anthropology

Seven steps to a thriving loving marriage . Seven steps to a thriving loving marriage

For an extraordinary and nourishing marriage you will need the following ingredients:

2 Individuals

1 Bonding ritual

1 Communication skills

1 Relationship support skills

Step one:

Stir two individuals together until they begin to form an Us.

Step two:

Expand the new Us, folding in relationship-quality communication skills.

Step three:

Knead the Us, as it gains elasticity and resiliency.

Step four:

Fold in relationship-nourishing oils and aromatic spices.

Step five:

Become aware of and then speak one another's love languages.

Step six:

Develop a deep awareness of the challenges and opportunities of differing personalities.

Step seven:

Permit the Us to rise in a warm supportive space until the Us first doubles and continues to expand.

When all previous steps have been skillfully accomplished, the Us has evolved into a loving marriage, equipped to thrive with mutual honor, and respect. 

When difficulties arise:

Immediately seek out a marriage and communication professional who will guide you along your journey towards a successful Us.

Expect that this process may require a lifetime to complete.

Incorruptible Organizations AMA with Eric Ries. Wednesday 2/4 at 3:00 PM CT

Lean Startup author who now focuses on legal structures to protect mission-driven organizations from corruption. incorruptible.co

Free book giveaway! Register here.

What is the 'Metacrisis' and How Do We Solve It? (AMA). Rewatch the live AMA conversation with Layman Pascal 

First world is the third world or older. Beyond the obvious time line of identification being in reverse order and why I titled as I chose, our defining is in reverse, historically speaking. The world we all live in now, meaning kings and other governmental authorities, was not the first world. There were many other kings and governments throughout history. Likely way more than three. The application of polarity in our typical English language is quite interesting. Reverse ordering time to define many things. They can become eternally debated by being correct or incorrect and the entire space between. Even deeper they relate to our living human feature, e motion, as defining right or wrong, righteousness or evil, in the highest and lowest in human e motional feelings and polarity correlativity. Here we are and if we’re truly honest we discover we are all here, in the between, somewhere, working on figuring it out more. And barely, yet strongly, offer fatigued withstanding of our lives and our civilization. Loving and living onward, on words alone ? Let’s Up the trust? 

Building bridges and bursting bubbles.

Anytime we address new interlocutors, we engage in a constant recalibration of our common assumptions. And, why deny it: preaching to the choir feels better than talking to a wall. Yet, we don't want to be preachy, at least not admittedly. 
This takes me back to @blake's humility and pride dialectic... My question is:

I'm all in for building bridges and bursting bubbles, and I it's almost a mantra for a lifetime project of mine. But I have to constantly remind myself: who's 'in charge' of designing the bridges? What's the most gentle way to burst someone else's bubble, if we deem it necessary?

An example: this very morning I brought up Gandhi to my 17-18 year old highschool students. No one knew who he was. For a moment I had the urge to find a scream booth somewhere near, but after discarding the possibility, I proceeded to introduce the guy and his works to a new audience.

By now you can see I am assuming you know who Gandhi was, but how can I possibly tell, this is a new audience to all of us! What common grounds are we relying on? Are we aware of them? For instance, most of you are English native speakers, while I'm not, so now I'm sort of bracketing other idiosyncratic and linguistic stuff I carry around, in my attempt to (co)build a bridge with you... Or burst a bubble in an almost gentle way...

I sincerely hope you are looking up and/or not looking up Gandhi on Wikipedia right now (yes, both at the same time, mixed feeling or what have you...) Let me know what you think and feel (which can't be separated) about this...#DeepTakes

The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, probably via use of the word "optics" ;) . I've been reading the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (abridged*, of course, at least to start with!). New to the topic, and I’ve never identified as a history buff, but I’m really loving it. I wanted to write a short post about it, but couldn’t quickly figure out how to say what I wanted briefly, so here’s a long one!

It feels like a bird's-eye view of modern politics, in many ways, but especially regarding "The American Experiment." I'm sure this comparison isn't new--it's probably a huge part of what makes Decline and Fall popular today, despite being published in 1776. Since there's a whole trope about Rome buffs, I imagine many of you have hashed over all this a ton previously.

The early part of Decline and Fall starts with how amazing Rome was. Of course, it built on other civilizations and governments that came before it, but I think we these days have a hard time imagining just how surprisingly modern it would seem to us, if we were transplanted to the Roman Empire in its heyday. Of course we have tons of hard tech they didn't. But on the social level, I think a lot of it would feel spookily familiar. (I’m sure the author and I are both missing or leaving out huge ways it’s different. But I think there’s still a lot we can learn from it.)

Widespread assumption of and dedication to: rule of law, trial by peers, market-based economy. And somehow the start of the Roman Empire manifested a deep dedication among citizens and leaders to a Republic as the form of government. No nepotism, no monarchy, no might makes right. Government of the people, by the people, for the people, at least in spirit--my sense is people and government and military were all aligned in their dedication to that spirit. 

