“My eyes heart and mind were expanded to allow for the possibility of using a mindful approach to envision and take active steps to creating a global civilization with integrity and true personal and entrepreneurial freedom at its core. Highly recommend everyone to read the book A Golden Civilization and to attend an upcoming Conversation event.” - Conversation Participant
A Golden Civilization Conversation begins in Strafford, VT
On Sunday, April 28, many members of the United Church of Strafford met after their morning service to participate with George Kinder and his family in a Golden Civilization Conversation. With 23 perspectives from individuals ranging in age from 15 to 90, they began the conversation by exploring the qualities of “A Golden Civilization.” Each person answered the questions in turn: “What would a Golden Civilization look like? What do you dream or long for human civilization to become? Imagine it is hundreds of years from now and we have established the ideal society, what are its qualities?” Responses like “respect,” “love,” and “freedom” were shared along with “wisdom/vision guides us and keeps us on track,” “harmony with animals and nature,” and “citizens are trained to be stewards of the Golden Civilization,” among so many more.
The group reviewed their list of qualities and were asked, “If, as a consequence of our work together and with groups like ours all over the world, we were to bring this world [referencing the group’s list of qualities for “A Golden Civilization”] into being within a generation, how would that be?”
Tom reported that “All enthusiastically agreed it would be the best thing that could possibly happen, and the greatest achievement that any generation had ever accomplished.”
The group then dove into exploring what could get in the way of bringing their vision to fruition. Each shared the inner and outer obstacles that came up for them. The list was much shorter, but each response carried weight. Outer obstacles included “many stuck in fundamentalist developmental stage who cannot see oneness,” “media, and money in media,” and “systems are self-perpetuating and growing in power.” Inner obstacles included “fear,” “greed,” and “hopelessness.”
The group acknowledged the obstacles and revisited their vision of “A Golden Civilization” before moving on to determine what global, national, and local actions are possible. From the actions and the energy arising out of the ideas shared, each member made a personal commitment to act toward living into “A Golden Civilization” now, including “write more letters to politicians to put climate change front and center,” “continue lifting voices of color,” and “use social media in positive way for environment.”
The group has decided to continue this conversation by holding on-going meetings. All are welcome to join the next Golden Civilization Conversation. Their next meeting is set for Sunday, May 26, 2019 at 11:30 AM in the Parish Hall. You do not need to attend the church to participate, and should you wish to attend service, it is at 10:00 AM (followed by refreshments). Sarah Root has graciously offered to be the group’s organizer and Tom Kinder to be the facilitator as they move forward. For more information, please email unitedchurchofstrafford@gmail.com.
To read a full account of the event, visit https://unitedchurchofstrafford.com/2019/05/08/golden-civilization-conversation-continues-notes-from-4-28-19/.
Brothers George Kinder and Tom Kinder out for a walk.
Reading list & ideas contributed by Dr. Charlie Easmon
Dr. Charlie Easmon, Medical Director of Your Excellent Health Service, recently attended a Golden Civilization Conversation in London and felt inspired to share a reading list and ideas that he feels are contributing to delivering a Golden Civilization now.
