Changemaker Q&A

Click here to read the episode show notes and watch the full episode.

Click here to read the episode show notes & watch the full episode.

0:00

Before we begin, we would like to acknowledge the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples who have been the original change makers and stewards of Australia for over 60,000 years.

Their profound wisdom, resilience and deep connection to country have fostered countless stories of survival, adaptation and transformation.

0:18

The knowledge held by these communities is an invaluable resource for understanding how to create positive change and build a more just and sustainable world.

Welcome back to Change Maker Q&A, everyone.

I am excited to jump into today’s topic.

0:35

We’re going to be talking about something that is a little bit spiritual in nature, but I also think that spirituality and science as ways of obtaining knowledge about reality do not conflict one another.

0:50

I think they complement one another, and I’m going to be diving into an example of this as we explore today’s question, which is can we manifest social change Now, before I dive into this, first of all I want you to just get rid of any preconceived ideas you might have about what manifestation is based on what you see online.

1:13

A lot of the kind of new age spiritual approaches to manifestation and like the Law of attraction and things like that, I just want you to forget all about that clear that from your mind.

I’m going to be going through exactly what manifestation is from a more philosophical perspective and looking at what that means in the work that we’re doing as social change makers.

1:33

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1:51

So let’s dive in to this question now.

I mentioned before that spirituality isn’t at war with science, right?

It’s not a battle of spirituality.

Or we could put religion under the category of spirituality versus science.

2:09

These are both kind of ways of making sense of different aspects of reality, and spirituality in particular is a way of making sense of the aspects of reality that we can’t use science to make sense of.

So science we should first of all just acknowledge is not reality.

2:30

A lot of the time people say I don’t believe in ex spiritual view or ex religious view.

I believe in science.

Science isn’t something to believe in or not.

Science is an epistemological approach to understanding reality.

2:45

It is not reality itself.

That is probably one of the biggest mistakes that we tend to make, particularly in Western societies and even in the Academy.

We have this tendency to reduce our understanding of reality to our epistemology, to our knowledge of that reality.

3:06

And you know, I really do think this is one of the greatest flaws of so-called modernity.

There’s a great quote by Vandana Shiva.

She is an Indian physicist and activist, academic scholar, All the things.

3:22

And she says that we have moved from wisdom to knowledge and from knowledge to Wis.

That’s not right, she says.

We have moved from wisdom to knowledge and knowledge to information, and that information is so impartial that it’s creating incomplete human beings.

3:48

I obviously love that quote because I know it off by heart.

But I think it really speaks to the way that we have a tendency in Western societies in particular to really, I guess, value so-called objective knowledge over more subjective or not even subjective knowledge, but more kind of like holistic or contextual knowledge.

4:11

We seem to prioritize facts rather than what we might call truths about reality.

And this is something that I think Martin Luther King Junior also speaks about in one of his speeches that I’ve listened to.

4:27

I am a bit of an MLK nerd.

He talks about how facts are these kind of pieces of information that don’t have anything about them that conflicts with what we know about the world.

But facts are not truth, because truth has to contain within it more context.

4:49

It has to, I guess, bring together different conflicting ideas in a way that kind of says this is what’s right in both of these and this is what we can kind of ignore in these conflicting ideas.

So I really like that approach.

5:05

But anyway, I think what all of this kind of really speaks to is the way that we have a tendency to reduce reality to our knowledge of it, and in turn, how that then influences the way we think about reality.

5:26

Now, when we think about things that exist in reality, there are things that exist intransitively.

For something to exist intransitively, it exists beyond human knowledge of it.

5:42

And when humans can obtain knowledge about that thing, it then exists transitively.

It exists through our knowledge of it.

That might be through science, that might be through religion.

But when we have transitive knowledge, including scientific knowledge, that transitive knowledge is always fallible.

6:04

It’s always going to be open to correction and reinterpretation.

As things change, as we change, as the way that we are able to obtain and test, our knowledge about this thing changes.

And the reason for this is because I think at its core, we as humans can never really observe or experience something as it exists intransitively.

6:31

All we can ever really obtain knowledge about or experience or observe is the effects of these things.

So this is what we’re doing in science, whether that’s the natural sciences or social sciences.

6:47

We are making sense of a phenomena by observing its effects.

We’re not observing the actual thing.

So that affects our understanding of that thing.

As a quick example, just to like kind of illustrate what I mean, there is if we looked at a phenomena or a concept, something like patriarchy for example, we can never observe patriarchy itself.

7:16

It exists intransitively, but what we can observe is the effects of patriarchy, the way patriarchy manifests in our reality.

I’ll illustrate this with probably my favorite example to use, and that is the example of gravity.

So we can assume that gravity has always existed here on Earth, and it existed before humans were here, and it existed before humans had knowledge of it.

7:43

OK, so we would say that gravity existed intransitively.

In the intransitive dimension of reality, we could never really observe gravity, and we still arguably can’t observe gravity.

But what we could observe or experience was the effects of gravity.

8:02

So throughout history, people likely knew that if they dropped an apple and a feather at the same time from equal heights, the apple was going to fall to the ground faster than the feather.

And we knew that because we had experienced gravity, we had experienced the effects of gravity.

8:20

We had seen in the past that, you know, if you drop two different things at equal distances, you know from the same height at the same time, the heavier one or the one with less surface area is likely going to hit the ground first.

We could explain it like that, but we didn’t really have a way of explaining the cause of that gravity being the cause.

8:44

Until one day Isaac Newton sitting under a tree doing his thing, apple falls on his head, bam, he creates the law of gravity.

And suddenly Isaac Newton’s law of gravity was a way to transitively make sense of gravity as a causal law.

9:03

And this was transitive knowledge.

So it was always going to be fallible, always open to reinterpretation, adjustment, fixing, challenging.

And we saw this later when Albert Einstein came along and developed his theory of relativity and basically offered a more comprehensive, more complex way of making sense of gravity and our knowledge of gravity.

9:29

So I reckon one day we’ll probably get, you know, an even more comprehensive explanation of gravity as a causal law.

I don’t see why not.

But one thing is certain, We’re never going to observe the causal law of gravity.

We as humans are only ever going to observe or experience the effects of that law.

9:50

Just because we can’t directly observe the law doesn’t mean we can’t make sense of it, OK?

That’s what we do through our transitive knowledge of that thing.

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10:06

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When it comes to causality, science never creates causal laws.

All science does is uncover those already intransitively existing laws, and science makes it transitive.

10:50

This is why we don’t call it a process of creation.

We call it scientific discovery.

It’s because we’re not using science to create something.

We’re using science to discover an already existing causal law that explains phenomena that we experience in reality.

11:12

In the same way that, you know, if you’ve got a scientist in a lab and they’re mixing two different chemicals and you know there’s a reaction, the scientist didn’t create the causal law behind that reaction.

That reaction, the causal law explaining why it reacted the way it did always existed, regardless of who had come along and put those two chemicals together.

11:34

It was always going to react the way that it did because that causal law explaining why it existed intransitively.

What the scientist has done is they have come along and they have created the right conditions by mixing chemical A and chemical B to activate that causal law.

11:56

And what manifests is chemical C that these two things create.

This is the same as maybe to illustrate it a little bit differently.

If you have a painter come along and they mix for the first time ever yellow and blue paint and they get green paint, did this painter invent or create the process of getting green paint?

12:26

No, there was a causal law that already existed.

To explain why that was going to happen we would use maybe the principles of colour theory or the science that explains how human eyes see light and how that affects the colours that we see.

12:43

That is the causal law that would explain why that happened.

What the painter did was the painter came along and they created the right causal conditions to activate that ’cause they created the right conditions.

They mixed the yellow and they mixed the blue, and green was the inevitable result.

13:03

So this is what manifestation is in a nutshell.

When you were creating the right causal conditions to activate some kind of law or principle that already exists intransitively as potential, right, the potential for that thing to happen is already there.

13:25

It’s always there.

The potential for yellow paint and blue paint to make green paint was it always existed as potential.

You just needed something to come along and activate that potential.

And that’s really what manifestation is.

13:42

It’s creating those conditions, whatever conditions are needed to activate the right law, principle thing, whatever it is that allows that thing to manifest or be brought forth into reality.

So don’t think of manifestation in terms of like new age practices, like positive thinking or the law of attraction When I use manifestation, and I would argue that when anyone uses the term manifestation, we should be using it in its most fundamental, I guess, term.

14:13

And that’s, you know, to manifest as a verb.

It’s the way in which something intransitive is experienced or brought forth into our reality.

And we see this in a lot of the, I guess, like kind of common uses of the word manifest.

14:30

If I said that the increasing average temperature was the first obvious manifestation of climate change, that makes sense.

That’s use of the word manifestation in its more fundamental sense, not in the woo, woo, spiritual sense.

We could say that his fear of public speaking did not manifest during the presentation.

14:52

That also makes sense.

The panic attack she had was a manifestation of her social anxiety.

Their failure to comply was character was a characteristic manifestation of the team’s distrust in the team leader’s leadership.

15:11

The workers chose to manifest their dissatisfaction in the form of a series of strikes.

All of these things make complete sense.

They are examples of the term manifesting as a verb when we manifest something.

It’s the way that something that exists intransitively, something that is already there, is kind of brought forth and experienced by humans in our reality.

15:35

So a lot of the time the origins of the use of the word manifestation tend to be quite spiritual or religious, just because I think that it was often used to describe something becoming real that couldn’t be explained by science.

15:53

And for that reason it does tend to be used a lot in a more spiritual or religious context.

But it has definitely spread to all aspects of life.

So we’ve got this much more nuanced but fundamental definition of manifestation that I want us to use.

16:11

Manifestation is when something exists as potential, as a possibility intransitively, and it is brought forth into reality.

And we do this by creating the necessary causal conditions to activate that potential.

16:33

So with this more kind of philosophically grounded definition of manifestation, I think we can reject quite a few of the misconceptions that people have or the arguments people have against manifestation in like mainstream spiritual discourse.

16:49

First of all, you know manifestation is not thinking positively.

Although I think most kind of like spiritual approaches to manifestation don’t actually assert that a lot of the time it tends to be interpreted in that way.

Positive thinking might be needed in a lot of instances in order for a person to actually be able to take the correct actions that they need to take in order to create those causal conditions to manifest something.

17:16

But the positive thinking alone isn’t the thing that is creating the causal conditions.

Doesn’t mean it’s not important, doesn’t mean it doesn’t have a place, but it’s not the only thing.

Similarly, you know you can’t manifest anything.

You can only manifest something if it already exists as potential in the intransitive dimension of reality, right?

17:40

So you know, I could not manifest being born in a male body because there is nothing in the intransitive dimension of reality.

There is no potential for me to, first of all, travel back in time to when I was born and change the body that I was born in.

18:02

But there is the potential that exists for me to identify as a different gender, for me to change my physical body.

These all exist as potential.

18:17

They’re all possibilities.

So I could manifest becoming a boy.

Does that make sense?

So you can’t manifest anything if it doesn’t exist as potential.

So a lot of the times what you might need to do is if you want something that seems like it doesn’t exist as potential, like if it’s not possible, think of the ways in which it could become possible.

18:44

Another example might be.

I probably could not manifest being in London tonight.

It is already 2:00 PM here in Brisbane, and I don’t think that in the in transitive realm of possibilities, it is possible for me to get from Brisbane to London in such a short period of time.

19:04

But I could manifest going to London in the near future.

I could put a specific time frame on that if I wanted to in the next few days, that would be possible in the next week.

In the next few months, all of those are possible.

So I could manifest that I would need to create the right causal conditions.

19:22

For that I would need to buy myself a plane ticket.

I would need to, you know, book the ticket.

I would need to take all of these actions and do all of these things that create the right conditions for me to actually get there.

But it is a possibility, Whereas me being in London in a few hours is not something that exists in the realm of possibility.

19:44

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20:02

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20:21

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So manifestation is also not really about being like high vibe or low vibe.

This is something that is spoken about a lot and sometimes people will use the terminology, being an energetic match for the thing that you want to manifest.

20:42

I don’t really reject that.

I think that is a totally fine claim to make.

I think that being an energetic match is to embody something, and to embody something is I guess, a more holistic way of saying you are aligning with that thing, so your thoughts align with it, your actions align with it, your attitudes towards certain things align with it.

21:07

I think that’s completely fair to say, but I don’t think that it is necessary to manifest.

It’s well, I know that it’s not not necessary to manifest.

You do not need to be like an energetic match for something.

21:25

You don’t need to have the right attitudes and beliefs and take, you know, the right actions, because it is possible to manifest something without having that.

It’s not a necessary causal factor at play.

Similarly, there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to manifesting.

21:45

So there are always going to be things that are necessary in order for you to manifest something.

But a lot of the time there are multiple different possibilities.

So if I wanted to manifest $1,000,000, there’s a number of ways I could do that.

22:05

OK, I could go and buy a lottery ticket and I could win the Lotto.

I could get a really high paying job and I could really aggressively save and invest that money and you know, eventually those returns and my savings would get me to $1,000,000.

22:25

Or I could start my own business where I’m able to generate less restrictive amounts of income depending on the services or products that I provide to the market.

So each of these is a possible way for me to get $1,000,000.

22:41

Obviously one of these is a lot easier than the others, but less likely so.

There’s always going to be a lot of, I guess, factors at play, but nonetheless, all of these things have the potential to activate the causal conditions for me to get $1,000,000.

22:59

It’s just a matter of it actually happening.

Finally, manifestation happens whether you are doing it intentionally or not.

So I like to use the example of my PhD program and how you know I manifested getting into that PhD program.

23:19

The reason I well, the way I did that was I created the causal conditions that I needed in order to get offered a PhD scholarship in this particular PhD program.

So how did I create those causal conditions?

I applied for the specific program.

23:35

I had an application that met all of the minimum criteria.

I sat 2 rounds of examinations and obviously did well enough in those exams.

I proposed a specific project that appealed to the advisory team for that particular PhD project.

23:55

So all of those things working together was what created the causal conditions for me to get the PhD scholarship offer.

So throughout that process, was I thinking positively?

More or less.

I had my moments of doubt.

24:11

But more or less, yes, I was thinking pretty positively.

I had created a vision board for my life at that point.

It was the start of COVID, and on that vision board I had a PhD.

So, you know, I was doing these things that we might consider to be like more spiritual or new age approaches to manifestation.

24:30

Were they the things that manifested the PhD?

No, it was all of those other things that kind of created those causal conditions.

But that doesn’t mean they weren’t important and it doesn’t mean they didn’t help.

Having that positive mindset was the thing that kept me going when I looked at the criteria and I thought, I don’t know if I meet all of the criteria or when I start that first exam.

24:51

And I thought, man, that did not go well.

I can’t believe I have to do another one of these exams.

Similarly, you know, I had the vision board, and that kind of motivated me in a way not to give up because I had all of these other things on my vision board.

And I thought, you know, one day I will probably do a PhD, and if this isn’t the program that I get into, that’s OK.

25:11

I want to start the Humanitarian Change Network, so I’ll do a PhD in the future.

Spoiler alert, I try to do both at once.

So I hope that kind of clarifies a little bit what manifestation is, but more So what it actually means in a more fundamental sense of it and how we actually manifest.

25:36

So this brings us to, I guess, the end of the episode, but also the first question that we kind of started with and that is this idea of, you know, can we manifest social change well with this understanding of manifestation being the process of creating the right conditions to bring forth something that exists as potential into reality?

25:57

Yes, we can.

That is literally what we are doing in our work that we do across the social change phase.

It’s simple.

It’s not easy.

You know, whether it is investing in a certain company or business, whether it is engaging in activism, whether it is social work, whether it is starting a not-for-profit or teaching a particular skill to a particular group of people, Whatever it is that we’re doing, these are things that we’re doing because we believe it is going to help to create the necessary causal conditions, the right environment that we need to bring about the change that we want to see.

26:43

So whether we are aware of it or not, we’re taking these actions and doing these things because we somehow know or believe that the world we want to create exists in the intransitive dimension of reality as potential.

We wouldn’t be taking the action if we didn’t think that right.

27:02

And we’re doing it because we believe that the thing we are doing is one of the things that is going to create the right conditions for that potential and whatever causes that potential to activate and manifest in our reality.

27:21

So one more thing I might add to this is this definition of manifestation, I think is something that I have developed not only through my PhD research, but with the intention that I have in a lot of the more spiritual stuff that I kind of delve into in my work.

27:46

Something that I developed in a way that would appeal to people of all faiths and no faiths.

If you take the way I have defined and explained manifestation, regardless of what your particular spiritual or religious beliefs are, I really do think that your beliefs will fit into this.

28:06

Or you can fit this into your beliefs however you want to look at it.

For example, if you are somebody that believes in this idea of destiny, you could say that your destiny is the things that exist as your unrealized potential.

28:24

And when this potential actualizes or manifests in reality, that’s the manifestation of your destiny.

If you are a Christian and you believe that one of the kind of big forces behind causality in the world is like the will of God, you could say that the will of God is what always exists there as unrealized potential.

28:56

And when we as humans do the things that create the right conditions for the will of God to manifest in our reality, that’s what we’re doing with, you know, the thing that is manifested was God’s will.

29:13

The Buddhist notion of karma, I think also works here.

We could say like in terms of causality, karma is what exists as your potential and the things that you do, the actions that you take are going to, you know, lead to specific consequences.

29:35

And those consequences, good or bad, was your karma, the things that already existed as your karma.

So I don’t think it really matters, you know, what you believe about the world, the stories that you kind of use to make sense of this stuff.

29:53

I think that this notion of potential always kind of pre-existing, the manifestation of something in reality is really kind of the only way of explaining causality in a way that appeals to people of all faiths and no faiths.

30:10

So that is why I am such a huge proponent of manifestation as a way of making sense of social change.

So I don’t think I have anything to add.

I’m just trying to check over my notes, which are really messy.

I think that kind of sums up everything I kind of wanted to say.

30:29

I hope this made sense.

Again, feel free to ask me any questions.

If you want to hear me talk more about manifestation, definitely give me a follow on Instagram or TikTok.

It’s at Tiana, JTIYANA and the letter J.

30:45

As always, give us a follow on Instagram at Humanitarian Change Makers.

Head to our website.

We’ve got heaps of goodies and freebies to help you manifest change, and I look forward to connecting with you all and seeing the amazing things that you’re doing out in your communities to make change happen.

Click here to read the episode show notes & watch the full episode.

Well, welcome back to Changemaker Q& A everyone. This is the podcast where we answer any questions related to all things social change. I’m Tiana Jay, your host and the founder of the Humanitarian Changemakers Network. I’m also a PhD student researching in the field of communication and social change.

And today’s question. is one that was asked about my research. And I love answering questions all about research because I love talking about not only the role of research in the role of social change, but also just more generally about how the way we Obtain knowledge, the way we consider what is and isn’t knowledge and how that informs our understanding of the world and reality kind of influences, the ways in which we ought to go about social change.

So today’s question comes from Dess who asks, how do you do a PhD in a topic? So subjective, as an industrial hygienist. Having to read so many scientific articles from research and a lot are so inconclusive. They basically say, use at your own risk or needs more research, et cetera. I can’t imagine researching about a word like empowerment.

Now this is a great question and it’s a really common question that I get asked about my research particularly online, particularly on platforms like TikTok. It’s generally not asked as much. By people within academic circles or communities, although I’m sure that there probably are a lot of people out there who may belong to the field of the so called natural sciences, who probably have this same view when it comes to anything in the social sciences or even the humanities and.

This is, you know, to no fault of their own, although I had a conversation recently with somebody and we were talking about how it’s kind of interesting that when you do a PhD and you’re doing research in a particular field, in a particular discipline, it doesn’t matter what field your research is in, it doesn’t matter what discipline you belong to, what department you’re a part of at your university, the degree that you get at the end is the same.

The doctorate degree is a philosophy doctorate, a doctorate of philosophy. That’s what the PhD stands for. And it’s really interesting to think about the fact that whether you are researching in the field of biomedical science, public health, psychology, anthropology, history. literature, it doesn’t matter what you’re studying, everybody’s getting a doctorate of philosophy, yet so many researchers are unfamiliar with the actual philosophies and the aspects of philosophy that underpin their research.

And this is something that goes, I think, really overlooked in the academy. And I think, and this person that I was talking to kind of agrees that there needs to be more of an emphasis for researchers on not only selecting an appropriate methodology or kind of talking about their, ontology or their epistemological approach in their research, but really actually understanding what these mean and the implications of these and not being afraid to challenge them within your field.

However, I could talk about this for so long I could do a whole nother episode. So if you do have any questions about anything I discuss in this episode, feel free to ask directly on the platform that you’re listening to if you are on Spotify or YouTube. Or you can head to the link in the description humanitarianchangemakers.

net forward slash podcast. You can ask your questions on there. You can ask anonymously or not. You can leave your details and we will send some Changemaker Co goodies to anybody whose question is answered on the pod. So with that said, let’s dive in to this question of subjective research and understanding subjective topics.

Now, I think there are a lot of misconceptions that we need to address first when it comes to these notions of so called subjectivity and objectivity. First of all, there’s a bit of an assumption in this question that was asked by Des about inconclusivity. And this idea that an inconclusive result is is a result of whether the research was…

either conducted subjectively or objectively, or about a subjective or objective phenomenon. In reality, inconclusive research findings can result from methodological challenges. so Things like having an inadequate sample size, having a flaw in the design of the study perhaps errors in measurement or analysis of the data.

And these issues compromise the reliability and the validity of the data in the research. And that is what can lead to ambiguous results. So when we use rigorous research methods and approaches. tHis is applied regardless of whether the research is what you might consider subjective or objective, and you can get inconclusive research results and findings from subjective or objective research if you don’t address these methodological challenges.

So I think it’s also important to touch on this idea that What people tend to maybe consider as subjective is probably better understood or conceptualized as being context dependent. So where Des has mentioned that they come across a lot of inconclusive results in the research that they read, this is probably more so reflective of the challenges of the research findings and the results only really being applicable in certain contexts.

