June 19, 2025 • 54 mins
When Jack Stewart turned off the internet, he discovered that digital connection often acts as a “social appetite suppressant”—satisfying on the surface, but not deeply nourishing. In this conversation, Jack explains how removing online distractions led him to seek out in-person connection, from literally knocking on neighbors’ doors to organizing his own book and writing salons.
We discuss the qualitative difference between digital admirers and real friends, and why meaningful conversations rarely happen through casual online chat. Jack outlines how he created formal spaces—book clubs, writing groups, salons—to foster intellectual depth and genuine community.
The discussion moves to Jack’s research on “common pool resources,” and the practical lessons from Nobel Prize winner Eleanor Ostrom’s work on how communities can successfully govern shared spaces. We explore what makes a community sustainable, including trust, collective rule-making, and how conflict is resolved without defaulting to authority or privatization.
Cecilie and Jesper share their own experiences with offline community-building and the Scandinavian tradition of “hygge” as an egalitarian way of sharing space. The episode finishes with a reflection on what it really takes to build trust, give comfort, and create belonging in a world shaped by digital isolation.
🗓️ Recorded June 17th, 2025. 📍 Åmarksgård, Lille Skendsved, Denmark
🔗 Links from our talk
- https://www.gaiaeducation.org/
- Download the PDF of "Money Can't Buy Me Hygge: Danish Middle-Class Consumption, Egalitarianism, and the Sanctity of Inner Space": https://www.researchgate.net/publication/272570361_Money_Can't_Buy_Me_Hygge_Danish_Middle-Class_Consumption_Egalitarianism_and_the_Sanctity_of_Inner_Space
- overning the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action by Elinor Ostrom: https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/governing-the-commons/A8BB63BC4A1433A50A3FB92EDBBB97D5
PODCAST INFO
Podcast website: http://theconrad.family/podcast
YouTube Full Episodes: https://www.youtube.com/theconradfamily365
Apple Podcasts: https://www.theconrad.family/apple
Spotify: https://theconrad.family/spotify
RSS: https://theconrad.family/rss
SUPPORT & CONNECT
Support on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/Theconradfamily
Share a review: https://www.theconrad.family/review-our-podcast
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theconrad.family
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theconradfamily
Twitter: https://twitter.com/theconradfamily
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jesper Conrad (00:00):
Today we are together with Jack Stewart, and
Jack is one of those guys Ireally love to talk to because
he is using his wonderful brain.
He set things in motion in mybrain.
Cecilie Conrad (00:15):
You quote Jack quite often.
Jesper Conrad (00:17):
I actually quote Jack quite often.
Jack Stewart (00:21):
What's the quote?
Jesper Conrad (00:21):
Give me one of the quotes that go around I will
give you the quote as I haveinterpreted it, so it might be
like totally correct, Okay youparaphrase.
I paraphrase it, yes, but let'stake a quick welcome.
Welcome, jack.
Cecilie Conrad (00:39):
Good to see you, hi, thanks for having me.
Jesper Conrad (00:43):
What I'm telling people is that you turned off
the internet and one of thethings you saw in your own life
was that the internet it couldbe podcast, it could be YouTube,
it could be social media hadbecome a social appetite
suppressant.
And when you turned it off,then what happened was that you
(01:07):
realized that there were timesin your life where you earlier
had filled up your socialappetite by watching YouTube,
being online, doing stuff thatwhen you turned it off, you
realized, hey, those momentsneed to be filled.
And there one of the things yousaid is that you actually went
around knocking on theneighbor's door and was like,
(01:27):
hey, you want to come out andplay, and yeah, that has meant a
lot to me.
It's a funny thing isn't it?
Jack Stewart (01:34):
because on the face of it it's a bad thing that
it caused to tell you off theinternet, which is loneliness.
You know I, I disconnected frompeople and so, if you think
about it like that, it's kind ofa strange thing to speak of
positively because, you know I,I removed something from my life
and then I had appetite for itand then I built up that thing
(01:56):
in my life.
So it's a net neutral questionmark, but that only works if the
relationships that I had beforeare worth an equal amount of
the relationships I have now, ifyou see what I mean.
So I had 10 friends on theInternet.
Got rid of the 10 friends.
Now I have 10 friends in reallife.
The problem is that I didn'tactually have 10 friends on the
(02:18):
Internet.
They were admirers.
Well, that's the way I you knowknow.
As you know, you guys probablyhave a similar thing.
You have lots of peoplelistening to the podcast and
they but they're not yourfriends.
They from a distance, like whatyou have to say or or in some
way, yeah, like admiring ratherthan trusting you closely.
(02:40):
So let me, can I, can I ask you, how do you think about that?
Do you think about.