Ted Talks
Books
Man’s search for meaning by Viktor Frankl
Thinking fast, thinking slow by Daniel Kahneman
Neurotribes - Steve Silberman
Why we sleep by Prof Matthew Walker
Madness explained, Richard Bentall
The Element: How finding your passion changes everything by Ken Robinson
Happier by Tal Ben-Shahar PHD
Stephen Covey - the 7 habits of highly effective people
Awaken the giant within By Anthony Robbins
Napoleon Hill any book
Dale Carnegie any book
The leader who had no title by Robin Sharma
The Kaiser Permante ACT study
The Spirit to Serve by J.W. Marriott Jnr & Kathi Ann Brown
The top five regrets of the dying by Bronnie Ware
How the mind works by Steven Pinker
Status syndrome by Prof Michael Marmot
You are not a gadget by Jaron Larnier & 10 reasons to turn off all your social media right now
Madness and Civilization by Foucault
Man up: surviving modern masculinity by Jack Urwin
Being a man ...in the lousy modern world by Robert Twigger
Stiffed: The Betrayal of Modern Man by Susan Faludi
The OIQ Factor: Raising your school’s organisational intelligence - How schools can become cognitively, oscillating and emotionally smart by William Powell & Ochan Kusuma-Powell
Smile or Die: How positive thinking fooled America & The World by Barbara Ehrenreich
Authentic Happiness by Martin EP Seligman
Toxic Parents: overcoming their hurtful legacy and reclaiming your life by Dr Susan Howard
Sway: the irresistible pull of irrational behaviour by Ori Brafman and Rom Brafman
The Descent of man by Grayson Perry
Happiness: Lessons from a new science by Richard Layard
Confidence by Rosabeth Moss Kanter
Extraordinary Popular Delusions & the Madness of Crowds by Mackay
Reasons to stay alive by Matt Haig
How much is enough? By Robert Skidelsky & Edward Skidelsky
The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson
Rumi
The Happiness Advantage: The 7 principle that fuel success and performance at work by Shawn Achor
The art of handling people by Herbert N. Casson
Why we sleep by Prof Matthew Walker
The art of Happiness: A handbook for living The Dalia Lama
The road to character by David Brooks
The confidence game by Maria Konnikova
The art of the good life by Rolf Dobelli
Seneca the good life
Fear of Freedom by Erich Fromm
The Anatomy of Human Aggressiveness by Erich Fromm
On Aggression by Konrad Lorenz
The Human Condition by Hannah Arendt
The deepest well: healing the long-tern effects of childhood adversity by Dr Nadine Burke Harris
Fully connected: Social Health in an age of overload by Julia Hobsbawm
The Power of Less: 6 essential productivity principles that will change your life by Leo Babuata
The Examined Life: How we lose and find ourselves by Stephen Grosz
The art of thinking clearly by Rolf Dobelli
Black Box Thinking by Matthew Syed
Scrum - The art of doing twice the work in half the time by Jeff Sutherland
A guide to confident living by Norman Vincent Peale
The art of loving by Erich Fromm
Emotional Intelligence: Why it can matter more than IQ by Daniel Goleman
Primary Greatness by Stephen R. Covey
Confessions of a sociopath by M.E.Thomas
The First and Second Penguin Krishnamurti Reader
The first and last freedom by Krishnamurti
Intimacy: Trusting oneself and the other by Osho
We are what we think - a journey through the wisest and wittiest sayings in the world by James Geary
How art can make you happy by Bridget Watson Payne
Poiesis: The language of psychology and the speech of the soul by Stephen K.Levine
Sapiens: 10,000 year’s of human history by Yuval Noah Harari
The Logic of Life by Tim Harford
Mid Life: look younger, live longer, feel better by Dr Muir Gray
Theory X & Theory Y Douglas McGregor of MIT 1960s
The No Asshole Rule by Robert Sutton
Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World by Anand Giridharadas
Charities
Apps
Practitioners
Dr Rosemary Taylor (adolescents)
Tony McLellan crew inc
Mandy Saligari
Nightingale
Dr Andy Zamar
Sleep specialists including .....
Resilience Prof Richard Williams (via Iapos)
Lexxic
Simon Baron-Cohen
Lighthouse
Alpha
Warren Von
Hoffman
Central and North West London NHS Gaming addiction Prof Bowden-Jones
Techniques
Counselling of many sorts
EMDR
RTMS
ECT
Drugs
Psychopaths vs sociopaths
Training for non specialists
Mental health First aid
People management
The one minute manager series by Ken Blanchard
Emails to chaplian
Models
Deloitte Mental Health Champions
Disney
Zappos Tony Hsieh
Unilever
De Bono 6 thinking hats
Dr. Charlie Easmon MBBS MRCP MSc Public Health DTM&H DOccMed
Medical Director of
Your Excellent Health Service
charlie@yourexcellenthealth.co.uk
www.yourexcellenthealth.co.uk
The RSA offers perfect venue for a Golden Conversation
George Kinder and Adam Wells review the obstacles to a Golden Civilization with a group at The RSA’s Rawthmells Coffeehouse on Friday 12th April 2019.