It’s not really subjective if we consider the definition of subjective to be open to individual interpretations or experiences. When Des says that they’re subjective or inconclusive, what I think she is actually referring to is that the research findings are only applicable in a particular context.

And Anybody looking to apply these research findings needs to consider the fact that the context in which they are working may not be the same in which the context that the research was conducted in. And it kind of opens up this broader discussion about this idea that knowledge or research findings that are only context dependent aren’t necessarily any less valid than those that are not context dependent.

So You know. Maybe the people who were researching this particular thing went out with the intention of hoping to find some kind of results that could be applied by people in the industrial hygiene field across different contexts. And maybe they actually found after conducting their research that you can’t apply this particular hypothesis, this particular thing, whatever the object of the research was in different contexts.

It’s only applicable in the particular context that we studied. And that’s okay. The whole point of conducting that study is so that people can then say, okay, we can’t actually apply this across different contexts. And that opens up the opportunity for more research to be conducted to either explore this further.

Or look at alternative pathways. So, So if we think about the conclusiveness of our research being open to interpretation or correction, that’s a good thing. The very nature of human knowledge is that it should evolve as humanity evolves. It doesn’t make it any less valid if our research findings are context dependent or perhaps open to reinterpretation or correction.

correction in the future. Now, if we go back to this kind of original definition of subjectivity being that it is open to individual interpretation or experience, there are still lots of phenomena in the world that individuals experience subjectively. We could look at health, for example, health. Is a very subjectively experienced thing.

What I consider to look like health in my life is probably very different to what you might consider health looks like in your life. And we have different ideas of what we believe healthy is. We have different ways of experiencing different aspects of health, like exercise and diet and illness. How we approach health might also be dependent on the particular culture or context that we find ourselves in.

But that doesn’t mean health is inherently subjective. We can still research health from an objective standpoint. We can still develop certain indicators of health and develop standards and definitions and approaches to healthcare that are based on an objective analysis. that considers all of the subjective experiences or aspects that individuals might have within that.

It is possible to have both. I think it is actually necessary for a full or holistic conception of anything to include both. And this applies to any research in fields like human behavior and psychology, finance or economics, politics, ethics and justice, even history. People are always going to have subjective views of these things, or subjective experiences of these things.

Or they’re going to behave in a way that is context dependent, but we can still study these things objectively. And later in this episode, I am going to share my personal favorite framework for kind of conceptualizing how we can go about this. So, it’s important to distinguish between, I think, both the relative subjectivity or objectivity, of a phenomena itself and the way in which that thing is studied.

So, For example, my research looks at empowerment. Empowerment as a phenomenon can be experienced subjectively depending on an individual’s experience of it, but it can also be studied objectively. We can look at empowerment as an objective whole. At the same time, the approach to research, the research methodologies that are taken, might take a subjective or objective approach.

So the research methodologies might actually focus on capturing those individual experiences of empowerment. Or it might look at the individual experiences of empowerment from an objective perspective, and maybe that means using quantitative as opposed to qualitative data. So we can always distinguish between both the subjectivity and objectivity of a phenomena itself and the way in which we study it.

So. All of these kind of like misconceptions are really reflective of one of the biggest challenges I think we face when it comes to understanding reality and the world. And that is this problem of dualisms. This is a big problem. Particularly in contemporary Western ways of knowing and being of our epistemology and ontology to use the philosophical terms.

So I’ve mentioned this in our episode about systems thinking, I believe. And I definitely recommend checking out that episode because a lot of the concepts and things I discuss in this episode will reference systems thinking. So if you’re not familiar with what systems thinking is, definitely check that episode out.

But there’s a quote that I love from Vandana Shiva. Vandana Shiva is an Indian physicist, theoretical physicist. She’s an activist, an academic. And her work kind of sits, I think, at the intersection of both academia and activism. So I love that. It focuses both on theory and practice and she has this quote and I love and it says, we’ve moved from wisdom to knowledge and now we’re moving from knowledge to information and that information is so partial that we’re creating incomplete human beings.

I love that quote because I think it really captures some of the biggest problems that we face in academia today. And it can be traced all the way back to, I think, philosophers like Rene Descartes. Descartes and the impact of his philosophy was really pivotal in shaping our understanding of reality.

And Descartes is the guy who said, I think, therefore I am. And. That concept is fundamentally flawed, but he essentially led to what’s now called Cartesian dualism. And it was this split or this separation between different phenomena. So that saw the split that we now see in academia, things like theory versus practice, the micro versus the macro, subjectivity versus objectivity.

And even I guess the disciplinary splits that we see like the natural sciences versus the social sciences is another example. And these dualisms that we see really impact the way that we engage knowledge and obtain knowledge about the world and the way we understand the world. And the problem with dualisms is that They’re a misinterpretation of reality.

Dualisms are effective insofar as they allow us a lens through which we can understand reality. We can obtain information about something and knowledge. The problem is that we have a tendency to reduce reality to this knowledge when there is a bigger, broader, independent, objective reality out there.

And it’s a mistake to try and reduce this reality to what we currently know about that reality. And when we can accept this, we begin to recognize that these dualisms aren’t necessarily two competing phenomena or two competing things. They’re two sides of the same coin. The existence is intrinsically connected to and dependent on the other.

You cannot have the micro without the macro. You cannot have theory without practice. You cannot have subjectivity without objectivity. And vice versa. So, When we can kind of get past this need that we have to create these false dualisms about reality and our knowledge about reality, we can begin to understand things a little bit more holistically, and in a way that is a better reflection of how reality actually exists.

So… A little analogy that I like to use, I call this the puzzle analogy, I like to think of the different roles or responsibilities of researchers when it comes to, uh, constructing knowledge. So, the role of a PhD. candidate like myself, is to create, oh sorry, make an original contribution to knowledge. So the whole point of doing a PhD is that your research is supposed to discover, uncover something that is original, something that no one else has, uh, come to a conclusion about, and put that forth into the Ever changing, ever evolving, dynamic body of knowledge that comes from the academy.

And different researchers in different fields, using different methodologies in different disciplines, have different roles to play in this broader ecosystem of knowledge building. And I use the analogy of a puzzle. So, you could think of the three roles being focusing on a single piece of the puzzle.

the role of putting different puzzle pieces together, and then the role of looking at the puzzle as a whole. So, A researcher looking at a single piece of the puzzle is somebody who’s really honed in and focused on one particular thing. They’re going to be looking at things that are perhaps subjective.

They’re going to be analyzing. They’re going to be looking at events or experiences. They’re going to be either looking at the micro or the macro perspective. And they’re probably going to either… be within a single discipline or taking a multidisciplinary approach. A researcher whose role is putting puzzle pieces together is going to take a more intersubjective approach.

So an approach that instead of looking at individuals experiences of reality, it’s looking at the shared reality. individuals have. They might be using synthesis as opposed to analysis. They would probably be looking at broader patterns and trends as opposed to those individual events and experiences of the single puzzle piece.

They would be looking at the relationship between the micro and the macro, not necessarily choosing one or the other. And they would probably be taking an interdisciplinary approach. Then we have the whole puzzle. So a researcher whose job is to look at and make sense of the whole puzzle, or the whole puzzle so far, is probably one that is more objective.

You’re looking at both the individual subjective reality from those puzzle pieces and the intersubjective shared reality of individuals and their broader collectives. You’re probably doing what’s called a meta analysis. So, you’re analyzing the whole as opposed to an individual part. Rather than looking at the events and experiences of a single puzzle piece, or the patterns and trends that we see when we put the puzzle pieces together, they’re probably looking at the causes, the underlying causes that explain why something is the way that it is.

Rather than looking at the micro or the macro or looking at the relationship between these things, it will be looking at the whole. So it’s looking at the micro, the macro, and the relationship between them. And finally, it’s probably going to be transdisciplinary. So we’re looking at it in a way that transcends any of those disciplinary bounds.

So that’s my puzzle analogy. And it kind of explains that When researchers are obtaining and building knowledge, we play different roles. Sometimes we might play one role in an entire research project. Sometimes a single research project, we might take on all of these roles at some part. But generally, these are the three types of roles that researchers play when it comes to the building of knowledge.

The true nature of reality is that phenomena are incredibly complex and The true, I guess, understanding of these phenomena is going to be one that encompasses both the subjective and the objective, the micro and the macro theory and practice. It’s a mistake that has become, I think, so normalized in Western societies and through our knowledge systems to reduce.

complex phenomena to these individual things. Now, a tool that I think is really useful for anyone engaging in the social change space but also researchers or practitioners who might be looking at a complex phenomena and wanting to understand it a little bit more holistically and in a way that is more reflective of the true nature of that thing is the iceberg model.

So the iceberg model, is a heuristic model that is used in systems thinking. It’s based on the analogy that the majority of an iceberg is what sits below the surface and what we can’t see. And we only really see the top part of the iceberg, but the top part is where Empirical knowledge sits. So empirical knowledge encompasses both the subjective and objective.

It’s the events or the things that we can observe or measure, and it’s also the subjective or contextual experiences of people. So that sits in the very top part of the iceberg, in what is called the events. Under that, we have the patterns and the trends. So, this is where we begin to analyze or perhaps synthesize, and we start to notice patterns and trends, both between and across these different events or experiences that we can empirically observe and measure.

We can begin to ask questions like, what are some of the regularities that are occurring? What might this say about the true nature of this phenomenon beyond different contexts?

We can then go a little bit deeper, and we get below, like the surface of the water, and this is the underlying structures level of the iceberg. So, If we’re talking about social reality in the social world, this is where any kind of social relations or assemblages would go. Things like legislation, policy, procedures within a society, the social relations between a population.

If we’re looking at perhaps a hard system or a phenomena that exists in something like the environment maybe. We would be looking at the physical structure of that ecosystem. We would be looking at basically the things that the system is composed of and the relationships between those things.

Then we go a little bit further below to the bottom of the iceberg. And this is the mental models. So this would mostly only apply to any kind of like soft systems, but it can also apply to hard systems and. I like to think of mental models as culture, culture being those kind of intangible aspects of humans or humanity and human societies, its ideas, beliefs, values, philosophies, things like that, and really understanding what the mental models are in place is really critical.

These mental models in a soft or a social system and the structure. in a soft or a hard system are the things that tend to have causal power. So they’re the things that can explain the events that we’re observing or experiencing and all of those patterns and trends. So we can’t reduce reality to just those subjective and contextual or objective and empirical facts that we observe at the top of the iceberg, nor can we just reduce it to those patterns and trends.

We need to go deeper and we need to take a holistic view that looks at all of these levels. We’re looking at the events, we’re looking at the patterns and trends, but we’re also looking at those underlying structures or mental models that might have causal So to use the example of empowerment, which is what my research focuses on, In the context of using ICTs in rural development interventions.

I’ll illustrate this with the iceberg model. So at the top level of the iceberg, we have the events and the experiences. So what this involved for me was. using both existing data from the organizations that I’m working with, a lot of quantitative data and through the focus group discussions that I had with participants, really trying to capture both their individual experiences of empowerment, how they defined empowerment in their different communities and as individuals and comparing and contrasting that.

And what you kind of then get is that next level of patterns and trends and you can begin to kind of see that yes, even though individual women have individual experiences of empowerment, the ways in which they define empowerment, the things that actually empowered them can be categorized into these categories or put into Thank you.

groups of similar things. And we begin to notice that there are regularities. We then go a little bit deeper. And this is my role as a researcher to kind of analyze all of the structures and the mental models that are actually holding the system in place. So the things that might explain the patterns and the trends that we can notice.

So this is looking at things like. The caste system in India, all of the different laws and policy that have shaped the different contexts that the participants find themselves in. So looking at India from independence all the way to now. Looking at the things that influence the strategies and approaches that are taken by the development organizations I was working with.

So looking at global development agendas, the sustainable development goals, the predecessors of the Millennium Development Goals, how they influence. The approaches taken by these organizations, how state level or national level or regional policy and procedures, legislation, all of the goals that have been set how they influence what’s happening.

And then what you get at the end is essentially this very holistic view. of empowerment that encompasses both the subjective individual experiences of individual women, their shared reality as larger communities, and the more objective view that looks at the events. That we can observe and measure. It looks at the patterns and the trends, and it looks at the underlying causal.

So anything that is causally efficacious within the structures or the mental models. And that holistic thing, that whole puzzle, that iceberg is essentially how we get A more objective, more holistic understanding of a concept that can seem incredibly subjective. And this can be done not just with empowerment in my research, but in any field.

It can be done in, like, literally any other discipline. And that is what the role of research is. It’s… Both looking at those individual puzzle pieces that might fit at any level of that iceberg model. It’s synthesizing and kind of drawing those connections and looking at how different components relate to other components.

And it’s also looking at those kind of underlying causes that can explain what we’re seeing at those other levels. So, I hope this answers the question. I hope this answers any of your questions that you might have had about how we can, I guess, obtain knowledge about subjective phenomena and how we can utilize that in a more effective way.

If you have any questions about anything I discussed in this episode, I would love you to ask them. There are no dumb questions. Even when a question like Dez’s question has a lot of misconceptions or assumptions underpinning it, it’s not a dumb question, it’s not a bad question, it’s quite reflective of kind of broader challenges that we need to deal with as changemakers.

In order to understand and intervene in the social world a little bit more effectively. So, if you enjoyed this episode, I always leave a link in the description to the episode show notes. In the episode show notes, I summarize the whole episode in an article. I include useful diagrams and things like that.

And I also include the episode transcript for anybody who would like to read the episode. So definitely check that out. You can see the iceberg model and things like that. If you enjoyed the episode, it would really mean a lot to me and the team. If you gave us a review or a five star rating on the podcast platform that you’re listening to, or a thumbs up on YouTube, it really helps us kind of see the type of content that people like, and also helps us get the content out there to more people as an independent podcast.

It’s. I guess it really means a lot to us to have your support in order to help as many people kind of access this knowledge and this stuff so that we can all become better changemakers. You can follow us on Instagram at humanitarian changemakers. You can follow me personally at Tiana J, T I Y A N A and then the letter J.

And I look forward to connecting with you all and seeing all of the wonderful things that you are doing in your communities or online to make change happen.

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Click here to read the full episode transcript.

0:00

Before we begin, we would like to acknowledge the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples who have been the original change makers and stewards of Australia for over 60,000 years.

Their profound wisdom, resilience and deep connection to country have fostered countless stories of survival, adaptation and transformation.

0:18

The knowledge held by these communities is an invaluable resource for understanding how to create positive change and build a more just and sustainable world.

Welcome back to Change Maker Q&A, everyone.

Today we are going to be talking about a topic that I am super passionate about and one that I think is often overlooked in the mainstream social change space, and that is the topic of mindfulness.

0:45

Specifically, I want to look at why mindfulness is not only really important for us as individuals working in the social change space, but particularly why mindfulness is important within our broader social movements and how we can actually work to create mindful movements.

1:02

Now if you have any questions about any topic related to social change, you can always head to our website humanitarianchangemakers.net/podcast.

You’ll find a little type form where you can ask your question either anonymously or not anonymously.

1:21

But if you leave your details there and we answer your question on the pod, we will send you some change maker code goodies as a thank you.

And today’s podcast episode is part of our broader, I guess, series that we are doing as part of our coaching branch of the humanitarian change makers network called New Humanity.

1:45

New Humanity is kind of at the intersection of the work that we do in the social change space, self development and life coaching and also spirituality and the importance of integrating a type of spirituality into social change that I guess appeals to people of all faiths and no faith.

2:05

So that’s what we do at New Humanity and we have our 2024 Completely Free Coaching program open at the moment.

So I encourage you to join.

It is essentially looking at self development through the Inner Development Goals framework, which is a framework of 23 Inner development goals that fall into 5 distinct categories.

2:30

And these goals were created in response to the 17 of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals as kind of like the essential skills and knowledge that leaders of change need to work on if we are to lead ourselves, our wider movements, our organisations, our communities towards those 17 Sustainable Development goals.

2:56

So we’re going to be looking at mindfulness in this episode because mindfulness is really kind of key tool or practice that is important not only for our self development but for our wider social movements.

3:11

And it relates to some of those inner development goals that we are looking at, things like presence and self-awareness in particular.

So traditionally, mindfulness has kind of focused on the individual.

3:27

It’s been something that is very much focused about you and your awareness of your body, your surroundings, your breath, whatever it might be.

But when we place this idea of mindfulness into a broader context of social justice or social change, mindfulness becomes a really powerful tool for change at both the individual and that collective level.

3:51

At the individual level, mindfulness really allows us to increase our self-awareness, our understanding of our personal privileges, our own personal situation and any biases that we might have.

It can also help us at the collective level to kind of Foster and create a sense of solidarity and community.

4:16

You know, when we think about this idea of like what it means to feel connected to our wider community, it’s a very intangible thing.

And in order to kind of, I guess, foster that, we need to tap into those kind of less tangible tools or tools that focus less on doing and more on being.

4:40

And that’s where mindfulness really comes into play.

So it can help us to kind of create those senses of solidarity or community with people in our community, in our network, in our circle.

And it can also kind of help us to just promote a more open, I guess, communication and more effective dialogue around really challenging issues when we integrate individual and collective change.

5:09

Mindfulness kind of as a practice has the potential to contribute to really lasting social transformation.

And I would even argue that it is essential because so many of the problems that arise in the world that we live in come from, I guess, this lack of mindfulness or this lack of presence.

5:31

We’re stuck in these kind of like perpetual cycles of doing and doing and being and being and trying to keep up with everything that’s happening around us.

And in order to, I guess, create an alternative, we need to, I guess, do and be in an alternative way.

5:51

So in order to create lasting change, mindfulness also means that we need to do more than just ease our stress and our reactivity to what’s happening.

We need to be able to take a critical look at the ways in which we have been socialised in our society or our culture and we need to kind of do that work to unlearn any of the harmful patterns of thinking or behaviour that we’ve kind of developed over the years.

6:23

This is not an easy task.

So much of the work that I think is essential to address some of the problems that we are experiencing in our society, things like anti racism work requires a degree of mindfulness.

6:39

It requires the ability for you to be aware of your thoughts, to kind of think critically, to be able to separate you as an individual being from those initial feelings or thoughts or emotions that might come up in a lot of this work that you might find yourself doing as a change maker.

6:58

And it’s not an easy task, but it is an essential task and mindfulness practices can help us in this arena.

So when we pay attention to our thoughts and emotions, we can obviously see how we have been conditioned by our broader context, by our environment, larger society.

7:17

And we can start to, I guess, observe those, first of all, observe without judgement.

And then start to make choices that kind of move us away from those more harmful patterns of thought and behaviour towards thoughts and patterns that kind of enable or encourage liberation for ourselves and others in order to create an inclusive and just society.

7:41

I think that it’s really essential that we consider the ways in which our individual identities also kind of intersect with larger systems of power, and this recognition that our kind of individual or individualized reflection of who we are and ourselves is also shaped by these external systems of power.

8:06

And we can kind of use mindfulness to observe, I guess, our interpersonal experiences and begin to understand how our, I guess, our own perspective of who we are has not only been shaped by our race, our gender, our class and other factors, but then also how others might view those things.

8:33

So when we, I guess, really take the time to actually reflect on our own lives, when we really take time to, I guess, do the work.

As cliche as doing the work sounds.

I think that it is the first step that we need to kind of take in order to, I guess break free from a lot of these systems of power and oppression that have been shaped by our socialization into a Society of particular dominant socio political dynamics and powers.

9:10

And this understanding can also lead us, I think, to reflect on the relationships that we have with others.

And, you know, we may begin to notice that our sense of other people is shaped by these factors as much as it shapes our views of ourselves.

9:29

And when we reflect on these things and we use mindfulness as a tool to do that, I think it really allows us to kind of tap into that sense of interconnectedness that we have with one another, with humanity as a whole, with other beings within the universe, with the divine or God or whatever that might be your higher self, whatever it is that you kind of perceive.

9:59

It’s mindfulness that allows you to kind of, I think, tap into that sense of connectedness and realise it.

And you know, we all have various versions of an us or me versus them construct in our lives and how we view the world.

10:15

It’s, you know, it might arise in our interpersonal relationships.

It might arise in the work that we’re doing when we so often see people or groups that think or behave differently to us as our opponents in the context of the work that we’re doing as change makers.

10:33

And it can be really easy to, I guess, lead to this notion of othering when we aren’t able to kind of recognise that some of these distinctions are arbitrary and they’re often based on things that are unconscious.

10:52

So when we can use mindfulness to actually be aware and conscious of the ways in which we might begin to other different people or different groups, we can kind of move away from so much of the energy.

11:08

I think that goes into being focused on fighting the other and instead focus on changing the systems that are creating and perpetuating these distinctions.

It often leads us to a feeling of either inferiority or superiority in our work, and in turn that leads to violence or anger.

11:33

And when we continue to perpetuate and mirror these, US versus them, I guess mentalities or constructs, that’s the very constructs and mentality and mindset that has created so many of the problems that we see today.

And unless we can be really honest with ourselves and recognise the ways in which we also contribute to those, we’re never going to be able to break free from them.

11:57

And if we’re not able to break free from them, we’re not able to truly create the change that we want to see in the world.

So there’s this concept of oneness that I think is so crucial when it comes to mindfulness and also the work that we are doing as change makers.

12:15

Oneness, in particularly mainstream mindfulness communities, is kind of considered to be like the absolute or the ultimate goal.

It’s about tapping into that sense of oneness with others, with humanity, with the universe, with God, whatever it might be.

12:35

But an important aspect of kind of tapping into like this idea of oneness, or realising this idea of oneness is recognising the diverse lived experience and the diverse communities in which we all find ourselves.

12:54

The interesting thing about oneness, and this is I think where a lot of people get it wrong.

Oneness doesn’t mean sameness.

It’s the same as, like when we talk about equality, we’re not talking about, you know, wanting men and women to be treated the same.

13:13

We just want them to be treated equally in the same way.

