces stress

• Why imagining a future scenario trains your brain to respond better in real life

• Why realistic optimism, not blind positivity, is the mindset leaders need right now

This conversation is a practical, hopeful guide for anyone trying to lead with more clarity, calm, and positivity. Caroline shows that the skills we need to navigate the future aren’t abstract. They’re learnable, repeatable, and rooted in how we manage our minds today.

Links from the show:

• Learn more about Caroline and her projects on her website

• Buy the book: How To Have a Good Day by Caroline Webb

• Take Caroline’s LinkedIn Learning Courses: Science-based Habits for Modern Leadership and How to Have a Great Day at Work

• Link to HBR Chapter: Guide to Dealing with Conflict by Caroline Webb

• Even more resources from Caroline Webb to help you thrive!

• Psychologist Podcast with Scott Barry Kauffman

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today.

I’m so excited to welcome my friend, Caroline Webb, to How We Future. Caroline is a leadership coach, economist, and author of the international bestseller How to Have a Good Day, a book that blends behavioral science, neuroscience, and everyday wisdom to help us all thrive at work and in life.

I first came across Caroline’s work during the pandemic, and it was exactly what I needed at that time. Her ideas about how to focus our attention, reclaim agency, and bring a little more joy into even the most complex days have stayed with me ever since. Today, Caroline shares practical ways to manage stress, lead with realistic optimism, and find meaning even when life feels uncertain. She talks about how focusing on what we can control changes everything and how small daily choices can ripple into better leadership, better days, and better futures. I’m so grateful she joined me for this conversation. Here’s Caroline.

Caroline Webb: I’m delighted to be here. Thanks so much.

Lisa: I’ve been a big fan for a long time. We are part of a shared authors group, so we’ve gotten to know each other. I have to say, I really dove into your work. It was almost like the heavens opened up and it was delivered to me at the right moment during what I would call peak pandemic. I have this great vivid memory of doing one of the few things we could do at the time, which was take walks outside. I was listening to this brilliant conversation with you and Scott Barry Kaufman, another colleague and friend of ours. It was like one of those moments where it was like, “This is what I need to hear at this moment.”

Everything you said was just the reminder of how to be intentional about my attention and how to figure out how to do more with what was available to me versus not. I’m a huge fan and I’m excited to talk to you about all of that and more. Maybe we should start with where some of those ideas came from, which was your first book called How to Have a Good Day. Maybe we’ll start there and talk about how did you come to write a book called How to Have a Good Day?

Caroline: Obviously, I’m having a very good day right now. [laughs] That’s not the origin story of the book. I got interested in how to use behavioral science, behavioral and cognitive science to help people thrive at work. A long time ago, I actually had a first career as an economist, and then I went into management consulting and I was doing a lot of work on leadership and on organizational change.

I saw time and again how a little bit of understanding about the brain could help people tweak the way they work to give them more productivity, for sure, but also well-being and, dare I say, even some joy. What I noticed was that also using a little bit of neuroscience and psychology and behavioral economics made it a lot easier for people to accept that it might be worth trying to behave a little differently at work to get more of all of those good things. That’s where it emerged.

I was using this in my coaching work. I was using it in my training and teaching work. Eventually, a client said to me, “Where’s the book that takes all of this and writes it down?” I thought, “Oh, maybe there’s a place for a book that actually shows people how to practically apply all of this stuff to have better days.”

Lisa: I love that description because one of the things I experience in your writing and your work and, of course, the conversations that we have is I think you are a brilliant strategic toggler where you can take big concepts that are backed in science and have rigor behind it and then translate them into very actionable bits.

Certainly, that’s throughout the book where you have chapters and you talk about things that make sense to so many leaders around how do they prioritize their time, how do they think about resilience, and it’s very directed. It has that both-and feel to it of like, “Yes, I’m going to help you and I’m going to shrink the change and give you some guidance on how you can do that right away.” Was that something that has always been part of your practice?

Caroline: Absolutely. I think everybody is busy, everybody is stretched. A lot of the advice that’s out there requires people to create whole systems and put a lot of effort into re-engineering how they live their lives. That’s not realistic for a lot of people. We might have space for one small change in how we run our days.

I’ve always been interested in what’s the highest leverage points of intervention that are going to make the biggest difference. That’s where science helps because if you understand, oh, actually, if you do this, then it’s going to have an outsized effect. The way that your brain works, then that, to me, has always been a tremendous unlock.

Lisa: I think it also helps that you come to this work from many years working at the highest echelons of strategy and consulting. You were a partner at McKinsey for many years and got fascinated with leadership, almost, I don’t want to say by accident, but it sounded like it was not intended to be your main job and to take this route. You were doing some exploration to make you better at being a partner at McKinsey and then had a moment where things shifted for you. I wonder if you could talk about that transition for yourself.

Caroline: That’s certainly true. Actually, the time I first got interested in leadership goes back earlier in my life. I was working in Central and Eastern Europe because I had that first career as an economist. I was doing work on behalf of the British government to help with the transition from communism.I fell in with a group of students. They were former students in Prague who had led the peaceful revolution, the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia as it then was. That was mind-blowing to me. I was 21, 22. They were the same age.

I was very proud of having led this society or run this little thing at university, at college. Then they’d actually run a revolution. This blew my mind because it helped me realize, oh, leadership isn’t about seniority or age or status or job title. It can be something you step into at any age and any stage. That was very inspiring to me. It took me a while to get back to that and realize that was the topic I really most wanted to work on.

When I went from working in the public sector to McKinsey, I did have an inkling that I really wanted to work on leadership. Then when I was there, it became clear after a couple of years this was my jam, this was really what I wanted to work on. I did then get certified as a coach, which was quite early in this coaching world. Then realized, “Oh, okay. I specifically want to be a leadership coach. This is clearly what I want to do with my life.” Writing allows me to coach people at scale, let’s say, so I love that too.

Lisa: It’s a great combination. Oh, gosh, what an incredible experience to have early on. Talk about how, in future, to see 20-somethings changing the direction of their country. One of the things, at least, I’m trying to offer in this conversation series and podcast is this idea that there are no they that’s going to tell you how to do it, particularly in moments of high volatility and change.

Often, you are the they. [chuckles] You often buy the like, “Wait a minute, I’m living in a place right now. This is not how I want to see the future. There’s a big gap. What can I do? What can I try?” The courage to do it, not necessarily knowing if you’re going to be successful. How extraordinary to have that up-close view of that change and transition so early on.

Caroline: It gave me a huge sense of the agency that’s there if we look for it and if we’re willing to take it. It’s not an exaggeration to say it changed my life to see that. I’m still in touch with many of them now, and it’s fascinating to see what they’ve gone on to do.

In general, it helps me help my clients, help my colleagues, help my friends and my family focus on what they can change, focus on where are those points that they can control. It can be sometimes just in the way that they hold themselves and how they show up in a situation. It can be in the small things that you actually do control. There’s a lot there usually. It can sometimes feel like there isn’t when you feel very done to by what’s going on in the world. There’s always plenty that you can take control of.

Lisa: I know. What always amazes me is that we don’t spend a lot of time focusing on that or practicing that. I remember writing an article pretty early on into the pandemic talking about leading, learning, and living through a pandemic. Part of it was, though, what can you control peace? We’re just not as practiced at that.

I think as the world feels like it’s speeding up, the gift of reminding people that we can actually slow down and notice more and pay more attention and do something with that I think is so critical. I think that’s what you do so brilliantly at the highest levels in your leadership work. It matters for all of us, for sure, but leaders are often in a position where they’re making choices that have impact on their teams, on their organizations, on their cultures. There is a larger lever if they’re able to embody that, too.

Caroline: Absolutely. We get a lot from neuroscience on why it’s so important to look at what you can control. Uncertainty is deeply stressful for the average brain. It’s highly taxing. It means you have to cogitate and compute all sorts of possible futures. When you don’t have Lisa in your back pocket, that’s hard work. [laughs]

The more that you can reduce the cognitive load by focusing on what’s certain and what’s known, then the more you can use your small amount of mental energy and attention for the things that really need it and really need you to do that cogitation. As ever with all of these things, there’s a good scientific reason why this kind of approach actually works.

Lisa: Are there certain questions, either reflective questions? Again, going back to this idea of a big idea, focus on things you can control versus what you can’t, and then the integration and application into our lives. When you’re working with leaders, are there some go-to questions to help people to start to pay more attention to the fact that all the things happening are not the same, not necessarily the same quality, that there are some things you can influence over and some things that you can’t?

Caroline: Yes. I actually remember it myself by know, be, do. What are the things we know for sure? There’s often more in that than you think. Sometimes when 20% of a situation is uncertain, it colors everything. Often, there’s a lot that we do know for sure.

We might not know what the outcome of a decision is, but we might know when it’s going to happen. We might not know when it’s going to happen, but we might know the process that is going to unfold. There’s more often in the things-we-know bucket than we sometimes immediately think, or at least until the leader gets a team to sit down and say, “Okay. What are all the things we know for sure?”

Then there’s the Be buckets. There’s who are we, what do we stand for, what has been true about us that will still be true in the future, what are our values, and so forth. That really is powerful when you’re facing into a challenge. It can also include strengths and talents and experiences.

Then the question of what are we able to do, and that’s where it gets to, what are the things we might be able to choose ourselves to do in a difficult situation? I find with those three questions, which are what do we know for sure, who are we, and what is there that we can do, that’s the rubric that really helps leaders when they’re sitting down with their teams in the midst of chaos and crisis. It gives everybody a sense that they can move forward, even if not in an ideal world.

Lisa: It’s so valuable. I’m so thrilled that we’re going to be able to offer that to folks listening to How We Future. It reminds me a lot when I’m trying to help leaders and students learn the difference between what they can influence and what they need to maybe reframe or think differently of in order to put their attention intentionally towards the right areas, is this idea of paying attention to strong ideas loosely held, having a strong opinion about something, but you can be open to new ideas because it’s dynamic, it’s ambiguous, and strong values strongly helped. That, you can control.

I often say to leaders that if they have done their job in really creating a clear mission statement and strong values, that’s your superpower because that’s the stuff you can go back to. That can create a rubric that’s clear amid a context that’s changing so dynamically.

Caroline: So true. So true. I bet people are very lucky to have a chance to do that with you. If anyone is listening to this and thinking, “I don’t know what my values are,” there’s another simple question you can ask, which is what do we want to be known for? If you want just one question, that is a way into that big topic.

I think you also raise a really important point about attention. That’s the currency of our lives, is where our attention goes. We have much less of it than we tend to think. Our conscious attention is very limited. Both for leaders for themselves, but also in how they lead their teams, being deliberate and intentional about where do we want to put our attention. It will otherwise be scattered by whatever is coming through the door.

You can end up feeling like the proverbial headless chicken very, very easily unless you’re really intentional about saying, “Leaving aside all the things we don’t know, what matters most today is that we communicate really well with our customers or whatever it is.” That clarity of where attention should be going is such a gift when you’re in a team that’s being led by a person who knows how to do that.

Lisa: I love that. It really creates a grounding for people because let’s face it, the world does feel, at any given moment, that it’s spinning in all these different directions. My colleague, Scott Doorley, has a great term. He talks about we are living in a never-up-to-speed environment, which is the acronym, NUTS. “It’s NUTS,” he says. Our little puny nervous systems are not able to handle. He says, “Our nervous systems are nervous.” I think that’s so true that we’re not prepared, we’re not practiced.

That’s why I think one of the gifts of your work is to be like, you don’t have to do this alone. There’s some knowledge and science we have from behavioral economics, from neuroscience. Not all of this has to be into the wilderness.

Now, the way you apply it is going to be appropriate for your context. That will take some work and application, but you don’t have to invent all of it. I think this idea of really being able to go back to some of those core questions, say, “What do we want to be known for?” By the way, side note, I think that’s a futurist question. I’m just saying. When you say, “What do I want to be known for?” what you’re saying is, what do you want to be known for at a future point in time? Then come back to say, “And then therefore, how does it inform?”

Caroline: The neuroscience behind why that’s calming when you’re dealing with chaos is that what you’re doing is distancing, which is a well-established psychological technique to get some distance from a situation. It drops as a state of threat in your brain. We can do that by saying, “What would my best friend say to me?” That’s distancing and putting yourself in someone else’s shoes. I do really like the power of the future as a place from which you can think more clearly. Thank you for inviting me on your podcast about the future. [laughs]

Lisa: Thank you for giving me the technical term for why scenarios are so powerful because they allow for distancing. They often say one of the most vague, broad pieces of work was for South Africa when it was moving from apartheid to a more democratic government. Adam Kahan, among others, created these mount floor scenarios. One of the things, it’s hard to fight the same way you would about this present day as you would about the future. You just gave me this gift that there’s this distancing that can be so powerful, so thank you for that.

One of the ways I know you talk about your work and how you approach, which really is resonant for me, is this idea of realistic optimism. I want to talk a little bit about that phrase because I think that really does embody a lot of what we’re trying to offer in How We Future and in the conversations and in the resources that I’m working hard to provide is to not be Pollyanna, not be so optimistic that you’re like, “No, it’ll all be fine,” but also not to say that we are helpless either. That there’s this way of approaching this moment with some realism and a sense of hope. I just think the way you talk about that is so powerful. I wonder if you could talk about how you came to that and how that plays out in your work.

Caroline: How I came to it is a really good question because I remember writing in a school yearbook when I was 17 that my life philosophy was realistic optimism. I wonder where that came from. I think it came from a sense that there was possibility in the world, but there was also challenge. I’d not been to an easy school from 11 to 16. I was pretty tough, and yet I saw that it was possible to rise from that and to do something with my life.

I think from an early age, there was this duality, this sense of, okay, things are tough. It’s back to the question of where’s my room for agency? Where’s my room for influencing the situation? I think if you start to look for that perspective, then it becomes easier to see, yes, you acknowledge that things are difficult because if you don’t, actually, psychologically, it’s really hard. If the situation is really hard and everyone is just saying, “No, no, everything is fine,” you feel gaslit in our current language. That’s what we would call it now.

If you acknowledge, “Yes, this is what’s going on and this is difficult, and here’s where we can take steps to move forward.” I think I saw the power of that early in my life. Then I saw it again and again once I was looking for it in the professional realm as well.

I saw how different it was when a leader did the realism bit as well as the optimism bit and how much more powerful it was than if they just said, “We’re going to do great,” versus, “Here are the things we’re wrestling with. I believe in you. I believe in us. This is what I think we can do.” Obviously, I think anybody listening to that, you say, “Actually, I would believe the second leader more than I would believe the first.” That’s what I’ve seen again and again.

Lisa: I think particularly powerful when it can be grounded in purpose, when it can be grounded in values as opposed to some abstract idea. I think you are really naming something to look out for that I know for me as someone that tends to be very enthusiastic about possibility to not go to a place of toxic positivity where you are, as you were saying, not quite gaslighting, but just not really being authentic about the challenge. I think it is what I would say this both-and is what I get from a lot of this.

Caroline: Exactly.

Lisa: Hard things are possible and let’s not overlook or minimize that they’re hard. Let’s do what we can.

Caroline: Again, there’s a deep truth that comes out of the science here, which is that affect labeling, and this is actually more from the psychological research, labeling the emotion, labeling how you’re feeling actually reduces the grip of the emotion on you. If you’re in a meeting and things are getting a bit sticky, that’s why it can feel so much better if someone says, “Gosh, this feels hard, doesn’t it?”

Calling it out, if you do it without drama, if you just name what’s going on, it’s a very, very effective way of reducing some alert that people’s brains are trying to telegraph, and then that allows you to move forward and think about what happens next. There’s almost always some kind of really fundamental thing about how people’s brains work that then explains why common sense actually [laughs] is common sense. In this case, it’s perhaps not so common sense to do the acknowledgement, not just the optimism.

Lisa: I think when you acknowledge it, you’re also saying, “Wait, there’s data I can pay attention to.” I’m not acknowledging it and therefore I’m weak and can’t do it. I’m acknowledging it so that I have more to work with.