I’m Adam Wells and as a life planner and personal coach I help individuals navigate major life transitions. After reading George’s book The Seven Stages of Money Maturity, I signed up with curiosity to George’s 2-day programme, of the same name, which introduces financial advisers to the concept of financial life planning.
To my absolute surprise, George co-led the programme. I found his energy, passion and vision inspirational and refreshing (in an earlier life, I worked for the financial compensation scheme which compensated investors who had lost money through negligent advice/theft by financial advisers and I left the industry disillusioned).
George’s ‘message’ fully resonated with many of my own life learnings since leaving the financial services industry; including walking Spain’s Camino de Santiago pilgrimage path leading me to life transition coaching. Often, I ask individuals to ponder the question, ‘What special gift do you have that you could give to the world?’ Perhaps with everybody aligned to their special gift, the world would be in a better place.
And so, when I heard that George would be visiting London as part of his book tour and the UK launch of a global conversation movement to establish “a Golden Civilization” now, I thought this feels very exciting and offered to gather a group. The RSA, with its mission to enrich society through ideas and action, seemed like the perfect venue for a Golden Conversation!
The RSA Golden Civilization conversation will took place at RSA House on Friday 12th April 2019, 6.30pm – 9pm in the Rawthmells Coffeehouse. If you are interested in hosting your own conversation please find further resources here or feel free to contact me on info@adamwells.com.
CISI experiences A Golden Civilization
George Kinder and Amyr Rocha-Lima at the CISI Financial Planning Forum on 16 April 2019. Photo credit: Farida Hassanali.
George Kinder spoke about Life Planning, Mindfulness, and A Golden Civilization at the CISI Financial Planning Forum on Tuesday 16th April. From the event description, “George Kinder discusses his latest book, A Golden Civilization and the Map of Mindfulness, and a powerful structure for hosting conversations that has developed into a global grassroots movement. Applying the Life Planning methodology he developed over the past 30 years, Kinder helps groups create a united vision of the future and deliver it in short order. Experience a Golden Civilization Conversation that demonstrates how Kinder proposes people life plan civilization with participatory democracy.”
The speech was well received. Here’s what Registered Life Planner® Amyr Rocha-Lima had to say about the event via Twitter: “Really good session at CISI this afternoon! It’s great to learn from a very experienced financial planner, who has made it his life’s work to teach others how to match their life goals to their money. Forever grateful to have studied with the mighty George Kinder!” For more about Amyr, check out this great Advice Front interview.
Reflections from Primrose Hill
“In twilight shadow and evening darkness,” eighteen conversationalists gathered at the home of Julian Powe on Primrose Hill last Thursday for a “convivial, warm-spirited, curious and inquiring, and edgy in the imperative for action in service of improving civilisation through conversation and collaboration.”
Host Julian Powe offers here a brief summary of the gathering:
Our Conversation
We reflected on our stance and actions in support of our ‘torch’ (shown, as usual under my signature here); heard about what was emerging through the many conversations taking place around the world; conversed and worked with George on his thinking and practice for elevating the present moment and being fully mindful in it; and surfaced individual and collective action ideas.
The following themes emerged strongly:
Our stance in support of our ‘torch’ – delight; harmony; moving towards darkness and embracing the shadow; the power of kindness; the importance of critical thinking, courage; discipline and practice; a spirit of appreciation for what is working and is good; connecting with our and others’ souls; engaging and reaching out, more alignment in conversations; staying ‘in’, facing what is going on but not at the expense of our own balance and integrity; supporting and challenging leaders to really attend to the well-being of their people and colleagues
The imperative for action – now; within a generation; significant change needed across all domains and levels of system, political – economic -social – organsitional – individual
Attention to wisdom – strong common ground emerged here – wisdom is lagging and lacking – we have strong aspirations to see its rapid development across all domains, to be at the centre of discourse and organisational life – this community has deep knowledge about it – our call to action was to develop in 2019 a curriculum for wisdom for 6-96
Our Actions
We all reflected on our personal intent going forward.