And peace! Peace, for centuries, throughout a huge swath of the known world, where that hadn’t happened before. There was a kind of national religion they inherited from the Greeks, but they seem to have been even more dedicated to religious tolerance than to their religion (prior to Constantine and the Christians taking over). Sure, there was kind of constant fighting on the edges of the empire, including always against the pesky Gauls and German barbarians, who really hated the idea of being part of the big empire. But mostly, and especially compared to times before in much of Europe, you could live safe in your home with your family, for generations even, protected by law-abiding and law-enforcing local authorities, backed up by the Roman army when needed, truly answerable to the people through the representation of the Senate, such as it was, and it was pretty great as far as I can tell. 

Now, the bird's-eye view of the modern USA comes in when, generation after generation, leader after leader, eventually monarch after monarch, the common-knowledge shared dedication to being a Republic and to all the ideas above, faded over time. First, one or two leaders came along who had enough sway over the army and enough popularity with the people that they were able to, against the grain of all Republic dedication, declare themselves effective leaders of the empire. First humbly, as first-among-many. Then with time, openly and pompously. Then with more time, it became obvious to everyone that the Republic was only a Republic in name, that it was just obviously "the way things worked" that the army effectively got to decide who became emperor, and that as soon as the army switched loyalties, you'd better be ready for a change, including probably a bunch of people getting killed for being on the wrong side. 

The thing about Decline and Fall, wrt this kind of degradation, is you get to read real human stories of this happening, again, and again, and again, and again. The same patterns, the different humans with unique circumstances playing them out. 

Why did the dedication to the original ideals degrade with time? I think the same natural processes, and lack of opposing processes, have led the US and myriad other democracies down similar paths over time. People and groups learn to subvert the system to get more of what they want in the short term, sacrificing the common-knowledge dedications and ideals that support the good things they have in the world. They pay less attention to the whole than is needed to maintain it. 

I'll name what I see today as one instance of roughly this kind of degradation, and I hope it's a little spicy. I have been part of many, many conversations in organizations where, when discussing some strategic question for the organization, the word "optics" comes up. For the uninitiated, the word "optics" in this context means: people could see what we're doing and have interpretations of it. We don't want those interpretations to have bad consequences for us. So let's be sure to include in our strategizing some component of consideration for trying to get people's impressions (the public, journalists, stakeholders, or etc) to be at least neutral. I can understand that. But I want to live in a world where we're creating the whole we want, not mostly attempting to persuade or convince or if nothing else not be noticed by parts of society that IMO we ought to relate to as peers. If we all practice distrusting our peers' sense-making processes in this way of strategizing about "optics", we'll all end up with a society with worse and less sense-making. So what do I want instead? I want us to take actions with integrity. Yes to being aware of our reputation (individually, organizationally, etc) and acting with integrity.

(*The abridged version I landed on, after some back and forth about versions with Claude, is the Womersly version. I love it. You get 100-200 pages of the above, which was just right for this first-timer.)

#DeepTakes

Partisan Politics: The Ultimate Smokescreen? The Left demonizes the Right. The Right demonizes the Left. The media, for the most part, only stokes this rivalry. Both sides are up in arms, believing that they have to keep the other side from winning at all costs.

Meanwhile, governments and central banks everywhere keep issuing more money, devaluing its purchasing power in the process (causing inflation). They do this to finance wars, to bail out banks, to fund massive bureaucracies and social programs and/or to stimulate the economy. They do this regardless of which party is in power.

And they do it because they can. Because our money used to be backed by gold or other scarce commodities, now it’s backed by nothing. Therefore its supply can be inflated at will (and this is what the original meaning of the word inflation alludes to).

I don’t think they do it out of malice. They likely often have the best intentions, and entire economic theories have been created and are espoused by Nobel-winning economists and academics to justify why they do it. But at the end of the day, the power to issue money out of thin air is just too great for any person or group to wield responsibly. It inevitably gets misused and abused.

And it has disastrous consequences. Most people around the world are getting poorer in real terms, regardless of how hard they work, because their purchasing power is being inexorably eroded. And most people don’t fully realize that this is what’s happening. They intuit that something’s fundamentally very wrong, but don’t really know what it is. Stress, depression, anger, frustration and despair run rampant, and are usually misdirected.

And so governments of every stripe and their central banks keep diluting everyone’s purchasing power, effectively stealing our time and energy. You work to earn money, and the money you earn buys you less and less over time. This isn’t an accident, and it isn’t because of corporate greed, or because illegal immigrants are taking what’s yours. It’s the result of deliberate governmental monetary policy, and it’s a global phenomenon.

And they get to keep doing this because almost everyone is too busy fighting the other side to even notice or understand that it’s happening.

What do you think of Circling Europe dropping the term "Circling?". I almost don’t want Circling Europe to show up in my feed, but I am very curious about people’s thoughts and reactions.

