Only ten percent of our happiness is determined by our circumstances. Where we live. How rich or poor we are. Our health. Our place within the structure of oppression.

I want my work to have a direct impact on the objective conditions of the people. I want to have a positive effect on people’s circumstance. But it is imperative that I pay attention to how I go about doing this. Because I risk limiting my impact. My work should aim for more than only 10 percent of a person’s experience of happiness, of freedom and aliveness. I want real leverage.

Michael Pollan just wrote a beautiful book on the “psychedelic renaissance.” He titled it “How to Change Your Mind.” And it is a phenomenally important work. He is a best selling author many times over. Many of you may remember groundbreaking books like “The Botany of Desire,” “The Omnivore's Dilemma” and “In Defense of Food.” I mention these because he is one of Time’s 100 most influential people. This is what is important about this post: Michael Pollan just made “Journey Work” go mainstream.

the Vision & Justice Civic Curriculum is now freely available to you.

“How has visual representation both limited and liberated our definition of American citizenship and belonging?”

This is the animating question behind the Vision & Justice Project, led by the incomparable Sarah Lewis. Visual representation has always been a powerful tool for reshaping our culture. But social media has exploded the power of the image. We need to be aware of this power. And we need to wield it with intention.

We are part of a global community that meditates together evrey Wednesday morning at 9:30am Eastern Time on a Zoom Video Conference Call. We support each other in our meditation practice. It is a powerful way to deepen our sense of connection.

Our work brings together shamanic ritual and the practice of emergent dialogue. We experience it as a forward facing remembering.

We tune into the aliveness of our shared consciousness. We nurture the possibility of something that can take us beyond the boundaries of ourselves and what we think we know.

This is an experiment. You are welcome to join us on any Wednesday morning over the next three months. You are invited to join us starting Wednesday, April 10 at 9:30AM Eastern time.

Deepening human connection is at the heart of the evolutionary leadership framework. It is a response to our times. It understands that the species is at a choice point. That we are on the fast track to an evolutionary crash. And that we need to take an evolutionary leap. A leap at the level of consciousness and culture. A leap away from the narcissism of our day. And towards the possibility of a new “We.”

We can only grow in this direction by coming closer to each other.

I turn 44 today. Samantha and I had a date yesterday, and she held space for my reflection. Birthdays are good for looking back and looking forward. I had to start with gratitude. I know that I am abundantly blessed. Blessed by the goddess. By my family and friends. By my community and vocation. By the light of my ancestors. and by the grace of life in these times, in this place and in this moment.

Our faith in institutions has shifted. But we still long for spiritual community. My friend Casper Ter Kuile recently wrote a powerful reflection on our need for spiritual containers. I have been contemplating it ever since. Nisha Purushotham and Jen Kiok, two women from our Evolutionary Leadership Community have recently launched a powerful experiment in holding such a spiritual container. Last month I was able to participate with my family. And it was medicine. It was grace.

We are rarely called to live into the higher virtues. Grace. Forgiveness. Compassion. Love and Letting Go.

The opposite tends to be true. Our culture encourages punishment, vengeance. Tearing down. Making things right by dehumanizing the other. There is little room for error. And so there is little room for growth.

Our moral stance tends to be static. We are rewarded for knowing right from wrong. For declaring it and enforcing it. But not so much for bringing others into the fold.

I’ve been thinking a lot about this.  It is a rigidity that has been with us for a while. But the last presidential election brought it sharply into view. Faced with hate come into power, we gave ourselves license to hate.

As I turn towards a new year, and the evolution of my own work, I am bringing more of my attention to the idea of radical responsibility. Radical responsibility is the centerpiece of the couple’s work that Samantha and I facilitate. It is a stance that refuses to blame. It means turning toward conflict with a very specific question: how am I responsible for the situation?

Radical responsibility seeks to honor the resilience, power and grace of our ancestors. It says: terrible things happened to us, terrible things happening even now, but we are still here. And we did not get here by chance. We bring our attention to each and every way in which we hold power. We seize on every prayer and every lesson that has been passed down by our ancestors. And we honor them with our courage and our strength.

When I ask a group to talk about what it is like to be with someone who is really present, they say words like: comfortable, safe, being held, alive, joy, energizing, grounded.

WOW.

Consider being so present that others feel joyful around you, alive, energized, grounded. Wouldn’t this be an amazing way of being?

We can be this generous.