By way of examples, here are Aaron’s selected actions:
To continue having conversations.
To assist those however I may in having conversations
To encourage my peers and contemporaries in the life planning world to hold conversations.
To get a babysitter so I can attend future conversations in person ;)
To connect jointly with Bruce and Julian to see what we can do in SE London for future conversations.
……And here are mine:
To continue to support this community in service of all we want to do to improve civilisation through conversation and collaboration, lining up with George’s wider movement and other collaborative efforts
To make the next move in our collective work on a curriculum for wisdom for 6-96 by circulating a discussion document by 26 April 2019 and inviting collaborative support from all interested (Jane, Parul, Bruce, Adam – you were among those who kindly expressed interest, all thanks and delighted to hear from others as we move forward on this)
To support George’s and other conversations in educational systems – and any other conversations where I can help
To up my game, month to month, in all I choose to do in my leadership work, my writing, my volunteering and my political involvement
And to have even more fun and delight!
Our ‘Torch’:
‘If – as a consequence of our work together and in league with other likeminded groups across the world - we, the human race, connected and one as we are :
Live in liberty, with truth, freedom of expression and justice at the core of our existence
Place the health and longevity of planet earth and all who live on it at the forefront of our attention
Delight ourselves and each other with our joy, humour, optimism and sense of fun
Live in harmony and compassion, embracing and working with difference to find common ground and alignment in a spirit of love, empathy, kindness, and inclusion
Explore and deepen our wisdom, self-knowledge, creativity and that of others through vibrant dialogue, curiosity, learning, science and art – stepping into the new and realising the potential we do not currently know we have
Move forward every day with a deep sense of collective endeavour, service, responsibility, courage, vigour and vitality to improve the lives of all on the planet…..
………How would that be?
Conversing with the Spiritual Sun
George Kinder, Tim Heath (Chair of The William Blake Society), and Julian Powe opened up a Golden Civilization conversation at the top of Primrose Hill at 1700 on Thursday 11th April with anyone who was passing by at the time and was interested. They gathered at the top of the hill by the William Blake stone inscription- ‘I have conversed with the Spiritual Sun. I saw him on Primrose Hill’. The event was publicized in The Blake Society newsletter. Thank you to everyone who joined!
Crafting A Golden Civilization at Coventry University
On the move once again! I’m holding several Golden Civilization Conversations throughout the UK, and have been met with tremendous enthusiasm and positivity. Here’s a comment from friend and event host, Lien Luu:
“Amazing Conversation on A Golden Civilization at Coventry University with George Kinder Yesterday we were honored to host an interactive conversation on A Golden Civilization with George Kinder, (the founder of the Kinder Institute of Life Planning).
The lecture room was quickly filled with energy, excitement and passion as both students and financial planners took an active part in mapping our Vision for the ideal society, acknowledging the obstacles and understanding the actions needed.
We were also privileged to witness a powerful live demo of life planning, as George showed us how through deep listening we can help people achieve clarity about what is important to them, and kindle their passion! A truly incredible evening. Thank you very much George D. Kinder for this honor and privilege, and we can't wait to have you back on campus.”
Golden Civilization Conversations in London
I was delighted to speak at Jarrovian Wealth Advisors in London and introduce them to the Golden Civilization Movement! We crafted a beautiful vision of a Golden Civilization, here’s some feedback from conversation attendee Chris Salacinski:
“We had a great session with George Kinder last Friday talking about the 'Golden Civilisation' and how to make it happen. Very thought provoking!!”
Anne Johnson - What is a Golden Civilization?
Conversationalist Anne Johnson presenting a shortened version of a Golden Civilization Conversation
Integrity in Civilization
The purpose of each system in society is to model integrity and deliver freedom. Nearly all of the problems we face have arisen because so many of our systems have not reliably done either.
A Blade of Golden Light
An excerpt (read by George Kinder) from a Golden Civilization and The Map of Mindfulness.