That oneness isn’t about everybody being the same.

It’s just about recognising that connection, that kind of thread that connects all of us as humans, as a species, as beings in this universe.

13:31

And once we can kind of recognise that oneness isn’t sameness, we can kind of come together and celebrate diversity and celebrate our differences, including differences in perspectives.

And we don’t have to give up our identities or our views and conform to somebody else’s.

13:51

And we also don’t have to have other people conform to our views about the way the world is or the way the world should be because we can appreciate each other for who we are.

And one of the ways that we can do this is through mindfulness.

14:09

So, you know, I kind of talked a lot about how mindfulness helps us to become aware of the interconnectedness of all life.

And it’s kind of like this tool that we can use to embrace the diverse richness of humanity and our differences and the interrelations between them.

14:30

But how do we actually do that?

And before I talk about the ways we actually do that, I want to talk about how we don’t do that.

So there’s this concept that I think was first put forward by a guy called Ron Purser, who he kind of coined this term MC mindfulness.

14:54

It’s essentially the version of mindfulness that we often see as something to be consumed.

So it’s I guess this way that we’re kind of sold mindfulness as a product.

As you know, it’s something that we can consume to help us to manage our stress.

15:13

But what mindfulness really does is it kind of ignores, I think, a lot of the systems and the factors that are actually causing these problems in the 1st place, regulating our emotions, developing self compassion.

15:32

You know, making ourselves less calm, less stressed, less reactive can result in, I think, better work for us as change makers.

But it’s not going to challenge the status quo.

It’s not going to encourage people to really be mindful and question the context of the systems and the society that they actually find themselves living in that is causing a lot of the stress in their lives.

16:02

It’s going to, I think in many ways actually just continue to perpetuate the very conditions that it claims to be alleviating.

And this is where we kind of can take mindfulness and again turn it from something that tends to be very reactive.

16:22

And mindfulness, in this context, like MC, mindfulness is very much a reactive thing.

It’s a way of using mindfulness as a response to all of the symptoms of a dysfunctional society.

What I’m arguing we can and should do is take mindfulness and actually use it as the tool to overcome so many of the causes of dysfunction in our society.

16:50

So proponents of what we might call the Mindfulness tend to purport that it is mindless or maladapted individuals that are to blame for a lot of the dysfunctions that we see in society, not the political and economic frameworks within which we are all forced to exist.

17:12

They often kind of frame it as the need to shift the burden of responsibility to individuals to manage their own well-being.

And by doing this they kind of privatize and pathologize stress and it’s led to a $1.1 billion mindfulness industry.

17:34

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17:52

For every online order that is placed, we will plant one tree with our climate positive tree planting partner Ecology.

All of the remaining profits from our sales are redistributed to our impact partner, the Humanitarian Change Makers Network, providing workshops, events, solutions, focused news and resources to catalyze young Australians to become active across the social change space.

18:17

I think this notion of MC mindfulness really kind of highlights the commodification of really crucial things that we need to, you know, survive and to create the kind of change that we want to create in the world.

18:33

That happens when we live in a capitalist or neoliberal environment.

We’ve kind of taught people that in order to cope with the negative effects of neoliberalism, they can use mindfulness techniques.

And in order to do that, we then kind of try and sell people mindfulness products, meditation apps, books, courses, things that are going to help them achieve that goal.

18:59

It does nothing to actually address the root causes of stress.

It kind of just tells people that you need to accept the system that you find yourself in.

And here’s a way that you can kind of take responsibility to deal with it.

And that’s not the kind of, you know, attitude that we want to have as change makers.

19:20

You know, we don’t want to just turn mindfulness or accept mindfulness as a way for capitalism to profit off people’s misery.

Want.

We want to actually say, here’s this tool that we can use to not only deal with a lot of the problems that we are experiencing, but here’s how we can actually use this tool to come together as a collective, to change the systems and structures and cultures we find ourselves in and actually use this as a tool to address those, to address the root causes of all of these symptoms we are experiencing.

19:53

So when we move beyond this idea of Macmindfulness in order to kind of overcome some of the key challenges of Macmindfulness, there are kind of two areas that I think need to be addressed by any practitioners or anybody wanting to kind of.

20:13

Utilize mindfulness as a tool in their work.

The 1st is how do we make our mindfulness teachings or practices more accessible and inclusive to people from diverse backgrounds.

One way to do this is creating opportunities for dialogue and exchange between different communities.

20:31

There is, I think, a need to increase representation within our networks of people that are making a conscious effort to recruit members from diverse groups by increasing access and inclusion in these practices.

20:48

It needs to help us ensure that mindfulness isn’t just, you know, meditation that is not available to everyone.

And the second question I think we need to kind of ask is how do we ensure that mindfulness is done for the purpose of benefiting the collective, not just ourselves as individuals?

21:09

And I think the skills that mindfulness give us can really add to our change making tool kit, not only kind of for our personal lives, but for, I guess social cohesion and effective functioning in our communities.

21:24

And mindfulness practitioners, and also leaders of change must kind of come together and explore the best ways that we can actually use mindfulness practices to raise our collective consciousness capabilities.

Now, there is obviously a lot of scope to make mindfulness training and practices more transformative, but there are kind of people out there who are already doing it in ways that we can use existing approaches to do this.

21:55

So during the past few decades, mindfulness has kind of evolved from it’s original, you know, Buddhist or yogic, Hindu or Indian roots.

And the way it’s been brought to the Western world is through what we might call healthcare interventions that are sometimes referred to as mindfulness based interventions.

22:22

So Mbis, these are essentially standardized approaches or programs that allow us to adapt mindfulness teachings and practices to educational contexts or organizational environments like workplaces or schools.

22:41

So a lot of the Mbis that we see are typically well researched.

They do have a lot of evidence behind them.

So they can kind of range from different like formal mindfulness practices, things like sitting meditations, mindful movements and body scan practices as well.

23:03

So whether that’s something like a yoga or whether that’s a more simple exercise like a kindness or compassion related like guided meditation, these are all different types of Mbis.

Now Mbis as a practice are often taught over weekly sessions or as daily home practices.

23:28

They can also be integrated through informal practice.

So another common way to do this is kind of for people to bring awareness to their everyday activities by pausing and responding to the situation that they’re in really mindfully, when they otherwise might kind of engage just through habits or I guess impulse.

23:52

So an example of MBI practices that are taught over like weekly sessions would be a yoga class.

If you go to like a weekly yoga class, an example of ways that these are kind of practiced as daily home practices might be through like a iPhone app or phone app doing mindfulness meditations every day or something like that.

24:20

I have a reminder that goes off on my Apple Watch that reminds me to just check in and spend 60 seconds just focusing on my breath.

So little things like that.

They are kind of ways that these daily home practices can kind of be integrated through, like informal ways of just bringing your awareness to your current situation.

24:42

So these exercises, these formal kind of Mbis, are really aimed to develop attention regulation skills.

They give us the ability to kind of focus on one thing at a time, but really also be open to an awareness of what we’re doing.

25:03

And they can help us to foster, I guess, a greater awareness of our thoughts, our emotions, our bodily sensations, And they allow crucial foundational attitudes to arise.

Things like openness, curiosity, care, all of these kind of intuitive feelings or emotions that we can sometimes get and push back because it’s not how we think we ought to be behaving or feeling in a particular context.

25:34

These also make mindfulness, I think so much more than just training or practice about attention or relaxation.

When we use any kind of teacher LED enquiry it also helps us as participants to kind of develop a better understanding of our minds and I guess develop more skillful relationships to different forms of distress that we might experience.

26:00

So in an organizational context, mindfulness based interventions, Mbis and different practices can support, I think both leaders and employees or leaders and their teams in both their personal and professional development as well as just through their daily work tasks and their operations.

26:20

There are a lot of evidence based effects of practicing mindfulness on a regular basis in an organizational context.

Things like improving productivity, mental health and well-being, emotional processing, communication and connection, connection with nature, appreciation of others, all of those good things.

26:38

They have also kind of been shown to increase and support transformative qualities and capacities for health.

And they relate to a lot of the sustainable development goals like SDG Three, I think, which is the one that deals with good health and well-being.

26:54

And I guess when we can kind of see that the evidence is there for the importance of Mbis in an organizational context or in a more collective context.

What I personally think is missing is the ability to kind of link or bridge the Mbis that we might practice these mindfulness based interventions, yoga classes, mindfulness exercises, those kind of informal practices that we might have and kind of linking those Mbis and our personal mindfulness to that need for kind of broader mindfulness or collective mindfulness within our social movements and the ability to kind of apply mindfulness in the context of social change.

27:49

This is something I would love to work on myself one day.

Hopefully I get the chance to.

Something that I have worked on is putting together a bit of a library of daily mindfulness exercises for the Humanitarian Change Makers Network.

28:04

If you head to newhumanity.humanitarianchangemakers.net, you’ll find out in a development goals course.

And through that, this idea of mindfulness is really about building the skills that can help us with those inner development goals that relate to our being and our way of kind of relating to our self and also relating to others.

28:29

And you’ll be able to access our library of daily mindfulness exercises that I’ve recorded and put together.

And you know, that’s just kind of like a starting point, I think for us as change makers to develop a bit of a mindfulness practice, build up those skills and engage in some kind of MBI that can help us to be mindful in a broader context of promoting social change.

28:57

I do think that what the world needs is kind of Mbis that can maybe be practiced as a collective, I don’t know, exercise or a way that we can kind of come together and really overcome the mindfulness that we see so often and really utilize mindfulness as a tool for social change in our existing social movements and the interventions that we’re doing.

29:25

I guess I will kind of end this episode here, but maybe leave it with a bit of like a question for you guys watching or listening.

If you have any ideas for how we can kind of create more mindful social movements, I would love to hear your thoughts.

29:42

If you know of any interventions that exist, definitely let me know.

I would love to kind of explore these.

If you have any kind of skills or the passion to maybe lead a project that can help to build more mindful social movements, definitely reach out to me and the team.

30:04

Our e-mail address is teamteam@humanitarianchangemakers.net.

We would love to support you, whether that’s through our resources, our time, our network.

If we have the ability to fund a mindfulness project here in Australia, I would love to get behind that.

30:23

So definitely feel free to reach out and connect with us.

Otherwise, if you have any questions about anything I discussed in today’s episode or anything else related to social change, you can also ask that at our website humanitarianchangemakers.net/podcast.

30:39

You can follow us on social media at Humanitarian Change Makers.

For me personally, I am at Tiana TIYANA and then the letter J.

You can also follow New Humanity which is New Humanity under score Coaching and you’ll be able to learn more about our inner development goals, training and coaching program that we’re doing throughout 2024 on there.

31:06

Other than that, I look forward to connecting with you all and seeing all of the incredible things that you get up to in your community to make change happen.

Click here to read the episode show notes & watch the full episode.

0:00

Before we begin, we would like to acknowledge the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples who have been the original change makers and stewards of Australia for over 60,000 years.

Their profound wisdom, resilience and deep connection to country have fostered countless stories of survival, adaptation and transformation.

0:18

The knowledge held by these communities is an invaluable resource for understanding how to create positive change and build a more just and sustainable world.

Welcome back to Change Maker Q&A.

I’m Tiana Jay, your host and founder of the Humanitarian Change Makers Network.

0:35

Change Maker Q&A is the show where we answer all of your questions about anything to do with creating social change.

If you have a question that you would like answered, you can head to our website humanitarianchangemakers.net/podcast.

You can directly ask your question on there.

0:52

If you leave your details we will send you some change maker code goodies to say thank you for having your question answered on the pod and you can also directly ask your questions in the comments via Spotify or YouTube if you are watching on either of those platforms.

So today’s question came from somebody on one of my YouTube videos and I loved this question so much that as I started kind of planning and prepping to answer it, I decided to actually turn it into a little bit of a series throughout 2024.

1:23

So the question was and do you think having a background in systems thinking and design helped with your permaculture journey slash is necessary?

I’m keen to begin permaculture but overwhelmed at where to start.

First of all, Congrats to this person.

Beginning your permaculture journey is going to be life changing and I don’t mean that in a very cliched way.

1:43

It is literally going to change the way you think about the world.

It’s going to change the way you live in your day-to-day life and the way you engage with the world as both a citizen and a consumer.

It is also going to equip you with some of the systems thinking and design skills that you can then actually apply in other areas of your life.

2:04

So to answer this question, the TLDR version is I don’t think you need to have a background in system thinking and design at all.

I think that they are actually embedded within permaculture as a framework and as a design system.

2:19

So you don’t need to have a background in those things.

You can actually learn those things through permaculture.

And like I always kind of advocate in a lot of my permaculture content and my videos on my YouTube channel, I think that you can actually use the skills that you can get from permaculture and actually use them in other types of social change work that you might be doing in the social change space.

2:44

So what I want to do to kind of answer this question in a little bit more detail is break it down and actually explore the 12 principles of permaculture.

So I’m going to do one principle every month throughout 2024, and we’re going to dive deep into each of the 12 principles of permaculture, look at it from both a systems thinking lens and a design thinking lens, and then look at how that principle more broadly not only helps us in permaculture.

3:18

And I’ll share some stories and experiences of how I’ve applied that particular principle in my own permaculture journey in my suburban backyard.

But we’ll also look at the, I guess, value that that principle and maybe some tools or frameworks can actually bring to other work that you might be doing as a change maker.

3:37

So a little bit of background information for those of you who maybe aren’t super familiar with permaculture, permaculture.

Some people say it’s a philosophy.

Personally, I agree with the kind of school of thought that says it is a design approach for me.

3:54

For something to be considered a philosophy, it has to have either an explicit or an implicit approach to epistemology, ontology, and perhaps even methodology.

But it definitely needs an epistemology and an ontology for me to consider something a philosophy and permaculture, I don’t think has either of those.

4:17

I think that that’s one of the strengths of permaculture is that it actually doesn’t matter what your ontological view might be, how you perceive reality.

It also doesn’t matter your epistemological view if you want to take a more, I guess, westernized, scientific empirical kind of approach to gaining knowledge about your environment and the world, or if you want to draw upon more traditional wisdom and knowledge like indigenous wisdom and knowledge.

4:48

I think the beauty of it is that it doesn’t need to take anyone specific approach.

You can kind of take permaculture and apply it to your own epistemology, your own world view and your own ontology, how you understand the world and reality around you.

5:06

I like the idea of thinking of it as an approach to design and one that I think is very much grounded in both design thinking and systems thinking.

So before we dive into these principles, permaculture as an approach to primarily it evolved as an approach to agriculture, but it is kind of more generally an approach to just living and building communities.

5:34

It was developed by two Australians, Bill Mollison and David Holmgren, and it kind of evolved, I think through three kind of distinct waves or stages.

So there’s a book called The Politics of Permaculture, which I definitely recommend.

5:50

If you’re kind of interested in kind of like the theory or the sociology of permaculture as an approach and kind of understanding how different practitioners of permaculture actually understand permaculture as a like approach to their work, definitely check out that book.

6:10

But in that book I kind of agree with this notion that there was kind of these like 3 distinct waves or periods that permaculture evolved between Bill Mollison and David Holmgren.

They each have a series of works that they published from around the late 70s that kind of set the scene for what would become permaculture.

6:34

The term itself actually comes from the it’s an amalgamation of the two words permanent and agriculture.

So this idea of permanence and this idea of something being sustainable and resilient or renewable.

6:50

So not necessarily static, like not permanent as in a static thing, but permanent in the sense that it is always going to be there, It can continue to evolve and adapt.

And then this idea of the culture in agriculture, I think not only being about food production, but also just culture more generally about the kind of informal ways that we organise as communities.

7:14

So that’s what permaculture is, that’s what permaculture means.

Like I said, I think the beauty of it is that it is very much grounded in systems thinking and design thinking, but they’re kind of, it’s flexible enough to be applied in a whole range of different concepts.

7:33

And the way that you can kind of apply permaculture is through these 12 principles.

So there are three permaculture ethics, which I like to kind of think as like forming the kind of like foundation upon which permaculture has kind of evolved and continues to evolve.

7:51

Or you could think of it as an overarching thing if you wanted to.

But there are three ethics.

They’re often shortened to people care, Earth care, and fair share People.

Care is all about caring for other people.

It’s about caring for humans.

8:06

It’s about seeing humans as an important part of the ecosystem and not necessarily like seeing the ecosystem as something that humans are separate from, but seeing us as a part of it and prioritizing our needs as much as we prioritize the needs of our broader environmental ecosystem.

8:31

I think that’s important because a lot of the time in Western societies in particular, we have this idea of like humans as being separate from the environment.

And we have these concepts like wilderness, which you know is kind of a construct that separates us from the natural environment and you know, we kind of value untouched nature or untouched ecosystems above those that we engage in in our day-to-day life.

8:58

So this idea of people care is really central to permaculture.

At the same time, so is Earth care.

So it’s not about saying we prioritise people over the planet, it’s about saying we prioritise people as much as we prioritise the planet.

9:14

And obviously the the ethic of Earth care is all about thinking about the environment, how everything we do in some way has an effect on our natural environment.

And the way I like to kind of conceptualize it is particularly in the context of agriculture and food production, which is kind of at the heart of a lot of what permaculture practitioners focus on is this idea of recognizing our food systems as not only ecosystems in and of themselves, but also as part of wider ecosystems.

9:51

And then we have this permaculture ethic of Fair share, which as you could imagine, is all about finding that balance between caring for people and the planet today and those in the future.

You could also extend that permaculture ethic to include fair share being prioritising the needs of not only our own community but other communities, whether that’s at a local level, a national level or a global level.

10:22

So that’s what permaculture is.

We have these kind of three key or core ethics of permaculture.

And then it was David Holmgren, one of his publications which first put forward the 12 principles of permaculture.

10:39

So the the 12 principles kind of came in that final of the three stages of kind of like the development of permaculture as a school of thought or a body of knowledge.

So there are 12 principles and throughout the year throughout 2024, I’m going to be diving into each of those 12 principles and how they help us not only in permaculture design but just more generally in our social change efforts.

11:04

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11:21

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So the first principle we’re going to be looking at today is observe and interact.

11:42

So observe and interact, It kind of forms the foundational cornerstone of permaculture design and philosophy.

At its core, it’s really just about emphasizing the importance of being patient, of taking time to actually be thoughtful and observe the natural environment around us or the system that we might find ourselves in before we initiate any design or intervention.

12:08

In permaculture, you’re really encouraged to actually spend time immersed in the landscape.

So not just kind of observing from afar, but actually like getting involved and seeing yourself and interacting with that landscape and observing any patterns, interactions and kind of the nuances of the ecosystem or the system that you find yourself working in.

12:33

Now this prioritization of deliberately observing kind of allows for us to not only understand kind of like the ecological dynamics of things like climate and soil and the relationship between animals and plants and things within an ecosystem.

12:51

But this idea of interacting, I think also kind of emphasizes that as humans, we are always going to be a part of our environment, a part of our ecosystem.

And it’s really about understanding that we’re always going to have an effect on it.

13:10

So we should be doing it intentionally.

And in order to do that, the first step is to kind of say, OK, like how do our actions actually affect the system?

What is the cause and effect relationship, the causal relationship between us and our environment when we do certain things.

13:28

And you know, rather than, I think, imposing any kind of like preconceived ideas about the system or potential solutions, what permaculture design really encourages us to do with this first principle is to adapt any of our strategies or our interventions based on the insights that we gain through our initial interaction.

13:52

So when we embody this principle, practitioners of permaculture really can, I think, cultivate A profound connection to our landscapes.

It allows us to foster designs that are not only sustainable but harmonious with the natural processes happening around us in our environment.

14:11

And I think the thing I love about this is it really reminds me of indigenous approaches to not only knowledge and the acquisition of knowledge, but also design in Aboriginal communities.

They when they design, they design very intentionally with country.

14:32

They design with the surroundings and kind of in the system as opposed to the approach that a lot of Western practitioners might have where we kind of design on something.

If you think of like a dwelling, you think of like a house or something in the suburbs, it’s very much this thing that has been designed outside of the context of where we find it.

14:58

It’s like we’ve come up with this concept of a house and we’ve just put it on the landscape.

Whereas if you look at dwellings and things that were designed by Aboriginal people throughout history, they designed with country.

Their designs were made from the materials around them.

15:17

It was designed to, I guess, create like a positive interaction.

It was designed to help the system continue the natural processes that it would have been doing without them there.

So that’s just something I think is important to note.

15:35

And just more generally, when we are kind of talking about permaculture or thinking about these principles, it’s important to acknowledge that, you know, these principles that are put forth in permaculture aren’t necessarily like new ideas.

15:50

And we’re not saying that, you know, David Holmgren and Bill Mollison were the first people to come up with these ideas.

It’s nothing like that at all.

It’s just they were the ones that kind of put these ideas into a framework that has become popularized and mainstream in the permaculture community.

16:10

But a lot of these ideas and, you know, systems thinking and design thinking more generally, can be traced back to indigenous ways of knowing and being and designing.

So that’s an important thing to note.

16:25

And even this concept I think of permaculture being permanent culture.

And if we think about what that means for me, when I think about what we’re trying to achieve through our permaculture and the permaculture, things that we might be doing, the work we might be doing, the way we might be living.

16:45

I guess like the kind of quintessential example you could come up with is indigenous communities and the way that indigenous communities survived for so long and the way that they continued to evolve and adapt to a changing environment and a changing landscape, It’s that’s what we’re aiming to do with permaculture.

17:06

So I think that we can’t ignore the role of indigenous wisdom and knowledge and I think we need to make sure that our permaculture is acknowledging that these ideas are not original.

When we think about, I guess, change and what that means, it’s a continual process.

17:33

It’s an evolutionary process.

And so our observations and the way we’re interacting with our system also needs to be a continual process.

It’s not a one off event.

You don’t just like begin your permaculture journey or begin any kind of change making intervention with observation and then never coming back and observing again.

17:54

That’s not how it works.

It is a continual iterative process.

