DANIEL GOLEMAN, Focus: The Hidden Driver of Excellence – The critical skill of attention

Written on February 6th, 2021

Biden’s pitching unity, but he seems determined to go big and the Dems sound serious about accountability. Pandemic numbers are easing and vaccines increasing, but we fear the unknown of virus variants. Normal is not around the corner. How will we come out of this – as a society and as individuals? Here’s my 2014 conversation with DANIEL GOLEMAN. In his book, FOCUS: The Hidden Driver of Excellence, he cites the latest neuroscience to make the case for the power and impact of where we choose to put our attention. Like a muscle, use attention poorly and it withers; work it in the right way and it strengthens.

At 28, CHLOE MAXMIN defeated the minority leader of Maine’s State Senate. Her secret? She listens.

Written on January 29th, 2021

In college, CHLOE MAXMIN co-founded the Divest Harvard campaign calling on the university to divest from fossil fuels. After graduating in 2015, she returned home to rural Maine, and In 2018 was elected to Maine’s House of Representatives, in a district that had voted Republican by a 16-point margin over the past three elections. In November, at 28 and after one term in the House, she defeated the incumbent minority leader to move to the State Senate. Chloe Maxmin bucks the obstacles to living democracy by focusing her energies on listening to the citizens she represents and then representing them. Today this is fairly radical behavior, radical in its simplicity and its potential.

My 2018 conversation w/ARLIE HOCHSCHILD (Strangers in Their Own Land) – listening to our alienated fellow Americans

Written on January 21st, 2021

Last week I spoke with ARLIE HOCHSCHILD, author of STRANGERS IN THEIR OWN LAND: Anger & Mourning on the American Right, about the Trump years, the insrrection, and the future. Given the inauguratiopn of Biden and Harris and the several immense crises we face, nothing may be more important at this moment than understanding our neighbors with whom we disagree. So here’s my 2018 conversation with Hochschild, in which we learn about her path to her current work and the lessons she learned from the folks she listend to. Finally we ask each other what new story might inspire more Americans to yearn for the future rather than the past.

ARLIE HOCHSCHILD-Strangers in Their Own Land-She’s been talking with “Trumpers” since 2011 – and since election day

Written on January 14th, 2021

I last spoke with Berkeley sociologist ARLIE HOCHSCHILD in 2018 about her book, STRANGERS IN THEIR OWN LAND: Anger & Mourning on the American Right, in which she shares what she learned in five years talking to Tea Partiers turned Trumpers in Southern Louisiana. Turns out she’s continued to talk with the folks she met researching her book. I call on her again to try to make some sense of my fellow Americans and find a path back from the chaos and breakdown that seems possible in the days and weeks ahead.

THOMAS HOMER-DIXON – for the new year – COMMANDING HOPE: The Power to Renew a World in Peril

Written on January 1st, 2021

THOMAS HOMER-DIXON correctly predicted a lot of the crises we face. But, as we leave 2020 behind and give birth to 2021, i talk with him about his new book, COMMANDING HOPE: The Power We Have to Renew a World in Peril. Sample “To keep our hope from being vague and naive, it must have a clear vision of a positive future. Then, to keep it from being false, we must avoid wishful thinking about the likelihood of that future.” Learn more at commandinghope.com