That is like a social adjacentthing, people who are listening
to your podcast.
Cecilie Conrad (02:50):
No, I actually don't, and I also have noticed I
just wrote something about ittoday for the blog.
15 years ago, when I startedblogging, my blog was a more
social space and a space fordiscussion and the space for
exploring, where the readerswould share their thoughts and
(03:11):
and in the whole thread ofcomments there would be a
continuum of what I would writesomething and then we would have
a conversation about it andeveryone would come out smarter.
Now I don't don't hear from myreaders almost at all If I
explicitly write in the textthat that hurts me, that I feel
(03:35):
lonely, that I feel I'm speakingto a void though I can see in
the statistics I have readersthat this change that has
happened in the intimate, thatpeople don't respond and engage,
it hurts me and it makes itharder for me to share.
And we have the same thinggoing on with the podcast that
(03:55):
only we have a lot of listeners.
We can see that on thestatistics, but we very, very
rarely hear from them.
And you know if you havesomething you're thinking or
want to ask or want to talkabout, or if it had an effect or
whatever, you know we're doingthis for free, spending our time
trying to make the world abetter place by sharing all
(04:18):
kinds of just differentperspectives on mainstream.
It's nice to know that there issomeone on the other side.
So the answer to your questionis no, this is not a social.
It's social because you and Iand my husband we all three are
having a real conversation,though we're using this media of
the internet to have theconversation.
(04:40):
We're having a realconversation, that's the social
part, but besides that we'redoing it.
Real conversation, that's thesocial part, but besides that,
we're doing it because we thinkI think there's some voices that
needs to be heard exactly and Ialso am quite egoistic in my
choice of guests.
Jesper Conrad (04:58):
Sometimes in talking to you it makes me happy
.
And also there's someone whohas written a book and I can be
like, oh, I have some questionsfor that person and then having
a podcast is a good excuse forme getting to talk to them.
Yeah, and the most profoundeffect it has on me making the
(05:21):
podcast is that, a I get to havea good conversation.
B I get to play with a lot offun tools.
I like to edit, I like to makeimages and I all these things I
find interesting and it's itnurtures my, my playfulness and
my lust for exploration andlearning new tools and new stuff
(05:43):
.
But then it is most often, orthe last thing I really enjoy
getting out of it is that it issome of the more deep
conversations I have in my life.
I'm trying to move this outsideof the podcast, also taking a
(06:03):
subject, talking with a friendabout it.
But often everyday life can benot superficial, but it's not
the same trying to go deep intoa subject that I would like to
try more in real life, and thenit lingers for me.
I have last week I mentionedyou in a dialogue and I
(06:25):
mentioned how you had seen theeffect of the internet on on you
and so so it stays with me andI really really like that do you
think that?
Jack Stewart (06:38):
what would it take ?
So you mentioned, for example,that you like having these long,
um, deeper, uh, sort ofintentional chats with people.
What do you think it would takefor you to cultivate that
face-to-face with people?
Jesper Conrad (06:54):
I think it needs a format.
I hope and believe that the,the coming of ai, will make
people want reality more.
We are in Denmark, here insidethe next month giving three or
four talks for free, but thegoal is not us talking for an
(07:16):
hour, but it is that we choosesome subject we try to go deep
in before so we have somethoughts on a subject we
actually want to share.
But what I look most forward towith that is the facilitating
of the meeting.
Yeah, that people show upbecause there's someone's
putting themselves out there andsaying, hey, I've thought about
(07:39):
this, let me share it.
Jack Stewart (07:41):
Yes, so one of the things that I did when I got
rid of the internet to fill upthis space in my life was I made
a book club, a writing club,and like I call a salon, like it
in the 1800s in france, like aconference almost thing.
(08:03):
So.
So book club is obvious aninteresting book, we'll talk
about it.
Writing club you do half anhour of writing Now you bring it
and you read your piece ofwriting and this is creative
writing stuff and you getfeedback.
But the conference is reallyscratching an itch and that is
like.
So I have five or six people whocome twice a year and some of
(08:27):
them fly in so it's kind ofgetting pretty important for us
and give a talk, like a half anhour talk.
They're all researchers apartfrom me I'm the layman, but I
organize it, so it doesn't count.
So a researcher in townplanning she comes, a researcher
(08:48):
in biblical studies, aresearcher in Arabic and Muslim
studies, a researcher inphilosophy and a psychologist,
and they all come in and givelike here's 20 minutes of
something that I'm reallyinterested in at the moment and
we talk about it.
Cecilie Conrad (09:04):
And this has been such an invaluable thing in
my life who do you need to knowto get a ticket to that evening
?
Jack Stewart (09:12):
well, you have to give a talk of 20 minutes or
something you're interested andthen you can definitely be part
of it.