George Kinder — The Path & The Present Moment
A Global Vision for A Golden Civilization
“Golden Civilizations radiate from the light inside each of us, Delivering freedom and modeling integrity in all things.”
Participate in a global visioning exercise. George Kinder, internationally-recognized thought leader and father of the financial Life Planning movement, invites you to Life Plan civilization!
Imagine a thousand generations in the future where there is a Golden Civilization. What does it look like? Feel Like? How do people communicate, exchange goods, and govern themselves? Bring your wildest ideas and most personal values to a conversation about what could be. Let’s paint a vision of the future and then ask ourselves “How can we live into that vision now?”
This BrightTALK is one of hundreds of conversations that happened globally since the launch of Kinder’s latest book, A Golden Civilization and the Map of Mindfulness. The grassroots movement of community conversations asks attendees to vision a Golden Civilization and then work to establish it now.
“Golden Civilizations radiate from the light inside each of us, Delivering freedom and modeling integrity in all things.” – George Kinder, A Golden Civilization and the Map of Mindfulness
#AGoldenCivilization Movement Launched on March Fourth!
“ I was deeply moved and inspired by how George eloquently described, and has brilliantly mapped the only possible way forward for us as a species. I know these truths in my bones and have built my own private practice helping individuals out of outworn patterns and into living new creative ways of being. George is inviting this and more on a global scale. He has a thorough understanding of what our larger political and economic systems are based on, and is able to specifically assess what’s no longer working while introducing new possibilities for the future. Of course, this can only be accomplished with a fundamental shift in consciousness and so he gracefully introduces his expertise in mindfulness. In the past, I’ve attended two conferences with His Holiness at MIT’s Dalaï Lama Center for Ethics and Transformative Values where they admitted that a shift in consciousness was absolutely necessary to make crucial decisions in areas of global impact such as environmental engineering and sustainability in big business. George is also putting together these needed worlds of a more enlightened consciousness, changes in commerce, political reform and earth sustainability, but he is taking this out of academia and calling on our individual participation. We can bring our collective ideals, creativity, enthusiasm and active involvement to the Golden Conversations taking place all over the world. I look forward to being part of these conversations towards the creative enlightening of our future.
Many thanks!!”
Mindfulness Mapped: A Leader’s Guide to the Present Moment
Step boldly into your greatness by accessing the present moment. Thought leader, mindfulness teacher/author, and finance guru George Kinder unveils his life’s work with a Map of Mindfulness. He uses the map to explain new forms of leadership, economics, and democracy all rooted in the present moment.
This radical 60-minute talk offers insight into how you can personally apply his methods to access your inner leader and enhance your performance in every aspect of life: at work, with your family, and in your relationships. Kinder explores how strong leadership skills come from being present. Always residing in the present moment means you are ready for anything from inspired action to empathic wisdom.
His leadership system democratizes entrepreneurial spirit, maximizing both innovation and growth across society as it maximizes the efficient allocation of human capital. He shifts the frame of economic thinking by grounding all of space and time in the present moment and argues that moments of freedom rather than moments of transaction become our focus. He proposes self-knowledge as a more sustainable motivator than self-interest. In just one hour, you will understand the present, how to access it, and how it enhances your leadership potential.
George Kinder discusses the Map of Mindfulness
A Facilitator's Guide to Hosting Golden Civilization Conversations
It's time to Life Plan civilization! Kinder Institute founder, George Kinder, leads a live training focused on hosting community conversations for a Golden Civilization. Inspired by his latest book, A Golden Civilization and the Map of Mindfulness, George encourages you to step into leadership roles within your communities and help groups vision the future and live into it now!
Golden Civilization West Coast Tour
Laguna Beach, California Conversation Group
Irvine, California Conversation Group
Golden Civilization Conversations in Hawaii!
Aloha from Hana!
George Kinder & friends gathered in Hawaii for a Golden Civilization Conversation with uplifting results. We especially love the personal actions they’ve pledged to start to help bring the Golden Civilization into their lives!
George Kinder, his wife Kathy & company
The groups values of a Golden Civilization
Personal Action Steps