And when we kind of, I think recognize this as being an integral part of change processes, we can see the comprehensive observation and interaction play a really crucial role in fostering social change for a number of reasons.

18:19

And there are a lot of benefits to observation and interaction in our interventions regardless of the space that you might be working in.

So just to go over a couple of these, first of all, I think it helps us to understand the root causes of problems.

18:35

We’re never going to be able to I guess understand or get a deeper understanding of the root causes of a lot of the issues that we’re tackling.

If we’re not observing, we’re always going to be relying on those kind of surface level symptoms and reacting to those symptoms and we’re never going to be able to really identify the underlying factors that might be contributing to the problems unless we are observing both causes and effects.

19:07

It helps us to make more informed decisions.

So observation really provides that necessary information that we need to make informed decisions about our interventions or any strategies that we might take.

It ensures that our efforts are going to be properly targeted and effective and address the actual needs of the system or the community.

19:29

It can also help us to build trust, interaction, and this idea of engaging in some way with the broader system is really integral to develop empathy and engage with individuals or community and understand their experiences and their needs and their aspirations.

19:50

In the same way that you can’t just observe an ecosystem, you need to kind of interact with it to see and understand these patterns and things like that when we’re working with other people, particularly people who might come from a different background or a different culture.

20:06

You don’t just observe them, you need to interact with them.

That would be like if I had gone to India and only observed the people that I was working with, the participants for my research, rather than actually interacting with them.

20:22

It would have never worked.

It was essential for me to actually converse with these people as best I could.

Obviously that was through a translator, but I wasn’t just going and observing women in garment factories or women who were working as agricultural labourers.

I was going into their houses, I was drinking Chai with them.

20:41

I was sharing a little bit about my background and myself and I was interacting with them and building like a genuine relationship.

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21:07

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21:32

Continuous observation also allows us to be adaptable and flexible.

Like I mentioned, systems, particularly social systems but also ecosystems, are dynamic.

They’re constantly changing and evolving, and in order for us to be able to adapt to these changes and be flexible in our approach, we need to be observing it and making observations.

21:56

It can also help us to have a more holistic understanding of the system.

I think that comprehensive observation and interaction is really that kind of like first step that we need to understand these complex social systems we might be working within and understanding and recognizing kind of the interconnections between different elements within that system and creating a more integrated and sustainable solutions.

22:23

Observation and interaction also helps with things like cultural sensitivity, being able to kind of maximize the efficiency of our resources.

A big one is being able to measure impact.

You know, what gets measured, gets managed.

22:40

And if we aren’t observing things, we can’t measure our impact.

And I’ve spoken about this in previous episodes.

I spoke about this when discussing the Sustainable Development Goals and that episode.

I talked about how one of the biggest, I think, challenges with my biggest critiques of the Sustainable Development Goal framework is that a lot of the targets that have been set, sorry, not the targets, the indicators.

23:10

So there’s targets for each goal, and then there’s indicators, but a lot of those indicators aren’t actually effective ways of measuring that target.

And if we can’t monitor and evaluate the outcomes of our interventions or our interventions themselves in an effective way, we’re not going to be able to make adjustments and actually approve our effectiveness or be held accountable.

23:34

And then we’re just going to end up stuck in this cycle where we’re continuing to waste resources, waste time.

So that’s why observation and interaction is so critical for our social change efforts.

23:51

Now in the context of systems thinking, I want to talk a little bit about what observation and interaction means from a systems thinking perspective, and then we’ll also look at it from a design thinking perspective.

If you are unfamiliar with systems thinking or why it’s so important in social change, definitely check out our previous episode which looked at what is systems thinking and when you might need to use it.

24:20

Systems thinking is essential for social change.

It’s not the only approach that we can take or that we should take, but it is an essential approach that some of our efforts and some people working in this space need to take.

So systems thinking itself, I think, could be considered a framework or an approach for observation and interaction, particularly within social systems.

24:45

Systems thinking begins often with systems mapping.

It’s where we identify the key components within the system and any kind of interrelationships between those different components.

And then we look at how these might kind of causally affect one another with things like causal loop diagrams.

25:01

We look at the role of feedback and things like that and how they kind of create a stable system.

So that all begins with, I think, observation and interaction.

That really kind of is the starting point.

And this works at both small and larger scales.

25:20

I did this in my own garden.

I took a, you know, I did a systems mapping exercise when I first began my permaculture journey, and that began with just observing and interacting with different parts of my garden.

And I also did this at a much larger scale with my PhD field work, actually using systems thinking to understand the rural development contexts that I was working in and developing maps for each of those systems.

25:47

Now aside from system mapping, which is a great systems thinking tool that I think anybody utilising systems thinking or beginning kind of an observation and interaction exercise can use, another great tool that I want to mention that really helped me, particularly when I was first beginning my permaculture journey was a SWOT analysis.

26:12

A SWOT analysis stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.

It’s a tool that can be used in the initial stages of any observation and interaction with a system because it provides a really structured framework for actually assessing both the internal and the external factors that can influence changes in the system.

26:34

Now I’ll walk through kind of each of these four aspects of the SWOT analysis.

So we have the identification of the internal factors, which are the strengths and weaknesses.

So with the strengths, you essentially begin by identifying the strengths of the system.

26:53

So as an observer, you want to look out for what’s currently working particularly well in the system.

So this could include any kind of internal resources that the system has, any kind of capabilities or positive aspects of the system that are contributing to its effectiveness.

27:13

The weaknesses are the things that we might observe that can help us understand where the system might either be vulnerable or in need of improvement.

So this could involve any kind of internal challenges, any limitations of the system or aspects that might hinder optimal performance.

27:31

Then we look at the external factors.

So these are the opportunities and the threats.

Opportunities are anything we observe that involves I guess recognizing what we might consider to be favourable conditions, any trends or potential avenues for improvement in the external environment of the system.

27:54

Then we have the threats which are the things we observe and identify externally to the system.

So any risks or potential obstacles that could negatively impact the system.

So this awareness is crucial for developing any strategies that we might need to actually mitigate or navigate through these threats.

28:17

So once we’ve observed our system and we’ve conducted our SWOT analysis, we can then actually use that to inform the initial stages of any kind of interaction we might have with that system.

So the strengths can be leverages, leveraged, the weaknesses can be addressed, our opportunities can be pursued and threats can be mitigated.

28:40

So once we’ve done this, we can also engage with other stakeholders.

So a SWOT analysis can be a great communication tool, a way of communicating kind of your observations with other people that might be interested.

It might also be a way for you to kind of invite other stakeholders to work with you by saying like, hey, what do you think from your perspective within this system are some strengths and weaknesses?

29:04

Or as somebody outside of this system, what do you see as some potential opportunities or threats we might deal with?

So the SWOT analysis can kind of help you to turn your observations into like baseline information or like a baseline analysis.

29:20

And then from there that helps to guide any further investigation.

It helps to align any observations you’ve made with some strategic goals and maybe balancing those internal and external factors through any interventions that you might have or any ways that you might interact with that system.

29:40

So that is, I guess, the role of observation, particularly through the lens of systems thinking.

Now I want to turn to design thinking and look at the role of observation and interaction, which I think again, observation and interaction is kind of at the core of design thinking.

30:00

Design thinking, if you are unfamiliar with it, is a human centred approach to problem solving.

It emphasizes things like empathy, collaboration, iteration, prototyping, and it’s an approach to solving problems for really complex challenges.

30:16

So it originated in the field of design, but it’s since been kind of widely adopted in different industries and disciplines.

Now I like to think of systems thinking as the approach that we take to really kind of observe and identify and understand a system.

30:32

And then once we can kind of do that and we identify some problems, some, you know, weaknesses and threats within the system, design thinking is the approach that we take to kind of start designing solutions to those problems.

So I think that they work really well together.

30:52

Systems thinking helps us to understand the system.

Design thinking helps us to solve problems within that system.

Now some key principles or stages in the design thinking process, it begins with empathy, which is about understanding the needs, perspective and experiences of end users.

31:11

So end users are maybe not the people that we are actually working with.

It’s the beneficiaries.

So for example, if you are maybe working on an advocacy campaign and you are working you’re trying to change a particular law and you’re working with a particular local council, they’re not the end users.

31:33

The end users are actually the people that are affected by changing that law or that policy.

So it’s important to just make that distinction.

You want to empathize with the end users and really immerse yourself in their environment and gain a deeper understanding of what their challenges and their aspirations are.

31:52

Then we define, we clearly define the problem.

In the same way that in system thinking we have to have a clearly defined but somewhat flexible boundary for our system.

In design thinking, we want to clearly define the problem that we are trying to solve.

32:09

So design think has worked to kind of reframe and articulate the problem in a way that’s going to inspire innovative solutions.

Then we have the ideation stage, which is about generating a really wide range of ideas without judgement.

It’s not about coming up with the best idea or the best solution.

32:30

It really is about coming up with, I guess, quantity, not quality, Because this is where you’ll find that brainstorming and other kind of creative techniques really encourage out-of-the-box thinking, and they encourage creativity.

And sometimes it’s the combination of two different ideas that will lead to the best solution.

32:53

Or it might be a matter of you know you can’t actually get to the best solution unless you’ve gone through some really terrible ones in the process.

So that’s what the ideation stage is all about.

Then we have prototyping that’s developing some kind of tangible representation of ideas.

33:09

It’s going to allow for quick testing and iteration.

So prototypes can be anything like an MVP to a simple sketch that can help you redefine a concept or an idea.

And we test.

So we need iterative testing to gather feedback on prototypes from our end users.

33:28

And this feedback loop kind of allows for us to further refine and improve the design based on our real world observations and insights.

And then we iterate.

So this is kind of like a cyclical process and we continually refine and test and feedback and observe and empathize and define the problem even more until we reach, I guess the best solution for a changing world and changing needs.

33:56

So design thinking isn’t linear, we can kind of move back and forth between these different stages, but generally it kind of follows this cyclical cycle.

So observation and interaction of obviously play pivotal roles in this approach.

34:12

And you might be thinking how how do we actually, I guess use observation in these stages.

It’s probably clear that throughout each of those stages, empathy, defining the problem, iterating, testing, prototyping, everything involves observation and an interaction.

34:33

So I want to instead look at some tangible, I guess, activities or tools that we could use to do that.

So an example of a qualitative approach might be to conduct user interviews.

So when we conduct in depth interviews with people, our either end users or other stakeholders, community members, and we really understand their perspectives and needs and experiences, we can use open-ended questions and that can be a way to actually observe what’s happening in the system, what people’s needs and values are, but also to actually interact with them and ask them questions.

35:12

We can use something like empathy mapping.

This is a way to kind of visually represent the thoughts and feelings and actions and pain points of end users.

We can use tools like persona creation.

This is where you create kind of like a persona based on observed characteristics and behaviours of the people that you interact with.

35:33

They’re kind of like a fictional avatar or character that represents different user segments, and they kind of take all of the needs and motivations that people might have and kind of humanize them into like a story format.

We can journey map so we can map out the user’s journey from start to finish, looking at each of the touch points that they might have.

35:55

And you know, obviously we can conduct on site observations to witness how people kind of navigate these or navigate their environments more broadly.

Other exercises include things like a day in the life exercise.

36:10

So this is where you ask users to document a typical day, or ask them to document how they do a particular thing.

If you’re looking to design a solution for a particular problem, you know, maybe the problem that you want to solve for is a children.

36:29

You want to help children’s lunches stay cold when they’re walking, you know, 45 minutes to school with their parents or something.

You want to design something.

So you actually want to go through their whole day and that whole journey from when the food is made to when they actually get to school and eat the lunch.

36:46

And it’s important to actually kind of observe what happens because people will only share the details that they think are important to them.

But as an observer and as you interact with them, you might be able to pull out things that they didn’t think were particularly important because it’s so normal.

37:05

It’s just such a like a normal part of their everyday life.

So day in the life exercises or how I do this activities are really useful.

There are so many different things.

Surveys and questionnaires are kind of like a common tool we might use.

37:21

I would always encourage more kind of, I guess, immersive approaches.

Another great usability test when we’re testing prototypes and things like that is to have a think aloud test.

This is where people actually voice in real time their thoughts of like what they think about the particular prototype.

37:44

Often when we are just filling out a questionnaire or a survey or we’re reflecting back, we, like I said, don’t really think that certain details that might actually be really important to the designers are as important.

So we tend to leave them out.

37:59

But if we can actually walk somebody through that process that we’re going through similarly to a day in the life exercise, they can kind of see I guess the users expectations and the usability of it in real time.

So there are so many different I guess tangible approaches to actually practising observation and interaction in the systems that we’re working in.

38:24

So I hope that gives you a bit of a clearer idea of not only why observation and interaction is so important in the context of permaculture, but also just more generally if we are taking a systems thinking or a design thinking approach to our work in the social change space.

38:44

I really encourage you to ask any questions that you have about this particular permaculture principle, about observation and interaction, about permaculture more generally, or anything social change related.

I am always keen to answer your questions.

39:02

That’s why the podcasts exist.

We wouldn’t have it if we didn’t have our incredible community members like you guys to ask questions.

I will be recording an episode next month about the next permaculture principle.

So hopefully by the end of 2024 you will have an understanding of the 12 permaculture principles, how you can apply them in your own permaculture projects potentially, or just in your work across the social change space.

39:30

More generally, if you want to kind of see more of the behind the scenes of my personal permaculture journey or learn about permaculture in a little bit more detail, definitely check out our initiative Fixing Food.

It is a free resource library all about permaculture design based on the tools and frameworks that I have used.

39:53

As a systems thinking practitioner, you can head to fixingfood.humanitarianchangemakers.net.

All of the resources on there are completely free.

I am always adding new things.

I am looking to really build that library throughout 2024.

40:09

I’m going to be releasing with this podcast episode some tangible tools and frameworks that you can use worksheets and things like that to actually implement each of the permaculture principles.

So if you head to the Fixing Food website with our educational resources, there will be a free online course.

40:31

It’ll be a 12 month course that you can take and I really encourage you each month as I release these podcast episodes and release content on my YouTube channel to follow along and focus on one permaculture principle every month.

By the end of the year you will be amazed at how much you learn not only about systems thinking and design thinking, but just about your environment, your community, the food that you can grow, the animals that live around you.

41:00

I’ve learnt so much in a little over 12 months since beginning my permaculture journey.

It’s it actually blows my mind.

Sometimes I’ll have little moments where I’m talking to my partner, Like the other day I was telling him about the six different species of native bees that we have in our house.

41:21

And he was like, how do you, like, know that?

Like, how do you even know what these native bee species are?

And I was like, you know what?

12 months ago I hadn’t, I could not tell you the difference between a native Australian bee and a regular American or sorry, Asian or European honey bee.

And now I can identify different types of native Australian bees.

41:40

We have a stingless beehive.

And that’s all because I really just began my permaculture journey with observation and interaction.

I had a little notebook, and I kept note of things I would continue to learn from that.

I bought books.

41:55

I used all the free resources.

So I really encourage you to begin whatever project it might be, whatever thing you’ve wanted to kind of learn about as a change maker, begin your journey with some observation and interaction.

Other than that, I look forward to answering your next questions in our upcoming episodes.

Click here to read the episode show notes & watch the full episode.

0:00

Before we begin, we would like to acknowledge the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples who have been the original change makers and stewards of Australia for over 60,000 years.

Their profound wisdom, resilience and deep connection to country have fostered countless stories of survival, adaptation and transformation.

0:18

The knowledge held by these communities is an invaluable resource for understanding how to create positive change and build a more just and sustainable world.

Welcome back to Change Maker Q&A everyone.

If you are new here, this is the podcast by the Humanitarian Change Makers Network where we answer all of your questions about anything social change related.

0:39

I’m Tiana Jay.

I am the founder of the Humanitarian Change Makers Network, and I’m the host of Change Maker Q&A.

And we’re going to be diving into a topic that I love learning about and thinking about and talking about.

0:54

And it’s this idea of an abundance mindset and the importance of having an abundance mindset in social change.

And I talk about this a little bit in our first social change handbook, The Change Maker in You.

1:10

If you haven’t read The Change Maker in you, you can grab a ebook copy for free by just heading to Humanitarian Change makers.net and at the bottom of the home page you can subscribe to our mailing list.

And not only will you get fortnightly updates about everything we are doing here at HCN, you will also get APDF copy of the handbook.

1:33

You’ll get a cheeky 10% discount code to spend at our e-commerce Store Changemaker code, and if you have read The Change American you, you would know that.

I talk about this idea of having an abundance mindset and the importance of an abundance mindset when we are engaging in the work of change.

1:52

And an abundance mindset can be contrasted with a scarcity mindset.

A scarcity mindset is one that is really rooted in this idea of lack or not having enough, whereas an abundance mindset is kind of about recognizing that we have enough, whether that’s enough resources, enough support, enough, whatever it might be, and we don’t need to, I guess, accumulate and keep things to ourselves.

2:20

We actually have enough to share with everyone, and we have enough to actually achieve the things that we want to achieve.

And I posted a video on my YouTube channel a while back now talking about how sometimes it can be really hard to kind of think with an abundance mindset because so much of the systems within our society are kind of rooted in scarcity.

2:46

We do kind of live in an environment and and a capitalist economy that is really kind of grounded in this idea of competition and scarcity and this idea that, you know, if you don’t work hard enough and if you don’t look after yourself or your family, you won’t have enough or you’ll fall behind.

3:03

That is very much rooted in a scarcity mindset.

So when we grow up in that environment, it can be really hard to kind of shift into an abundance mindset.

And I talked about our concept called collective enoughness in this one particular YouTube video.

And collective enoughness is essentially A mindset shift that’s kind of like not quite an abundance mindset, but on the way to an abundance mindset.

3:28

And it’s this idea that, look, we might not experience abundance in our own lives, but when we come together collectively, we have enough.

And I received a question on that video about how we actually kind of implement or utilise this idea of collective enoughness as more than just a mindset shift.

3:51

But, you know, how can we actually practice this?

And so I wanted to address this question in today’s episode.

I wanted to kind of refer to the theory of change known as catalytic thinking that was first proposed by Hildee Gottlieb in her work.

4:08

And this is really, I guess, a theory of change that is grounded in abundance, and it kind of looks at different interrelated concepts.

And that’s what we’re going to unpack in today’s episode.

So if you have any questions about absolutely anything you would like me to answer in an upcoming episode, definitely head to our website humanitarianchangemakers.net/podcast.

4:32

You can ask your questions there.

You can ask them anonymous anonymously.

You can leave your details.

And if we answer your question on the pod and you have left us your details there, we can send you some Change Maker code goodies.

Now catalytic thinking is essentially a theory of change like I mentioned before, first proposed by a woman named Hildee Gottlieb.

4:56

And it’s essentially a theory of change that is rooted in the logic or the mindset or the philosophy of abundance.

And it kind of has these three interrelated observations or premises about the cause and effect of positive social change.

5:15

So we’ll go through these three kind of interrelated observations or I would call them the premises of this argument.

So the first is that our power to create really powerful results lies in our power to create favourable cause and effect conditions towards our vision for the future.

5:36

So that’s the first one.

So this is really important because I’ve mentioned this so many times, but so much of the work that we are doing is focusing on being kind of reactive or addressing a lot of the symptoms of big problems that we see in society.

5:53

But when we can understand the cause and effect relationships and really understand those kind of like root causes that are affecting what we’re seeing happen in reality, then we can be much more effective at actually addressing those root causes and changing things.

6:11

So when we have this vision for the future and we really understand what the cause and effect conditions are for that vision for the future as well as what’s currently manifesting in reality, then our power to create those results that we want lies in our ability to create those.

6:33

Essentially the correct what I would call the causal conditions or those kind of favourable cause and effect patterns.

The 2nd is that the most favourable conditions being sorry, begin and end with bringing out the best in people rather than focusing on stuff whether that’s money, food, education, other resources.

6:58

And this is really important.

This is what a lot of the work that we do at HCN is kind of grounded in.

It’s this idea that the most important asset that we have when it comes to creating social change is people, because that’s what we’re ultimately seeking to change when we say the word social change.

7:15

The social in social change is things to do with people.

It’s people themselves and the things that people create.

Nothing changes without people changing it.

Laws don’t change themselves.

We have people that change those laws, right?

7:32

The way in which we engage with each other doesn’t just magically change itself.

We have to change as people to change the way we engage with other people in the same way that, you know, the resources that we have available to us don’t just change unless we actually change the way that we are generating or sharing and distributing resources.

7:57

Change happens through people, whether that’s like physically through our actions, whether that’s through our mindset, whether it’s through like the outcomes of the things we do, Whatever it is, people are the vehicle for social change.

So we need to bring out the best in people and we need to support people more than we focus on all of these other things.

8:18

That’s something that I believe in very wholeheartedly, and it’s why we focus so much on the work that we do at the humanitarian Change makers network with building people’s capacity.

We focus on giving people the skills and the knowledge that they need so that whether they’re working on their own or in a larger organization, whether they’re working on an environmental issue or a humanitarian issue or a human rights issue or an issue of injustice or inequality, whatever it might be, people have got those skills that they can take with them.

8:51

Finally, we have the observation or the premise that together we have everything we need.

It is only on our own that we experience scarcity.

And this is where the reality of collective enoughness kind of comes into this idea of catalytic thinking and the work of Hilde Gottlieb.

9:09

So I will dive into that Third Point more in this episode.

Those are essentially kind of the three premises that underlie catalytic thinking as a theory for change.

Sustainable and ethical business practices are at the heart of change may occur.

9:27

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For every online order that is placed we will plant one tree with our climate positive tree planting partner Ecology.

9:47

All of the remaining profits from our sales are redistributed to our impact partner, the Humanitarian Change Makers Network, providing workshops, events, solutions, focused news and resources to catalyse young Australians to become active across the social change space.

10:05

Now catalytic thinking is essentially called catalytic thinking because it’s really about shifting the focus to our thoughts and the assumptions behind our thoughts.