And I think people have abarrier of thinking.
That's going to be cringy toask someone.
To ask just a friend, like ifyou're not into the whole
research, academic thing, tojust ask like, look poor people,
let's really get dive into asubject.
I'm no good at biology, I'mjust interested and so let's do
(09:35):
something about it.
So it's almost like I have kindof like a pancast.
But I'm like guys, I either wedo this by letters or I fly a
pigeon over or you'll have tocome twice a year.
And I think actually if I wastalking to these guys on
whatsapp every day or every week, I probably wouldn't be doing
this, because on whatsapp itwould be scratching the itch or
(10:00):
that's not the right, it wouldbe an appetite suppressant.
So it be like it wouldn't bequite as good quality as this
conference I'm doing right now.
We would have a little chat oh,what are you interested in at
the moment?
We wouldn't really get into it.
But now that I'm not doing thatand I can't have those chats,
and once a week I might do anemail, but it's really not the
same, because I feel like Ireally need some thoughts from
(10:25):
Hans.
You know, it's been six months,we haven't had a good chat, and
so now we need to organize thisthing, and so it's a bigger
thing than it would be.
Cecilie Conrad (10:34):
That makes a lot of sense.
I'm sitting on a point herewhich is I think you, my husband
, you have a lot of very deepconversations and you made this
point even before we met JackSome years ago.
You said I don't likechit-chatting, I like talking
with people, I want meaningfulconversations.
(10:56):
That's a long time ago.
You put that.
You put a list on the fridge offive things that were really
important to you and it wasactually number one and it was
not a prioritized list yeah butit was a list of the five most
important things in your lifeand and well, the obvious health
, and you know me and the kidswere on, but so were my top five
(11:16):
passions from yeah, you wantget all the rich conversations
with people and doing thepodcast is part of that.
But you also are the one to ina in a cozy social setting, that
we, we're very social in reallife, all the time, to the point
of social marathon.
(11:36):
But you are the one to say, ohyeah it's for those listening.
Jesper is now sobbing no, butyou're the one to say to people
you know are your parents alive?
And if the answer is yes,what's your relation with them
these days?
How do you feel about yourparents?
(11:57):
Or, if it's no, you know whathappened and how did you get
over it?
You ask those questions, youknow that start a real
conversation.
Jesper Conrad (12:07):
It would be really, really boring to me if I
didn't.
Cecilie Conrad (12:10):
You and I both read that book right now, and we
keep bringing up thatconversation with everyone.
You know what do you thinkabout this problem and how do
you handle it.
And so we just both read thebook Superstimulated.
It's a Danish author, so wejust both read the book
Superstimulated.
It's a Danish author.
So in our language the title isCreatures of Habit, which is
(12:33):
and the core hypothesis isaround the concept of super
stimuli how we can hack our ownbiology, how we are being
basically manipulated by well,whatever some other interests
than maybe the best ones, byhacking our instincts.
And this can be done on animalsas well as humans.
(12:54):
And he's writing, he wrote thisbook about it.
It was really a page turner.
It took me like three days toread it because I couldn't stop
reading.
Jesper Conrad (13:01):
We will put the link in the show notes and
recommend it for your book club.
Couldn't stop reading.
Cecilie Conrad (13:05):
We will put the link in the show notes and
recommend it for your book club.
Same book, but we do bring upthese conversations.
I feel like I have them alsoall the time, but mostly around
children, unschooling, freedom,all these things.
People want to talk to me aboutthese things.
So it's just when you say thatyou need that, not that I don't
need the podcast for this, butyou are doing it in real life.
Jesper Conrad (13:28):
I am all the time but I love the connection there
is when people are togetheraround listening to a subject
and the talks that comesafterward.
Like that is how we met you.
We gave a short talk on ourworld schooling thing at HIF and
(13:50):
you came over and chatted withus afterwards and that was for
me bigger than giving the talk.
It was a bit of deeper dialoguethan me standing and sharing.
But someone needs to go thereand arrange, someone needs to go
there and share, and that is athing I've been wanting to do,
(14:12):
besides a podcast, in real lifemore and more.
And it's one of the subjects wewill take up to do at our
forthcoming what we call WorldSchool Village, which is where
people come and find an Airbnbor whatever that suits them, and
then during that month we willdo some conference part as well,
(14:35):
because we miss this wisdomsharing or sharing of a subject
that can be the focal point fora dialogue that day.
Jack Stewart (14:45):
Wisdom sharing.
That made me think of aroundthe bonfire.
You know, it's been there awayfor thousands of years.
Someone has a really good storyto tell and everyone huddles
around to hear it.