I really appreciate, Caroline, in your work that you name stress as a real condition of the human experience. There’s too much of it that leads to dysfunctional anxiety. To not name it and not practice how we deal with it and to understand that all of us deal with it differently is critical and particularly critical for leaders. I wonder, could you share a bit more about specifically that area that I think a lot of people are feeling right now, which is this pervasive stress or even anxiety about the things out of our control and how we could learn to do maybe a more adaptive job? [chuckles]

Caroline: Sress, as many people listening will know, is not all bad. There is a degree of rising to a challenge that actually is really healthy in how we go through life and work. I think when we talk about stress, what we mostly mean is negative stress, where it’s turning into something that feels unpleasant and is triggering a threat response.

More and more, I think we understand there are three components to the kinds of situations that generate a defensive stress response. They’re negative, of course. Otherwise, what’s the problem? [laughs] They are unpredictable, so you’ve got this uncertainty, and they’re demanding. If you had something that was negative and something that was uncertain, but it wasn’t that big a deal, whatever. It’s the combination of being demanding, unpredictable, and negative that actually ends up creating this stress response.

That then gives you, quite quickly, okay, what can I do to find the positive? We’ve just said we don’t want to be polyannarish. Can we find something that is meaningful, that gets us back to, as you were saying, gets us perhaps back to things we care about, things we value, things that are meaningful to us. Unpredictable, okay, so can’t necessarily make the unpredictable predictable. Can’t make things that are demanding easy, but you can focus on what is manageable in the situation. I feel like we keep on coming back to the same point.

All of the stress management techniques that work are effectively doing are reconnecting you to your sense that you can find meaning and manageability in the middle of the noise. One of the things that people might be thinking is, “What about meditation and breathing and stress and sleep?” The reason that helps is it helps your body feel like, “Oh, I’ve got this.”

Your brain is taking signals from the quality of your physical state and your health. The better rested you are, the fitter you feel, the more your brain says, “Everything seems to be under control. I’m going to interpret this situation as manageable. That’s why the physical side of things is part of this question of how do you make stress feel meaningful and manageable even when it feels hard.

Lisa: That contributes to having a good day. I joke, but I’m serious about it. When we think about what do we really care about, we care about not necessarily delivering on our KPIs or whatever they are, although those are important. We care about the connections we have, the quality of our life, our health, our relationships with others.

I think that what you’re sharing is an opportunity to do some context framing, maybe some perspective shifting about how do I think wider about this so I’m not so in that moment of reacting to whatever is coming my way. I have larger reservoirs to pull on. As you were saying, my body is even ready to pull on it. Really thinking with a much wider systems lens, I think, is so powerful.

I just want to say one of the things I also appreciate about your approach is that it is interdisciplinary. It’s not just one way of going about it. You’re like, “Here’s why we understand our bodies work this way when it encounters something unpredictable.” I think that’s incredibly helpful. First of all, it validates, hey, if you’re feeling your heart palpitating or you’re sweating a little bit, not just you. [chuckles] Not just you. It’s a biological evolution of telling you that you’re alive. I just think that’s such a helpful way.

Then to think about once we understand that, then we can practice it. I’m a big believer that we get better at things we practice. What I often say to people is, “Listen, I was not born learning how to give a great presentation or do an Excel spreadsheet. It’s okay. If I’m not born practiced at handling this level of complexity, it doesn’t mean I’m a failure. It just means I’m under-prepared or I have an opportunity to get better at it.”

Caroline: There’s a phrase I learned from Ben Zander, the conductor. He used to teach his musicians, when they made a mistake, to throw their hands up in the air and say, “How fascinating. What can I learn from this?” I’ve now worked with hundreds of leaders, probably thousands of leaders I’ve used that phrase with. Sometimes it comes back to me. I’ll get a message from someone saying, “This was a ‘how fascinating day.’” [laughs]

Lisa: I love it. What a great reframe. How fascinating because that says we’ve learned something. I think that one of the most powerful things we could do is learn how to learn forward. So much of what you offer is an opportunity to not stay stuck. Say, “Wait, how else could we interrogate this? What else is happening?” How fascinating also reminds me, we had an earlier guest, Dan Klein, who teaches improv at Stanford. He plays an improv game called Oh, Good! Like practicing, whatever you get. Oh, Good. Same kind of thing. It just changes your whole posture.

Caroline: I love that. I’m going to steal that. Oh good.

Lisa: There’s another piece of this too that I want to dive into around our posture towards uncertainty in the future being one of abundance or possibility or one of scarcity and reaction. So much of what I try to do in my classes or experiences or even conversations that I design is to not only get to a better idea, but also to help people feel like they’re building the capacity to be comfortable in the ambiguity.

To say, “I have a choice here. Am I going to look at this and react or am I going to pause,” as we said, pay attention, “and reframe?” I wonder if you could share a little bit about your experience with helping leaders move from a reactive or narrowing state to a more abundant being state.

Caroline: It takes practice. I love that you’re emphasizing that. Any new practice takes a little bit of work to have it feel habitual. The first thing I always start with is self-awareness because there are certain tells that we all have when our brain and body are working in concert to put us in a state of alert. We are all a little different. Yes, for most of us, our heart rate will rise. For most of us, we’ll notice our palms get a little sweaty if we start to feel stressed. It’s a little different for everybody.

Getting people to tune into, when was the last time you were super stressed? You think about, what do you think you would have noticed had you been watching you? What do you remember? Might have been a phrase going through your mind. What do you notice about your physical state? Actually, people can usually home in on it. They might say, “I’m not sure. It might be this.”Then the homework is to go and notice because it’s rare that there’s a week that doesn’t have a moment of some stress. Just starting to pay attention to that. Honestly, that is the first step.

Then the second step is to label, as I said, what you’re feeling and say, “Oh, I noticed that I seem to be a little stressed. The internet isn’t working very well today, and I am concerned about that.” Just even labeling that will drop the state of alert so that you can think more clearly. That’s probably where I start with just about everybody.

Then I also get people to tune into which types of situations tend to push their buttons. I talk about cues and tells. The physical stuff might be tells and then cues are specific hot button situations. You know that you’re meeting with someone who will always talk over you, and it really pushes your buttons. Okay, well, that’s actually a really useful thing to know because you can get yourself ready before going into the conversation and do some mental preparation about how you want to react. Take a beat, take a breath, put your feet on the floor when he or she starts doing it.

I think that might sound fundamental to people. Most of us need to recalibrate that stuff every few years because we do change. To know what your cues and tells are is the foundation for managing your stress effectively, I think.

Lisa: It’s so powerful. Again, dare I say there’s a little futuring happening there to imagine the scenario and to try to then rehearse it. Sometimes they say better rehearse the future than be blindsided by the present. This notion of like, “Hey, if this happens, then I might respond this way if this happens.” Now, of course, we can’t predict, but at least it’s not the first time. The first time we want leaders navigating ambiguity is not peak pandemic. That doesn’t mean that we should put undue stress on our systems, but we should practice when the stakes are a little lower. I think that’s so valuable.

Caroline: Yes, really nicely said. I’d also pull out, once again, that there’s a bit of science that sits behind this, which is that when you rehearse in your mind a situation, you notice is it going to be potentially a roadblock and you rehearse in your mind, “How am I going to react to that?”

You’re creating some of the same neural activity as when you actually then go into the situation. That’s why behavioral science research on implementation intentions, as this is sometimes called, what I call when-then, because that’s easier to say. [chuckles] When this happens, when I’m interrupted, then I will take a breath and I will smile and I will remind myself that this is a frail human that I’m dealing with who has their quirks and I have mine too. Back in the room. [laughs]

Lisa: When-then, that is brilliant. We could all use, I think, a little bit more practice in when-then. I remember early on when I started to facilitate groups and teams around conversations that had some high-stakes elements to it and unknown variables, so two things that I think get us hyped, we did some work around Chris Argyris’ ladder of inference. Oh, that was just a huge eye opener in how quickly people jump to a conclusion without, what I hear you say, slowing down and thinking about, “What am I noticing? How could I be more curious about what’s happening versus jumping to a conclusion that I get stuck on?”

Caroline: Absolutely. I love what you’re doing there. You’re helping people come up with a different story. That doesn’t mean, for example, the person who’s interrupting me, it doesn’t mean they’re not annoying, but to go quickly to, “They’re awful. They’re an awful person. They’re an evil person, even.” That’s a story we tell ourselves. Actually, to catch yourself and say, “What might be a different story?”

It’s not that you’re going soft on the person or the situation. What you’re doing is you’re loosening, back to your point about lightly held, you’re loosening your attachment on one possible interpretation of the situation. That then allows you to de-stress a little and then think more clearly. These mental tricks to increase your mental flexibility and your ability to see possible stories helps you in so many different ways, not just problem solving, but also managing yourself through uncertainty.

Lisa: I appreciate that there’s a real attention to what you can do in the moment. I sometimes think about these as micro moments that can lead to macro movements. This idea, if we practice in the small-- well, first of all, when you’re a leader, sometimes people then, “Oh, that’s a good practice. I’m going to learn from that.” You’re modeling. There’s a piece about the muscles growing together. Then it gets better if you start in those moments. I think that is so powerful and, again, a reminder of what we can do versus being overwhelmed by the stuff that we can’t.

Caroline: So true.

Lisa: Are there things that you do in your day to set yourself up for having a good day? Are there rituals or reflections or just things you incorporate?

Caroline: Oh, my goodness, absolutely. I had a filter for the last book for How to Have a Good Day, which was I wouldn’t put anything in if I didn’t do it myself. I needed to shorten the original draft. That was a very helpful filter because there was some stuff that I might advise other people to do, but if I wasn’t doing it myself. Okay, maybe I hadn’t run into that specific situation or whatever, but that was a solid bar, so I can vouch for what’s on the page.

I will say probably my favorite technique, the one that I almost always use whatever is going on is the end-of-day review to say, “What went well and what can I learn from the things that didn’t go so well?” That’s a really rock-solid habit for me. Even as everything else changes, even as the country I’m living in changes, it’s really guided me through. I sit on the couch at the end of the day with my husband and do it. Although I have sometimes had a formal journal, it doesn’t have to be using an app or a journal. That’s probably the most powerful thing out of everything.

Lisa: Oh, that sounds like a fantastic feedback loop. I sometimes ask when I’m in interviews, one of my favorite questions is, tell me about a good day, just to learn about them. It’s like everything has gone well, you’re thinking, you’re reflecting at the end of the day, what has happened? It’s very telling.

Caroline: One of the reasons the book was called How to Have a Good Day was I did the same thing. Great minds. We hadn’t yet met. Whenever I started a consulting project, when I was doing big organizational change work, working with a top team on driving some strategic initiative, I would actually go in and my interviews would start with, “What’s a good day for you? What’s a bad day? How could you get more good days?” Sometimes my colleagues used to say, “Where is the rest of the question?” I said, “Trust me, this is all we need.” [laughs]

Lisa: I love it. Sometimes the best question is the one that is most simple in that way. I did not quote this. I think it’s Oliver Wendell Holmes around finding simplicity on the other side of complexity, which that question does, which I love. Caroline, I know you’ve been working hard on a new book for leaders. I wonder if you can share anything about the research you’ve been working on or what you’re excited to bring to the world next in this new book.

Caroline: Thank you. That’s a lovely question. Yes. I’m working on a playbook for leaders that takes a similar approach to How to Have a Good Day in that it blends science and stories and strategies to give really, really practical advice on how to deal with everyday situations. It’s structured around 21 very common leadership situations from how do I find out what’s going on to how do I make a good decision to how do I set direction in a really inspiring way. That’s how the book is structured.

I’m very hopeful that it’s going to be a one-stop-go-to book for leaders because a lot of books go very deep in a specific area, difficult conversations or whatever. I really want to create a book for busy leaders who can only really have one book to hand and they can go to it again and again. That’s the idea. Then I’ll send people off to the more detailed specific books in a reading list. I think there’s a little bit of a gap for that sort of general leadership guide, and I’m hoping to fill it.

Lisa: I cannot wait. I cannot wait because it is. That, I would say, is really leaning into the use cases of what happens in our everyday. I think that’s going to be so powerful. There are so many times where I think, “Gosh, have we just expected people to be really good at setting direction for their team or running a team meeting?” Why don’t we slow down and actually [laughs] help people learn how to do that?

Dan Klein and I, that I was talking about earlier, I remember we were watching this beautiful exchange of gratitude from a group we were hosting from New Zealand. It was beautiful, filled with Maori traditions and honoring and music and song. We were like, “We could teach that, how to be grateful, how to introduce someone, how to be thankful.” All these things that we take for granted and just be like, “This is how you can elevate everybody in this way.” It sounds like that your book is really going to be just a tremendous asset for leaders that are expected to know, but maybe really don’t.

Caroline: Thank you. I really hope so. It reflects the topics that come up most in my coaching work with people of all ages, but even those well into their 50s and 60s. I hope that it’ll be a book for everybody. Anyone who’s in any kind of leadership role, even if it’s not a formal one like the students in Prague.

Lisa: Well, you are a gift to so many, helping them how to have a better day and helping them learn how to future with humanity, which I just think is so critical in this moment. I just wonder as we close out, Caroline, is there anything that you’d like to share for our listeners about just how they can think differently about how we future, about how they can future?

Caroline: Well, I do have a website and I have a bunch of resources on that website that are free. I’m very delighted to see people come and download them and use them. That might be a place to start. My website is carolineweb.co. That’s .co, not .com. There are lots of Caroline Webbs in the UK. It’s a very common name. [laughs] Not so common in the US, but it’s very common in the UK. Carolineweb.co. Yes, absolutely. There are a bunch of things there. You can search by topic and you can search for resilience, for example. You can search by a keyword of uncertainty, and you’ll get some help, I hope.

Lisa: Oh, absolutely. We will definitely put that in the show notes and we’ll do some continued digging ourselves. I just want to thank you so much for taking time amid the final stages of this new book and for doing what you do to help more people. Have a good day. I think it is essential, it is foundational. We don’t talk about it enough. I cannot wait to share your work with more people. Thank you so much for being here.

Caroline: Thank you so much, Lisa. This has been tremendous.

Lisa: What a gift to spend time with Caroline Webb. I learned that having a good day isn’t about everything going right, it’s about noticing what’s in our control. Here’s a practice you can take away from this conversation. Before you close out your day, take a minute to reflect on two questions Caroline offered. Number one, what went well? Number two, what can I learn from what didn’t? It’s a small ritual that can completely change how you end your day and how you start the next one.

If this conversation resonated with you, take a moment to share it with someone who could use a bit more calm and clarity in their leadership. Or leave a rating or review for How We Future. It helps new listeners discover these conversations and join our community of curious, optimistic changemakers.

I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thank you for listening. Here’s to more good days ahead.

What if the future makes more sense when we treat it like a game?

In this episode of How We Future, Lisa Kay Solomon is joined by Jeffrey Rogers—futures facilitator, lifelong learner, and co-founder of PROJECTORY—to explore how play, prospection, and curiosity help people prepare for inevitable uncertainty. Jeff is an expert at designing experiences, workshops, and games that help leaders feel the future, not just think about it.

Together, Lisa and Jeff unpack why the future is “too important to leave to the futurists,” and how all of us can build their capacity to imagine, experiment, and act with more confidence.

Jeff shares stories from youth leadership trips, corporate workshops, and global facilitation work that reveal how people learn best when they’re invited to experiment, reflect, and play their way into new futures.

You’ll learn:

• Why prospection, or an ability to imagine forward, is a superpower we’re all naturally equipped with

• How games create low-stakes environments for exploring high-stakes ideas

• How simple imaginative activities (like interviewing a child about their future) promote agency and perspective

• Why designing your future self is just as important as designing future strategies

• Jeff’s favorite books and games, so that YOU can put his great ideas into action

This episode will encourage you to stay open, curious, and willing to try things that might not work (yet). Jeff’s approach makes the future feel expansive, collaborative, and wonderfully human.

Links from the show:

• Chair Zombie Game

• Gamestorming (practices by David Gray and Sunni Brown)

• Hal Hirshfield’s work at UCLA

• PROJECTORY

Bonus! Jeff’s recommendations for diving into futures practices:

• How to Future by Scott Smith and Madeline Ashby – an accessible toolkit for futures facilitation

• Timefulness by Marcia Bjornerud – a geologist’s perspective on thinking across vastly different time scales

• Borne: A Novel by Jeff VanderMeer – science fiction that builds deep empathy for non-human entities (and yes, he cried at the end)

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today. Today I’m joined by futures facilitator Jeff Rogers. Jeff doesn’t just talk about possibilities. He creates experiences that help people live into them, test them, and feel them. In this episode, Jeff and I talk about how games are crucial in navigating complexity and how to bridge the gap between our future selves and our present selves.