It essentially argues that the results that we see in any of our change efforts actually begin with the thoughts that kind of pre exist any of our actions or that shape and create our actions.

10:35

And when we ask questions that are kind of rooted in scarcity then that’s why we get the reality of scarcity.

And if we develop the ability to ask the right questions and ask questions that are rooted in abundance then we’ll get more effective answers.

10:58

We’ll understand those cause and effect patterns and relationships better and we’ll be able to move past this mindset of scarcity into one of abundance and we’ll actually be able to realise that through our actions.

So just for some examples to kind of illustrate this, I’ve got three questions that we might typically ask in the work that we’re doing as change makers and then a reframing them through the lens of catalytical catalytic thinking.

11:27

So we might ask a question like what is the problem that we want to address and how how might we solve it?

That’s a pretty standard typical question.

We might find ourselves asking if we want to reframe this through the lens of catalytic thinking though we might ask what is the future that we want to create and what will it take to create that reality.

11:49

So you can see that we’re kind of shifting it from this focus on the immediacy of the problems that we’re maybe witnessing or experiencing and things that might be the symptoms of larger problems.

And instead we’re shifting the focus to what is the future we want to create.

12:04

So what is that big picture vision for the future that we have and what will it actually take to get there?

So what are the causal conditions?

What are the things that are going to ’cause that and how can we begin to create those conditions?

Another example of a question that we might ask in our work is, can we really trust them?

12:26

What if they steal my idea or our stuff?

Now this is a common question that we ask we might find ourselves asking.

It is very much rooted in scarcity, this idea that you need to protect your resources and protect your ideas.

12:43

And this is definitely something that I have experienced in my own life, in my work, in my research.

It’s, you know, it’s something that because of the nature of the way our social system is designed, we feel like we have to, I guess, protect our things.

13:02

And you know, we’re living in a society that promotes this idea of individualism to the point where I think it is rather unhealthy.

And it’s this idea that you have to look after yourself 1st and you have to protect, you know, yourself or your family or whatever, rather than this idea of sharing and looking after your community as a whole.

13:23

And if you look after the community, the community is also going to look after you.

So a way we can reframe these questions in the lens of catalytic thinking is to say, who else cares about this thing that I care about?

What can we accomplish if we work together that none of us could accomplish on our own.

13:44

So it’s this idea of saying, OK, this is what I have and what I can contribute.

How can I join forces with others in my circle, in my community, in my wider society?

And how can we actually achieve something way greater than what we could achieve on our own?

14:01

It’s this idea that, you know, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

Another question is how will we pay for that?

Where will the money come from?

If you’ve ever worked in a not-for-profit organization or for a charity, I’m sure this is a question that you have found yourself asking or the people around you have often asked.

14:23

And a way we can shift this through the lens of catalytic thinking is to ask the question, what resources do we have together that none of us have all on our own.

So there’s two important things here.

First of all, it’s this idea of coming together.

14:40

It’s this idea of how can we actually collaborate.

But it’s also this shift from asking questions about the money that we want to the resources that we need.

So money being the means that we think we need to acquire these ends and instead shifting the focus on the actual ends, the things that we want.

15:01

Because chances are there are probably ways that we can actually bypass the need for money and just directly acquire those things.

Not always, but often.

So in order to begin to ask the questions that we might ask when we are catalytic thinking, there are kind of three questions at the heart of this framework.

15:25

So you might have picked up on this from those previous questions, but these three questions are what do we really want?

Who else cares about this and what do we have together?

So that first question, what do we really want?

That is a question of kind of getting to the why, the heart of why we want something, why we think we need something.

15:51

We can ask questions like what will that make possible and for whom?

To kind of delve a little bit deeper.

If you’re familiar with the book by Simon Sinek, start with why.

I think that’s a great example of this idea of kind of getting to the heart of the why.

16:10

I also talked about this in I think it was episode 4 where I addressed doing a PhD and looked at different career options in research.

But I looked at this framework by Simon Sinek called Start with Y and it’s about starting with the Y.

16:29

So in this context it would be why do you need something?

How is that going to help?

And then what?

The what is the thing that you think you need?

But the why is what it’s going to achieve.

So you ask this question, you know, what will that make possible?

Because sometimes we think we need like these tangible resources, but we could actually achieve the thing that we want to achieve through alternative means.

16:54

So it’s about saying, OK, what do we really want?

You want to get to the heart of what it is you really want.

You want to keep asking this question until you can’t answer anymore and that’s going to get you to, I guess, the essence of what you truly want.

So a lot of the time, the resources that we think we want or that we need are actually the means of getting us to the thing that we really want.

17:17

And the smaller you get, the more you can kind of drill down into this, the more likely you are going to be to find a way to get it.

An example of this, just from my own personal life would be the example of travel.

17:35

It was really hard for me during the COVID-19 pandemic during 2020 when we couldn’t travel.

Travel has always been such a big part of my life and it’s, you know, one of my passions.

I’ve always loved travelling and as somebody who had travelled, you know, for multiple months every year, it was really hard for me to suddenly have these travel plans taken away from me and to have to stay home.

18:02

And in the beginning I kept thinking that the thing that I really wanted was to travel.

I that’s what I thought the thing that I wanted was.

But if I really kind of asked myself those questions and drilled down to the core of what it was about travel that I liked, I realized that travel was actually the means of me getting other things.

18:24

So I wanted to be able to connect with people and share stories with people from diverse backgrounds.

I wanted to be able to explore new places, to learn new things.

I love learning.

I love place based learning, but I just love learning in general.

18:40

And so asking those questions and realizing the thing that I really wanted, I was able to find alternative ways to kind of get those experiences even while I was stuck in lockdown in my house.

So the next question who else cares about this when we get clear on why we’re doing what we’re doing and the thing that we really need, not those surface level things we think we need, but you know the why of what we need.

19:09

We can find the people who also care about the thing that we care about.

And if we find the people, then we might be able to find other ways of getting what we want.

We can find people who have those things.

We can find people who help us.

This is all about strength in numbers.

19:24

And this idea that, you know, we only experience scarcity on our own when we come together.

This is where the idea of collective enoughness comes in.

When we actually come together, we’ll find that we can probably have everything we need together.

19:41

The final question is what do we have together?

So when we share, we have everything we need.

It’s only on our own that we experience scarcity.

So in the context of social change, this looks like rather than calculating how much funding you think you might need and you know, going out and looking for grants or fundraising opportunities to access those resources, actually breakdown those resources that you need and seek out opportunities to directly acquire those resources.

20:11

Focus on the functions rather than the resources.

So you want to focus on the thing that the resources are allowing you to do, not the resource themselves.

Partnerships and collaboration I think are always going to add that extra layer of community and ownership for a project.

20:30

So don’t go to people with an ask saying you know this is what I want from you.

Have a genuine conversation with people and potential partners.

Ask them.

You know, this is what I want to accomplish.

What do you want to accomplish?

How can we accomplish this together?

And you know, how can we benefit each other?

20:48

Make it a mutually beneficial relationship.

Don’t make it a one way relationship.

So the quote that I love from Hildy and her framework for catalytic thinking is when we change the way we see things, things change.

21:08

Now, collective enoughness is a manifestation of abundance.

It is a way that we can kind of overcome one of these challenges that I think is so prominent in the work that we’re doing, in this idea that, you know, if only we had more money, more time, more resources, which is grounded in scarcity.

21:31

The reality is that it’s only on our own that we don’t have enough, and together we do have enough.

So how can we begin to, I guess, take action to actually realise that abundance or that collective enoughness?

And something that I love about Hildy’s work that really challenged me, I think in the beginning was this idea that resources are everywhere.

21:57

Money is scarce, but resources are abundance, Sorry are abundant.

Money is scarce and tightly controlled.

Now, money isn’t a resource in this framework.

It isn’t inherently valuable to us.

22:13

It’s the things that money buys that have value and have lost resources.

That was a really challenging mindset shift that I had to make in order to understand that.

But once I got it, I got it.

And This is why it’s so important to develop this ability to ask the right questions.

22:34

Because when we can distinguish between things like cash, which is a means for securing what we need, versus the actual real resources, which are the things that the cash might buy us, that is essentially how we can live out this idea of abundance and collective enoughness.

22:54

Now there are so many systems for sharing that exist.

We have things like libraries, food banks, tool libraries, couch surfing.

These are all kind of like systems that exist that allow us to, I guess do this and bypass the need to have cash as a means for securing resources.

23:15

And all of these kind of systems for sharing are grounded in I guess, the framework or the approach known as mutual aid.

I strongly believe that experiencing the world is one of the most important things we can do as change makers.

23:31

And one of the best ways to experience the world affordably and meet like minded travellers is to stay in hostels.

I’ve almost exclusively stayed in hostels when I travel.

It’s how I was able to afford to travel to almost 50 countries while studying full time.

And Hostel World is the platform I use to search, compare and book hostel accommodation whenever I travel.

23:53

If you’re ready to experience the world, click the link in the episode description below to explore over 36,000 properties in 178 countries.

You may have seen that we are in the process of launching our very own mutual aid network through the Humanitarian Change Makers Network, which I will discuss very shortly.

24:15

But just for those of you who aren’t familiar with what mutual aid is, it is, I guess, a framework or an approach to giving that was first put forward by Peter Kropotkin.

He was a Russian anarchist, geographer and biologist, and he essentially argued against this idea of social Darwinism.

24:38

And if you’re not familiar with social Darwinism, it’s based on Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution and this idea that it’s about the survival of the fittest and only the strongest can survive and work constantly and like species are constantly in competition with each other.

24:54

And Social Darwinism is the application of that logic to people in a society.

What Mutual Aid essentially argues is this idea that actually mutual Aid, this idea of collaboration.

25:09

It was actually a very natural factor of evolution and it was first published in 1902 and he essentially challenged this view that cooperation and mutual aid amongst individuals within a species actually played a crucial role in the development and the survival of the species.

25:30

So while different species may have been in competition with one another within the same species, there was actually a lot of collaboration.

So there were a few key points in his argument, which I will go over.

25:49

So it was based on his observations in nature.

He pointed to various examples of cooperation and mutual aid amongst animals.

He looked at birds that nest in colonies, animals that hunt in packs, the way that bees work together in a hive.

26:05

And these observations kind of contradicted this popular notion within social Darwinism, that there is kind of like a war of all against all.

There’s this idea of the survival advantage.

So, oh.

Kropotkin argued that mutual aid provided a survival advantage rather than a disadvantage.

26:26

So in many situations, this idea of cooperation and working together increased the chances of survival for individuals and the species as a whole.

He believed that the species that engaged in mutual aid were better equipped to face environmental challenges, to find food, and to protect themselves from predators.

26:44

Then this.

There’s this idea of social instinct in humans.

He extended his argument to human society, suggesting that the principle of mutual aid is kind of ingrained within human nature.

And he contended that human communities are not solely built on competition and conflict, but they’re equally shaped by cooperation and solidarity and mutual support.

27:09

Then there’s this idea of sociability as an evolutionary force.

So Kropotkin proposed that the evolutionary success of social species like humans was closely tied to their ability to live and work together in groups.

He argued that the social instinct was a powerful force in our evolution, and it fostered the development of social bonds, the ability to communicate and develop tools and activities together.

27:36

Finally, he rejects Malthusian ideas, so he criticized Thomas Malthus’s idea about population growth and the scarcity of resources.

Contemporary academics and scholars have all kind of rejected this idea anyway.

27:56

But considering he wrote this back in 1902, he was kind of one of the biggest, I guess, scholars or people writing at the time that argued against this idea of Malthusian population growth and the idea that populations will grow and then they need to kind of balance themselves out.

28:17

And I won’t go into it now, but essentially, he argued that mutual aid is actually a really positive way that we can kind of counteract or mitigate the impact that resource scarcity has in population growth.

28:34

So we don’t actually need to rely on something negative happening like conflict, war, disease, whatever it might be, in order for a population to kind of balance itself out when resources are getting scarce.

We can actually use something like mutual aid as a positive way to counteract the resource scarcity that might come with population growth in an unpredictable environment.

29:01

So that is essentially Hopkins argument for mutual aid.

Since then, mutual aid as a concept or as like a broad kind of movement has grown a lot.

It’s something that we are really embracing here at the Humanitarian Change Makers Network as a way to kind of, I guess, manifest this notion of collective enoughness or abundance within our community and the wider community.

29:28

So I am in the process of building a website for our mutual aid organization called Mutual Aid Australia.

It is a not-for-profit cooperative.

So essentially the idea is that we are creating a platform where change makers can come and share any resources or things that they might have to bypass the need to pay for these things.

29:53

If it’s appropriate, money can be exchanged through the platform, but essentially the idea is that we’re taking the things that we have more than enough of, all the things that we can offer our community, and we are offering it to them for the betterment of our whole community.

30:10

An example of this is I grow a lot of my own food.

As many of you might know, I am really into permaculture and I’ve also been really into just like propagating certain plants, things like bromeliads, succulents, things that I have a lot of that I don’t really have a lot of use for.

30:27

I’ve been propagating them and trying to kind of build like a little mini nursery in my backyard of all of these plants and I give them away to members of my community.

So I let people donate on a pay what you want basis, just to cover the costs of the potting mix that I have to create the little pots that I put them in, things like that.

30:49

But the idea is that I am growing more than enough of these.

I don’t need any more in my own garden, so I’m just growing them to give them away.

It doesn’t require that much effort on my behalf because I already spend so much time in my garden.

It’s not that hard for me to kind of grow a little bit extra so that I can give it away.

31:07

So that’s just like a really simple example of Mutual Aid and how I will be sharing my own resources through the Mutual Aid Australia platform.

I’m sure I will get asked questions about this and I’m sure I will answer them in upcoming podcast episodes, but definitely feel free to ask any questions that you might have about Mutual Aid About Mutual Aid Australia, If you aren’t already signed up to our newsletter, definitely do that.

31:36

Grab a copy of The Change Maker Renew and you’ll also keep get updated on how we are going with Growing Mutual Aid Australia.

It’s currently a solo project that I’m working on.

If anybody listening to this is interested in helping us build the website, we do need to raise a little bit of money in order to actually get the website posted online.

31:59

So if anyone wants to help with that kind of stuff, if anyone has any ideas or anything, I would love people to volunteer with me.

I am, you know, trying to do it on my own.

I obviously know that I can’t do it on my own, and that’s the whole point of collective enoughness and having people come together.

32:16

So if that interests you, definitely check out the resources in the episode Show Notes to get involved.

Otherwise, feel free to ask all of your questions about anything social change related at humanitarianchangemakers.net/podcast.

32:32

Check out the post that accompanies this episode if you want to see just some resources and things about catalytic thinking.

I think it is a great theory of change that has definitely helped me in my own life and my own work, and hopefully it will help you a little bit.

32:47

Otherwise, I will see you in the next episode.

Click here to read the episode show notes & watch the full episode.

Welcome back to Changemaker Q&A, everyone. I am Tiyana J, the founder of the Humanitarian Changemakers Network, and Changemaker Q& A is the podcast where we answer all of your questions about anything social change related. We have just relaunched the podcast and I wanted to go back and readdress some of the questions that I answered in earlier seasons of the podcast… Just because I am a little bit older, a bit more wise, I have a little bit more experience and I think I can answer them and a little bit more of a nuanced approach. Now, today, we’re going to be going back to one of our top episodes, which really surprised me, actually. It was all about systems thinking for social change.

And that honestly really excited me when I saw that that was one of our top episodes, because I love talking about systems thinking. I have been using systems thinking. As the approach to all of my PhD fieldwork, so I am really passionate about the application of systems thinking for anybody who might be working out in the field in the social change space.

It can seem like a very kind of complex, academic, approach to knowledge, but it does have some really tangible applications and there are so many great tools that we can put in our changemaking toolkit from systems thinking that I think can really make this a lot easier. I will share one of my favorite systems thinking tools or frameworks in this episode.

But if you have any additional questions about anything to do with systems thinking you want to learn a little bit more about something that I mentioned, definitely feel free to ask any questions that you have. You can ask your questions directly via Spotify or YouTube. If you are watching this episode, if you are listening, head to the description below and click on the link to humanitarian changemakers.net. Forward slash podcast, where you can ask your question. It can be asked anonymously and you can leave your details and we will send any questions that are answered on the pod. We will send the asker of the question, some goodies like our change maker code patches. Now, today we are answering the question.

What is systems thinking and when might we need to apply it to social change? And. Without getting too deep, I think that one of the biggest barriers to social change is something so fundamental and so foundational to our thinking that we don’t even think about it. And it is actually the way we think about the world and about different phenomena.

Now, Ever since around the 19th century 20th century, we had philosophers like René Descartes come around and they really changed the way that we approach Knowledge, particularly here in the West, uh, Rene Descartes is the guy you might know. He’s famous for his expression. I think therefore I am, which essentially reduced his entire existence to his knowledge of his existence.

And we saw the emergence of Cartesian dualism. This idea of mind and body being two separate entities, and from there, we really just saw this kind of emphasis on dualisms within not only, I guess, knowledge, but also just how we understand reality. So, some examples of these, like, dualisms that, you know, We probably don’t even recognize is maybe the dualism of theory versus practice of the macro perspective versus the micro perspective.

You can see that these are different ways of kind of viewing reality. in like distinct ways, but they’re not necessarily reflective of how reality actually is. When you think about it, there is no distinction between theory and practice or the macro and the micro. These things exist within and are dependent upon one another.

And even though we can kind of separate them analytically and we can analyze them. as distinct things. They don’t actually exist that way. Now, if you have ever been to university or ever considered studying, the academy and the way that we separate and distinguish, uh, how we approach knowledge in these institutions is another example of dualisms and the way that if you go to university maybe like myself, you would probably study different social phenomena in the social world through a particular lens.

You might study it through the lens of sociology, psychology. anthropology, criminology, these are all different kind of ways of viewing the world and it kind of compartmentalizes them and allows us to take big complex phenomena and I guess Look at them through a very distinct lens, and there’s nothing inherently wrong with that.

The problem is when we get so used to seeing things through our particular lens, we can sometimes lose sight of everything else that is going on around us and all of the other ways of looking at it and all of the different interconnections and things like that. And that’s really where systems thinking comes into play.

Systems thinking is one of many ways to kind of challenge our conventional thinking. Another example of a way to challenge conventional thinking might be to look at something like Indigenous wisdom, Indigenous knowledge, which is something that is a lot more holistic than the typical approach that we take in Western societies.

It tends to not fall into this trap of distinguishing between different dualisms and reducing things to small component parts. It tends to be a lot more holistic. So that is one example. But today we’re going to be looking at systems thinking. Systems thinking is, like I said, a, I guess, a way of challenging conventional thinking, and it’s something that emerged in the 1950s

or 60s to kind of directly challenge the conventional ways of approaching something. things within academia. So it kind of emerged in these different waves. So we had general systems theory and from there we ended up with these kind of three waves of systems thinking. So first there was hard systems thinking and hard systems thinking was really looking at kind of more well defined maybe mechanical systems that had very clear inputs and processes and outputs.

Then we went into soft systems thinking and this dealt with a little bit more complex maybe more human centric systems where there was often multiple perspectives and Approaches to looking at things. And there was not really a single right approach or solution. So an example of this is any kind of social system is a great example of a soft system.

So something like the healthcare system, the education system, where you’ve got all of these different stakeholders that have different perspectives and different goals or agendas, and they’re all kind of working together and competing and having a causal effect on one another. So we can look at this from a holistic perspective and that would be a soft systems approach.

Then we have critical systems thinking. So critical systems thinking emerged from soft systems thinking. But it tends to take obviously a more critical approach. It is grounded in the philosophy of critical theory. So you could think of philosophers like Karl Marx Hegel. Philosophers like that were all critical theorists.

And critical systems thinking has this kind of underlying assumption that the system is probably not functioning. as best it should or not functioning to achieve desirable outcomes. So when you look at something like soft systems thinking, that tends to have the assumption that there’s no single solution or no single approach that we should be aiming for.

Whereas if we take a critical systems approach, we’re kind of coming at it from this assumption that there is a better way. We can do things a little bit differently and we should be hoping for better outcomes. And so critical systems thinking really focuses on Things like power imbalances within these kinds of social or soft systems.

It’s looking at and questioning these power structures, and it really considers the interplay of social phenomena, ecological phenomena, economic phenomena, political phenomena psychological phenomena, all of these different Kind of interdisciplinary approaches are really important within critical systems thinking.

So when might we need to use one of these types of systems thinking and In my opinion, the type of systems thinking that we’re probably most likely going to be using in the context of social change is critical systems thinking. We’re probably going to be coming at it with this assumption that we want to make a change because things aren’t working the way that they should or could.

So that would generally require a critical systems thinking approach. And, you know, there’s no kind of right or wrong. Issue that it could be applied to, but generally we would look at applying systems thinking to what we call wicked problems. So wicked problems is a term that’s used to describe problems where there’s no single solution.

There’s a lot of different things to consider, things like human rights, environmental sustainability, there’s ethical questions and dilemmas. They’re really complex and they probably require many approaches lots of different resources. And wicked problems are things like the climate crisis, things like.

Different like human rights challenges, conflict all of these sorts of things are really complex and they’re all examples of wicked problems where there’s no kind of one way of approaching it. And. They tend to be very complex. There’s a lot of stakeholders at play. There’s a lot of kind of root causes and things going on in the background that we’re probably not going to be aware of until we actually kind of analyze and approach the problem from a whole systems approach.

Now, if we are using systems thinking, then. The chances are we are aiming to bring about what I would call systems change and through a systems theory of change. Now, just a little note on the term systems change. Systemic change, systematic change, systems change. They all sound very similar, but they are all very different approaches to change.

So, if we’re talking about… Systemic change, we’re talking about changes to a society’s social system. So legislative and policy changes, formal changes like that within a social system. That is systemic change. If we’re talking about systematic change, that is about our approach to change, the way we are doing it.