I wonder, I suppose, like inAthens or something, it'd be the
(15:05):
Parthenon or some sort of likewhat would be the equivalent of
a podcast before books.
Cecilie Conrad (15:12):
It's a deep human nature and that's actually
one of the points of this book.
Jesper and I just read both ofus and also another book.
I suppose I talked about it onprevious podcasts with you,
because I was very fascinated bythe book Stolen Focus.
I read it a year and a half ago.
This fact that the fact thatwe're overly stimulated, that
(15:36):
you know, you call it a socialAppetite suppressant.
Appetite suppressant.
Maybe it's also or not, maybeit's very much an intellectual
appetite suppressant.
The internet, it's so bad thatit freaks me out.
To be honest, the people can'tread any longer.
(15:57):
They think something is long.
They tell me oh, you're writingso long things.
It's like page and page.
I tested it.
It takes not page and page andI've tested it.
It takes about 10 minutes toread a block of post.
That's not a long time, it'snot a long time.
Jack Stewart (16:13):
It's not the place .
Don't you think that thearchitecture, when you step into
a room, the architecture kindof wants you to do something.
It wants in a church, it wantsyou to look up.
Or in a library, it kind ofwants you to do something.
It wants in a church, it wantsyou to look up.
Or in a library, it kind ofwants you to get a good library.
It wants you to go into thenooks to settle down with a book
(16:33):
.
Or in a farmhouse, it wants youto go to the hearth or the
kitchen.
You know places want you to dothings.
And I just wonder if thedigital architecture that is
most prevalent on the internet,I wonder if it wants you to look
at the, the highlight, theheadlines rather than read for
10 minutes.
(16:54):
So I I wonder if you'refighting against the actual
architecture, that, as it were,the infrastructure that you are
putting your work into.
Cecilie Conrad (17:05):
But I think I am , but I also think we all well,
all the rest of us who are notJack Stewart, completely off the
internet.
We're fighting against the wayit works.
Jack Stewart (17:18):
How suppressive, oppressive and how anti-human
does the internet have to getfor you to say that you know
what this is just like anabusive.
This is a like an abusivepartner or something that it's
like you can take enough from itand yes, he's helping me by
doing this and that, but howabusive does it have to get for
(17:40):
you to say no well, I think I'vesaid no to quite the extent.
Cecilie Conrad (17:45):
I don't spend a lot of time on the internet.
I don't spend a lot of time onmy phone or my computer.
I just notice that it'sbecoming increasingly
complicated to spend time on mydevices without being distracted
by the device itself, the wayit works.
(18:07):
We just got a new iPhone,jesper and I.
We bought new iPhones and Inoticed that the basic setting
could be an update, could be thenew phone, I don't know.
There's this button on the side.
I can press it and then thescreen goes black.
So when I'm done with what I'mdoing, I'm turning it off.
I can't see anything.
But with this new setting itdidn't turn off, it just got a
(18:30):
little more discreet and I waslike you're kidding me.
You know it just wants myattention.
I've got all notifications off,nothing.
You know I choose what I'mdoing.
I think I've got it to quite alarge extent down that it's not
hacking me as such.
I just noticed that I have tobe more and more aware of how I
(18:52):
navigate that architecture,because it's like being in a
mall looking for the onlybookshop you know and among all
the other bullshit that I don'tneed, and it's a big mall and
there's a lot of flashing lightsand noise and smells and things
on sale.
Jesper Conrad (19:13):
I think it's a very interesting question how
abusive does it have to bebefore we can turn it off or at
least be in control of it?
Today I was actually just outtrying to look for an old school
clock, because I have taken anew tool in my fight against
(19:33):
being seduced by the internet,which is no phone.
In the bedroom I have my Kindle, I read, and that is wonderful.
But then I realized that somemornings I can be like oh,
what's the time?
I don't know what time it's,maybe I need to do stuff, maybe
I have a meeting soon, and thenI walk into the other room to
look at my phone to see theclock.
(19:53):
So I actually just need like ananalog clock and I was out
looking for that in asecond-hand shop today because
time is still relevant, becausewe have arrangements and
dialogue with other people.
Cecilie Conrad (20:07):
So can I ask you , is the analog alarm clock so
extinct that they're not even inthe thrift stores?
Jesper Conrad (20:18):
There was none.
That's amazing.
There was no clocks in thethrift stores?
Cecilie Conrad (20:20):
There was none.
That's amazing.
Jesper Conrad (20:21):
There was no clocks in the thrift store.
Jack Stewart (20:24):
Really.
Yeah, there's a couple ofthings I've had to buy, I mean,
apart from paper maps and thedumb phone, but the typewriter,
that's been an interesting one,because sometimes I do writing
for various things.
But I had a big projectrecently.
It was 40 pages.