Jeff also shares some of his favorite futures resources, including his sci-fi book collection. If you’re someone who doesn’t only hope that things get better, but is ready to make them better, then let’s dive in.

Jeff Rogers, I’m so excited to welcome you to How We Future.

Jeff Rogers: Thank you so much. Thrilled to be here.

Lisa Kay Solomon: We’ve known each other now for many years, which is an absolute benefit to me and the work I’ve been doing since meeting with you. Every time we talk, though, whether we’re working on an actual project together or we’re just hanging out, I always leave feeling more energized about what’s possible. There’s probably a lot of folks listening to this that are meeting you for the first time. I’m curious, how would you introduce yourself? When you tell people, “This is what I do for a living,” at a dinner party or hanging out, what do you say?

Jeff Rogers: That’s usually an absolute disaster, a train wreck intro. I have been workshopping it for a long time, mostly by trying to help my parents understand what I was doing professionally. I often actually default to futures facilitator. I do think of myself as a facilitator, first and foremost, that I am there to support conversations, to design and facilitate experiences, and as much as possible, have those actually be in service of an exploration of futures. That’s where I like to start, futures facilitator, and see how quizzical the look I get in response is, and then I’ll go from there.

Lisa Kay Solomon: I love that. I appreciate that you’ve actually been actively workshopping it because it is-

Jeff Rogers: [laughs] It’s been a long-term challenge.

Lisa Kay Solomon: Well, listen, I have almost everyone in my family going, “What exactly do you do? I know you do good stuff, but what exactly is it?” I think it is a challenge because it doesn’t yet exist as a field. I think people know what a meeting is. They know what it’s like to facilitate a meeting. This idea of facilitating futures is somewhat of a new concept. I’ve heard you say, “The future should not just be for the Futurists,” and this idea of bringing this work to more people.

Jeff Rogers: Yes, too important, in fact, to be left to the vanishingly small population that self-identifies as futurists, which also tends to skew towards certain demographics. I think one of the things that you and I have really shared over the years, and both centered in our work, is trying to make those conversations and those explorations more accessible and feel like they are more open, more inclusive, more participatory, that everybody has something to offer, and that we can all learn from each other in doing this thing.

I also think one of the challenges of articulating exactly what it is that you or I do is that it takes different forms. I could tell people, “Oh, I’m a workshop designer,” or “Sometimes I make games,” but part of the beauty, I think, is that we’re always looking for and discovering new ways of helping people explore and experience futures. It’s open-ended by design. I think that’s the way it ought to be.

Lisa Kay Solomon: I love that. I would say that’s the beauty of the design part, which is meeting people where they are.

Jeff Rogers: I think one of the ways that I like to open Futures conversations and bring people in is by emphasizing the fact that they already have this capability, that superpower of prospection, that we can all imagine futures. We can do interesting things with them. We can even imagine multiple futures, not just one. We can stay up at night thinking about all the things that could go wrong. [chuckles] The word for that would just be anxiety.

[laughter]

The other word is this prospection, and being able to imagine forward and then recognizing not only that we have that capability, but that you can do cool things with it. If you can see a range of possible futures, you can start to ask yourself some questions, like “Which of these are favorable? Which ones would I like to make more probable? Are there things that I could do to increase the probability that one of these possible futures might actually be the one that we wind up with?” That’s all really natural.

Actually being intentional about it is where people can discover some of their agency. I think that’s a lot of ultimately what we’re trying to do. Starting from the point of helping people recognize that they all have this capability. They probably just undervalue and underutilize, and underappreciate it.

Lisa Kay Solomon: I love that framing so much. It always reminds me of the Wizard of Oz lesson. It’s in you all along. [laughs] I’m not sure we all have the red ruby slippers, maybe we do, a futures agency. It’s in us. That last point about it being undervalued and underutilized. I think, Jeff, you come to this work from a very unique place, which is that you’ve worked and spent a lot of time with our youngest futurists, helping teach them how to grow and learn and develop themselves.

I know that was hugely formative for you and your approach. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about your work with some early folks in experiential ways and how that’s informed now the work that you’re doing with executives and leadership teams across the world.

Jeff Rogers: Happy to. This is one of the fun things we get to do as creatures who can think forward and backward in time. I can look back on my very messy, nonlinear career path, and now I can project some coherence on it in retrospect. One of the things, if I had to stitch a red thread between the early years, [laughs] that I was feeling out what I could do in the world. I did do quite a bit of work in experiential learning and outdoor education, and youth leadership development.

I took kids on backpacking trips in the Sierra, I was a sailing camp instructor for a while. I have had a lot of different roles from that time, and I’m getting eventually into corporate learning and development and executive leadership, and the Futurist focus. In every stop along that career path, I think I was trying to help people do things together that they didn’t necessarily feel like they could do on their own or that they couldn’t do as well on their own. I love that collaborative aspect of it.

I also really like some of those early things that you emphasize in experiential education and youth leadership, getting people to step outside of their comfort zone, getting them to try new things, getting them to be open and okay with being wrong. When it comes to futures, we’re going to be wrong about all kinds of things. We need to be. We would love to be able to precisely forecast everything, but that is an illusion. We’ll never get there. What we might be able to do is be wrong in interesting ways and ways that actually give us a new perspective on choices and paths and contingencies.

Some of that same spirit of tapping curiosity and a passion for exploration and discovery, and a collaborative journey. An experience that we’re going to build together. That I can pull pretty neatly from some of those early years. I would also add to that just in terms of how we engage people and particularly how I approach the craft of facilitation. I think a lot of the things that I do well now are things I learned working with kids. You know I’m very big on play as a modality for learning and exploration.

We all recognize that it works really great for the little animal. Then at some point, we say, “Oh, well, now that the animal’s bigger, they need PowerPoint decks and white papers.” Those are fine things, but there are other great ways of exploring and imagining. Often, I think that can and should involve play.

Lisa Kay Solomon: Oh, hallelujah. Totally agree.

Jeff Rogers: Very simple audience here.

Lisa Kay Solomon: You and I, one of the most fun things that we do when we work together is to think about how do we introduce this game or how do we get them to be more playful in a way that doesn’t trigger this huge threat response? Because, as you said, somewhere along the way, you said, “Hey, as you’ve gotten bigger, let’s get more serious.” Even when we have research that suggests we learn better during play, we work better with others during play, but yet nobody says we have a really difficult problem to solve, let’s go play a game. Okay, speaking games, you play a lot of great games.

I wonder if you want to share, maybe a game or two, because one of the things we want to do in How We Future is to make this very practical and tangible. Do you have a favorite game or two, Jeff, that you love to play with us older animals who may be a little bit more resistant to the idea of play?

Jeff Rogers: Yes. I’ll start with one that is not actually a game, straight up, but it is an imaginative activity that I think is really powerful in opening people to conversations about futures and also their agency and shaping them. I think I’ve mentioned this to you before. I have some friends at an innovation and L&D agency called Stoked, and this is one of their favorites. You probably know some of these people through the design school at Stanford. They have connections there.

One of their favorites that I have enjoyed co-facilitating with them is something we’ll do often at the beginning of a high-level leadership executive education program that’s going to have a futuring component. We’ll ask them as a preparatory piece to do a quick interview, talk with someone that is maybe a family member, someone close to them, ideally a young person, like if they have a child or a niece or a nephew, something like that, and ask them to describe the future that they imagine for themselves 10 years or 15 years down the line. Maybe even illustrate it.

That adds an extra layer of fun. They’ll all do this. They’ll have their little interview. They’ll hear from this young person who, in some way, is connected to and meaningful to them. Then they’ll come to the program, and they’ll share that out. We’ll also ask them about how they felt when they were hearing about this future. Where were they surprised? What resonated with them? What was their response as they were listening? Almost inevitably, these adults find, as they’re hearing these visions of the future, that they start to ask themselves reflexively what their role in it is.

How could they make that vision a reality for this young person that they care about? What could they start to do today to make that future a little bit more likely, to bring it a little bit closer, to be a steward of this imagination, of this vision of a possible, and in this case, a preferred future that they in some way are already connected to and that they care about, that they’re invested in because it matters to someone else. Already, they’re starting to discover their agency.

They’re starting to think about how they put the present in service of the possible future, how they connect their actions today toward a vision of tomorrow, and one that is probably going to play out and extend beyond their own lifetime. All of that winds up being really powerful just in orienting you to connecting your imagination of possibilities and maybe even seeing some possibilities that didn’t occur to you immediately. That opens you to that wider range of possible futures, and then using them to get a new perspective on what you can do as a partner or as a parent, or as a friend today. I think that’s a tremendously powerful, simple thing. I love it.

Lisa Kay Solomon: Oh, it sounds amazing. There’s so many things embodied in that modality of, first of all, this idea that we have the power, as you said earlier, to prospect, to imagine a future that’s a little bit further out than maybe we’re comfortable with, and that intentional prompt to think about it and put some texture to it and, as you said, maybe even illustrate it, taps into other parts of our brain to make it more concrete. That design and simplicity gets at some interesting research I’ve read from Hershfield over at UCLA that talks about the fact that we tend to think of our future selves as strangers.

That there’s something when we get too far out that feels so disconnected from where we recognize ourselves today that we don’t even make that connection that it’s the same person. If you think of your future self as a stranger, then in many ways, you’re not going to have the same level of empathy that you might have. That just small, even fun exercise that may seem super simple and easy at the time, but actually gets into these deeper layers is such a powerful way to break some of those barriers.

Jeff Rogers: I agree 100% and I think that’s a lot of why it works so well.

Lisa Kay Solomon: There’s another game I’ve seen you play that I have to ask you about, which is to help leaders get more comfortable with emerging complexity. To do that in an incredibly experiential and immersive way that is very fun but also has quite the kicker of a punchline. I wonder if you could talk about that one.

Jeff Rogers: Absolutely. As I did with the previous interaction, I want to give a little bit of attribution and lineage to this. I know that this game has been floating around for a long time. In fact, one day I spent an afternoon trying to chase down the origins online. I was able to get back to the early aughts. I actually found a collection online of summer camp and youth leadership activities. This was in there, which was interesting. Now, I didn’t learn it until probably about 10 years ago. I encountered it actually from a friend of yours. Robert Poynton was the first person to show me The Chair Game.

You can read about it online. I know Rob’s written about it. Other people have written about it as well. It is a human systems dynamics game. The dynamics play out in ways that are really rich and actually allow for a range of possible frames. I like to talk about this game in that context of navigating uncertainty and complexity in an environment where you have limited information and limited influence. I’m sure when this is framed for youth leadership at a summer camp, it’s probably a lot more about collaboration and communication and listening to and learning from others.

Understanding how you can be a good leader and also how you can be a good team member. The idea is that you have a group of participants in a pretty open game space with one chair per person. For reasons that will soon become apparent, I think it’s good that the chairs don’t roll. You have one chair per person, and the chairs are randomly distributed with enough room to walk between any of them safely. A few feet between each chair. You ask one person to stand up.

Now there is an empty chair. That person now becomes what I call the chair zombie. The chair zombie has one goal in mind, and they are looking for an open chair to sit down. Right now, it’s the chair that they got up from. They have to walk. It’s not the new school zombie where they’re super fast. I like them to be lumbering. Also makes things a little bit safer for everybody involved. They’re walking, and they are trying to occupy an open chair. Everybody else gets to work together.

They get to work on a team. They also have one goal, and it’s to keep the chair zombie from getting into that open chair. They cannot restrain the zombie physically. They can’t hold them back. They can’t form a wall and block them. The way that they keep the zombie from getting the open chair is by occupying it. If anybody gets up to move to a chair, they have to go to a different one before they come back to the chair they started in. You can’t get up and pop back down.

If you’re up, you’re up. They cannot move the chairs. That’s the other rule. That’s pretty much it. It’s really simple. You present it to people, and they’re like, “Oh, yes, sounds easy.” This is the beauty. It sounds easy, but it’s not because you have to do it with other people. You don’t know exactly how the other people in the room are going to respond once the game starts. I like to run it with at least 20 people. I have played it with up to about 150. That gets pretty raucous.

Lisa Kay Solomon: Sounds dangerous.

Jeff Rogers: Yes, but usually, the first round goes for somewhere between 10 and 20 seconds. It’s an absolute disaster. People are mystified by how difficult this thing turned out to be. I like to play several rounds, and after every round, ask people what happened. It gives them an opportunity to reflect. It gives them an opportunity to point fingers if that’s the kind of crowd it is. It gives them an opportunity to ask questions for clarification. I played the game one time, and it was an intact corporate team. They played the first round in total silence. Only afterward, they said, “Hey, Jeff, are we allowed to talk to each other?”

Lisa Kay Solomon: Oh, my gosh.

Jeff Rogers: Yes, which is a beautiful moment. Yes, because you ask, well, why would you think you couldn’t? That actually surfaces an interesting learning that very often in an unfamiliar, uncertain environment, we try to draw on analogous experiences, things that seem like they might be valuable points of reference. You’re like, “Oh, I’ve played something like this.” Very often, we assume boundaries and limitations that may not exist. That’s actually a thing you can take out into the real world.

How often are you in an unfamiliar environment, and you don’t actually explore it as thoroughly as you could, or you don’t ask for clarification? Instead, you might be assuming that certain options are on the table or off the table, that might not be the case. I would argue that that’s often how people approach futures. We don’t actually fully explore the limits and contours of our agency, and we just assume that some things are fixed or they can’t be done.

Lisa Kay Solomon: It’s fantastic. I’ve watched you play that game, but hearing you describe it in this way allows me to even understand its brilliance at a whole other level. It reminds me of a great quote, you can learn more from an hour of play than a year of conversation. I just think about all of the different levels of debrief and conversation you can have from that. As you were saying, anything from what are our cultural norms? How do we show up? This idea that we just assumed we couldn’t speak.

What does that say about the culture? What does it say about collaboration and trust? What does it say about our own beliefs about being better at something than we might actually be? As you described it this way, I never really thought about it as a derivation of musical chairs, a game we played when we were all young. If you think about musical chairs, which is super fun and could get a little raucous, too, the cues involved are a little bit more linear and bounded than what you’re describing in the chair zombie games.

There, it’s like music cue, off, on. Usually, the chairs are in a row, not scattered. Sometimes we can think that because it feels a little familiar, we’re going to be expert at it. Then going back to this wonderful point you made earlier about our natural abilities as humans to both reflect what happened in order to prospect what could happen, and to do that in a way that has an element of fun but also has a lot of seriousness behind it.

Jeff Rogers: Yes. This is part of why games are so great for learning and exploration in general. It creates an extremely low-stakes environment to explore concepts and ideas that can be very fraught. How we navigate complexity, how we show up as a leader and a learner when we have limited information, limited influence, and we can’t necessarily just tell everybody what to do top down. It allows us to explore that kind of thing in a space where the outcome doesn’t matter.

Actually, you learn faster and tend to make progress in a game like that by running quick cycles because I’ll always say after the first round, well, we didn’t have a strategy, we didn’t have a plan. I say, okay, great, I’ll give you a minute, and you can decide on what to do. You can coordinate. It’s always interesting there, too, to see how long they’ll debate what they should do. Someone inevitably will say, “Well, we should have one person telling everyone what to do,” which, as you can imagine, is set up for failure.

It’s interesting to see that sometimes they have this bias toward, well, we should debate the thing to death before we just try something new. You’ve given them an environment where the cost of running an experiment is basically zero. They have a really good opportunity to quickly validate or invalidate an approach and learn. That’s another thing that people can take away is what are my biases? When the game starts, if I’m thinking musical chairs, what do you do in musical chairs?

Well, you keep moving. You all stand up and start moving, but this is a game where actually that’s making it more complicated. It’s a really beautifully designed interaction that I, now playing this for, I think, close to 10 years, I feel like I still see new things that are rich and transferable aside from the fact that it’s just super fun.