And if it’s systematic, it means it’s probably going to be very well thought out. Very orderly. There’s going to be a very clear process and strategy that we follow. We kind of know what the inputs are and we can predict fairly well, what the outputs are going to be. That would be a systematic approach to social change.

When we talk about systems change, we’re talking about changing an entire system, not a. system in the sense of a social system, but we’re talking about a hard or a soft or a critical system that we’re looking at. So when we talk about systems change and we talk about what a system actually is, a system is very hard to define by definition.

It, is hard to define, but it has a clearly defined boundary. So a system is essentially a way of modeling something. It’s a way of modeling complex phenomena. It is a way of applying different frameworks. And when we talk about systems change, the thing that we’re trying to change is the system. But it’s just important to remember that it’s not systemic change.

We’re not necessarily trying to change a specific element of a social system. We’re looking very holistically at this complex phenomena and all of its components and the relationships between things and all of the interactions and the way that they feed back into one another and create new emergent challenges.

That’s what the system actually is. Now, when we’re thinking about applying systems thinking, some things that make systems thinking a little bit distinct from our conventional approach to thinking. First of all, like I mentioned, it takes a very holistic approach to a situation or a problem. So it’s looking at the big picture.

It’s looking at all of the relationships between different elements. It’s looking at the interconnections and all of the different components. It’s looking at the whole rather than isolating into different parts. Now this doesn’t mean it doesn’t look at those individual parts. It just means that when we break things down and we…

look at these individual parts. We’re then taking a step back and we’re looking at those individual parts within the broader context of the system or the system’s environment. Another kind of characteristic of systems thinking is that It’s really about embracing non linearity and non linear cause and effect relationships.

We are so accustomed to thinking about causal relationships in a linear fashion that This is something that takes a lot of practice, I think. And luckily in systems thinking there are some great tools that we can use. But if we think about a linear cause and effect pattern, it’s essentially saying that we have this particular input, this particular process happens, and then we see this particular outcome.

So conventional thinking tends to assume that there is a linear cause and effect for a lot of the problems that we’re seeing. So, for example, We’re currently in the midst of a cost of living crisis a little bit of a rental crisis here in Australia, and a very linear approach to cause and effect would say, well, the reason that we are having we’re in a rental crisis is because there’s Too much demand for rental properties, not enough rentals, therefore too many people and not enough affordable rentals.

If we were to look at this from a more holistic cause and effect approach, we would take a step back and say, well, okay, what are some of the other reasons that This is happening. What are some of the economic factors that have contributed to the rising cost of living? How has COVID 19 changed the way people live and work and how has that affected maybe the need for particular types of housing, the amount of housing that is available, where people are looking for housing.

We would need to ask questions about how other factors are feeding back into this and affecting things like supply and demand. How has… The increase on short term rental properties like Airbnbs contributed to the supply and demand and the cost of housing in Australia. We would need to ask questions about the different taxation laws and how certain tax benefits are impacting investors of property compared to people that are renting…and how all of these different factors come into play. So that’s what it means to take a non linear approach to causation. Now there is also the concept of feedback loops, which I won’t go into too much in this episode. I could do a whole episode on feedback loops. But feedback loops are a really fundamental part of systems thinking.

And like I just mentioned, all of these kind of. Approaches to understanding causality from a nonlinear perspective are very much grounded in the idea of feedback loops, where the outcomes of a particular process or relationship are feeding back and becoming causes. So the effects or the outcomes become inputs or causes.

We have the concept of emergence, which is also really important. Emergence is probably best described by the expression when the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. And emergence essentially means that we see something emerge, something manifest. in reality that can’t be reduced to its causes or the component parts of it.

An example of emergence would be the production of honey. So, we can take a flower and we can take a bee. We can combine those two inputs or those two components and from the process that happens between those two components, the thing that emerges Now we know honey comes from flowers and a bee, but we can’t actually reduce it to either of those things.

You can’t take a jar of honey and say, oh yes, this part of the honey comes from the bee and this part of the honey comes from the flower, right? It has, that process has led to the emergence or the manifestation or the creation of a phenomenon or an entity that is fundamentally or qualitatively different to the things that created it.

So that’s also a really key part of systems thinking. Some other things include the focus on a long term approach to different issues. Interdisciplinarity also plays a key role. There’s lots of different things that kind of distinguish system thinking from conventional thinking. And there are, of course, lots of benefits from applying this approach to how we think about and intervene with various social challenges.

So… I mentioned this idea of nonlinear causality, and this is really important because when we have a better understanding of feedback and emergence and how different elements within a system can contribute to the outcomes that we’re seeing, we’re able to better address the root causes of change, emphasis on the word causes, there’s almost always multiple causes of complex Problems, wicked problems.

It’s never a single root cause. It’s also really beneficial to identify leverage when we have this more holistic understanding of all of the processes and relationships that are contributing to the problem that we’re actually seeing manifest in reality. We can better identify leverage points or kind of weaknesses within the system, which are sometimes the best way to create significant change.

If you can find the Element within a system or the thing within the system that looks like it’s doing what it should, but is actually like the weakest link. It’s it’s like the one tiny thing that the entire system is dependent upon. If you could alter that, then you have the best chance at creating change.

I could also create a whole episode on leverage. It’s one of my favorite things to talk about in terms of social change. Particularly from my own PhD research, some of the points of leverage for women’s empowerment. Definitely not the things that you would expect could be the most powerful ways of empowering women and creating change.

Yet these leverage points require a lot less effort and a lot less inputs than some of the other things development actors tend to focus on and could lead to much better outcomes. So. I think this is a good place to kind of begin to wrap up. Systems thinking is such a big, broad topic. You know, it draws upon general systems theory.

It draws upon complexity theory. It draws upon systems dynamics. Systems dynamics is a whole other kind of… Field within systems thinking that looks at the behavior of systems and the way systems function over time. And systems dynamics is a really great tool. If you are wanting to look at the kind of typical Ways a system tends to behave.

Once you are able to kind of identify those general patterns it’s a really great way to begin to kind of predict and think forward a little bit about what the future might hold. And I think that systems dynamics, particularly in the context of social change, has the potential to be really beneficial.

We live in a world where. We’re so focused on addressing our immediate problems and the symptoms that we just don’t have the capacity or the resources to kind of take a step back and address the root causes. aNd think a little bit further into the future. I think a great example of this is the way that most of our politicians tend to only really think about addressing issues within the context of the next election cycle.

Very few politicians are actually thinking about what the world is going to look like. 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 100 years from now. Because, A, they probably won’t be alive then, and B, it’s not gonna benefit them, it’s not gonna get them re elected, so… Why would they want to focus on it? And I can understand that for a lot of people and for a lot of voters, you want to have your immediate needs and immediate problems addressed.

And I think that there is a degree of privilege that comes with being able to actually think and take action now to address things that are going to happen very far into the future. But I think that particularly here in Australia, Uh, as a nation, we are very lucky to have the resources and to have, uh, you know, access to the knowledge and the people and, you know, all the resources and things that we need to address our immediate problems and think about the problems that might arise in the future.

And in term enable, sorry, in order to do that effectively, we can apply systems thinking and systems dynamics. So, if systems thinking is something that you are interested in learning more about, like I said, feel free to ask any specific questions. I’m happy to kind of dive into them on the podcast.

We do have a social change handbook. It is called opening the black box. And I wrote this while I was living in India, after I had done all of my field work, I basically took everything I’d learned. From applying systems thinking in my PhD research and particularly in my fieldwork and basically said, okay, if I needed to teach somebody.

without an academic background. Basically everything they needed to understand what systems thinking is and how they can begin to apply it. And I had to put that into a handbook. What would I put in it? And then before I knew it, I’d written this book. Now you can. Download this book currently we are offering it as a free ebook with our Fixing Food online course.

It’s a free online course all about systems thinking and permaculture design. There is a three part video series available in that course of a webinar that I… taught back in 2021 or 2022. I can’t remember now. But it basically looks at some of the kind of introductory or fundamental things in systems thinking.

So it looks at the key components, how we define a system. It looks at modeling systems and systems mapping, systems dynamics all that good stuff. I would really love to put together an online course that basically is like an introductory course to systems thinking. It’s something that I’m really thinking about launching in the new year.

It would be a four or six week online course, potentially live cohort or potentially self develop self, what’s the word, uh, you do it yourself, self paced but. I’m just not sure if I’m going to have the capacity with my PhD at the moment, but I would really like to do that because I have been teaching a lot of workshops and things to teach people systems thinking.

I would like to put my teaching experience and stuff to good use by creating a resource for the Humanitarian Changemakers Network. So that is where I’m at at the moment. If you aren’t subscribed to our mailing list definitely do so on the bottom of our homepage on our website, because if we do launch that course anytime soon, I will be looking for change makers to try it, give me their feedback.

And I will offer a lot of additional one on one support. So you’ll find out about that through our newsletter. Other than that, if you guys have any questions, again, feel free to ask them. I really appreciate if you enjoyed this episode, if you learned something definitely feel free to follow me on Instagram at Tiana J on my YouTube channel.

I have other videos all about different systems thinking tools. I will leave a link to them in the description below. You can follow the Humanitarian Changemakers Network on Instagram at HumanitarianChangemakers. And if you found this episode useful or valuable, I would really appreciate if you left us a review left us a five star rating, anything to help get this education out to as many changemakers as possible, so we can all start thinking about the world better and being more effective changemakers.

Click here to read the episode show notes & watch the full episode.

0:00

Before we begin, we would like to acknowledge the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples who have been the original change makers and stewards of Australia for over 60,000 years.

Their profound wisdom, resilience and deep connection to country have fostered countless stories of survival, adaptation and transformation.

0:18

The knowledge held by these communities is an invaluable resource for understanding how to create positive change and build a more just and sustainable world.

Welcome back to Change Maker Q&A, everybody.

This is our last episode for 2023.

0:35

I can’t believe how quickly this year has gone.

Oh my goodness.

It was only a year ago that I was getting back from doing all my PhD field work in India and I moved into the house that I am now living in.

0:51

On the 1st of January I began my permaculture journey.

So much has happened.

It’s been kind of a slow year for me, but also really quick.

I haven’t gone overseas at all this year.

1:08

This is the first time in my adult life that I have gone a whole year without travelling overseas, which is crazy.

I never thought this would happen, but I did do plenty of travel around Australia.

My sister lives in a van that she renovated and travels full time.

1:29

So I met up with my sister quite a few times and got to see a bit of Australia with her, which was really nice but crazy to think I haven’t gone overseas.

That was a very intentional thing for me.

I wanted to focus on finishing my the bulk of my PhD research this year and next year.

1:46

I’m really looking forward to travelling not only for fun, but also to present at some international conferences disseminate my research out there a little bit.

So really looking forward to that.

We have a resource called Change Maker Travel through the Humanitarian Change Makers Network and it is a place where you can not only find blog posts and tips and tricks and itineraries if you are interested in obviously travelling the world, but also learning about human rights, learning about different cultures and history from the perspective of social change and making the world a better place, so definitely check that out.

2:33

The website isjusttravel.humanitarianchangemakers.net.

We also have a really cool resource on there where you can book your travel.

You can book transport, accommodation, tours and if you book through that platform then a small percentage of the price that you’re already paying for the booking will go directly to the Humanitarian Change Makers Network.

3:01

And we can use that not only for our operational costs, but also to help launch our new not-for-profit, which I’m sure I will be talking about very soon either in the next podcast episode or in our newsletter.

3:18

If you do not get our fortnightly newsletter then I definitely recommend heading to our website and at the bottom of the homepage you can join the newsletter.

You’ll get a bunch of goodies.

When you sign up, you’ll get a copy of our first social change handbook, The Change Maker in You as an ebook.

3:38

You will also get a cheeky 10% discount code for our store, Change Maker Co and lots of other bonuses and goodies.

So with all of that said, let’s jump into our final episode for the year and this comes from a question that was asked by Ashley and they have asked in 2024, I’m aiming to focus more on self-care and self development.

4:09

Do you have any resources or recommendations for someone working in the not-for-profit sector?

This is a great question.

I love this question.

First of all, congratulations.

I think it’s a really good thing that you are focusing on yourself development.

4:26

I know that coming into the new year, we all have a tendency to kind of set these very ambitious New Year’s resolutions.

Sometimes they can be a little bit vague.

We kind of make these grand announcements about the kind of person that we want to be, but we don’t actually set kind of clear goals or objectives for how we might actually get there.

4:48

So I am going to talk about a framework that I think is really helpful not only for Ashley, who is working in the not-for-profit sector, but for anybody who is active in the social change space.

So whether the work that you’re doing as a change maker is your hobby, your job, your career, or your vocation.

5:08

And if you’re not familiar with that distinction, check out Episode 4, where I answered a question about doing a PhD and research.

But I talk about this distinction that Liz Gilbert, the writer of Eat Pray, Love, makes when talking about the kinds of ways in which we might relate to work or engage in work.

5:31

She talks about it in the context of being a creative person.

But I think it applies to those of us working in the social change space.

It’s this really nice distinction that kind of shows that there are different ways in which we engage in work.

And some of them are paid, some of them are unpaid, some of them might be fulfilling.

5:48

Some of them have like more of a more utility in our life than being something that we’re passionate about or something that we enjoy.

And it’s a nice way to just kind of use that to recognise the different ways that you engage with work in your life and how the work that you do as a change maker might fit into that.

6:07

And you know, there’s no right or wrong way, but I think self development is so important, if not essential for social change.

And this is something that I’ve only come to realize in the last few years.

6:24

I have not only been on a bit of AI guess spiritual journey over the past few years, but also just a journey of self development and it really came from a place of me feeling quite burnt out and I guess not really fulfilled in the work that I was doing.

6:46

I was overworked for so long and I think it’s because I almost felt guilty, like a sense of guilt for putting myself in my own needs 1st.

And obviously now I recognize that that was kind of a fallacious way of thinking about things, but the energy that we engage in the work of change with is going to be reflected in the change that we create.

7:13

And you know from the strategy that we’re taking to the approaches that we take in the planning to the execution, how we interact with people through various change processes, that’s all causally efficacious.

7:32

It is all in some way going to have an effect on the outcomes that we create.

And if we’re engaging in the work from a place of scarcity or lack, if we’re engaging with this energy of hatred or anger, that’s going to be reflected in the change that we create.

7:54

So we need to be really intentional about how we are actually showing up and not only what we’re doing, but how we are being as change makers.

And I really think that self development and social change should really be considered two sides of the same coin.

8:13

I think that we are intrinsically connected to other people and you know, whether that’s our family, our community or humanity as a whole, we can’t expect humanity or our community to evolve if we ourselves are not doing that.

8:32

So when it comes to the what and the how of self development for social change, I’m going to be diving into a framework in this episode called the Inner Development Goals.

And essentially what the ID GS are, is they are a self development framework that was developed in response to the 17 UN Sustainable development goals.

9:01

You can go back and listen to.

I think it’s Episode 5 where I kind of talk about how the SDGS came about, what they are in the context of the work of the United Nations and some of the kind of challenges that I think we kind of have when it comes to achieving the SDGS.

9:20

But essentially the SDGS are these seventeen goals that all 193 member countries of the United Nations have agreed upon.

It is part of the 2030 agenda, so that they are 17 goals that we want to achieve by the year 2030.

And they cover a really wide range of issues that involve people with different needs and different values in different parts of the world.

9:46

And there’s this really clear kind of vision or framework for what we need to achieve with the SDGS.

But a lot of the progress towards that vision has been lacking.

And part of the reason for this is because we as individuals and as a collective and as leaders of change, have a tendency to kind of lack the inner capacity that we need to deal with a lot of these increasingly complex challenges and environments that we find ourselves working in.

10:20

But there is a lot of modern research that looks at the types of inner capabilities that need to be developed, and this was kind of the starting point for the Inner Development Goals initiative.

So the Inner Development Goals puts forward 23 different goals across five different category areas.

10:43

And these are essentially goals that leaders of change need to be able to develop in order to not only work towards the goals themselves, but to lead their community, to lead people in their organisations, to inspire others around them to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

11:08

So I want to go through the different goals, what they are, kind of give you an overview of them and then just talk about a way that you can kind of begin to implement these in your life through your own self development work in 2024.

11:28

So the five areas of the inner development goals are being, thinking, relating, collaborating and acting.

Now being is all about your relationship to self and it’s really all about cultivating your inner life and developing and deepening the relationship that you have with your thoughts, your feelings and your physical body to help you be present to be intentional and particularly non reactive when facing complexity.

12:08

This is so important when so much of the work that I think we are doing, just by the nature of the work that we do in the social change space is very reactive.

So much of it is reacting to problems and challenges that arise.

12:28

Some of us might be working in a particular field or area where we are being a little bit more proactive.

So rather than addressing the immediate needs or challenges, we’re actually able to kind of build or work towards creating the solution or an alternative.

12:47

But for the most part, a lot of us are trying to address those root causes of problems and we are being a little bit more reactive to what’s happening around us.

And that’s why it is so important to develop these five inner development goals within our being in our relationship to self.

13:07

Because these once we can build these, I guess traits or characteristics or skills or the knowledge within ourselves, then we can begin to apply it externally to others, to our community, to our society, to our environment, whatever that may be.

13:25

So the first of these goals is your inner compass.

And your inner compass is all about having a deeply felt sense of responsibility and commitment to values and purposes that relate to the good of the whole.

So a lot of the work that I have done with change makers and leaders of change in the work that we do with New Humanity, which is our coaching and consulting I guess wing of HCN is really focused on this inner compass and figuring out what success looks like to you as an individual based on your unique passions, purpose and values.

14:08

The next goal is integrity and authenticity, so this is all about a commitment and the ability to act with sincerity, honesty, and integrity.

The next is an openness and learning mindset, which is all about having a basic mindset of curiosity and a willingness to be vulnerable and embrace change and grow.

14:32

It sounds very counterintuitive, but I find, and this applies to myself as well, a lot of us who work in the social change space are so afraid of change.

We don’t like change.

We like things to be predictable and organized.

14:52

And you know, we lack the, I guess, comfort that comes from being able to anticipate what’s going to happen.

And the very nature of change is that it’s not static, it is dynamic.

It is this constantly changing or evolving process and as change makers, when the work that we’re doing is focused on change, we need to get comfortable with change.

15:16

So I think this goal of an openness and learning mindset is a really important one.

Then we have self-awareness, which is the ability to be reflective in and in contact with our own thoughts, feelings and desires, and having a realistic self-image and ability to regulate oneself.

15:36

This is one that I have had to work on quite a bit myself over the past few years.

And the final goal in the Being category is presence, which is another one that I’ve really had to work hard at.

And presence is all about the ability to be in the here and now without judgement and in a state of open-ended presence.

16:00

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16:16

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16:32

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Then we have thinking, which is all about developing important cognitive skills.

And we do this by taking different perspectives, evaluating information and being able to make sense of the world as this interconnected whole rather than kind of like isolated individual parts or components.

16:58

And this is really essential for our ability to make decisions as leaders of change.

So we have another five inner development goals within the thinking category.

So the first is critical thinking, which is all about developing those skills to critically review the validity of views, evidence or plans.

17:22

We have complexity awareness, which is an understanding of and the skills required to work with complex and systemic conditions and causalities.

This is where a lot of my research for my PhD has focused on all about systems thinking and dealing with complexity.

17:44

We have perspective skills, which are the skills to seek, understand and actively make use of insights from contrasting perspectives.

This is something I spoke about in episode one of this season of the podcast, where we looked at no episode 2, sorry, where we looked at what happens now that Australia has voted no in the referendum for a voice to Parliament.

18:08

And a big part of the message in that episode was the ability to create a shared vision for the future based on the different opinions and views that different people might have as opposed to kind of creating an US versus them approach or mentality.

18:28

It’s about being able to kind of synthesize everybody’s needs and values.

And that’s what where perspective skills can really come into play.

Then we have sense making sense making is the ability and the skills that allow you to see patterns to be able to structure unknown phenomena and being able to kind of consciously create stories.

18:53

It’s the ability to kind of take abstract data or concepts and kind of make sense of it and give it meaning in the context of the work that we’re doing.

And finally we have a long term orientation and visioning which is the ability to formulate and sustain A commitment to visions that relate to the larger context.

19:16

And again this was one that we focused on in episode 2 where I looked at creating that shared vision and how we can kind of use our long term shared vision to then create a theory of change which is kind of a road map that might get us to that longer term vision that we hold.

19:39

The next category is relating.

Relating is all about caring for others and our world and we have 4 inner development goals that fall within this category.

So relating is appreciating, caring for and connecting to others, such as our neighbours, future generations or the biosphere and the environment as a whole, which can help us to create more just and sustainable systems and societies for everyone.

20:06

So we have the goal of appreciation, which is all about relating to others and to the world with a basic sense of appreciation, gratitude and joy.

We have connectedness which is all about a keen sense of being connected with and or being part of a larger whole such as our community, humanity or global ecosystem.

20:29

We have humility, which is being able to act in accordance with the needs of a particular situation without having to concern or prioritise our own importance.

And finally we have empathy and compassion, which is the ability to relate to others, oneself and nature with kindness, empathy and compassion and address any related suffering.

20:56

So I think that is going to be a really challenging category for a lot of people.

I think a lot of us think that, you know when we work in the social change space and when we care about things like environmental justice or human rights that you know, caring for others and our world is kind of at the heart of what we’re doing.

21:21

And I think it is.

But sometimes our way of relating to others isn’t actually reflective of that.

And this is where that kind of key message that I mentioned before about the energy that we engage in the work of change with is going to be reflected in the change that we create.

21:40

And when we are so focused on what we want to achieve, and, you know, this might be in the context of injustices or human rights and things like that, it can be really challenging to relate to those who have opposing views to us or differing perspectives or those that we might see as being in opposition to what we’re trying to achieve.

22:10

And we have a tendency to, I think, to see these people as being like objects that we have to overcome in order to achieve our goals.

And that is a very problematic mindset.

That mindset is part of the reason that got us here in the first place, and the ability to genuinely relate to the people that we see as being our opposition is really critical for social change.