So I had project recently whenit was 40 pages.
So I had to write this thingwith 40 pages.
But when you write a thing andyou want it to be good enough to
(20:45):
sell you, there's it's not just40 pages, it's 40 page draft,
and then one word, and then like50 on every page you know
there's 15 words that need to bechanged, and then there's
that's the next draft, and thenyou have to do the next, and
then on the next draft there'sfour words that need to be
changed, and then two, and thenI'll flip back to eight and then
(21:07):
one word on the last one andthen you know you've got six
drafts.
So that's six, nine, forty maybenot quite that much, but it was
a lot.
It's a lot, but it was reallygood because it changed the way
I thought about the whole page.
Like I had to think about thewhole page as a piece, if you
see what I mean, because this isa piece of paper that I can't
(21:28):
just take one thing out of.
This is a whole print that Ihave to think about how this
works as a page and I have to bemuch more carefully about.
I have to think much morecarefully about selecting words
and I have to think much morecarefully about selecting words.
So it was good and there wasmuch more note-taking on a piece
of paper, like just with a pen,to think about structure of the
(21:50):
page and thinking through howcould I phrase this.
Yeah, it was definitely givingme some extra muscle in a part
of my brain that I hadn't usedbefore when all of my all of my
university work was on a laptop.
So I hadn't.
I've never done this beforewhen I was a typewriter so this
is one of the things.
Cecilie Conrad (22:09):
I think I'm a bit older than you and this is
one of the things I think is agreat improvement, great
improvement where I love mycomputer.
My first computer obviouslywasn't on the internet because I
had it more or less beforethere was such a thing as
internet for the public, butjust the fact that you could do
text editing.
(22:30):
I did the typewriting I learned.
I took typewriting in schoolwhen I was something like 14.
Hours I've put into all that youknow rewriting the page and all
the things, the fact I stillwork with pen and paper.
I can't.
I even have pen and paper nextto the computer right now.
I have to.
There's something different forthe brain with pen and paper.
(22:52):
I structure my work with penand paper, I plan it with pen
and paper.
I sometimes need to even printand comment with pen and paper.
But the fact that I can writethe actual text and make
mistakes and edit and movethings around without having to
rewrite and rewrite and rewrite,I find that that is one of the
(23:12):
reasons I'm not getting rid ofmy computer.
I think it's great, great and Ithink we need to look at how
well I'm not trying to changeyour opinion, but I think I need
to look at how is the computera great help and what's getting
in the way of me using it onlyas a great help and a great tool
and not as a distraction?
Jack Stewart (23:34):
Yeah, that's good.
Jesper Conrad (23:35):
That's good thinking.
What inspired me what you said,jack, was the amount of time
you put into the words youworked with, and sometimes when
you have a computer and just canedit it, it goes very fast and
you don't put the same hours ofthinking into it.
Cecilia sometimes says thatwriting is the greatest form of
(24:00):
thinking.
I don't know if it's a quotefrom somewhere, I can't remember
, but that it's a really goodway to structure your thoughts.
Cecilie Conrad (24:10):
It organizes my mind to write and I enjoy
writing on the computer.
I'll just say it again it's agreat improvement in my life
that I can do it that way.
I enjoy that For some, somethings.
There are a few things I stillwant to write by hand and I
cannot find a tool that willhelp me on the computer.
So I do both is?
Jack Stewart (24:30):
is most of your writing for blogs or journals
that go online or that sort ofthing, or is it like well, I'm
also in the process of writingtwo actual books and a cookbook.
Cecilie Conrad (24:39):
so three books, okay.
So I also do even longer format.
Jack Stewart (24:44):
Will that be printed like an old-fashioned
book?
Cecilie Conrad (24:48):
When I'm done, yeah.
Jesper Conrad (24:50):
I would like to dive into the subject of
community spaces and some of theother things you, before the
recording, set that you werelooking into.
So what are you doing, jack,with all that time you have
gotten by dropping the internet?
Jack Stewart (25:07):
My end goal is to set up some sort of community
farm, residential monastery,education center thing,
education center thing, and soI'm doing some research into how
(25:28):
common pool resources work andhow common pool resources can be
best governed.
So a common pool resource is aresource that a community has in
common, that nobody owns, thatis not privately owned, not
owned by the government, likethe ocean or like a community
garden.
I'm interested in how do we setup these spaces where everyone
(25:48):
gets a piece of the pie,everyone's happy, and there are
no like in a community garden.
Nobody takes the tomato.
Nobody, no one person takes allthe tomatoes.
Because this is, you know, somecall this the tragedy of the
commons where in a communitygarden, there's always going to
be someone who is going to takemore because, because human
nature is that you're going tobe greedy and so you're going to
(26:09):
want to take all the tomatoesand then nobody else has
tomatoes.