Lisa Kay Solomon: It’s great. It’s super fun. I know you work with a lot of leaders, Jeff. Again, we’re trying to make this practical for folks and fun. A, to open up their horizons, that there’s lots of different ways to approach the future. There’s no one right way. This isn’t a show for a recipe or a single process. The future feels pretty serious right now. There’s a lot happening that is, as my colleague Scott Dorley says, that is making our nervous systems nervous.

When you are working with a leader or a group that knows they want to bring people together to talk about the future and serious issues, how do you help them get comfortable that this lighter side, or perhaps a little bit more game-oriented or play-oriented approach, might actually be more effective? What are just some ways that exchange unfolds? Just to get people that are looking for new approaches, that are hoping that it might actually be fun, and that fun part doesn’t necessarily take away from the seriousness. Just curious about tips you might have of trying to get more people more comfortable with this way of entering into conversations about the future.

Jeff Rogers: As I said earlier, I like often to start with something that feels relatable and very human, and not overburden things with jargon and terminology and heavy conceptual frameworks. I’ll introduce the idea of prospection, but through that interaction, I talked about where it actually starts with you exploring a future that you are connected to and care about, and might reflexively assume a position of stewardship and care for. Then you can pretty easily connect that to, if you wanted to, within the organization that you may actually be enabling a set of futures for your teams, for your employees, for your stakeholders.

They may have things that they desire that they want, and you have an opportunity to understand those visions by starting those conversations and listening, and then reflecting on asking yourself, “Well, what can I do with these? What is my role? What is my responsibility?” I think having an entry point like that is at once accessible, but also I think pretty deeply resonant. People see that there is a creative practice here, but also it’s getting to something serious. Same with that chair game.

I will frame it up as a game, and we will have fun, but as we go, I will push harder and harder on some of those things that I think will be valuable takeaways for a leader and for a learner, and for a team within an organization. For me, a lot of the craft of facilitation, as I try to practice it, is being able to toggle between these moments that feel exploratory, open-ended, freeing, creative, and then actually reflecting on those and asking, “Well, what do we take from that experience?”

This is actually something that I picked up from you, that the future is an area where we don’t have any experts. There’s not somebody in the room that we can turn to who’s going to tell us everything we need to know about the future. Instead, we can try to design experiences that allow us to learn, that allow us to ask new questions that might be rich and valuable. Easing people into the creative practice of it, so then we can do some of the analytical reflection, synthesis, distillation. I think the two need to go hand in hand. If you have all of one and not the other, you’re not maximizing the value of the experience.

Lisa Kay Solomon: Oh, my gosh. There’s so much I love in that. What I hear you say is really having a lot of empathy for where the group is, where the team is, where the leader is at that moment, and trying to work with them to help them grow and shift and move enough that it really might open up, versus break them because you’re pushing too fast. Jeff, I could talk to you forever, as you know, but I want to end with some final gifts, maybe to our listeners. You may recall that in the book I wrote about designing conversations called Moments of Impact, one of my favorite parts about that book is the starter kit we had at the back.

That was like, look, we wrote this book, but we also know you all are very busy people and probably won’t have time to read all of it, so just go to the back, the starter kit. Where we say, hey, ask these questions, try these things, read these things. I want to end in that same spirit. What are some questions that people should be asking, particularly if they’re interested in more expansive approaches to the future, whether in their personal lives or professional lives? Are there great questions maybe they should be asking themselves or their colleagues?

Jeff Rogers: I love this approach, by the way. Questions that I think are particularly rich or useful or fun, just asking yourself or your team, whatever group you’re talking futures with, how our present actions or strategy, leadership, what have you, how that actually aligns with the futures that we want to enable. There’s not a direct linear thing where we can say, “I do this today, and it creates this perfectly in accord vision of tomorrow five years down the line.” Instead, it’s always probabilistically, and it’s thinking about what kinds of bets can we be making in the present that might increase the likelihood of a future?

What are some little things that we can nudge while also learning in the right direction so that we’re refining our vision of the future or futures as we’re working towards our preferred futures? I think that is a continuous reflective practice of just asking yourself, “Are these really aligned? Am I using today to serve the tomorrows that I want to see?”

Lisa Kay Solomon: I love that question. It really connects with something I’ve heard you say a lot around learning with the future and not having an antagonistic response to it. I love that question around alignment and that it’s an ongoing question. It’s not one and done. It’s something you can keep doing.

Jeff Rogers: This is another thing that I’m always thinking about, and we’ve talked about a little bit, and also ties back to my early youth leadership days. I remember I had a couple of experiences where I had a group of teenagers for a few weeks. They were from all over the country. They didn’t know each other. Some of them were away from home for the first time on a backpacking trip. At the beginning, I would remind them that they had perhaps a unique opportunity.

That they’re away from their family, they’re away from their friends, they’re away from all the things that people already know or assume about them. They have an opportunity to think about who they would like to be. They can practice some new things. They might be able to treat this as an opportunity to explore who they would like to return as when they go back to their world. Maybe if you’re a little more shy, this is a time where you play with a new behavior of being a little bit more outgoing.

I was always happy to talk with them about how they might do or be that thing. Very often, that one actually is by asking other people more questions. If you’re someone who talks a lot, maybe this is a time where you try listening. That’s another thing that I always try to emphasize when leaders and learners are thinking about the future, to remember that we’re not just prototyping and designing futures. We’re also prototyping and designing our future selves.

That you too are a prototype and you can reflect on who or how you would be if you were designing a character, and you dialed up this aspect of yourself plus 10 points, or I’m going to give myself a new superpower that I can try here in this situation. This is another place where gameplay is really great, but I really encourage prototyping your future self by picking up and exploring new practices today, playing with them.

Lisa Kay Solomon: Thinking about your choices through the lens of a prototype for yourself and your future self is something we can all try in that way.

Jeff Rogers: Yes, or I remember actually attending a web session that you hosted at Stanford a couple of years ago, where you had Leah Zaidi, another futurist that you and I are both fans of. She talked on that session about approaching early stages of your career and professional development as LARPing. You can try these different things and explore them, and experiment in them. I think we can do the same to a certain extent with some of our behaviors and our mindsets, and maybe even some of the things that we want to experiment with developing as practices that might actually prove adaptive as we’re continuing to navigate this uncertain future.

Lisa Kay Solomon: Bringing back the LARPing. I love it. For those of you that are not into gaming jargon, LARPing stands for live action role play. I love that, though, because the format of that asks you to take on different personas, which, as you said, might be an accelerating move to get us to become more adaptable. Okay, Jeff, my last question for you, because I know you are a voracious learner. Suggestions on resources or places where people can read or listen opportunities for them to broaden their own horizons.

Jeff Rogers: Lisa Kay Solomon has a fantastic LinkedIn learning course, Leading as a Futurist, which I definitely recommend.

Lisa Kay Solomon: Okay, thank you very-- We’re out of time. Thank you so much. Longest promo ever.

Jeff Rogers: That is a great starting point, I will say, and it is easily accessible. I would also say for people who are interested in futures facilitation piece, that How to Future?

Lisa Kay Solomon: Scott Smith.

Jeff Rogers: Scott Smith. That’s a great toolkit. It’s really accessible. That’s another book that I go back to often. Gamestorming as well is one. If you commingle those books and you get a bunch of interesting futures ideas, and then some games and frames from Gamestorming, you’re off to the races, you’re ready to design workshops. The things I wanted to get into that are less likely to pop up elsewhere, I love books that get you to think about time and time scales.

One that I came across recently that I really enjoyed was called Timefulness by a geologist named Marcia Bjornerud. It is a beautiful book that gets you to think as a geologist and also, in a certain sense, think about time on geologic non-human scales. Then, of course, it does relate back to the human scale and the decisions we make and the systems we build and how those interact with and ultimately affect these larger geologic scales and processes. It’s a beautiful thing.

I like stepping out of our human bias in that sense. Related to that, I’m a big sci-fi fan. I can’t do this and not recommend some science fiction. One of my favorite sci-fi books that I think is under-read, perhaps, is a great sci-fi writer named Jeff VanderMeer. He’s written a bunch of stuff that’s awesome. One of my favorites of his is called Born. It is a dystopian future. It’s a ripping story. It also has some non-human characters that you develop surprisingly deep, empathic connections to.

I was in tears at the end of that book. Part of what I thought was so remarkable about it is that you do find yourself relating to and [laughs] feeling deep empathy for this weird range of entities. The level of wizardry involved in telling a story like that is that weird and that affecting, I think is really awesome and is a great thing when we’re thinking about futures and stewardship of futures. We have an opportunity to broaden the scope of our empathy and think about who and what we need to be taking care of and looking out for.

Lisa Kay Solomon: I can’t wait to check it out. Wizardry and weird storytelling. First of all, my huge appreciation for you, Jeff, for being on this journey with me, not only of this new journey of this podcast, but journey in the futures life and in life more generally. Not only are you a fantastic futures facilitator, you are a phenomenal friend. I just want to say how much I appreciate your spirit of generosity. And your spirit of care is, in and of itself, adaptive, resilient, proactive stance towards the future. I have benefited from that greatly myself. I want to thank you for all of those things.

Jeff Rogers: Absolutely. Fully and warmly reciprocated. Lisa, you’re the best. I very much look forward to seeing the futures that you shape through your work and hope to be involved as long as I can. Thank you again.

[music]

Lisa Kay Solomon: Thank you for listening to this episode of How We Future featuring Jeff Rogers. It was super fun to hear Jeff’s approach to inviting more people to imagine futures through play and games. Chair zombie game, anyone? I hope you’ll join me next time for more conversations on shaping the future optimistically, practically, and intentionally. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and I hope you have a great week.

Is trust the foundation of the future?

In this episode of How We Future, Lisa Kay Solomon sits down with Zoë Jenkins, Director of Civic Trust and Recruitment at Civics Unplugged, to talk about how the next generation is reimagining democracy from the ground up.

Zoë’s journey started early—she joined Civics Unplugged as a high school fellow, went on to write her own job description fresh out of college, and now leads programs helping young people build community through civic trust, a term you’ll learn all about in this episode.

Zoë and Lisa cover:

• Why democracy depends on trusting your neighbors, not just voting with them

• How young people are turning frustration into innovation

• The difference between attachment and affection, and why it matters

• How flattening hierarchies and “breaking the model” unlocks leadership at every age

This episode is a call to action for anyone who wants to strengthen the bonds that hold our communities—and our futures—together. Zoë reminds us that democracy isn’t just a system. It’s a daily practice of showing up, listening, and believing in one another.

Links from the show:

• Zoë’s TEDx Talk on “Saving the World in an Empathy Crisis”

• CBS This Morning segment featuring Zoë and Generation Change

• Learn more about Zoë on her website

• Zoë’s partnership with Aerie to speak about “How to Contribute to Social Justice”

• Article from More in Common about the role of sports fans in democracy

🎧 Listen now:

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Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite changemakers about shaping tomorrow starting today.

Today, I’m so thrilled to welcome Zoë Jenkins to How We Future. Zoë is the director of civic trust and recruitment at Civics Unplugged, an innovative organization empowering young people to design the democracy they want to be a part of. What’s remarkable about Zoë is that she’s been leading this work since she was a teenager. From joining the Kentucky Student Voice Team in middle school to delivering two TEDx talks before finishing college, Zoë built her career on one core idea, that trust is the foundation for every thriving community.

In our conversation, Zoë talks about writing her own job description straight out of college, why we need to move from affection to attachment when it comes to democracy, and how small, local acts of connection can ripple outward into real change. It’s a conversation about courage, empathy, and the everyday ways young people are already shaping what’s next. Let’s jump in.

Zoë Jenkins, welcome to How We Future. I am so excited to have you on today because we are going to do some time travel today, Zoë. We are going to start with the present, we’re going to go back to the past, and then catapult to the future. No better person to do that with, particularly when talking about civic futures, than you. Thank you so much for being here.

Zoë Jenkins: Thank you for having me. I’m so excited.

Lisa: Zoë, I want to start with this incredible position that you have with this unbelievably inspiring organization called Civics Unplugged that we met at over five years ago. Currently, you are the director of civic trust and recruitment for Civics Unplugged. Can you tell us a little bit about Civics Unplugged and also how this unique position came to be?

Zoë: Yes. Civics Unplugged, we’ve been around for, I guess, coming on six years now. Our mission is to cultivate the next generation of civic innovators. I got my start in the program, actually doing the fellowship back when I was a junior in high school where I got this incredible experience to develop as a leader in my understanding of democracy, what is civics, and how can young people build the future that they want to live in and deserve to live in. I did that program back when I was in high school.

I don’t know, I just stayed in the orbit of Civics Unplugged. When I first applied to join the program, I thought I was going to learn how to register people to vote and very quickly learned that civics is so much bigger than that. That was just an aha moment for me, especially during the pandemic when it felt like everything civic was falling apart. Stayed connected with CU. Then as I was going into my last year of college, I was like, “Oh, I need a job.” [chuckles].

I think I had the most fortunate situation possible if I was talking to Josh, who’s been a mentor of mine since I started the program. I was telling him my dream and my vision of, “Look, I think the problem with civics right now is trust. People do not believe in the good intentions of their fellow citizens. We don’t trust institutions. It’s like young people cannot build a democracy they want to build if we can’t even be in the same room with other people.” I was like, “This has been my dream, I want to do this,” but I was like, “I just don’t even know how to make that happen.”

Josh, I think believing in young people in the way he was, he said, “Look, if you want to do it, you can do it here. Write the job description, make it happen.” That’s how the Director of Civic Trust and Recruitment title came together. I began to do my dream job for the last almost six months, which is a real blessing to get to do alongside the great team at Civics Unplugged.

Lisa: I think that story really captures everything I’ve experienced about you, Zoë, which is just so much passion for the future, passion for other humans, belief that just because it doesn’t exist yet doesn’t mean that it can’t or shouldn’t, and how do we go for it, and also the trust that you build along the way. I’ve gotten to meet a number of people that have worked with you over the years, and I’ve had that pleasure of working with you over the years. There’s just such a desire to invest in you and believe in you.

I’ve seen you build the trust with others that say, “Yes, it doesn’t exist yet, but why not? Of course, let’s go for it.” I love that you invented your own job coming out of college, which I think some people don’t think they get to do until they’re much, much older. That alone, I think, is super inspiring.

Zoë: That’s exactly what I thought when Josh was like, “You can build your own job.” I was like, “You’re funny.” I was like, “I’m 21. Who gets to write their own job description?” It’s a real gift to get to build alongside an intergenerational team of other young people who are also getting to do their dream jobs. I think this is the way work should feel for everybody. I just feel very lucky.

Lisa: I also think that given the state that we’re in right now around our civic discourse and our societies, I feel like every organization and community needs a director of civic trust. That would be a step in the right direction. I wonder if you could share a little bit about some of the stuff that you do day to day. What is the goal of the director of civic trust?

Zoë: I should back up and talk about where civic trust even came from for me. When I was at the University of Virginia working in my last year of college on my senior thesis, I decided to write about civic trust, which basically is how much should we believe in the good intentions and potential of our fellow citizens? Because democracies are inherently fragile. It’s a very difficult thing that we do to go to the ballot box and hope that no matter what the outcome is, other people will look out for us.

That requires a really high level of trust. That’s just hard. That’s not like a deficiency in our society. It’s just that that level of trust is hard to achieve. I was writing my thesis, and I was thinking about all these things like, “How do we just get people in communities together where they start to believe other people are worth working with and worth sharing this democracy with, and that no matter what happens, we can work together and imagine a better future together, and that it’s worth imagining that future with other people included, not just your small group of people who are just like you.”

What does that look like for my job? The recruitment piece is the obvious part of we want incredibly talented, civically minded kids to join our fellowship. How do we reach those kids who maybe don’t think that civics is for them or don’t think that they’re a civic leader, but in fact they are? How do we help convert those kids into civic innovators, because they have all the tools? They just might not see the ingredients coming together.

Then the civic trust piece is helping kids build that in-person, local community that is so necessary for democracies to flourish, because you can talk about national politics all day, but the building blocks of democracy are, does your neighborhood come together for an annual potluck? Do your kids carpool together? Do you talk to the other people on your school bus? Do you play in the park with other people? Just how do you build that level of community that then can be supercharged into civic innovation when the time is right?

