Over the past few days, I have been struck by an intense experience of frustration. Being from Germany, and growing up in the 1980s, I remember the extent to which my education emphasized tolerance and acceptance of others as a fundamental principle of a functioning society. One of the reasons I felt so strongly about… Continue reading Character Litmus Tests
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Playing With Fire
Have you heard about—and maybe believe—the “lab leak hypothesis” related to COVID? The idea is this: people tasked with doing basic research on respiratory viruses might have been partly responsible for the outbreak. Why partly? Their work would have included “gain of function research”, which seeks to investigate more aggressive versions of the virus, artificially… Continue reading Playing With Fire
The Truth in The Expanse
Over the past five weeks, I took part in a series of calls under the heading of “Warm Data Labs“. The participants, broken out into groups of 3 or 4 people at a time and shuffled three times per call, were asked to answer open ended questions such as: “how are you tending to …?”,… Continue reading The Truth in The Expanse
Reciprocal Openings
Earlier this week, I took part in an empathy circle practice organized by Rebel Wisdom together with Edwin Rutsch and a group of facilitators. I was part of a group of five people, and after we engaged in this practice, we all reported on the effect this had: each of us, in different words, experienced… Continue reading Reciprocal Openings
Bullshit’s Shadow
To avoid confusion, I will start with my own definition of bullshit: whenever I exert energy into efforts which are primarily meant to make others—and sometimes also myself—believe that I have something of value to contribute, or into efforts to shift attention away from my true motives, and a truthful disclosure of what I can… Continue reading Bullshit’s Shadow
Inner and Outer Goals
Some months ago I joined a mens group currently organized by Jacob Kishere. Every other Sunday morning we take part in Zoom calls with men from around the world. The following line of thought struck me as important during today’s call in two ways. First, it demonstrates why I sometimes find it difficult to follow… Continue reading Inner and Outer Goals
Free-Energy in NVC
This post is a follow-up to my previous post, “Words as Windows or Walls“. I feel intuitively drawn to more deeply explore the connection between Nonviolent Communication—NVC for the remainder of this post, which is a process I learned about, together with some of the concepts described by it—and one particular way of describing (human)… Continue reading Free-Energy in NVC
Words as Windows or Walls
The title of this post comes from a song that I learned about while listening to Marshall Rosenberg’s 9-CD Nonviolent Communication training. The song is called “Words are Windows, or they are Walls”. He sings it after relating an anecdote about nuns in a convent: they were stuck on the question of whether or not… Continue reading Words as Windows or Walls
Individual vs. Collective Value
Yesterday, I was listening to a panel discussion on academic freedom. Close to an end, I noticed a conflict arising in me: many practical situations require that I seek and find value or utility in the connection to other humans—anyone who has ever networked to get anything done can attest to that. If you know… Continue reading Individual vs. Collective Value
Joy or Accomplishment
As I start writing this post, I am becoming aware that much of what I will express is based primarily on my intuition. I feel a bit nervous about that. Will I be judged more harshly? Is it not likely that I will fail in some important way? And yet, I would not want to… Continue reading Joy or Accomplishment