22:40

So I think this is going to be a really key area for a lot of people in our community to focus on.

Then we have collaborating.

Collaborating is all about social skills and there are another five inner development goals for this category and collaborating social skills.

23:02

This is all about the need to make progress on our shared concerns and to do that we need to develop our abilities to include others, to hold space for others and communicate with stakeholders with different values, skills and competencies.

23:18

So this is where we kind of take that idea of relating to others in the sense of like our being and how we actually do that and turn it into some kind of like skills and actions that we take.

23:36

So we have communication skills, which is the ability to really listen to other people, to foster a genuine dialogue that advocate for our own views skilfully, to manage conflicts constructively, and to adapt communication to diverse groups.

23:52

We have our Co creation skills, which is the skills and motivation to build, develop and facilitate collaborative relationships with diverse stakeholders.

And this is characterized by psychological safety and a really genuine sense of Co creation.

24:09

It’s not just about creating and kind of bringing others in at different parts.

It’s about actually like doing that together.

We have an inclusive mindset and intercultural competence.

This is a really important one.

24:26

I’m sure if you are involved with kind of a large organization or perhaps even through an institution like a university, you’ve probably done some kind of formal cultural competency training, whether that is looking at anti racism training or understanding indigenous knowledge and perspectives.

24:51

So this is kind of building on that, and it’s all about the willingness and the competence to embrace diversity and include people and collectives with different views and backgrounds.

Then we have trust.

Trust is the ability to show trust and to create and maintain trusting relationships.

25:08

This is something that I struggle with at a personal level and probably inadvertently in my work.

But you know, I grew up in an environment where you know, I would leave the house and you know, when I was a teenager I would go to a party or even now as an adult.

25:28

When we go on an overseas trip, our mum always says remember, don’t trust anybody, which I think is a, you know, pretty problematic mindset to have.

So definitely something that I have needed to work on over the years and probably still need to work on a little bit.

Even in my personal relationships, I think I have a little bit of a challenging time, genuinely trusting people.

25:52

And I always kind of think, well, you know, I’m not going to get this person to do this thing for me when I can just do it for myself.

And that’s definitely something that I think I need to work on a little bit.

Finally, we have mobilization skills, very critical.

This is the skills required to inspire and actually mobilize others, to engage in our shared vision and shared purposes.

26:16

And that brings us to the final category, which is acting.

Acting is all about enabling change.

And this is where qualities like courage and optimism can help us to acquire true agency, to break old patterns and generate original ideas and act with persistence in uncertain times.

26:36

So we have 4 inner development goals in this category.

We have courage, which is the ability to stand up for values, make decisions and take decisive action and if need be, challenge and disrupt existing structures and views.

26:52

I love that this goal says and if need be because sometimes I think we’re so focused on, like I said before, being reactive and kind of addressing the symptoms of a lot of problems.

We don’t realize that if we actually stepped back and kind of we’re a little bit more proactive and addressed the root causes or kind of created the solutions as opposed to just reacting to the problems, we might actually find that all of the problems and the symptoms naturally kind of change and go away.

27:24

So we then have creativity, which is the ability to generate and develop original ideas, to innovate and be willing to disrupt conventional patterns.

I like that definition of creativity.

I think sometimes we think of creativity in the sense of it being like being artistic.

27:42

But creativity is not really, I think like a physical skill that we have in the sense that like it’s like a technical skill about creating art or anything like that.

It’s just your ability to think in a certain way.

27:58

So then we have optimism, which is the ability to sustain and communicate a sense of hope, a positive attitude and confidence in the possibility of meaningful change.

So important.

If we don’t have hope, then we don’t have anything.

28:14

I really don’t think that you can sustain the work of change without hope.

I think that fear only motivates you so far, and fear comes from a place of scarcity.

28:31

And that is the very mindset and the kind of core underlying logic that got us to where we are so many of our problems, because we have this mindset of lack and scarcity, and we can’t overcome that with the very thing that created that.

28:51

So we need an abundance mindset, And an abundance mindset is driven by and relies on hope.

If we don’t think that things can get better, why would we act as if they can?

I don’t think anybody does something thinking that like it’s not.

29:08

I don’t know.

I wouldn’t go to the gym every day if I genuinely believed that it was impossible for me to improve my fitness, like I just wouldn’t do it.

So I don’t know.

I feel like hope is essential as well because it does build resilience and I could do a whole another podcast episode on resilience.

29:31

It’s something I’ve looked at a lot in my PhD research.

But this idea of hope is also really critical for empowerment, and empowerment is a key piece of transformative change.

I don’t want to go off on a tangent about my research, though.

29:47

The final in a development goal that we have is perseverance, which is the ability to sustain engagement and remain determined and patient even when efforts take a long time to bear fruit.

Very important.

So those are the 23 inner development goals.

30:06

I’m sure you can see that these are not only goals that would benefit you at a personal level, but they would probably also benefit the people that you’re working with, the organisations that you work within and the people that are like the beneficiaries of the work that we’re doing.

30:24

So these are really important goals, not only for our self development but for social change more generally.

Now the framework of the inner development goals is an Open Access framework, which means practitioners and leaders all around the world can use the framework within their organisations to develop the capacity of the people that they’re working with to drive change for the sustainable development goals.

30:51

And based on the Inner Development Goals framework, we have put together a completely free coaching program or the Humanitarian Change Makers Network using the Inner Development Goals framework.

So this is a self-guided course and essentially how it works is a new lesson is going to unlock every fortnight throughout 2024 that will introduce the new Inner Development goal.

31:20

So we’ll go through each of those 23 goals in more detail.

Every fortnight we’ll focus on a new goal and there are journal prompts to go with it.

There are set exercises and assessments that can help you kind of think about that goal and how it applies to your life and work on it a little better, a little bit better.

31:42

And then at the end of the five different sections, there is a self-assessment quiz or test that’s going to help you kind of engage with where you’re at with each of those.

And essentially, what you should be able to do is look at the particular inner development goals that you personally feel like you need to work on the most, whether that’s because you feel like you’re not very proficient in that area or that skill, or whether you think that that’s because it’s a particularly useful skill in the work that you’re doing.

32:19

That’s up to you to decide.

But the idea is that throughout the course of a whole year, you get walked through the entire inner development goal framework.

You can kind of build the skills for all of them a little bit, get comfortable with all of these concepts, and then figure out the ones that you need to focus on and then continue to do that.

32:39

So it’s, you know, you’re not going to become completely proficient in every single one of these skills over the course of 12 months.

Self development really is this like ongoing journey in life and that’s why we have put together this as just a little bit of an introductory program.

33:01

It is completely free for anyone in the Humanitarian Change Makers network.

So you can head to the episode description or just head to new NEW humanity.humanitarianchangemakers.net and you’ll be able to find the program through there.

33:19

I am going to be going through the whole program as well.

So if you follow New Humanity Under Score Coaching on Instagram or me personally at Tiana JTIYANA and then the letter J, you’ll be able to watch me go kind of go through all of these and talk about them from my own personal perspective.

33:38

But I am really excited to have this.

I have been working on this for such a long time to try and get a bit of a coaching program or self development program to offer our community that is completely free.

33:54

I don’t want to have a paywall up for this kind of stuff because I think it is so important and the people who could probably benefit from it the most, who are probably those of us who would kind of doing that grassroots level work, are probably the ones who need to be able to access it for free.

34:13

So it’s always going to be completely free.

This program, if you don’t start it when this episode comes out at the start of 2024, that’s OK.

It’s going to be unlocking every fortnight throughout 2024 and then after 2024 it will set so that it that each lesson will unlock a fortnight from when you start it.

34:37

So you can either jump in throughout 2024 and do it with us, but I really encourage you to actually pace it out the way it’s designed to be paced.

So doing one new lesson every fortnight, because that’s going to, I think, not only give you the time that you need to really kind of dive into each of these things and think about them a little bit more deeply and critically, but it’s going to get you into that kind of habit of making time once a week to really focus on yourself development and making that a little bit of a habit.

35:07

So that is one of the most important things I think you can do for yourself.

Development is actually just making it a part of your everyday life.

I have set habits that I do weekly or fortnightly and like little routines that I do, and I want to continue to maintain that.

35:24

Because once you start and start with the inner development goals course, once you finish that, you’ll still have that time in each week or each fortnight that you’ve kind of carved out and you’ll be able to continue to use that time moving forward to continue all of yourself development work.

35:44

So Ashley, I hope that answers your question and I invite you and everybody else to join our completely free program.

There is a downloadable workbook with like all the journal prompts.

36:01

You can just do it on your own.

You don’t need to spend any money on anything.

You can just use a Microsoft Word document, a journal, whatever you have on hand.

It doesn’t need to be fancy.

I’d rather you just start now with where you are with what you’ve got.

So if you have any questions like Ashley did, Ashley, we will be sending you some Change Maker code goodies like our Iron On patches.

36:27

If you have any questions you would like me to answer on the podcast in 2024, definitely head to our website LinkedIn.

The episode Show notes Humanitarian Change makers.net/podcast.

You can ask your question directly, you can ask it anonymously or not, but either way you can leave your details and we will send you some goodies if your question is answered on the pod.

36:50

Otherwise, I hope you all have an excellent new year.

I hope you’re ready to set some goals, not only for yourself development, but for your life more generally.

I have set a whole bunch of goals that I am really keen to dive into and I’ll see you guys in our next episode next year.

Click here to read the episode show notes & watch the full episode.

0:00

Before we begin, we would like to acknowledge the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples who have been the original change makers and stewards of Australia for over 60,000 years.

Their profound wisdom, resilience and deep connection to country have fostered countless stories of survival, adaptation and transformation.

0:18

The knowledge held by these communities is an invaluable resource for understanding how to create positive change and build a more just and sustainable world.

Welcome back to Change Maker Q&A, everyone.

I am your host, Tiana Jay, founder of the Humanitarian Change Makers Network, and today we’re going to be answering a question that I love because it is a little bit philosophical.

0:42

This was a question that we were asked on YouTube, and it is a question about what does it mean to live a good life?

How can we determine what a good life looks like and make decisions about our life?

0:59

So this is a very big question and I’m going to be kind of addressing it, I think from the position that there are different cultural and societal and philosophical viewpoints about what is meant by a good life.

1:17

And I want to suggest some tools or a framework that I use to kind of determine if I am living a good life.

And a good life in this context, I think is one that is very relevant for social change makers.

1:39

A good life is 1 where we’re kind of, I guess, finding that perfect balance between living a life that feels good personally.

So we’re focused on our self development and personal growth.

We’re also focused on doing good and having an impact in the world.

1:59

And so it’s kind of like self development or personal growth meets social change.

And I want to begin by just prefacing this, by saying I really don’t think that we can talk about, I guess, what’s best for humanity or how to live a good life without really acknowledging that the pursuit of happiness is kind of one of the most fundamental aspects of the human experience.

2:33

And so are ethical questions.

And I think that what constitutes a good life should be one that kind of addresses both of these, which is why I personally kind of define a good life as being one in which we are feeling good and doing good, or being good and doing good.

2:58

And this concept of the good life goes all the way back to ancient Greek philosophers.

The most, I think, well known example would be Aristotle’s concept of eudaimonia.

3:13

Eudaimonia is often translated as happiness or flourishing, but it’s meant in more than just like the fleeting sense of like joy or happiness.

And what Aristotle really sought to, I think, argue, was for this idea of a eudaemonic society in which we are all flourishing, we are all happy.

3:41

We are all like meeting the needs of our well-being while also contributing to the flourishing of others.

And it kind of recognises that the flourishing of everyone depends on the flourishing of individuals, and the flourishing of an individual is dependent on the flourishing of the collective.

4:04

Now the argument that Aristotle puts forward in what constitutes a good life is kind of made-up of a few key characteristics.

So the first of these is virtue.

4:21

Now, he was a virtue ethicist, like most philosophers of his time.

Virtue ethics is a little bit different to deontological or utilitarian ethics, which we explored in our episode about how we actually assess whether something is ethical.

4:41

They’re the kind of the two main competing frameworks, deontology and consequentialism or utilitarianism.

Virtue ethics is a little bit different in that we’re not assessing the actions or the outcomes we take, but morality and moral value lies in the pursuit of being a virtuous person.

5:06

So for Aristotle, this idea of eudaimonia was really closely tied to virtuous character traits and things like courage, justice, wisdom, temperance.

5:23

These were all kind of virtues that a eudaemonic individual or society required, and these were kind of like the virtues that you were meant to live your life in alignment with.

Aristotle also saw human beings as being rational beings.

5:40

So rationality is a key characteristic of Aristotle’s version of a good life, and individuals are expected to kind of use their reason in making ethical decisions and living in accordance with what he defined as their highest potential.

6:00

The fulfilment of human function is also another key characteristic.

So Aristotle believed that every individual being has a unique function or purpose in life.

And for humans this function is kind of shaped by our rationality and we can kind of achieve eudaimonia when we are living in a way that fully realises and expresses this human function.

6:31

Balance and moderation was also a key characteristic of the good life for Aristotle.

So there was kind of this importance of trying to find a balance between different extremes.

So if we look at some of these virtues, courage is a virtue that was encouraged.

6:53

But we could look at something like recklessness or cowardice.

Cowardice.

Cowardice as being the kind of opposites or the extremes of that virtue that should be avoided.

7:08

So it’s about finding that balance between the different extremes.

And eudaimonia is, like I mentioned, also not an individual endeavour.

It’s something that is closely connected to the social and ethical life of everyone.

7:25

So Aristotle believed that living in a just and harmonious community was essential for achieving eudaimonia.

So that was kind of the most, I guess, influential I would say, idea of what constitutes the good life in Western philosophy.

7:46

And we can look at other philosophical perspectives and what their take on the good life might be.

So if we’re going to take a utilitarian perspective, utilitarians are consequentialist and they want to maximise utility, utility here being well-being, happiness satisfaction.

8:07

So they would take the good life as being one that aligns with the principle of the greatest happiness.

So this idea that all of our actions should be judged by the ability they have to promote the greatest overall happiness or pleasure for the greatest number of people.

8:24

So we could contrast this then with a deontological approach which is more action focused.

We’re looking at the inherent rightness or wrongness of an action rather than the consequences of our actions, and it’s really strongly duty based.

So we would look at certain moral principles that we might set out very common in religious communities where religious doctrine kind of sets out particular principles or norms or values that our followers have a duty to abide by.

8:59

And these are kind of used to guide people in how they ought to live a good life.

So these are two different kind of approaches that we could consider.

My own personal perspective is that in terms of the deontology, verse, consequentialist or utilitarian debate, I think that truly ethical action or a truly good life is one that aligns with both.

9:30

We want a good life to be 1, where we are maximising the benefit that we have to others, whilst also abiding by particular principles that we think are kind of universal moral truths when it comes to what constitutes A eudaimonic society or human flourishing.

9:52

Of course, we live in a complex social world, and the reality is that we don’t necessarily have the means to make such rational, straightforward choices.

And so we are kind of forced to pick different approaches in different contexts.

10:09

So that’s the philosophical perspective of what it means to live a good life.

And there are also kind of different cultural or social approaches to what a good life looks like.

10:24

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10:40

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11:01

An example that I really like is if we looked at Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians.

Obviously the Aboriginal cultures that we have here are very diverse.

There are hundreds of distinct groups and languages, so there’s no kind of like uniform perspective on what a good life looks like.

11:23

But there are a lot of common elements that we can kind of see across Aboriginal cultures.

So a good life is one with a strong connection to the land.

Aboriginal cultures have a very deep spiritual and cultural connection to the land and the environment.

11:42

It is kind of like their source of identity and belonging and well-being in terms of the connection to and caring for country.

There’s kind of this perspective that people belong to the land, the land doesn’t belong to people.

11:59

And so a good life is 1 where people are stewards of the land.

They are engaging in conservation efforts and they’re kind of maintaining the natural, natural balance of ecosystems.

Another important element of a good life in Aboriginal cultures is this idea of cultural heritage and the preservation and continuation of cultural practices.

12:28

Stories, song lines, art, languages, these are all essential for a good life.

These are things that have been passed down from previous generations, for future generations.

They have been passed down for over 60,000 years and they’re a key element of what it means to live a good life.

12:48

Similarly, I think there is a strong connection with ancestors and a strong engagement in things like rituals and ceremonies as a way to kind of connect with the spiritual world as well as country.

13:08

Many Aboriginal cultures also place a lot of emphasis and importance on social equity, equality and justice.

I think this is something that has particularly emerged since colonisation, where Indigenous communities have been oppressed, they have been murdered, they have been greatly mistreated by settlers and as such there is a really strong importance of equality and justice in what it means to live a good life for Aboriginal people today.

13:50

I’m not sure, based on what I have read, whether this was what would have constituted a good life 10,000 years ago, previously 300 years ago.

I think that because of the the inherent world view that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people held, this idea of like justice was kind of embedded in that and equality or equity was kind of embedded within that.

14:21

There was no need to actively pursue these things.

Because if you were living in true alignment with the connection to country and the teaching and the wisdom and the knowledge that was passed down by ancestors, then you were already perpetuating notions of equality, equity, justice.

14:43

I think it’s only really been since colonisation that we’ve introduced all of these other, I guess, Western constructs and concepts and ways of living our life that has perpetuated inequality and injustice and inequity.

14:59

And it’s kind of a response to that, that these have become such important elements of a good life.

Again, I’m not an expert, that’s just my understanding from the learning that I’ve done.

And I guess with that, this idea of self determination is now also an important part of what constitutes a good life for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians.

15:25

The ability to kind of have a say in one’s own life to make decisions for their community and have a voice on issues that affect Aboriginal communities is something that is now really highly valued.

And you know, it’s important to recognise that these elements aren’t universal to all Aboriginal cultures.

15:42

There is definitely a diversity of perspective and practices within different communities, and it’s the impact of colonisation and the kind of ongoing and responses to these challenges that have kind of shaped what now constitutes a good life compared to what it might have looked like several hundred or thousand years ago.

16:05

If we look to other cultures, there are other kind of like frameworks or concepts that are used to, I guess, express what a good life looks like in these cultures.

An example that you might be familiar with is ikigai in Japan.

16:22

This is a concept in Japanese culture that is about finding your passion, your purpose, your reason for being.

And it kind of involves finding the thing that is at the intersection of what you love, what you’re good at, what the world needs, and what you can be paid for.

16:40

So this is an approach to a good life that kind of emphasises finding balance, your personal fulfilment and also your contribution to society, which is kind of a common element, I think, across cultures about what a good life looks like if we look at Bhutan.

17:01

Bhutan has adopted a really unique approach called Gross National Happiness and this is something that they prioritise above their GDP, their Gross Domestic Product.

So it’s a way of measuring the well-being of their citizens.

17:18

They look at 9 different domains including things like psychological well-being, health, education, cultural diversity and they place a really strong emphasis on spiritual well-being, community and harmony with nature.

And they actually use this to calculate how happy they think their society is.

17:39

And again, this kind of shows us that personal or individual happiness is critical when it comes to living a good life, but it’s your individual or personal happiness within the broader context of that of the collective and your wider society that really matters.

17:57

In Nordic countries, and particularly Denmark, I believe they have this cultural concept called HIG.

I believe it’s pronounced and it’s this emphasis on kind of things that are cozy and they offer us comfort and togetherness with our community.

18:17

So a good life is often associated with enjoying a lot of simple pleasures, like spending time with your loved ones, lighting candles, savouring good food.

All of those kind of moments throughout the day.

I like to think of them as like golden moments, the things we often take for granted.

18:35

And there’s a focus on creating a kind of relaxed atmosphere within the wider community that is believed to contribute to happiness and well-being.

So these are just some examples of how different cultures and societies today measure or assess what a good life might look like.

18:57

And you know, they all place different aspects on different things depending on their unique place in the world, their unique culture, their unique history.

And I think it’s just important to also acknowledge that for individuals, sometimes the kind of like cultural or social norms that contribute to what is considered a good life in our society or our community might be something that we find really fulfilling.

19:26

And it might be something that we found find pretty disempowering, depending on our own values and beliefs and experience.

If you’re living in a society where the conception of a good life maybe ignores inequality or social disparities, or it doesn’t encourage people to kind of take any kind of action to address a lot of these challenges, then people can become very dissatisfied.

19:54

So I guess This is why I really like to argue for a conception of a good life, whether it is one that I’ve mentioned in this episode or not, but just one that helps you to really find that balance between individual happiness and feeling good as an individual and doing good or contributing to good for your wider community on the collective.

20:22

So I have an exercise that I personally do.

This is kind of a framework that I developed a couple of years ago as a way to kind of help other people that I was working with in the humanitarian change makers network, assess and measure whether or not they are living a good life.

20:41

And I call this approach conscious living.

Conscious living is where you are being intentional and you are continually assessing whether or not the things that you’re doing in your life and your external circumstances align with your internal values and things that you believe make a good life.

21:04

And the reason that we need to kind of do this iteratively and as an ongoing process is because our external circumstances are constantly changing.

Often times it is beyond our control.

And rather than kind of saying, OK, this is what I believe is a good life for me, and then just kind of setting it and forgetting it when our external circumstances change, if we’re not actually looking and saying, OK, is the way that I’m living my life now aligning with this, then it’s really easy to kind of fall out of that balance.

21:36

So I like to try and take what I call like a life audit every six to 12 months.

And generally, the things that I consider to be the things that will dictate whether I’m living a good life or not, they don’t change too much.

21:52

They do kind of change and evolve a little bit as I do, but they tend to change more slowly and be relatively stable.

But it’s my external circumstances that are constantly changing.

So the way I kind of visualise a good life is imagine a Venn diagram.

22:08

So you’ve got 3 overlapping circles.

The 1st circle is for your values, the 2nd circle is for your passions, and the 3rd circle is for your purpose.

So your values are the things, the principles, the ethical frameworks, the norms, whatever they might be that you hold valuable based on whether you’re a utilitarian or a de anthologist, or based on your cultural upbringing.