Lisa: I love that focusing on the local, the hyper-local. We’re going to talk a little bit about your orientation from your roots of working in Kentucky and really being an advocate of that, even before high school. I have been so impressed by Civics Unplugged. I wonder if we could just take a moment to talk about the organization in and of itself. You mentioned it was started six years ago. I learned about it during the pandemic. One thing that struck me about it was how it talked about the future and how it talked about the role that young people had in the future.

Then, alongside that, the business model it had in thinking about the future around literally investing in young people. It struck me from the very beginning that this was not adults telling young people, “Eat your beets and get involved in civics and go vote.” It was something totally different. I wonder if you could just share a little bit about the roots of Civics Unplugged and some of the things that make it so unique.

Zoë: I think, Lisa, you just captured all of it. I think what I really admire about Civics Unplugged is that we really walk the walk in terms of we want young people to build the future, so young people are going to build the future. I think that’s been reflected in, back in the early days when I was in the fellowship, having a steering committee of young people, so high school students deciding which of their fellows were going to get funding for projects. I was with a group of four other kids, and we were deciding, “Okay, we have a $10,000 budget. Which youth civic projects are going to get funded, and why are we picking these projects over other projects?”

The invitation to have direct feedback on lessons and direct contact with the team. I think something I’ve always really enjoyed about our learning model at CU is just how deeply flat the hierarchical structure is. I was 16 and able to message the chief program officer on Slack and say, “Hey, I have questions about this, that, and the other.” At any other learning institution, that’s completely unheard of. You have to go through all of these levels of bureaucracy.

I think at CU, because we flatten everything and you’re supposed to connect with adults directly and there’s no waiting your turn to make change, we were inviting you to do that right now. That was just my early experience, which felt different from school, felt different from any other learning experience I had had. To your point about investment, I think that’s something else I’ve always really appreciated is that there are often so many barriers for young people to get funding.

There’s all this, “Oh, where are your parents? Is someone 18? Do you have an official nonprofit?” At CU, we don’t let those barriers stop us from doing anything. It’s like, “Okay, you don’t have a nonprofit, we’ll fiscally sponsor you. We’ll find someone to fiscally sponsor you. You’re not 18? Okay, let’s find a different way to get you this money or help you support this project, or, oh, you just have an idea but you don’t know where to start. We’ll find people who can help and support and join your team.”

I think that just speaks to this go, go, go. We’re building something here, and we’re not going to let the traditional confines of what are young people supposed to do or what is civics supposed to look like keep us from empowering young people to build the democracy they want to see.

Lisa: So inspiring. Time and time again, I would see Civics Unplugged breaking the model and moving beyond, again, as you just said, the constructs that we’re used to. I think the civic infrastructure might call that active learning or have an academic name for it. To me, it was just entrepreneurship on steroids. It was like, “We are just going to back the values that we say that we care about unapologetically. If there was some sort of disconnect between what we said and what we do, then let’s break that and let’s examine that.” It struck me that from the beginning, it was really about honoring core principles that you relied on and then giving leeway to the high school students to figure it out.

That was such a powerful model of engagement, authentically and holistically. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about what that was like in practice, particularly during the pandemic, where that was where a lot of the early action happened, and you were doing a lot of it virtually, and what you’ve even noticed since then, from that early exposure to a very different way of engagement. What have you noticed with some of your alumni from those early times?

Zoë: I think to speak to core values, we have these four Cs that we like to call them at CU of commitment, collaboration, curiosity, and community. I think something I’ve always really admired about Civics Unplugged, especially with that commitment aspect, is if a kid shows interest, we’re going to just let them do it. There’s not this false sense of like, “Oh, you need to have a 30 on your ACT and you need to be in X, Y, and Z clubs.” It’s if you’re showing up and you show interest, we will reward that with leadership opportunities and chances to drive things, which is the way that this work should work.

I think that was really modeled perfectly in all the work that we did during the pandemic with our Commence 2030 campaign to help fund youth civic projects is that the young people who-- When the pandemic happened during this digital fellowship and we were supposed to be going to Georgetown that summer, and then obviously that wasn’t going to happen, the group of kids who all came together and said, “Hey, I know we’re not doing this Georgetown thing, but can we still do something? We should still get together, celebrate what we accomplished. The world needs us more now than ever,” those were the kids who then got to drive the ship on, “Okay, how do we get celebrities like The Rock and Andrew Yang to come and be in the event?”

Lisa: It was amazing.

Zoë: “Who are our dream speakers we can get to come and engage?” We had young people MCing the event, deciding where the money was going. That wasn’t the kids who were going to go off to the Ivy League colleges or had certain AP scores. Those were the kids who just were showing up, who said, “Hey, I want to be involved. Here are my talents. How can I engage?” I think that really is emblematic of just how we operate. You can, I think, see it even now with our alums of just that level of agency of, “We don’t have--”

Something I think I’m really proud of a lot of our alums, is they’re not afraid to ask some of the questions that need to be asked about why things are working this way. To put on my Kentucky Student Voice Team hat from my education work, we talk a lot about learned helplessness. We teach students for 13 years that you have to ask for literally everything. You have to ask to go to the bathroom. You have to ask to speak. You have to ask to disagree with the teacher. You’re not allowed to do those things.

At Civics Unplugged, we’re trying to break that. I love watching our kids challenge us. We gather all of our kids in the summer for our Civic Innovation Academies. You’ll have city council members, sitting Congress people, and these kids are asking the most direct, hard-hitting questions that if you ask that in the school setting, you’d be told to hush, or that was disrespectful. I’m really proud of just how much agency they feel like they have of, “No, I have a question,” or “I want to do this, and I’m going to make this happen.” We just open up and make the space for them to do that.

Lisa: It’s so inspiring to hear. I know I’ve personally benefited from just that vibrancy. Literally, our young people are our future. There’s a lot that’s unknown about the future, but one thing we know for sure is that young people will not stay young people. We all get older. That’s just a fact of life. The investment that CU and you are making in allowing our next-gen leaders to practice the skills that they need to practice from those foundational ages is just so critical.

Also, to your point earlier about modeling a very different structure or scaffold than they were used to. Really appreciate you bringing up that work of learned helplessness. I think that comes from Martin Seligman over at University of Pennsylvania. He’s one of the big thought leaders behind newer movements in psychology, positive psychology, and even this idea of prospection, this idea that we can, as humans, imagine new futures. That’s something that’s really unique to our species, that’s allowed us to come together and build new narratives.

I think this idea of just giving the experience to see what it’s like to be rewarded for your instinct, for showing up, for building bridges, something that might not ever show up, as you said, in a standardized test or in the way that some people call it a used future, a future of the past, might reward. Really exciting to see that now there’s thousands of alumni that are out there that have had practice modeling a totally new way of showing up. It’s super exciting.

You mentioned it briefly, but I’d love for you to share a little bit more about where you started doing this work with your growing up in the Kentucky Student Voice Team. I think all the way back in eighth grade, Zoë, you were finding yourself seeking a place for your voice. Tell us about that experience.

Zoë: Oh, my goodness. I grew up in Kentucky. I’ll have to fastback a little bit to maybe, honestly, my elementary school days to even explain how I ended up in the Kentucky Student Voice Team. I think so much of my story is just luck. I just happened to be in the right places at the right time. My parents enrolled me at an elementary school that was a Leader in Me school. Those are schools that are based around Stephen Covey’s Seven Habits of Highly Effective Kids.

My principal, Joel Cottey, who is still an educator in Kentucky, had this saying that if a kid can do it, a kid should do it. I was in third grade, fourth grade, running to make copies for the teacher, or someone else would be the line leader, or someone else was helping design activities for the day. That was the almost very highly agentic environment that I got to grow up in, my last two years of elementary school, when I moved to Kentucky. Then I moved into a middle school that was the exact opposite environment.

This is a middle school that was in one of the lowest-income neighborhoods in my school district. The way that they managed the school is that you had the school of the kids who were districted there, and then they would bus in the gifted kids from the other side of town. Even though I looked like the kids who were in that school, I was not taking any classes with them. I was in the gifted program. I didn’t interact with that, which I think gave me this very weird sense of I both did not belong in the classes I was in, but I also didn’t belong with the student body.

I was just having a really difficult time in middle school, as I think middle schoolers do. I think I was trying to grapple with these questions of, “Why am I getting these better educational experiences, but also these people in my classes don’t think I deserve to be here and are asking why I’m here, or assume that I’m not the right fit because of my background.” Then Kentucky Student Voice Team actually came and did a workshop about school climate.

This is a group of other middle and high school students talking about, “What are the vibes of your school, and how does school climate affect academic performance?” It was just the light bulb moment of, “This is what’s wrong with my middle school. The problem here is school climate.” I’m like, there are kids who are districted to this school who feel like they’re being underinvested in and not being cared about, and that is reflected in how they perform academically. It’s not because they’re not capable, but they’re watching kids being bussed from the other side of town get more resources, get more love poured into them, and not getting that same love poured into themselves.”

And so I saw these students, and I was like, “Hey, look, this is awesome. I should try to get involved.” I went to my first monthly general meeting, maybe two or three months after that, and have been involved with Kentucky Student Voice Team ever since. It just was this incredible watershed moment. I think the moment for me that really unlocked it was my first time doing a workshop with them. I was like an apprentice. High school students were leading the workshop, but I was just there to watch them do the presentation.

We were leaving this high school classroom, and one of the kids pulled me aside and was like, “Hey, what high school are you going to?” I was like, “Oh, I’m actually not going to this high school. I’m districted for different high schools. I’m going to be going to the one on the other side of town.” He said, “I’m so grateful.” Because he was like, “You seem so talented. If you came here, I don’t think you would amount to anything.”

Lisa: Wow.

Zoë: For a 16-year-old to have that level of awareness of “I do not have opportunities because I went to this school and I want you to go somewhere else,” I think for me is the constant motivation in this work of how do we help young people feel like they do have control over what their future looks like, and that you have a say, and that you have potential, and that potential will be nourished, no matter what your socioeconomic background is? That’s the work that fueled me in everything I do at the Kentucky Student Voice Team, especially our storytelling work, which I helped to lead a lot in high school.

Lisa: Oh my gosh, Zoë. Thank you so much for sharing that. Wow, so many vivid moments. First of all, I want to go back and meet your elementary principal and thank him for that philosophy, which I don’t think a lot of elementary principals in particular share. What’s interesting, you’re making me realize I have memories from elementary school, but I can’t tell you maybe three things from the last 10 years, except for, of course, our work together. The point is the imprint that that can have.

I did not even realize that there were elementary schools that were based on Stephen Covey’s Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. My mother was a chief learning officer and would give me those kinds of books very early on, too. I think we share that of having proponents. I know you’ve talked in the past about what a support your family has been in allowing you to explore these opportunities. That story reminds me of my motivation for doing this podcast and why I think design and futures work should be made more available to more people.

One of the core models of Stephen Covey is those three levels of where you can have influence, this smaller circle of control, which I think the way you were describing a lot of our systems focus on, like what can you control and not control, and learning that there’s too much out of your control, why even bother. That second circle around circle of influence, like where might you be able to make a choice that might have larger influence, and that larger one of concern, which is things that are happening around us, but we can’t really influence.

We end up spending a lot of our energy and concern, particularly in these challenging times like these, and it robs us of our agency to think systematically about where we can control or where we can influence. One of the things that I’m really passionate about is using principles, practices of design and futures and stories like yours and learning from people like you and alumni at CU to expand, to have outsized impact, to learn actually when you look beyond the things that you’re told you could control to explore what you can influence, you can actually have a more positive impact on the things that are of concern, like some of those broader issues you’re talking about around how do we make education more accessible? How do we flatten the opportunities for more people?

You’re just a living embodiment of that. I guess I’m grateful to know more of that backstory about the differences of what you experienced in elementary school, that middle school experience that then led to these opportunities that you say you’re lucky for, Zoë, but I think that you created some of that luck.

Zoë: Oh, I appreciate that. That’s what other people tell me, too, every time I say that.

Lisa: I want to talk about that because what you have experienced and what you’ve had the opportunity to do is just truly extraordinary. We’ve talked a little bit about your CU work, but you did a TEDx talk, I think, while you were still in high school. That’s an extraordinary opportunity to, again, use your influence to have outsized impact. Can you talk a little bit about that experience?

Zoë: I actually had the chance to do two TEDx talks while I was in high school.

Lisa: Amazing. We will put links to those, of course, in the show notes.

Zoë: Yes. The first one came through Kentucky Student Voice Team connections, and that was a chance, I think, just for me to talk about my story of coming into my own sense of agency, which I think, Lisa what you were saying earlier of like I’m very fortunate to come from a family where my parents definitely had the mindset of, “Oh, you’re worried about blank? You should do something about that. Oh, you think someone else should do this? Why don’t you do it?”

I think they heavily pushed me of, “You have to build the world that you want to see, and it’s better to die trying than to not have tried at all.” I think that message was a lot of what came out in the first TED talk. The second one, which was in the peak of COVID, I think, was really what actually was the starting point of the civic trust train. I think that’s where I started to think more critically about empathy, and it’s like, is that a basis of a lot of where we are right now? It’s just not being able to get into other people’s shoes, understand why people are the way they are, or at least just take the time to slow down and try to appreciate that my reality isn’t your reality, and that’s okay.

That’s just part of the complexity of the human experience. Our lives are going to be different, and accepting that humility in that. That was actually a random, out-of-the-blue email that I got that I think was related to my work with the Kentucky Student Voice Team and with Civics Unplugged. It was just a great opportunity to talk more about I think the great work that young people are doing to push us forward in terms of our lives are not the only lives that matter, and so how do we open up our sphere of understanding to think about how do we imagine futures, to use your language, with other people in mind?

It’s not just me and my life and my career, it’s our life, our community, and our shared future together.

Lisa: That stance that you have around welcoming others, trying to be curious about others, inviting others to build with you is something that I think is so critical in a time where it feels like we have forces that are trying to split us apart and trying to make us smaller and trying to siphon off, whether it’s our attention or what we feel like we’re capable of. It’s so impressive, Zoë, and it’s so inspiring.

I feel like every time I see something that you’re posting on LinkedIn, it’s like a new alliance, a new opportunity, a new connection. I wonder if you could share a little bit more about what fuels that and also maybe any advice because I really don’t think that as many of our next-gen leaders have that collaborative abundant stance, not because they’re not capable of it, but because they’ve grown up in digital media that has reduced their input to transactional moments of likes so I wonder if you could just talk about how you think about building alliances and connections and bridges, and maybe advice that you might have for anyone that just hasn’t been exposed to that way of shaping better futures.

Zoë: I think there are two threads for me to pull on there, one about curiosity and then one about the “high tide raises all boats” abundance. The curiosity piece is probably the easiest one to answer. I just have always been a kid to ask a lot of questions, which my parents would get very annoyed with sometimes, thank goodness for Google, but I wanted to be a scientist when I was a kid. I wanted to be a doctor. I wanted to be a biomedical engineer.

I think that’s where that just natural, “Oh, let’s ask questions and experiment and try things,” that aptitude came from. Luckily, I had a mentor through Kentucky Student Voice Team, Rachel Bellen, who kindly redirected me away from engineering and said, “Hey, I think there are some other things that you’re really good at that you really like to do that are not biomedical engineering.” You could thank her that I’m even in the space that I’m in.

I think that abundance piece, though, I have to credit that with my grandparents, honestly. My mom’s parents, they were part of the Great Migration, so fled the South in the 1960s to try to start a better life for themselves and their family. They started a trash business right outside of DC that went on for 50 years, that my grandma was only able to get the loan for because she was a vet. Because she had served in Vietnam, you can’t discriminate against veterans. She was able to get a loan at a time when a lot of Black people weren’t able to do that.

They, I think, just embodied generosity. They are the first in their family to reach the middle class. My grandparents spent so much of their time and their money paying for other kids in the neighborhood to go to college, paying for other people’s scholarships, helping to put together sports teams. I think they just had this level of selflessness of you put out in the world what you hope to get back. I think that was something that they instilled in both my parents and then also me and my cousins, is if you have things, you should be giving them away. You should not be hoarding those things.

Those aren’t things that you can take with you into an afterlife. Those are things best spent supporting other people. I have that background. I don’t want to call myself a public persona, but I think coming into COVID, I was starting to have more interactions with people, invited to do more and more things. I found myself growing frustrated with, I think exactly this is what you said, this transactionalness that exists of, “I’m only going to do this speaking opportunity if I get paid X amount,” or “I’m doing this work so that I can post it on social media.”