Part of the reason I'minterested in this, not only
because it will feed into my inmy future plan farm thing, but
also, in a way, the life and theearth is a community resource.
So maybe trying to figure outthe principles by which we can
govern a community garden willhelp us think about the
(26:31):
principles by which we cangovern the world, or ourselves
or something, or maybe evenfamilies.
My friend is doing research intotown planning.
She's in the salon, she's inthe Jack conference and she's
she put me onto someone who isher intellectual hero, eleanor
(26:51):
Ostrom.
And Eleanor Ostrom wrotegoverning the commons and it won
the Nobel prize a couple ofdecades ago and it's blowing my
mind.
She basically did lots ofresearch in empirically, not
just theoretically, but incommon pool resource
institutions that actually existand have existed for a long
time.
What are the principles, whatare the characteristics of these
(27:17):
longstanding common poolresource institutions that work
and have worked for a long time?
And so clear boundaries aboutwithdrawal of resources is one
of them.
Collective choice about therules is another.
(27:39):
I could go into easy conflictresolution easy, quick, rapid
access to conflict resolutionthat you don't have to go to
like HR, you don't have to callthe police, you can start small
with a conflict resolution.
I can go into more, but to meit's blowing my mind because us
hippies I don't know, maybe notyou guys, I don't know how
(28:00):
you've grown up, hippie or notbut us hippies have always said
that I've always liked to thinkthat we could organize ourselves
without private ownership, withless of a at least at least
less of a dependence on privateownership and less of a
(28:21):
dependence on the government.
And it's always been sort ofairy-fairy and Eleanor Ostrom
comes along and says yes, theseare the characteristics you need
for your institution to worklike that if you want it to last
.
And so it's a good, like she'sa real scientific thinker.
It's been helping me ground my,my wishy-washy hippie isms.
Jesper Conrad (28:46):
Cool and two questions.
First a short one when is thenext Jack conference taking
place?
Jack Stewart (28:58):
Next one is, uh believe, next month, july Cool.
Cecilie Conrad (29:06):
We need to have a conversation about that, Jack,
because we will actually be onthe island in July.
Jack Stewart (29:12):
Really, you'll be in Brennan.
Jesper Conrad (29:15):
Yeah we will come to FN.
Cecilie Conrad (29:18):
Yeah, we'll see you there.
Jesper Conrad (29:20):
Yeah, let's talk, yeah.
The second question is so goingfrom researching to being
fascinated by, to learningthrough your research, adjusting
some of your former beliefs,going from there to making it
(29:40):
happen to what is your nextfirst step?
Jack Stewart (29:43):
so next step is more personal research into
these communities that are doingthis sort of thing.
So I've had some experiencegoverning common institutions.
But so, basically, in a in afew weeks time, I'm going to go
on a trip and go go aroundvarious communities who are
doing this Not necessarilylongstanding one that's
(30:05):
longstanding and I'm going to dointerviews on what do you have
common?
Do you have clear boundaries,do you have congruence with
local conditions?
Do you have these things, andhow does it work for you?
Is it working?
And really, what I'm mostinterested in is trying to ask
(30:25):
what happens when you're reallyangry at someone, what happens
when there's someone in thiscommunity that you feel like
isn't doing what they need to door is causing loads of problems
, or what happens with theconflict resolution.
So, anyway, next step is to tryand figure out real life, me
step into and live with for alittle bit.
These community residentiallike permaculture-y type places.
Jesper Conrad (30:52):
I would recommend and highlight one of the former
projects I've been involvedwith, which is Gaia Education,
that have created four greatbooks on both the economic side
of it, the worldview, the socialaspect and one more Earlier.
I could it all by.
I was helping with themarketing and the organizing and
(31:16):
had a short stint as theinterim CEO for them when they
needed that.
What is interesting is thatthey talk about that.
These ecovillages are more orless living laboratories who are
exploring new ways of livingand working together and a lot
of them is actually writing down, analyzing, looking at how it
has been done is actuallywriting down, analyzing, looking
(31:39):
at how it has been done.
Then Gaia Education havecollected a lot of this
knowledge into those, the GaiaEducation curriculum which
people can take and dive into.
I would recommend you to lookat it.
Ross Jackson, who is thephilanthropist who gave a lot of
money to Gaia Education duringmany years I've worked with him
(32:00):
in Denmark fantastic, inspiringman.
He said something about theecovillages.
He said that the ecovillagesthat were for something ended up
being the longstanding wherepeople had connected around
being against.
They ran out of steam at somepoint and I mentioned this
(32:23):
because you mentioned thecounterculture and I can feel it
in myself that the angeragainst the current society can
be there.