22:38

The society that you live in, your family, whatever it might be, they’re the principles or the things that help you to determine whether the life you are living is good in the moral sense of the word.

So for example, you might really value freedom.

22:55

You might really value adventure or exploration.

You might really value justice or equality, sustainability.

You might really value your family.

You might really value your wider cultural community.

There’s no right or wrong.

23:12

These are your personal values, but they’re the things that you will kind of use as like the compass, your moral compass.

They’re the things that allow you to say yes.

I’m aligning with these values, therefore I feel like I’m living a morally good life.

23:30

So I definitely recommend writing out maybe the top 20 values that come to mind.

Narrow it down to your top ten and then if you can, narrow it down to your top five values.

The 2nd variable is your passions.

23:48

Passions are the things that light you up.

They’re the things that bring you joy in life.

It could be anything from travelling.

It could be the music that you listen to.

It could be one of your hobbies.

24:03

You might really enjoy painting or creating.

You might be passionate about clothes and fashion and jewellery or make up.

You might be passionate about learning and reading books.

Whatever it might be, your passions are the things that bring you joy.

24:19

So it’s important to kind of know what your passions are.

Make time in your day, whether that’s daily.

Make time in your week, in your month, in your year, whatever it might be, to make sure that you’re actually engaging in these passions.

Because they’re the things that bring you joy, and they’re the things that are going to contribute to your personal happiness and your satisfaction and your personal fulfilment.

24:44

The 3rd circle is the third variable, your purpose.

Your purpose is your why.

It’s the reason you think you were put on this earth.

And you know some people believe that their purpose is something that they were born with and something that can’t be taken away.

25:03

Other people believe that you choose your purpose throughout your life.

There’s no right or wrong way, but I think we all kind of have an idea of the impact that we want to make in the world.

And you know, this is your mission.

25:18

It’s the legacy that you want to leave, for lack of a better term.

And I think that your mission is, or your purpose is kind of that overarching thing that you want to do to contribute to society, to others beyond you.

25:40

And this is really where we get that balance between doing good in the world.

So our values are kind of our compass, telling us the general direction that we want to go.

Our passions are the things that are bringing us joy and personal fulfilment and growth and lighting us up.

26:00

And our purpose is allowing us to contribute and make a positive contribution and impact our wider society or community.

And that’s where we get that balance, I think, between doing good and feeling good in the world and in life.

So I encourage you to write down your passions as well, Write down your kind of purpose, a mission statement, an impact statement, whatever that might look like.

26:26

And asking yourself periodically is my lifestyle.

Is the way I’m currently living my life based on all of my external circumstances, like where I live, my financial position, my job, whatever it might be?

Is it allowing me to live in alignment with these three variables?

26:47

And if the answer is no, that’s OK.

Ask yourself, is this a no because of a temporary circumstance outside my control?

Or is this a no because I am not actively doing something to ensure I remain in alignment with these things?

27:07

So more often than not, I find that the reason I am not engaging with a lot of my passions and the things that bring me joy is because I’m simply not prioritising them and I’m not making the time.

So I have to really allow myself to make a conscious effort to engage in these sorts of activities.

27:30

As an example, I one of my passions is art.

I love creating.

I love drawing.

It’s something that I can sometimes be really good at making time for.

Like when I was in India doing my PhD field work, I had my PhD diary, which was essentially a visual journal or an art diary where I would write about what happened in my field work and I would draw pictures and things that are related to it.

27:53

That was a really great kind of creative outlet that allowed me to live out that passion.

And then when I came back home, I wasn’t really making any time to be creative and to create art.

So I started going to life drawing sessions where on a Tuesday night every now and then I would make the time to go to a studio and I would be surrounded by other people and we would draw.

28:18

It was life drawing, so there would be a life model in front of us, and I just had that as a really nice creative outlet that allowed me to create something and kind of switch off from my work.

So that’s just an example of my own personal experience.

28:36

I tend to definitely let my passions fall to the wayside when it comes to my attempts to live consciously, so that tends to be the biggest focus for me.

I hope you found that framework kind of helpful.

I have kind of shared this a couple of times, but I will definitely leave some more resources and things about my framework for conscious living and living a good life.

29:02

But also the others that we discussed in this episode in the blog post, an article that goes along with this episode.

If you have any questions about anything social change related, definitely feel free to ask them.

You can head to humanitarianchangemakers.net/podcast.

29:20

You can anonymously ask a question if you prefer.

We love to send goodies to anybody whose question is answered on the pod.

If you want to ask directly on Spotify or YouTube, definitely just directly ask on the platform that you’re on.

Otherwise, I look forward to answering more of your questions in our next episode.

29:42

You can connect with us at Humanitarian Change Makers on Instagram or me personally at Tiana J and I look forward to connecting with you all and seeing all of the incredible things that you were doing out in your community to make change happen.

Click here to read the episode show notes and watch the full episode.

Welcome back to Changemaker Q& A, everyone. I am Tiyana J, founder of the Humanitarian Changemakers Network and currently a PhD student researching communication and social change. Changemaker Q& A is the show where I answer all of your questions about anything social change related, and in today’s episode, we’re going to be going back and addressing one of the questions that a member of our community asked us earlier in the podcast, and that is the question of “what are the sustainable development goals and when might I need to use them in any work across the social change space?” So this episode is going to be a little bit of a hot take on the SDGs and particularly my kind of opinion of some of the shortcomings of the SDGs that I’ve noticed after really focusing on some of the targets and indicators of the sustainable development goals through my PhD research. If you have any questions related to social change, it can be about the SDGs, it can be about anything else I mention on the podcast, or anything that you can’t seem to find a nuanced answer to across the internet, then definitely head to our website and ask us your questions.

You can head to Humanitarian Changemakers. Dot net forward slash podcast to ask us your questions there. If you are watching this episode on YouTube or Spotify, you can directly ask us your questions on those platforms. But if you do ask us on our website, we are able to send you some change maker code goodies as a bit of a thank you.

If we answer your question on the pod, we have our upcycled t shirts. We have our change maker code patches. Lots of goodies to send to members of our community who ask us questions. Without you asking your questions, this show would not exist. So definitely don’t be shy. You can ask your questions anonymously, but let’s dive into today’s topic.

So. What are the sustainable development goals? Essentially, back in the year 2015, 193 member countries of the United Nations came together and they agreed upon 17 goals for sustainable development that they would work towards. Now, prior to this happening, I think it’s important to touch on what led to this and the evolution of the SDGs because before we had the SDGs, we had the MDGs, the Millennium Development Goals.

Now, the MDGs something that I’m old enough to remember. If you are a young person, you may or may not remember the MDGs. You may not have been aware of them. You may have been aware of them through your work. But essentially at the start of the new millennium in the year 2000, Back then it was 189 member countries of the United Nations all came together at the UN headquarters and they signed the millennium declaration.

And that was a commitment to achieving eight specific goals. There were very measurable goals, very quantitative, very tangible goals. That ranged from halving extreme poverty to promoting gender equality, reducing child mortality, and promoting environmental sustainability by the target date of 2015.

Now, the MDGs were incredibly significant at the time, but I think just in general, this was probably the first big global agenda for something like development. That we have kind of seen since the inception of the United Nations. The United Nations, as I’m sure you’re aware, is essentially an intergovernmental organization that is made up of its member states.

And it is responsible for, A whole range of different things from governance and dealing with things like international crime through the International Criminal Court through to human rights with the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights all the way to things like promoting peace through the UN peacekeepers and the Security Council to development and inclusion, equality.

And all of the agencies that fall under the United Nations. So within the banner of the UN or kind of under the work of the UN, you have UN agencies like the World Health Organization, you have the World Food Program, the Food and Agriculture Organization, the FAO, you have UNICEF The agency for women and children.

There’s a whole range of different agencies that kind of all falls under this umbrella of the United Nations. So… The Millennium Development Goals and the Millennium Declaration was kind of the first big global agenda that the United Nations kind of created when it comes to international development.

The work was all kind of happening for a long time in peace and security, in human rights in international justice. But development didn’t really kind of become… Such a big thing until the MDGs prior to that, there was still a lot of work being done within the UN in the development space, but it tended to be very regional focused or focused at kind of like the national or state level.

And this was the first time that every single country came together and kind of agreed on a global agenda that primarily focused on addressing poverty within the context of development. Now, there were eight different Millennium Development Goals. The first was to eradicate extreme hunger and poverty.

The second was to achieve universal primary education. The third was to promote gender equality and empower women. The fourth was reducing child mortality. The fifth was improving maternal health, the sixth was to combat HIV, AIDS, malaria and other diseases, the seventh was ensuring environmental sustainability, and then the eighth goal was developing global partnerships for development.

Now, like I mentioned before, The MDGs set very clear targets, they were all quantifiable, they all kind of relied on quantitative measurements and outcomes, which made it very easy to kind of see whether or not a particular country or a region or the world as a whole had or had not achieved these goals that it set.

Now, when it comes to the success of the MDGs, I think that through most accounts, the success is kind of mixed. There was incredible progress made in a lot of different areas within the Millennium Development Goals. In particular, The number of people living in extreme poverty, which was defined at the time as under 1.

25 U. S. per day was reduced. The number of girls enrolled in primary education more than hit, I think it, overtook the goal. The goal was to match how many boys were enrolled and I think we actually saw more girls enrolled by the end. So there was lots of success, but at the same time there was some shortcomings, in particular, even though there were less people living under extreme poverty, the number of people living in poverty in general slowly increased.

And… According to the UN Secretary General at the time, Ban Ki moon, he said that the MDGs helped to lift more than one billion people out of extreme poverty, to make inroads against hunger, to enable more girls to attend school than ever before, and to protect our planet. Yet for all the remarkable gains, I am keenly aware that inequalities persist and that progress has been uneven.

So, while the MTGs were somewhat revolutionary, I think, in providing a kind of roadmap and a plan to reach a global agreement when it came to addressing poverty and challenges related to poverty the targets were very easy to communicate. They had very clear kind of measurements and monitoring mechanisms attached to them.

The… Sustainable development goals, which then emerged as a response to these in 2015 are much more comprehensive. I think they are much better in general. So after the MDGs, we had the SDGs. And I guess the purpose of the sustainable development goals is. Somewhat different to the millennium development goals fundamentally.

I think at their core, they are very different now from the beginning, all of the stakeholders that were involved in the process were very intentional about making this a global agenda for development, whereas the MDGs were a Goal for development in the developing world that was globally agreed upon.

The SDGs are a plan for global development and each of the goals are applicable within every country around the world. All 193 member countries that agreed upon them. So it’s not just addressing things like extreme poverty and hunger, diseases like malaria, HIV, AIDS. It’s actually addressing more things like inequalities, injustice, and all of those things that kind of Are applicable in any country, even the most progressive, most developed coun, most developed countries.

So we get 17 goals out of the SDG process as opposed to eight. It was a very participatory process and it involved members of civil society. Governments different NGO organizations, the private sector, unlike the MDGs, which just engaged members of government at the state level. So we expand the scope from those eight millennium development goals to 17 goals from 2015.

So the 17 development goals are no poverty is number one, zero hunger is number two. Good health and well being is the third. Quality education is fourth. The fifth is gender equality. The sixth is clean water and sanitation. Seventh, affordable and clean energy. Eighth, decent work and economic growth.

Ninth, industry, innovation and infrastructure. 10. Reduced inequality. 11. Sustainable cities and communities. 12. Responsible consumption and production. 13. Climate action. 14. Life below water. 15. Life on land. 16. Peace, justice and strong institutions. And 17. Partnerships for the goals. So something I really like about the SDG agenda is that they tend to take a more holistic whole systems, systems thinking approach.

I recommend if you’re not really sure what systems thinking is to listen to our podcast episode all about systems thinking. And it’s really important to more conventional approaches to thinking, SDGs address, and

particularly when we are addressing these so called wicked problems, which are problems that kind of transcend economic, social, cultural political boundaries, it’s really important that we take a more holistic and systems thinking approach. And that’s exactly what the SDG agenda. does. It recognizes the interconnected nature of a lot of local and global challenges.

It acknowledges that these actually don’t exist in isolation, which is something that I think the Millennium Development Goals wasn’t able to do. The MDGs also tended to focus, like I said, on issues that really targeted developing nations or regions of the world. And the role of more developed nations in the MDG framework tended to be more about providing humanitarian aid, setting up trade partnerships, or development assistance.

The SDG framework, by contrast, really presents a number of goals that are going to address issues that are faced by both developing and developed nations alike. So the way the SDGs work is that the implementation process starts with each member country, each state, selecting and adapting the aspects of the SDGs that are most relevant to their national context.

So this is where it gets a little bit murky where we can begin to kind of question the effectiveness of the framework. A lot of criticism. is targeted at countries that have a tendency to maybe cherry pick goals and targets that are going to be easier for them to achieve. It’s really easy for them to kind of say, Oh, look at all the progress we’ve made in addressing these SDGs and whatever, when it’s something that you were pretty close to doing before.

There’s, I guess, not… The degree of accountability to hold member countries responsible for actually addressing those most pressing needs, which is a bit of a criticism. But I think all in all, because the formulation of the SDGs was the result of a consultative process with all member States, civil society, the private sector, a whole range of different stakeholders, And because the goals address such different and interrelated issues, a good thing about it is that it opens up action to non government or non state actors. So civil society members, the private sector, big corporations, businesses are equally as responsible for actually addressing the SDGs as member countries are, which.

I think is really important. So I guess my biggest criticism of the SDG framework, and I just want to preface this by saying I am in no way against the Sustainable Development Goals. I think as a framework it is, I think it is really good. I think it addresses a whole range of different issue areas. I don’t think there’s any kind of broad issue areas that get left out of the framework.

I think any challenge that any nation or community is facing can fit into these kind of broad categories where I think it does fall a little bit short. Is perhaps when it comes to the measuring and the indicators for the sustainable development goals. So, I mentioned that the MDGs had a really clear, quantitative easily measurable targets.

Whereas the SDGs have a mix of both quantitative and qualitative targets and indicators for the 17 goals. Now, the qualitative nature of the SDG targets means that there can sometimes be a mixture of ideals, norms, values, or principles that become I guess the indicators of the targets and.

There tends to be some criticism towards this a quote I have here from the OECD is that a healthy dose of objectivity should be warranted. Otherwise, we risk falling victim to the tyranny of acronym suspending critical thinking because it could endanger the agreement about the SDGs. Now, I don’t necessarily agree with this sentiment.

Personally, I think that it’s really unreasonable to assume that we should be setting universal and objective clearly measurable, quantitative targets for each of the Sustainable Development Goals, given each country is so unique and has its own unique context, there are goals and targets when this works and when this does not work.

So. I will use the 5th Sustainable Development Goal just to illustrate this a little bit more clearly to you. This is the Sustainable Development Goal that is most relative to my PhD research, so this is the one that I am most familiar with. Now, we know that there are 17 Development Goals. Each SDG also has a number of different targets and indicators.

So, we have A broad goal, one of the 17 goals, there are targets that are expected to be met within those goals. And then there are also indicators that allow us to know what to look for, what to mark or measure as successful within those targets. And there are two types of targets for each sustainable development goal.

So there are outcome targets and there are means of implementation targets. The outcome targets are exactly what they sound like. They are targets that are about the outcomes. The specific changes that we expect to see at the end of a change process. The means of implementation targets are. Targets that address the ways in which we expect the particular outcomes that we want to see to be brought about, the means in which we want to see those ends.

And then for each of those targets, there will be at least one indicator, sometimes there will be more. Now, personally, I think that with the Fifth Sustainable Development Goal, the outcome targets I think are all really good. We have things like ending all forms of discrimination against all women and girls everywhere as an outcome target.

I think that is absolutely valid and One of the indicators for that target is looking at whether or not there are legal frameworks in place to promote, enforce and monitor equality and non discrimination on the basis of sex. Another example of an outcome target is recognize and value unpaid care and domestic work through the provision of public services, infrastructure, and social protection policies, and the promotion of shared responsibility within the household and the family as nationally appropriate.

And the indicator for this is the proportion of time spent on unpaid domestic and care work by sex, age, and location. So if we’re looking at the proportion of a particular population, we’re looking at the number. It’s a very quantitative very tangibly measurable, uh, indicator. And I think that that is an appropriate indicator for that outcome target.

Now within the SDG framework for those of you who are interested, The outcome targets are those that have a number, so there’s 5. 1, 5. 2, 5. 3. The means of implementation targets are the ones that are indicated by a letter. So we have 5. a, 5. b, 5. c. Now, this is one of the means of implementation targets for the fifth sustainable development goal which is to promote gender equality and empower women.

And it is to enhance the use of enabling technology, in particular information and communications technology, to promote the empowerment of women. Completely reasonable outcome target, one that is, What my PhD research is focused on, but where I think it gets a little bit problematic is when we look at the indicator for this target, there’s only one indicator for this target, and it is the proportion of individuals who own a mobile telephone by sex.

So again, this is a quantitative indicator. We’re looking at the proportion of women to men in a particular population who own a mobile phone. And while that might be an important indicator when it comes to things like access to technology and inequality, does this indicator Really say that much about whether we’ve achieved our means of implementation target to use technology, to promote the empowerment of women.

Obviously, I think it doesn’t, I think most people would agree, you know, and this is probably my biggest criticism of the SDG framework, it’s that. We’ve set these incredible targets that can achieve, I think, real meaningful change. These, you know, were not just arbitrarily set. These are targets that were set through a consultation process with governments, NGOs members of civil society, experts, academics, the private sector, the public sector.

And, you know, we’ve got these great… Targets about how we want to implement this change, like using technology to empower women and how are we going to measure whether or not we’re successful at this, we’re going to look at the proportion of men to women in a population that own a mobile phone. I don’t think that is very effective and.

It can be really easy, I think, to brush this off and say, well, you know, okay, the indicator might not be great, but at least the framework and the overall agenda for sustainable development is quite comprehensive and worthy of pursuit, but. When you’re actually on the ground doing the work to address the sustainable development goals, indices are one of the most important communicative and strategic tools that we actually have.

Because when we are developing a theory of change, we’re strategizing how we anticipate to achieve something. How do we know if we’re going to be successful in achieving that thing? We’re looking at the indicators. And if we’re using arbitrary or insufficient indicators, then we’re not going to have Any idea of whether we’re actually directing our efforts at something that is indicative of the type of change that we want to see.

And that’s the best case scenario. I think the worst case scenario is we end up with actors who say, well, look, look at this. We have achieved a sustainable development goal. Five target five B. You know, we’ve achieved this and really what they’re saying is, yeah, the same amount of men and women own mobile phones in this population that says nothing about whether they’ve actually used mobile phone technology to empower women.

So it’s really important that we have indicators that communicate to the general population and to actors and to the beneficiaries of interventions. They effectively communicate how we actually know whether we’ve been successful in achieving this. And whether they actually do that. So this tends to be, I think, a problem within the Sustainable Development Framework for the means of implementation targets, more so than the outcome targets.

We have these kind of Quantitative indicators that tend to measure static spatio temporal differences. And what I mean here is we’re essentially just comparing the conditions or the state between a population at two points in time. Between maybe two different populations, like men and women, or between populations in different locations, so comparing rural to urban women.

And the problem with this is that these static differences are the outcomes of change. It’s not change itself. Change itself is dynamic. It’s constantly moving. It’s the thing. It’s the process. It’s the evolution of things that is constantly happening. That’s what change is. These types of indicators can only ever measure the changes, the outcomes of that change.

And if we want to measure change, which is what our means of implementation targets are essentially addressing, we need more effective indicators for measuring dynamic evolving change processes, not just the outcomes of change. Now that could be a whole nother episode distinguishing between how we might look at and address change processes compared to the outcomes of change in different interventions.

But for now, I think it’s just important to note that this is probably one of the biggest shortcomings of the Sustainable Development Goal Framework. We are halfway through the Sustainable Development Goal agenda. So we have until 2030. To keep addressing these targets and these goals and if I had to think what the world might look like in seven and a half years time when we reach 2030.

I would think that the evolution of our global development agenda would probably still be addressing these same issues and the same areas that the SDG framework addresses, but hopefully by then we will have some more nuanced, some more effective ways to measure change. In our understanding of change in the ways that we work towards change, that is what I think will need to come out of the sustainable development framework.

So with all that said, Obviously the SDGs are still really important. They are kind of like the global agenda when it comes to development. So anybody working in the social change space whether you’re working in the development space, whether you are addressing human rights, social justice, inequality, anything like that, it’s important to just have an understanding of what the SDGs are, which SDGs might be applicable to the work that you’re doing.

And maybe just having a look at what the specific targets are for any of the relevant goals to your work, looking at the ones that are applicable in the contexts that you might be working in, in the locations and the communities that you might be working in, and looking at those indicators and kind of…

of say seeing whether they are an appropriate way to measure any success that you might have towards those goals, or whether you might need to come together with other people that you’re working with and come up with your own indicators that are better indicators for measuring these targets in the specific context that you are working in.

That is what my PhD research has largely been doing working with development organizations in India and essentially saying, Hey, this indicator about the proportion of men to women who own mobile phones is not an effective way for us to measure whether our interventions are actually empowering women.

And what a lot of my research is looking at. is what indicators these organizations can actually use to determine whether their mobile phone technology and campaigns run through their mobile phone network is empowering women. So I hope you guys enjoyed this episode. I hope you maybe learned something new.

If you did, I would really appreciate it if you left us a rating or review on whatever platform you are listening on. If you have any questions that have come up, from listening to me and my little hot take on the SDGs, then feel free to ask more questions. I’m always happy to answer your questions.

There are no dumb questions when it comes to social change. And. I will see you guys, or you guys will hear me, rather, in our next episode of the podcast. Don’t forget that you can connect with me or the Humanitarian Changemakers Network on Instagram, all linked below in the episode description. I look forward to connecting with you and seeing all of the incredible things you are doing to make change happen in your community.