I don’t know who said this to me, but someone made a remark of there’s a spectrum of posting things on social media, getting invited to speak places, and doing the work. Where you fall on that spectrum is your choice. I think I knew, for me, it was more important to be doing the work. Obviously, you have to speak about what you do. That’s how you get support for the great work that we do. I didn’t want to be remembered as somebody who seemed really cool online, but then when you meet them in person, they’re actually really stingy or don’t have a lot of ideas or aren’t willing to talk to people.

I think I just had to make that commitment to myself early on, especially for young people, that if a young person reaches out to me and has questions, I will answer because there are so many people where you can blind email them and they just won’t ever respond to you. I try to uphold that. I know that a younger version of myself would have needed that. I try to model that, let’s give as much as we can to other people with the hopes that it’ll come back to you because eventually it will.

It may not be a tit for tat, but that’s, I think, how we build better futures is high tide raises all boats. If I’m helping you, it helps me too, so let’s just help each other and be transparent and giving in that way.

Lisa: It’s so beautiful on so many levels, and I love that you brought in the story of your grandparents and what you saw there and how they modeled generosity as a strategic lever for better. I just think that generosity is a renewable resource that starts with our mindset of how we show up. In telling that story, just your own outlook, you’re reminding me of an early conversation that we had on How We Future with leadership coach Rae Ringel, who talks about the importance for leaders to marry the audio and the video, and that if you say that you care about these things, then you’ve got to show up and care for those things. You have to be authentic.

The way that you make choices is reflective of your values, and people see that, and they show up. Again, I’ll say I think it’s a huge contributor to why these wonderful opportunities are coming your way. Yes, serendipity, luck, but also you’re evoking it because it’s how you’re showing up in the universe. I’m having a memory, Zoë, you can correct me. This was, again, deep pandemic where we would have those Zooms that would flow one Zoom into another.

I’m having a memory of finishing up a Zoom with another guest on this show, Ahmed Best, who is a celebrated actor, an Afrofuturist, and just, wow, abundant future maker. Then you and I had a meeting right after, and then you showed up, and I was like, “Wait, Ahmed, stay here. You have to meet Zoë.” This beautiful exchange happened. I know my memory’s a little fuzzy for those times, but didn’t that end up in you MCing a Nobel Peace Prize gathering? Just remind me of what happened then.

Zoë: Yes. That is one of my favorite, I think, serendipitous moments of you put the time into building strong relationships so that you can be invited to meet the right people. I think meeting Ahmed and Lani was one of the best. I was like, “Wow, these people are just amazing.” I think that we got on that call, and he was like, “Hey, we need somebody to help MC this event in maybe two or three weeks.” It was a pretty quick turnaround for the Nobel Prize Summit.

It was just a wonderful opportunity to learn from other people to do an event at that scale, because I think that’s just a good experience to have, and just to see Ahmed in his element, because he is so good, so, so good at that exact thing. It was a real gift just to be in that environment, especially as a young person, because there weren’t a lot of young people invited to be there. Just being able to add that perspective was incredible. Thank you. Thank you for making that possible.

Lisa: Oh, it was so fun. It’s one of these things where it’s like, “Oh, this is running late, but how can we turn this into an opportunity?” I remember it was one of the things I used to do a lot because, of course, the pandemic robbed us of those spontaneous water cooler moments where you just bump into someone, but it actually gave us a whole new way of potentially having them when you would have meetings that would overlap. I remember a waiting room would come up, and I’d be like, “Wait a minute, these people need to know each other anyway.”

I’d be like, “Okay, Ahmed, hold on. I’m bringing in Zoë. Don’t go anywhere. You need to meet each other. Let’s go,” you give enough context, and the two of you are two of the most vibrant, generous people I know, and I just love that magic happened. I think, so much of it is like in this time of tumult and challenge and so much feels out of our control, there’s actually so much that’s in our control, how we show up for others, do we do it with curiosity and empathy, do we explore the, “Hey, what if?” and “Would you consider?” and “Is there a world in which?”

A lot of times, the answer is, “Yes, let’s go. Hadn’t thought about it, and that’s why it didn’t exist, but now you’re making me think about it, so let’s do it together.” I think that can be really infectious in the best possible way. Zoë, I want to turn our attention to a few things about the future. We’ve covered some about your present and working as the director of civic trust, just wonderful things about your past, and we’ll put lots of links in the show notes to your TEDx talks and others.

Let’s talk about the future because so much of the work you’re doing is focused on the future. I know you are part of the steering committee for Civics 2030, which is, I think, something you started years ago, but of course, still in our future. Would love to hear a little bit about that effort and how you are helping people imagine better futures with that initiative.

Zoë: Civics 2030 came out of that group of inaugural 2020 fellows who were saying, “Look, Civics Unplugged, what are we going to do in this moment when democracy feels like it’s falling apart and we’re not even able to physically join up together?” I think there are threads of that campaign and that initiative that still very much exist in how Civics Unplugged does what we do now. We’re looking well beyond 2030 now because I know it’s just a couple of years away, but I think we’re still doing that imagining of what young people deserve to live in the democracy that they can envision.

How do we build towards that? We’re not waiting to do that. It’s not like, “Okay, you’ve got to wait until you’re 18 so you can vote,” or like, “Oh, you have to wait until you turn 35 and you can run for president.” It’s like, “No, what are the things you can do right now in your community?” I think that’s how, at least at Civics Unplugged, we’re thinking about the future is now. We don’t have to wait. We’re not building something to pilot it and then launch it 20 years from now. It’s how do we just embody the spirit of the democracy that we want to live in?

That’s a lot of, I think, what’s been on my mind in that conversation we just had about building trust and showing up. I think that’s part of it. I want to see a future where we have stronger civic trust, and so I try to model that idea of, “How do I want strangers to interact with me in public? How do I want other people to show up for me?” I can’t wait for the world to be a better place in which everyone does that. You just have to start doing it and inviting other people to do that with you.

Some of what I’ve really admired about Civics Unplugged, especially in this moment, is that I know there are a lot of organizations and a lot of initiatives that are looking at the times we’re in and saying, “Whoa, what do we do?” and taking a pause. Civics Unplugged, we were like, “No, we have these four Cs. We have these values. We know that what we do works, and we know that we’re building the future we want to build. It does not matter what is happening outside of us.”

“We are doing something that we know works and is meaningful for kids. We’re going to keep doing that no matter what, and building alongside them through this moment and not waiting for this moment to somehow pass,” which I think is really emblematic of something I’ve been thinking a lot about is how do you just keep showing up? I think that’s more than half the battle of just making it through to something that we’re building together.

Lisa: It so much, again, echoes Ahmed’s philosophy of don’t let the future happen to you. Go do, and you have all that clarity to feel empowered, and others around you. I know, Zoë, you’re making a particular effort to reach rural areas, which I think is another geography that is often overlooked. Geographies, plural. I think not only are you trying to connect generations, but you’re also trying to connect geographies to feel unified in their power to create better. I think that is so important.

I wonder if maybe we could end with you just sharing. I imagine lots of people here are thinking, “I want to get involved in Civics Unplugged. I want to get involved in this civic trust stuff.” What recommendations do you have for people to be a part of shaping the future in this wonderfully abundant and generous way that you’re thinking about?

Zoë: I’ll give maybe the very basic, “Oh, here’s how you plug in,” but then just a more ethereal way to plug in that I always love to share. In terms of Civics Unplugged, we have a website. Please go to our website. If you know high school students, encourage them to apply. Even high school students who say, “I don’t care about politics, I don’t care about civics,” civics is for everybody, regardless of what your interests are. We just want young people to feel like they have more control over their future because they do.

That’s a different kind of education that a lot of young people don’t get. Just share that opportunity with high schoolers that you know to apply. Then just stay up-to-date with our work. We’re always sharing the great work that our kids are doing. They often need support from people in their communities. If you see a fellow who’s in your same state or in your same city, reach out to them, reach out to us, and just help support their work. That’s the more cookie-cutter recommendation.

From a civic trust, putting my political theory hat on, there’s this incredible but very dense book called The Public and Its Problems by John Dewey. He talks about this idea of attachment versus affection. I think it does a really good job of capturing the moment that we’re in. Affection is like, I don’t know, think back to high school when you had a crush on somebody, those intense, positive emotional feelings that you have that draw you towards other people. There was a place and a time for that, but democracies cannot run on affection.

What we need right now is attachment. That’s like the love that you have for that family member that’s very difficult to talk to, but that love is constant. This is a moment when we need attachment. I think we have floated for a long time in our democracy on affection. “Oh, we love this country,” or “We love this particular president,” or “We love this person.” We are definitely in a time right now where affection is not enough, and because we have not spent the time building that attachment, I think that’s why we’re seeing some of the really disheartening things that we’re seeing of people saying, “Oh, I want to lead the United States,” or “I don’t believe in democracy anymore.”

We’ve not ingrained this sense of real, solid commitment to who we are as a nation, what democracy means, how to include people in that vision. There are ways in which you can build attachment. That’s part of why right now I’m focusing a lot on rural communities, because I think rural youth struggle with this the most, because if you’re a rural young person and you turn on the news, you’re not going to see people from your background making positive impact.

There are these narratives of despair telling you that, “Oh, rural places just have nothing going on and everything’s going down the drain, and you should move to a bigger city.” A lot of what we’re trying to do at Civics Unplugged is help these young people find a sense of purpose that is rooted in their hometowns, because you have a sense of expertise that is innate to you and your experience, and your hometown needs you now more than ever.

I think that’s the message I would say to everybody, is that your communities, where you’re from, needs you now more than ever. Whether that’s your college alumni association, it’s a hometown friend group, maybe you participated in the YMCA when you were growing up, I think this is the time now more than ever to work on attachment, of building that sense of connections that have longevity to them because I think well, one, it’ll just make you feel better.

I think you’ll remember, “These are communities that value me, remember me, there’s change that can be made here,” but also that we need those bonds to be strong to resist the tides and things that are changing up above us. There are a lot of things that you can do within that of just gathering people more, spending time doing that intentional work, just saying hi to strangers and smiling at people, and building routines with the people you love. I think that’s more important now than ever is to model the kinds of communities that we want to live in and invite other people to join us in those same habits of being good citizens.

Lisa: Amen, Zoë. That’s what I’m going to say. Amen. I know you didn’t end up being like a traditional scientist, but as I listen to you speak, I feel like you are a civic scientist. And I also want to say you are very much in the spirit of a civic futurist. I think that is another way of showing up in the world and focusing on that attachment versus affection, that is so powerful because we can all do that. We see it happening. As you know, I’ve been working a lot with student athletes and trying to build on the attachments we have with sports. There’s even some studies about how fans are actually better citizens, which is cool, and we’ll put that in the show notes, too.

There’s so much to build on that we’re already doing. It really reminds me of where we started this conversation, where you were like, “Look, democracy in those words can feel very removed or can feel very narrow. It’s like you’re either voting or you’re not.” What I hear you saying is that we can all participate and do so in meaningful ways that strengthens our bonds with each other and therefore strengthens the resilience and the opportunities that our communities will have.

Zoë, thank you for being you. Thank you for sharing your time with us. Thank you for being on How We Future. I cannot wait for more people to learn about you, your work, and what Civics Unplugged is doing on behalf of better tomorrows.

Zoë: Thank you. Thank you so much for being such a big part of my journey of ending up here. I don’t think I would be here thinking the way that I think if I hadn’t met you five years ago. I really appreciate that.

Lisa: What an incredible conversation with Zoë Jenkins. I’m so inspired by her belief that democracy begins with trust, not institutions. I love her call for us to move beyond the quick bursts of affection and to start building deeper attachments to our neighborhoods, our schools, and each other.

Here’s my invitation to you. Take one small step to strengthen that sense of connection. Say hello to a neighbor, check in on a friend, or reach out to someone doing good work in your community.

Those small acts of trust add up, and they’re exactly how we future. If you’ve enjoyed this episode, I’d be so grateful if you rated and left a comment for How We Future wherever you listen. It helps more people find these conversations and join our growing community of future builders. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon. Thanks for listening, and I’ll see you next time.

How do we reclaim our imagination as a force for freedom?

You might know Ahmed Best from his role as Jar Jar Binks in the Star Wars universe– He is also the creator of AfroRithms from the Future and a lifelong champion of imagination as liberation. From the streets of the South Bronx to the worlds of the Jedi, Ahmed has spent his life proving that creativity can rewrite what’s possible.

You’ll learn:

• Why imagination isn’t a luxury—it’s a right

• How watching the birth of hip-hop in the 70’s taught him that the future can be built from nothing

• The origin of AfroRithms from the Future and the joy of collective play

• What Afrofuturism reveals about freedom, history, and self-determination

• How his Jedi character, Kelleran Beq, teaches that the Force is love

Ahmed and Lisa trace a throughline from ancient Egypt to Dynamic Land to the Star Wars galaxy, showing that the power to future is in all of us.

This conversation is a reminder that joy, creativity, and imagination are the real tools of freedom—and that the best way to shape the future is to play it into being.

Links from the show:

• The Long Now Foundation Talk: When is Wakanda: Imagining Afrofutures

• The Long Now Foundation: Feel the Future with Ahmed Best

• Learn about Afrofuturism from Ahmed’s AfroRithm Futures Group

• Buy Ahmed’s game: AfroRithms from the Future

• New York Times Article: The Actor Who Played Jar Jar Binks is Proud of his Star Wars Legacy

• Sneak Peak of Marvel Comics: Jar Jar, written by Ahmed Best

• Disney’s Lego Star Wars: Rebuild the Galaxy Series

🎧 Listen now:

▶️ Watch now:

📖 Read now:

Lisa Kay Solomon: I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and this is How We Future, where I talk to some of my favorite change-makers about shaping tomorrow starting today.

This week’s guest is actor, producer, educator, and Afrofuturist, Ahmed Best. You might know Ahmed from his groundbreaking work as Jar Jar Binks in the Star Wars universe, from his early days in Stomp, or his extraordinary Afrofutures programs. In short, Ahmed is a cultural maker and mover.

Today, Ahmed shares the effects of watching the genesis of hip-hop in the South Bronx and how it started a global cultural revolution. He’ll talk about the origin of his new character in the Star Wars universe and how the Force can inspire future’s work. Honestly, when Ahmed shows up, you know your future is going to be better. Let’s jump in.

Ahmed Best. I’m so excited for this conversation. Hello.

Ahmed Best: Hello, my sister Lisa. How are you?

Lisa: I’m so great because we’re having this conversation. You are one of my first guests on this new venture called How We Future. In some ways, if I’m going to be honest, I think you’re a huge inspiration. No, not I think. I know you are a huge inspiration for this work-

Ahmed: Aw, thank you.

Lisa: -because we started working together four or five years ago. I got introduced to you through our mutual friend, Dr. Lonny Brooks, who we’re going to talk about this podcast, no doubt, in this conversation. You said a phrase that has stuck with me ever since. You said, do not let people future all over you. The moment I heard that, I feel like my world went from black and white to technicolor because it was a framing that has inspired the classes that I teach, how I think about how I show up every day, and is really the genesis of what this podcast series is all about, which is helping more people learn how to have agency over the future, not in these grand gestures, but in everyday actions, how we future because we do. We all future.

Ahmed: Yes, we do.

Lisa: Maybe we could just start there, my friend, and talk to me a little bit about when you think about how we future and how you future and how we want to have more say and influence over our future. Where does that come from?

Ahmed: It really comes from me growing up where I grew up in the South Bronx in New York City. When you grow up in those kind of neighborhoods, where there isn’t very much-- not a lot of resources, there isn’t a lot of money at all, generally, you’re in a food desert, you realize that there are forces that are actively trying to keep you in that place, trying to keep you from moving out, moving up, advancing, thinking, creating.

It’s very much like a prison without walls because you are so worried about the minute-to-minute, day-to-day survival that you don’t have the ability or the energy to move beyond your circumstance. It really feels like a powerless situation. It didn’t feel like that in my house because my parents were incredibly creative people. My mother is very much like a polymath and a deconstructor. She can look at something and make it.