Monogamy v polyamory. Is monogamy better? Is poly better? Is there an overall norm for people, with exceptions? Is it totally pluralistic? Here are some points for monogamy, with some counter points, to convey some of my uncertainty but nevertheless leaning into what I’ve chosen:

• Point: I don’t know a single polyamorous couple that’s lasted more than a decade, whereas I know a ton of lifelong monogamous couples.
  • Counterpoint: many of the lifelong monogamous couples are not healthy relationships
    • Counter-counter-point: perhaps being in a lifelong commitment, even if the relationship isn’t ideal, is more healthy than being hyper-independent, especially as you get older. This runs right up against boundaries, how to know what to tolerate/love as is, when to leave, etc
• Point: The poly focus of attention tends to be the relationships themselves, often a kind of relational narcissism, rather than the relationship being a foundation for engaging the world in love (ironically). This is my version of the poly is impractical argument. Most of the people I meet practicing polyamory are constantly putting tons and tons and tons of life energy into their relational problems, and it seems like their relationships are often built around addressing these problems rather than enjoying life together. The fact that it takes so much time and energy points to something being a little off. Monogamous relating also takes energy but it usually seems less self-referential; they’re more often helping each other face and engage the world, rather than face and engage each other and their relationship.
  • potential counterpoint: You’re making a developmental point Jordan, not a mono/poly point. Most people practice poly from a Red ego-centric POV; most people practice sex from Red as well. If you practice from a genuine Green+ polyamory, this doesn’t happen.
• Point: Humans are largely monogamous; it’s instinctual
  • Counterpoint: How would we know if its cultural versus biological versus systemic versus psychological per person/family? it only takes a couple of generations of evolution to make massive physical changes, so even if it is biological, how could we know what’s possible for the future?
  • Counterpoint: people wanna fuck, especially dudes
  • Cheating, mistresses, polygamy, Sex at Dawn etc…
• Point: Many poly people avoid endings, boundaries, standards, and facing their own karma by just jumping from relationships to relationship. Sure monogamous people do too, but many of them end up getting married and that crucible forces them to face their stuff. Far fewer poly people get married, and when they do they can still use other relationships to avoid their shit
  • Counterpoint: we can use absolutely everything to avoid our shit.

there’s tons more, just want to get the convo started…

On Things I Loved That I Dropped. In a workshop I attended several days ago, everyone ended up sharing, one-by-one, about their experience or relationship with the subject of God (with a capital G). When it was my turn, I described being very young, with no training around religion or God, experiencing a very personal relationship with a God that cared about me and that was the still point at which all the chaos in my young life (and in the whole world) made sense. From this, I rested on a belief that somewhere beyond my understanding, life made sense. In many ways, this relationship not only comforted me but actually saved me.

Later, in college, I was exposed to traditional Christianity and took all the traditional teachings and trappings of it on as my own. I was a devout believer and I ended up leading the bible studies, not because of my expertise, but because of my earnest belief. And then, I began to find things about this Christianity I had learned, that I could not make sense of. As the questioning grew into serious doubt, I found I could no longer believe what I couldn’t believe. Through tears, I formally broke up with the very personal God of my youth, still vibrant in my experience, because I falsely believed that I could not have my real experiential God if I could not believe in the teachings that were associated with him. It has taken my years to begin to reclaim my God (different now, much more expansive, but still experientially real), leaving behind what no longer feels integral.

There are other things that I have loved and left behind based on trappings associated with it rather than on the essence of the thing (reading fiction, singing and playing the guitar, for example). As I move toward more integration in my life, I find myself rediscovering some of those things I loved from my past. They are not the same, having been laid aside for decades, yet rediscovering them is bringing my joy.

Do you have things that you loved that you dropped because of the trappings?

Racism through a developmental lens. unfinished draft…
note: I’m totally uninformed here…

• Red: Does this benefit me?

• Amber: My race is simply better (or worse) than yours. We perpetuate it because that’s good.

• Orange: Racism is a thing we transcend by being worldcentric and meritocratic; we perpetuate it by constantly looking at everything through the racism lens.

• Green: Systemic racism is everywhere (and at the root of many of our social problems); we transcend it by balancing the scales with education and programs to help the victims and stop the perpetrators; we perpetuate it by taking advantage of our privileges, ignoring it, and doing nothing.

• Teal: Systemic racism is real, but it’s mostly an unconscious self-organizing system that’s perpetuated because of the incentives that keep things how they are. We transcend by owning our projection, and by setting up systems that reward non-racism for each level of development in the currency that level values.

• Turquoise: We never transcend racism, it’s a construct we enact through conscious embracing and boundarying/channeling or we enact through ignorance.

All these are frames that enact world-experiences that overlap, and they’re all us; these frames keep us from being in awareness and seeing awareness as the stuff the frames are made of-which is the way out of the self-referential self refuting trap of this frame into unity of experience…

note: This doesnt mean everyone who’s using the surface language of systemic racism or whatever is actually at that level—for example there’s a red green alliance that uses Green language because it benefits them directly; there’s an amber-green alliance that uses green language to make their in-group good/better and make others wrong/bad.