Reports from the Knowledge Labs about our recent findings, research topics, and interviews with lifestyle leaders who are creating their own futures.
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How to stimulate your own powers of foresight. Consider the following thought provokers. Ask yourself, in these categories what are the brand new trends and forces? Which are the ones growing in importance? Which current forces are loosing their steam? Which have peaked or are reversing themselves? Which are the "wildcards" about to disrupt us in the future? POLITICAL AND TECHNICAL thought for food: Electronics, Materials, Energy, Fossil, Nuclear, Alternative, Other, Manufacturing (techniques), Agriculture, Machinery and Equipment, Distribution, Transportation (Urban, Mass, Personal, Surface, Sea, Subsurface, Space), Communication (Printed, Spoken, Interactive, Media), Computers (Information, Knowledge, Storage & Retrieval, Design, Network Resources), Post-Cold War, Third World, Conflict (Local, Regional, Global), Arms Limitation, Undeclared Wars, Terrorism, Nuclear Proliferation, Weapons of Mass Destruction, Governments (More/Less Power and Larger or Smaller Scale), Taxes, Isms: Nationalism, Regionalism, Protectionism, Populism, Cartels, Multinational Corporations, Balance of Trade, Third Party Payments, Regulations (OSHA, etc.) Environmental Impact, U.S. Prestige Abroad. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC Food for thought:
Labor Movements, Unemployment / Employment Cycles, Recession, Employment Patterns, Work Hours / Schedules, Fringe Benefits, Management Approaches, Accounting Policies, Productivity, Energy Costs, Balance of Payments, Inflation, Taxes, Rates of Real Growth, Distribution of Wealth, Capital Availability and Costs, Reliability of Forecasts, Raw Materials, Availability and Costs, Global versus National Economy, Market versus Planned Economies, Generations: Y, X, Boomers, Elderly, Urban vs. Rural Lifestyles, Affluent vs. Poor, Neighborhoods and Communities, Planned or Organic Growth.
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The Journal of 2020 Foresight
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Tuesday, December 20, 2005
Sedona to Manhattan, Same 30,000 Year Old Play Performed in Local Costumes
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
By Steve Howard, CKO
The Knowledge Labs
Table of Contents
Chapter One: Basecamp
Chapter Two: The Ridge
Chapter Three: The Outpost
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
“The term ‘rancho’ is Spanish…. ‘El Rancho’ kind of thing. It’s a funny thing in America. Spanish was there a long time ago, but still every once in awhile somebody writes down ‘rancho’ just because it sounds cool. So that’s what they did…. It used to be called the Double L, but now it’s called the Double E. It was a relatively easy change to make.”
Neil Young & Crazy Horse “Greendale”
DOUBLE NICKEL RANCH. During both of Pathfinder’s workshops some very fundamental questions about our life – our personal life story, and everything that has happened before we took our first breath -- commanded center stage in the Joseph Campbell and Geronimo Conference Rooms.
Journal of 2020 Foresight: As a result of your campfire discussions and your workshop dialogues, it sounds like everybody wanted to contribute to something bigger than themselves, to some kind of “Big Picture.”
Pathfinder: Well, once you begin considering the major events in the development of life on planet Earth, you branch off into an almost infinite number of paths.
J2020F: Like?
Pathfinder: Time scale, to begin with – millions of years ago and thousands of years ago. How many years ago did each of the known species of life entered the scene? When were the continents fused into one? Roughly 300 millions of years ago.
J2020F: You knew I was going to ask.
Pathfinder: Well, we were just marveling at the implications of the migration paths, fossilized footprints and land bridges.
J2020F: I imagine the Double Nickel Rendezvous conversations grew heated when some of those with vested interests in opposite worldviews exchanged their opinions.
Pathfinder: Not really. I don’t believe everyday people have polarized themselves into one extreme position or another, as the radical fundamental zealots would have us believe. Anyway, we set the ground rules early on and took a more historical view.
J2020F: For instance?
Pathfinder: We could all pretty much agree that biological evolution was even supported in ancient times. As early as 400 BC the Greeks taught that the sun, earth, life, humans, civilization, and society emerged over eons.
J2020F: So, is it fair to say the spirit of the events had more to do with respecting rather than rejecting each other’s belief system rather than obnoxiously arguing for a specific point of view?
Pathfinder: Yes. In fact, almost everyone agreed we need more venues to explore these kinds of discussions, if for no other reason than to better anticipate paradigm shifts.
J2020F: Well considering that we each only have one life to lead, and as you make one choice, you rule out another – you can’t have and do everything.
Pathfinder: So, it’s good to consider everyone else’s life story for commonalities and opportunities to explore something outside your own base of experience or limited point of view.
J2020F: As you said in Basecamp, since beginningless time people have wanted to know where life will take them.
Pathfinder: Exactly. One of my favorite quotes begins with, “The story of a human life grips us very directly because it is a case history of the condition we all share.”
J2020F: Even as we appear very conventional on the outside to the world.
Pathfinder: Yes. The history of the world, the different flavors of religion, all the scientific schools of thought each help us in one way or another to understand that we have much more in common than we know.
J2020F: And, what it means to be human.
Pathfinder: And, more importantly, to answer their own unique calling -- as an adventure. If I may, I’d like to quote Joseph Campbell from his “The Power of Myth” series of interviews with Bill Moyers:
“CAMBPELL: You've got the same body, with the same organs and energies, that Cro-Magnon man had thirty thousand years ago.
Living a human life in New York City or living a human life in the caves, you go through the same stages of childhood, coming to sexual maturity, transformation of the dependency of childhood into the responsibility of manhood or womanhood, marriage, then failure of the body, gradual loss of its powers, and death.
You have the same body, the same bodily experiences and so you respond to the same images. For example, a constant image is that of the conflict of the eagle and the serpent. The serpent bound to the earth, the eagle in spiritual flight -- isn't that conflict something we all experience?
And then, when the two amalgamate, we get a wonderful dragon, a serpent with wings. All over the earth people recognize these images. Whether I'm reading Polynesian or Iroquois or Egyptian myths, the images are the same and they are talking about the same problems.
MOYERS: They just wear different costumes when they appear at different times?
CAMPBELL: Yes. It's as though the same play were taken from one place to another, and at each place the local players put on local costumes and enact the same old play.
MOYERS: And these mythic images are carried forward from generation to generation, almost unconsciously."
J2020F: So, you’ve got to work it out all by yourself over and over again throughout your own life span.
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Copyright ©2002 - 2006 Aarnaes Howard Associates. All rights reserved worldwide.
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