My father worked for TV. He’s a cinematographer by education, but he was a TV cameraman for decades, but started in public television on PBS through a training program in New York City. It was something that he always wanted to do. Both my parents were very actively, professionally creative, and they took a big risk doing that because everybody in my neighborhood wasn’t that. Everyone pretty much had the job that they needed in order to survive, and my parents took that risk.

I grew up in a very creatively risky place inside the apartment that we lived in the South Bronx. Then something happened, and I talk about this. I do a talk called Be the Signal. I talk about this a lot because it really gave me agency. In the late ‘70s, early ‘80s, hip-hop music was being invented on my block in the South Bronx, in New York City. I watched the creation of not only this style of music, but this culture. It was a very specific New York creative culture that was being cultivated on the streets of the South Bronx.

It was at a time where making music was incredibly expensive. Jazz music and rock and roll music, you needed a lot of people in order to record that. You had to hire musicians. You had to hire the recording studio. You had to hire the engineers. It was increasingly becoming this expense that a lot of people who had a passion for music couldn’t afford to do. Kool Herc and all of these DJs in New York City recognized that you can put two turntables and a microphone and record music and create something that is brand new.

I was watching the future being crafted on my block in real time when I was very young. That just informed me. The only thing that stops you is creativity. If you are creative, you can make the change. All of the constructs that are around you to keep you in that place, to keep you in that position where you can’t move out, are really just imaginary. If you get with the right group of people who have that same impetus, who have that same heart, who have that same motivation, then you can literally change the future. I watched it happen.

Having agency over the future for me was incredibly tangible. It was something that was accessible, and it was something that I had seen proven from the streets of the South Bronx. That’s why my head is always just like, no one gets the future all over you because we had nothing, and we created the future from nothing, and no one could stop us.

Lisa: How early did you get a sense that this was going to be something beyond your neighborhood? Where were you able to really understand the viral and global impact, really, that this moment in time was having?

Ahmed: I felt it very, very early on. Hip-hop started in ‘73. I was born in 1973, so I’m as old as hip-hop. It didn’t really hit citywide until 1980. I was about six years old. Every summer, the DJs and the rappers would set up in this huge park across the street from my building. I lived on the 8th floor, and we had a terrace. During the summer, it was super hot, and my father was very old school, so he didn’t believe in air conditioning. I don’t know where that comes from.

Lisa: He missed that memo about the future.

Ahmed: I was like, “You know AC exists, you know?”

Lisa: It’s a thing.

Ahmed: He was like, “So what?”

Lisa: Makes you stronger.

Ahmed: Yes. I was like, “What is the adversity to air conditioning? I don’t get it.” He wasn’t an air conditioning person, so the windows would be open all night long. I have a twin brother, so my brother in my room was right next to the terrace. My sister’s room was a couple feet away. Every summer, the DJs would set up in this park right across the street, and they would jack into the streetlights for electricity. They would set up the turntables, and they would set up the amps, and they’d set up a microphone.

They would start a party, and everybody in the neighborhood would fill the park. The party would go on until four, five o’clock in the morning. My father hated it because he had to go to work at five o’clock in the morning because he was working on morning television. Morning television starts at 5:00 AM. His sleep hours were right at prime hip-hop party time. Because the windows were open, me and my brother and my sister would just sit out and look out the window all night-

Lisa: That is incredible.

Ahmed: -and listen to this music all night. Seeing everybody coming down from the projects that were across from us and different parts of the neighborhood, I knew that this was something special. I knew it was really special at six years old. I realized it was global in ‘83, ‘84. I was watching television, and there was a Barbie commercial on. This Barbie commercial, one of the lines of the dialogue, one of the young blonde actresses were saying was talking about how Barbie’s-- Barbie had a Corvette or something, some pink car or something like that.

I remember the young actor saying, “Oh my God, that is so fresh.” When she said fresh, I was like, that’s a neighborhood word. People outside of New York City–

Lisa: It signals that the future is here.

Ahmed: Boom. As soon as she said fresh in a Barbie commercial, I was like, that’s it. We’re there. This is going to change the world.

Lisa: Oh my gosh, I love that. Everything I learned about global cultural influence came from a Barbie commercial, but it is true. It is those small signals. Just connecting a couple dots that I love in hearing about your story is this idea that what happened within your family around appreciating creative risk-taking and following your passion, trying to bring new things in the world, was then unfolding around you in a more organic way. You had these reinforcing stories of possibility, of imagination, of breaking out of status quo, I think is really missing right now.

A big part of what I’m trying to do in these conversations and hosting a variety of different connections is making these ideas more concrete and more tangible. I think we’re really lacking feeling that agency, that it becomes abstract. Here you have these very concrete examples, both within your family and now within your block, and seeing it unfold, that you are reinforcing this belief of, wait a minute, other people don’t have to just make the future. I can make the future.

I’m also struck with how that’s then informed what you’re giving, what I’ve seen you give in your work as an actor, as a producer, as an educator, as a mentor, paying that forward.

Ahmed: Yes. As intentional as it is for those who are crafting the future to make you feel like you don’t have agency over it, we have to be as intentional with having agency over it. One of the reasons why I think there is such an incredible lack of imagination, especially when it comes to the future, is because there are people who do have agency over the future, and it’s very obvious. Mostly, there are people who have the means to have agency over the future. They put these obstacles and hurdles in our way to slow us down from having that imagination.

They also make us believe that, in order to be able to use this imagination that we all have, we have to reach some sort of financial comfort, some sort of level of luxury in order to use that imagination. The luxury of imagination, I believe, is a myth. I think imagination is something that we all have, and we all have a right to cultivate regardless of what our socioeconomic stands are or positions are. Unfortunately, we are in a transitional period where we are just discovering that.

It’s the same thing in higher education where everybody was like a coder in the first 10 years of the 2000s. Everybody was like, “Got to code, got to code, got to code, learn to code, learn to code.” Now here we are where coding is a bit obsolete. Now you have all of these coders going, okay, what do I do now? Now they’re trying–

Lisa: Too late to learn Play-Doh? [laughs]

Ahmed: Exactly. Is it too late to do a play? They’re going, how do I use what I do and find that creativity and find a way forward? I think it’s because we don’t teach imagination. We just let it go. We don’t pay attention to it. We don’t cultivate it. We don’t use imagination as a skill. We just think, oh, we all have it. You’re imaginative, you’re not. I believe that we can bring whatever we do up to this level of work of art. All we have to do is really train our imagination, train our creativity.

Lisa: That in and of itself is an agentic stance, that it is something we can grow. I agree. Listen, you want to be imaginative, just bring in a four-year-old into the conversation.

Ahmed: They’re the best.

Lisa: Then, unfortunately, they go to school. They get it just drilled out of them. It’s so depressing. I know that you are always looking for ways to not only bring imagination into your work, but also joyful imagination, generative imagination. I first experienced that with this incredible game that you and Dr. Lonny Brooks created around unleashing joy, imagination in positive and powerful ways. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about the game and what you had experienced playing it around the world.

Ahmed: Yes. The game is called AfroRithms from the Future. It was inspired by this game called The Thing From The Future, which is, of course, you know, Stuart Candy.

Lisa: Stuart Candy, yes. Jeff Watson.

Ahmed: Dr. Lonny Brooks really introduced me to this idea of gaming to help excite the imagination for the future. When I played Thing From The Future, I really enjoyed it. I really enjoyed the tactile nature of the cards. I liked having these things in my hands. I also enjoyed the images on the cards and what they made my mind do when I saw these images and when I saw the words on the cards. Lonny is so good at turning future parlance, combining it with Afrofuturism, and coming up with this new thing. He’s one of the most impressive scholars that I’ve ever met.

He’s in the true sense of the word of scholar. He is a legitimate according to Hoyle scholar. He’s amazing. His brain works so wonderfully, especially when it comes to things about the future and Afrofuturism. I’ve learned so much from him. When we started thinking about doing something together, we first did the Afrofuturist podcast.

Then I was like, there’s got to be a way that we can expand this thing. You know what I’m saying? Reach out to more people and put it in their hands. Lonny had been working with Eli Kosminsky, who is a programmer and a games developer in San Francisco. On our podcast, we interviewed the creators of this place in Oakland called Dynamicland. Dynamicland was this fantasy place. As soon as I walked into Dynamicland, it was this loft right in downtown Oakland. I wanted to move in. It was amazing.

Lisa: Who does not need Dynamicland? Why can’t that be the next franchise on every block? Dynamicland.

Ahmed: When I walked into Dynamicland, I looked around and I was like, this is what a library should be. All of our library should be like Dynamicland. It wasn’t just the components and the coding of the things. It was like the creativity of how you got to ideas. They had these projectors all over Dynamicland. They were on the ceiling of the loft. It was like 20-foot ceilings in Dynamicland. It was this beautiful loft space.

They created an operating system called RealOS. What RealOS did was interface with these projectors that were pointing down at the surfaces of Dynamicland. Rather than programming something into a keyboard, there were these microphones around Dynamicland where you would wish for things. They had these little tiny robots. You would say something like, “I wish this robot could go from one part of the table to the other part of the table on a 10-foot table.” Then RealOS would hear this and print out a card. On this card, there would be these dots on the card.

You would lay these dots down on the surface of the table. The projectors would read these dots, interface with this robot, and make the robot move from one part of the table to the next part of the table.

Lisa: Magic.

Ahmed: It felt like magic.

Lisa: Magic.

Ahmed: I was like, wow, this is amazing because it made learning tangible. They had all of these after-school programs where all of these kids would go to Dynamicland and use RealOS to make stuff. They could make movies and music.

Lisa: So empowering.

Ahmed: It was amazing.

Lisa: So exciting.

Ahmed: Lonny and I did the podcast with Dynamicland and fell in love with the place and the people. Because I live in Los Angeles, I could just call and talk to them. Lonny actually went there. He started going there every day and got in really good. I was extremely jealous. He and Eli met there. Because of Stuart Candy Thing From The Future, him and Eli, we’re just like, well, we should make a card game about Afrofuturism.

The first iteration of AfroRithms were Lonny and Eli at Dynamicland. At first, it was going to be like a Dynamicland thing where you would say, I wish there were black scholars on a planet that could be influenced by James Baldwin. Then RealOS would spit something out. Then it would project an image. I went to Dynamicland, and I saw this and I was like, I think you got something here. There’s something here. It’s not quite there yet, but there’s something there.

Fast forward to we’re at Institute for the Future, and there’s like a weekend of Afro-- I think Lonny helped produce this event where it was like a weekend of Afrofuturism and then African Futurists and people were like beaming in from Ghana and Uganda and talking about Futurism. Eli and Lonny were going to present AfroRithms for the first time to a group of people.

They called some people up, me and a couple of other people, and we were standing up there as Guinea pigs to play AfroRithms, and Lonny was facilitating. I looked at what they were doing, and I was just like, I think I have a way for this thing to work and be dynamic. One of my secret passions is I’ve always wanted to be a game show host.

Lisa: Who doesn’t? Who doesn’t?

Ahmed: Yes, because when I was growing up–

Lisa: I mean, not all of us can, but you know. Yes.

Ahmed: What was better? I used to watch game shows all the time. My mom was a huge game show person. It was like the Match Game and Jeopardy and all those old-school game shows-

Lisa: Price is Right.

Ahmed: -Price is Right, from the ‘80s.

Lisa: The Newlywed Game.

Ahmed: Newlywed Game. I love game shows, and I always wanted to have one of them skinny mics. You know how they used to have those skinny mics in the ‘80s, and it was just like, “Welcome to the Match Game.”

Lisa: Merv Griffin.

Ahmed: Merv Griffin. The Merv Griffin Show with the skinny mic. I always loved that. You’d have all these celebrity guests, and Nipsey Russell would always do a poem or something.

Lisa: Nipsey Russell. [laughs] I know what I’m getting you for your next birthday. I got you. I got you.

Ahmed: All right. Give me a skinny mic. I looked at what they did, and I was just like, let me game show this thing. I think this could be a good game show. I said, “Hey, Lonny, can I MC this thing?” He was like-- Lonny is probably the sweetest, most generous human being on the planet.

Lisa: Sweetest, loving. Kind. Yes.

Ahmed: He was like, “Yes, sure.” I turned it into a game show because I saw it. I saw where this thing could go and what it could do. I just started running around the room and playing AfroRithm. That was the first time a roomful of people were just like, you guys got something. This is fun. After, there was standing ovation. People really loved playing, and it was fun.

The thing that I thought was missing from a lot of these future forecasting or future imaginative games is the fun part. It’s not fun to play these games sometimes. It’s fun for a certain group of us who want to think that way. How do we get 12-year-olds to think this is fun? How do we get 80-year-olds who don’t think about the future to think this is fun? Fun is a good way in. We had a lot of fun at that first one.

That’s when I was just like, okay, I think we got something. Let’s start putting this thing together so that the game has some kind of foundation so it works. That’s when we started putting together the parameters of AfroRithms with having the xy axis of creating a multiverse and creating a planet in the multiverse and then populating the planet with artifacts. It was all Afrofuturist-inspired. It’s a good way to get you into thinking of the future from a different point of view, from a different perspective.

I’ve noticed this at Institute for the Future. I’ve also noticed this at the Dubai Future Forum, that there’s a type of monopoly on the way we think about the future. The point of view is mostly from a Western-centric perspective, where we’re not actually imagining what a future could be. We’re imagining how do we sustain our existing systems into the future. That might not be the future that we want.

It’s definitely not a future that we have agency over because it assumes that corporations will exist for 100, 1,000, 10,000 years. That might not be the case. We’re not asking the question, well, what if corporations were designed to self-destruct? AfroRithms is a catalyst for that type of thinking, for systems thinking in ways that are not the systems that we are used to.

Lisa: There’s so much to unpack in this oral history of where this game came from. I want to dive into a couple of details. At a high level, what I’m hearing, and I agree with you, that, as the world becomes more complex, more dynamic, more overwhelming, we have a default to search for the familiar. What I have seen lately is a proliferation of futurists and foresight practitioners that are using frameworks that are important to help us understand, but processes that feel very bounded and technical and without probably even realizing it, have the status quo embedded into it.

What I hear in this fantastic story about the birth of AfroRithms from the future is really leaning into the fun and the feeling of it, which is where the future can exist in ways that might serve all of us as opposed to some of us.

Ahmed: Absolutely.

Lisa: Your ability to sense that moment, to say, wait a minute, there’s some raw materials here that we have to unleash in new ways that really get at the humanity here, was a huge courageous risk. The other part that I want to dive into a bit more here to make sure people understand some of the words that are coming out in this conversation is using Lonny’s historical scholarship on Afro Futures as a grounding for, again, that more inclusive and expansive set of possibilities. That starts with ourselves, that we could unleash that.

I want to just take a moment. We’re going to point folks to Lonny’s work, to his master class on Afro Futures that he did at the Long Now Foundation, which is where I first got introduced to you and your work during the deep pandemic months. That was one of the bright spots. Can you just share maybe in a nutshell what is Afro Futures and how does it show up in the world right now?

Ahmed: Yes. Afro Futurism is really based on this idea that Futurism, the Futurist movement didn’t start with the Italian fascists in the 1920s. Most of the time, when you say futurist to Europeans, that’s what they think of. They think about the 1920s. They think of the fascist movement. They think of Italy. Futurism really started probably 20,000 years earlier. What we try to do is we try to go back and think about the future moving forward starting then.

One of the biggest influences for me for future thinking is the Nile Valley in Egypt. The Egyptians had to forecast when the river was going to rise and when the river was going to fall because that’s how they had food. That’s where agriculture came from. That’s where they moved. Animals, that’s how the civilization was able to survive. They had to realize this river rises at a certain point in the year and that it falls at a certain point in the year. In order for us to survive, we have to know that.

They developed these tools to help them track the astronomy in that region and create a calendar of the rise and fall of the Nile. Then they started building an entire culture around that. They started building their art around it with the Sphinx. They started building their monuments around it with the pyramids. It was all of these things that really came from forecasting when the river was going to rise and fall, which is really forecasting climate, which is forecasting weather, which is forecasting the future.

They got really good at it. So good at it that they started naming the stars. They started positioning the civilization according to when the earth moved and the stars would align and the Nile would rise and fall. To me, that’s the beginning of a futurist thinking.