I can feel that there's so muchwrong with how people live and
the way society is and howpeople are in this everyday.
Nine to five, but that powerwill run out, so we will stand
(32:47):
longer, being for than against.
That's a great point.
Jack Stewart (32:51):
Yeah, I should keep that in mind.
Cecilie Conrad (32:54):
I can't help but think about.
So Jesper, who actually has alot of meaningful conversations,
has been handing out a littlepamphlet in the community where
we're actually living right nowfour families together for the
month.
Someone wrote a doctorate andthen you always write the short
(33:15):
version, just 25 pages, and he'sbeen printing old-fashioned
printing and handing out becauseI think he wants to discuss the
points.
So I'm currently reading it andit's on the Scandinavian
concept of hygge, which is, youknow, there's the book and all
the things, and the Danes arevery proud of their hygge
concept.
(33:35):
But this is a more intellectualand critical way of thinking
about what is this and how is itand when?
You, when you said that you'reresearching how to have these
communal things.
I mean, we're very good atcommunal things because we do
community all the time and I'veput a lot of thought into what
makes it work and and whatsometimes can be harder.
(33:57):
And then I'm reading this fuggething and one of the things
there is about the concept ofhygge is the concept of equality
, that we're all equal and oneof the norms inside of the
concept of hygge is thateveryone, everyone, have equal
space.
So a thing that would ruin thehygge, the cozy space of hanging
(34:22):
out together in a good waywould be someone taking center
stage all the time.
That would be hygge, becauseeveryone, you have to step up
and be part of it.
You can't just sit in thecorner and do your own thing
that would be read a book orwatch your phone or whatever.
You have to be present for themoment of being together, so you
(34:43):
are contributing with yourpresence, but at the same time,
you cannot be the one to talkall the time and especially you
cannot be the one to talk allthe time about yourself.
That would ruin it.
And I think this concept, thisway of sharing time, we grow
(35:06):
into it.
This is something you learnfrom your parents.
It's something you learn whilegrowing up.
Your parents will teach youthis is not the moment to read
your comic book, because we aretogether and this is a moment
that's supposed to be a sharedpresence, which is part of the
concept of hygge.
And if you have a child whotends to talk a lot or share a
(35:28):
lot of his or her own stories,then you also take that child
down a little bit and say, hey,maybe make space for your
siblings to speak now.
Or thank you for sharing,please hold back to speak now.
Thank you for sharing, pleasehold back.
And I think this is actuallyspecial, not for the Danes, but
(35:55):
for the people who can do this,and hygge is one way of just one
word and one way of holdingthis sort of space.
For those who can do this,having community is easier
because we are used to showingup for shared presence, which I
think is the basis of of arespect.
Because I think, I actually dothink, that if I share a garden
(36:20):
with someone, a group offamilies, and someone takes all
the tomatoes and I come and Iwant tomatoes in my salad that
day and there are no redtomatoes come, you know, I can
only see green tomatoes.
I'm like what happened?
I actually do think that thatperson clearing the plant
probably needed the tomatoesmore than me that day.
Okay, if I can't trust that, Ido not want to be part of that
(36:46):
community.
Jack Stewart (36:48):
If you can't trust that person, so this is if all
the people that are in yourcommunity you otherwise trust.
So you come to the gardenalready trusting these people.
Cecilie Conrad (37:03):
Yes, otherwise I wouldn't put my labor in there,
but I think I would trust thembecause we were doing this
together on the basis of doingit together and I'm rambling
about Hugel because I come froma culture of a very egalitarian,
a very we want to have Hugeltime.
(37:24):
You know.
We want, want to be this.
Jack Stewart (37:26):
this is a gold standard of our national
identity so what part of what Iwant to explore is whether there
is, whether you can createtrustworthy participants through
that culture about trust andhow you create it.
Jesper Conrad (37:45):
There's an interesting point, linguistic
point, in the thesis or thepiece of paper he wrote about
Hygge and we will link it in theshow notes.
It's in English and it's quiteinteresting.
What he mentions is that theword trust have a linguistic
(38:06):
root together with the Danishword trust, and trust is meaning
comfort, to give comfort tosomeone.
If someone is sad, I wouldtrust them and it made me think
about if the relationship withthese two words originally were
(38:26):
that you trusted someone whogave you trust, you trusted
someone who gave you comfort.
So can you have a communitywhere you, being comforted by
another person, would maybecreate the feelings inside of
(38:55):
you where you give trust to them?
I believe trust is somethingyou give.
It is not something you candemand.
Trust is given and it's givenon the base of some kind of
exchange.
Why have you made me trust you?
Jack Stewart (39:14):
But if they haven't earned your trust,
that's the end of the communitygarden.