Lisa: Anticipating, imagining.

Ahmed: Anticipate, exactly. Imagine, forecasting.

Lisa: Preparing for.

Ahmed: Classifying, developing systems. The whole point–

Lisa: The human aspect of the art and the story and the communication.

Ahmed: Yes. Exactly. That’s where their god myths came from. That’s where their myths of death came from. That’s where their language hieroglyphics came from. This idea of forecasting really started creating a culture. Then you would read about the Egyptian mystery schools. The mystery would be mathematics and philosophy. The story goes that everybody from Socrates to Pythagoras went to the Egyptian mystery schools, learned the mysteries, and then brought them back to the Mediterranean valley in Greece. That was the birthplace of mathematics in the West. That was the birthplace of philosophy in the West as the story goes.

I was always influenced by that. What we were taught was science started in England, and Isaac Newton came up with calculus. It didn’t have an origin. It didn’t have a beginning. It didn’t have a start. It definitely didn’t start with people with dark skin. Afrofuturism assumes a future past that predates European civilization, which helps a lot because then you can look at all of those things that ancient civilizations created and imagine forward without things like war and famine and colonization.

That’s where we start with imagining what the future could be. With AfroRithms, we always say we have a reverence for the past, an awareness of the present, but the future is all creative. Future is creativity. We train your creativity through the stories of past African futurists in Afrofuturism. Then we look at the present of Afrofuturism, which is taking these ideas from the past and imagining a present with the ethos of what the past are.

Imagine if there was no Inquisition. Imagine if there was no medieval times. We go from Egypt to Socrates to Enlightenment to the space race. We would be a lot further along without demagogues and zealots moving us backwards. That’s what we try to do in AfroRithms with Afrofuturism. Afrofuturism really is the imagining of a future without these ideas of oppression. I believe freedom is the ability to self-actualize without the threat of oppression.

How do we free our imagination and move forward into the future? That’s what Afrofuturism, I believe, can do. A lot of people get hung up on the name. It’s like Afrofuturism, I’m an African futurist, I’m a blah, blah, blah.

Lisa: Right.

Ahmed: I’m very pluralistic when it comes to that stuff. Call yourself whatever, bring on all the names. I don’t think we need to reduce or classify anything into this one thing. I think we can have all the things. One of the beautiful things about Afrofuturism is it’s as complex as the folks who have descended from Africa, which is all of us. We really try to embrace complexity, embrace nuance, embrace pluralism. That’s how we build from there using Afrofuturism.

Lisa: Thank you for that. I think a lot of people are really going to be excited to turn to the history books in order to open up their minds about the future. I just want to call out, Ahmed, first of all, how lucky I am to be your friend and fellow journey member in this life because I always learn something every time we talk. We’ve talked now for many years. One of the things that I’ve loved about learning from you and with you and Lonny is the importance of the past in order to unlock the future and to do it in bold and creative ways.

I think the other part that I’ve learned when I’ve studied Afrofuturism and tried to bring it into the classes that we teach and how we talk about the kinds of futures that we want to be, is that it honors art and story and creativity and culture in ways that don’t have to be binary, in ways that can be really abundant and generative and possible. I think that is another practice that we need to lean into to see these possibilities and allow the space for them to come to fruition in a way that doesn’t trigger us into a threat response.

I want to maybe use that as a springboard to talk about some of your more current work that you’re doing. You’re always producing plays. I know that. I know you’ve got lots and lots of things coming up in the Star Wars universe, which is super exciting to see your expansive role, not only in the shows but also in LEGOville, which is so fun.

Actually, before we go into some of your work on what you’re doing with another dear friend of ours, Drew Endy, in bioengineering and earthling culture. Let’s just pause there because we can’t not talk about Star Wars, honestly. Tell us what’s happening right now in Ahmed Best in Star Wars that you can share.

Ahmed: A lot is happening. Season 2 of Rebuild the Galaxy is happening. There is a Kelleran Beq comic book that’s coming out in October,-

Lisa: Ooh. Oh my gosh.

Ahmed: -I believe, which I have to start writing.

Lisa: Now, you created that character.

Ahmed: I did.

Lisa: Tell us about that. Like I said, I always wanted to be a game show host. Right before the pandemic, Star Wars called me, and they were like, we’re doing a kids’ game show. Do you want to do it? I was like, two of my favorite things are kids and game shows. I was like, yes, I definitely want to do it. It was called Jedi Temple Challenge. Jedi Temple Challenge was a game where young Padawans would become Jedi by the end of the game.

They would go through all of these challenges, these Padawan challenges. At the end, they would get their lightsabers, and they would get their robes. It was very much a Nickelodeon-esque easy challenges for kids game, which I really loved. At our first meeting, they were just like, we want you to be the Jedi teacher of this thing, but you can create whoever you want to create. I was like, say less. I’ve been preparing for this for a very, very long time, since 1977. [laughs]

Lisa: Say less. Yes. I’m ready.

Ahmed: I really wanted to create a character that was excited about being a teacher. In Star Wars, there are a lot of reluctant teachers. Obi-Wan doesn’t really want to train Anakin, but Qui-Gon Jinn dies. He’s like, I want to fulfill Qui-Gon Jinn’s wish of training Anakin. Yoda says, yes, you can train him. Obi-Wan was not that great of-- and I know I’m going to get flat for this, but he wasn’t that great of a trainer for Anakin because he couldn’t control those dark impulses. Anakin eventually becomes Darth Vader.

Then Yoda doesn’t really want to train Luke Skywalker. When he goes to Dagobah, Obi-Wan tells him to go to Dagobah. Yoda is trying to find every way to say no. He’s like, “He is too old.” Too old to begin, and I learned so much. I’m not afraid. Yes, you will be. Yoda doesn’t really, but he says, okay, I’ll train Luke. Doesn’t do that great of a job because, before he’s done, he goes and fights Darth Vader, and he’s like, you must stay. You must not go. You must complete the training.

There is another. That’s where we learn Princess Leia is there. There were all of these reluctant trainers in Star Wars, and I was like, well, what if there’s a Jedi whose calling is to train young Jedis? That’s what he loves to do. He’s not one of those people who just–

Lisa: He wants to.

Ahmed: He wants to show up every day. It was pretty much based on the teachers that I’ve had in my life who were just like, yes, this is it. I love teaching, and that’s what I’m going to do. It’s like, I don’t want to be a CEO of a company or a superstar. I want to be-- actually, this is it. This is my calling. That’s what I wanted him to be. That was first. First, it was just like, I am psyched to show up and see these young people, and I really want them to do well. I am firmly invested in their success. They are everything to me.

The second thing I wanted to do was tie in a whole bunch of Star Wars loose threads. This is how I see Kelleran Beq. He’s the guy who can take all the loose threads and put them together and really sort out where everything is going and what everybody is doing. I decided to craft his name in a way that ties loose threads. In Attack of the Clones, I have a cameo in the bar. It was on my day off. Anthony Daniels, who plays C-3PO, was like, “Come on, we’re going to be in the movie.”

He gives me this costume. He goes, “Put this on.” I’m like, “Anthony, I’m not supposed to be working today. It’s my day off.” He was like, “Come on, we’re going to do it.” We put these costumes on. It’s like these blue pilot costumes. I was like, “Oh, wow, this is--” I was getting into it. We go into makeup. I was really cool with all the makeup people because the makeup that they were doing for Star Wars was just amazing. They were just painting people, and it was just this wonderful playground.

Lisa: By the way, pro tip, you always want to become besties with the makeup people. If you take nothing from this conversation, that’s the number one.

Ahmed: That’s it. They’re called the beauty department for a reason.

Lisa: Make them your besties.

Ahmed: Yes. I was cool with beauty. I was just like, “Yes, I’m doing this cameo.” Then they were just like, “Okay, let’s put the makeup on.” I was like, “Oh, you know what would be cool? If I have this huge scar over my eye.” They were just like, “Oh, yes.” Then they started getting into it. They started putting like, say, “Oh, let’s make it like this, and let’s make it look like it has veins coming out of it.” By the time I got out of makeup, I had this character, and I was fully invested. I leaned into this character.

I’m in the bar scene all day long. George comes in because they position us and everything. Because Anthony is Anthony Daniels, and everybody knew me from Phantom, Clones, the second movie, they’re just like, “What are you guys doing?” I was like, “Yes, this is Anthony’s idea.” Then they were just like-- they were getting into it. They were just like, “Okay, you got to stand over there. Anthony, you stand over by the bar.”

Then George comes in and sees me and Anthony and starts laughing. He goes, “What are you guys doing?” I was like, “It’s Anthony’s idea.” He was like, “All right.” He gives us close-ups. George is like, “You guys, I’m going to give you a close-up.”

Lisa: How we future, right there. How we future.

Ahmed: Yes, exactly.

Lisa: You make yourself interesting enough, you’re going to get some attention. Love it.

Ahmed: Totally. Obi-Wan comes into the bar, and we’re doing the run-through. Ewan McGregor sees me, and he starts laughing. He goes, “I’m going to walk right by you when we walk into the bar.” Obi-Wan comes into the bar, and he walks by me, and I give him a look. Then George was like, “That’s your close-up.” I give him a look. George hits me with the close-up. All of a sudden, it’s a thing now.

What happens in Star Wars is if you show up on screen, you get a character name, you get a history, everybody just fills in the blanks as Star Wars fans. This character gets an action figure. It was like–

Lisa: What?

Ahmed: Yes. I was just straight up, just playing.

Lisa: I love the red thread. Makeup, cameo-

Ahmed: Makeup, cameo-

Lisa: -action figure.

Ahmed: -action figure.

Lisa: Brilliant.

Ahmed: This character gets an action figure, and they call the action figure Achk Med-Beq. That’s what they named the action figure, Achk Med-Beq, which is like-- they didn’t have a name. They just used my name and threw in a Q. Then this action figure becomes this weird collectible. People are just like, you got to have the Achk Med-Beq if you’re a Star Wars fan. I thought my mom was the only person who bought these action figures. I really loved this action figure. I thought it was cool.

Because it was just a cameo, I never really got to flesh out the story. In my own headcanon, I started putting together who Achk Med-Beq was. For Jedi Temple Challenge, I knew my Jedi was going to have the last name Beq because I’m tying together the cameo Achk Med-Beq to this Jedi. The other thread for this character that I wanted to put together was-- the names of Star Wars characters are always incredibly interesting and where they come from. There’s a character in Attack of the Clones named Orn Free Taa. It’s like a weird name. It came from corn fritters. They just took the C away.

Lisa: Everything’s got to come from somewhere.

Ahmed: Right. It was like Orn Free Taa. Kit Fisto is another weird one. The Gungans, which Jar Jar was one, came from Jet’s son. I mean, George’s son Jet, who would call garbage trucks Gungans because, when they would drive by the house, that’s what they sounded like, “Gungan.” That’s where the Gungans came from. I have always been interested in name derivations. I love that, how names become what they are now, like how Wilhelm became William.

Lisa: The historian in you.

Ahmed: I just love that. I just love name derivations. When I was in Tunisia, I told the Tunisians my name. I was like, “My name is Ahmed.” They were like, “No, Ah-med is your name. Ah-med.” I was like, “Okay. I’m not trying to offend you with my name.” They were like, “No, that is the name of our god, Ah-med.” I was like, “Okay. I’m Ah-med. Don’t hurt me.”

I always loved-- I love that. One name that I could never really reconcile with was Kylo Ren from the sequels. I was like, where does that come from? I wanted to tie the prequels and the sequels. Kylo Ren, I saw as a derivative of Kelleran. Kelleran is the original name. Then Kylo Ren is how Wilhelm becomes William. That’s how Kelleran Beq came together. The whole idea is pulling these loose threads and connecting the loose threads.

Lisa: Loose threads.

Ahmed: Yes. That’s how I came up with Kelleran Beq.

Lisa: Is that what the comic book is going to be about? Is that Kelleran Beq’s-- one of his superpowers, the loose threads? Because that is, by the way, a superpower, which you have.

Ahmed: It’s definitely how I describe the force.

Lisa: Wait, what? We’ve been talking for 45 minutes, and I’m just now getting to the underbelly of the force?

Ahmed: Yes. The force, right, according to George, it’s this thing that connects us and binds us, which is love, love regardless of who you are. It’s very kind of like Buddhist ethos. Regardless of you-- and it could be an Abrahamic ethos as well, love the stranger. Love your enemies. This idea of love ties all of us together. Those of us who wield the force have a special connection to love to make it tangible. It feels like you have an invisible thread connected to everything in the universe, and you have the power to pull on that thread and either bring it to you or away from you.

How do you operate with all of these threads connected to you all the time? I akin it to how you move through water. If you’re moving through water, you can still move. There’s a bit of friction on you, but you can still move. Because of all the water, everything around you feels you move as well. If you ever go snorkeling, and you’re swimming towards a school of fish and then they come up to you and then they feel you and they go away, that’s what it feels like moving with the force.

Lisa: Ahmed, I could talk to you for hours and hours, but I know we’re just about at our time and I want to use–

Ahmed: No.

Lisa: I know, I know, but I have to–

Ahmed: No. Lisa, no. You got to do a part two.

Lisa: Yes, we’re just getting started. Clearly, a part two. We didn’t even get to earthling culture-

Ahmed: I know, so much.

Lisa: -what you do. We’re going to get there. We’re going to get there. Maybe we’ll even bring in our dear friend, Drew Endy, and we’ll talk about that. I can’t help but build on that beautiful sentiment of the force to what this conversation is about, who you are in the world, what I’ve experienced in being a part of your orbit, and what I hope this conversation series does for others, which is to find strength, find optimism, find history, and the humanity to bring us forward in positive and joyful ways.

I’m not even sure I even understood that the force was about love. I’m just going to say it right now. Maybe I’m naming that for lots of other Star Wars fans that never quite got that connection. This idea that love is a regenerative force, that understanding our connection to others and utilizing the force as a learned skill, as a way of moving about the world, to make it better for others in ways that honor our humanity, that is magnificent. That is magnificent. That’s how I experience you.

I have always thought of you as sunshine in my life, the way that sunshine warms you up. It can nourish your soul. It actually gives you vitamins to be filled with more vitality. Sunshine allows things to grow. I know I am not alone in feeling your love and sunshine, Ahmed.

I just want to thank you so much for being a part of this extended journey, for giving us the chance to talk about some incredible origin stories of things you’ve put out into the world that you’ve shepherded and showcased. We want to use that as an invitation for others to learn more about all these great things, like AfroRithms from the Future and your work with Lonny.

Ahmed: Well, thank you. You’ve always been, for me, a North Star when it comes to agency of the future and actually action when it comes to the future. You are the person that I call first when it’s time to get things done, when it’s time to take all of the talk and time to put the boots on the ground and time to get it moving. I believe in you. I really do. I believe in you. I have a lot of faith in you, and I am glad you are in this world doing this work because you make the world a better place.

You really do. We need this now more than we’ve ever needed it before. Every system goes through these points of chaos before exponential growth. Right now we are on the cusp of exponential growth. I know it doesn’t feel that way, and it doesn’t look that way, but everything that’s pushing on us right now to feel like chaos is us pushing back towards growth. We need tools like this and people like you to keep us in it. I once had a friend who said, you can’t fight for peace. You have to peace for peace.

Lisa: Beautiful.

Ahmed: Peace is not passive. You have to act peace. We have to put peace into action in order to achieve it. It’s not an awakening that’s going to happen eventually. It is an action that we are going to realize collectively, and the only way to do that is to put out the possibilities of it any way we can. I try to do that in the narrative space. I try to do that in the entertainment space and in the educational space. We have to be able to do it in every space that we hold, put out what the peace action is, and craft the future that we want to be in. We can make it.

Lisa: Yes, we can. Amen to that. Thank you, my friend. So amazing.

Ahmed: Thank you.

Lisa: More to come.

Ahmed: Love you dearly.

Lisa: Thank you so much for joining me on How We Future. As you can see, Ahmed doesn’t just channel the force, he is a force. It’s not every day you get a spoiler for what’s to come in the Star Wars universe while also getting a jolt of personal inspiration. I hope you’ll tune in next time for more conversations on shaping the future optimistically, practically, and intentionally. I’m Lisa Kay Solomon, and I look forward to spending more time with you in the future. Have a great week.