Cecilie Conrad (39:19):
Yes.
Jack Stewart (39:20):
Yes, maybe.
Cecilie Conrad (39:23):
I'll buy my own tornado plot.
Jack Stewart (39:29):
I think you're right and I'm interested in how
you might set up a communitygarden that can not withstand
but can make the untrustworthypeople trustworthy.
Jesper Conrad (39:42):
I just will go out and make everyone sad, and
then I will comfort themafterwards and then they will
trust me.
Yeah, there you go.
Cecilie Conrad (39:50):
So I was rambling about hygge, because
it's a cultural trait and it'snot unique to Scandinavia we
just have this word and becauseI was actually thinking what you
need is citizens, participantswho have grown up with
unconditional love, who do nothave an ego that has been under
(40:16):
pressure their entire life,because the ego under pressure
will try to well, will be veryvulnerable to the problem of
greed.
It has to do with upbringing.
That's why I'm talking beforein the Hugo talk about how
you're taught in big and littleways by your parents and by your
(40:38):
extended family growing up, howto participate in an
egalitarian way of sharing timeand space, and that means it's a
cultural thing, it's a deeplypersonal thing, and I think the
only way to educate participants, trustworthy participants for a
(41:00):
community garden, is to face itinside yourself.
Do not try to teach everyoneelse how to be, but be that
person and also be that personwho can handle an empty tomato
plant or someone not showing upthat's quite a nourishing thing
to hear actually be the person.
Jack Stewart (41:22):
And I can't teach, I can't tell someone how to be
or I can't demand trust, I justhave to be.
Cecilie Conrad (41:29):
I give trust and be trustworthy and also never
do anything you don't want to do.
That sounds very egoistic orhow do you say it in english?
Egocentric.
Don't do things if you don'twant to do them.
I mean, it can be soself-righteous to be the guy to
broom the pathway to the gardenbecause you think it should be
(41:51):
very nice and cleared of leavesevery day, and then you get so
annoyed when the other peopledon't do it all the other days.
You know, do the things thatyou think makes sense to do,
that you want to do.
That gives you happiness andjoy, and and if, if the
community garden doesn't do that, then you're going to have to
leave it.
(42:12):
This putting in work, expectingother people to put in the same
work or an equal work, is, Idon't know.
I mean I have a few friends whoare actually communists good
old-fashioned communists andthey mean I have a few friends
who are actually communists goodold fashioned communists and
they, well, I admire it.
I don't agree with it, but Iadmire it and they still say the
(42:34):
thing that was in the originaltexts that we could have
communism.
The problem is the people isnot educated for communism, and
it is a little bit the samething I'm saying here, with the
growing up with unconditionallove, not growing up with an ego
under pressure, everyone beingready for community, everyone
being ready for that emptytomato plant or for feeling I
(42:58):
think I'm putting in more thanmy.
You know, if we just do the mathI'm doing more work than I
should.
Are you open for that?
Are you doing the work that youenjoy doing and are you happy
to contribute?
You know, maybe some of themembers of the community garden
just had a baby or have a momwho just got cancer, or you know
(43:19):
they thought they could put ineight hours a week but they
actually can only stretch it tofive.
Or they work half as fast asyou, but they do work.
They do.
I mean, give what you can giveand take what you need.
Jack Stewart (43:33):
I find it interesting, though, that
Eleanor Ostrom she did her workin poker research over various
decades over various culturesand so like all the continents
nearly and she didn't find thatit was some cultures who or so
(43:55):
far it wasn't.
The common characteristics ofsuccessful, successfully
governed common core resourceswas not those who are culturally
brought up to not have an egoand to love and to be ready to
leave the tomatoes.
It was something about the waythe it was governed.
It was something about theorganization, which sounds
(44:18):
pretty cold when we're talkingabout these things.
But before reading ellis ellenostrom, I would totally agree
with you that those things seemlike those would be the marks of
a community garden that wouldlast a long time.
But it seems to me that shefound that even if you do have
an ego and you're really hurtfrom your childhood and you
(44:40):
don't love and you're not readyto leave the tomatoes, common
pool resources can still workunder some circumstances.
Cecilie Conrad (44:48):
It probably can, and I'm probably not smarter
than someone who researched itand won a Nobel Prize.
I'm not trying to claim that atall.
I'm just saying it wouldn'twork for me.
Jack Stewart (44:59):
Really.
Cecilie Conrad (45:01):
In all, I'm very humble.
I know I'm one of what ninebillion trillion a lot of.
I would personally notparticipate if I did not trust
people.
Jack Stewart (45:13):
But maybe you wouldn't.
You don't trust Period youdon't trust.
There are some people that youwork with, or you have some sort
of back and forth with, oryou're next to, or there are
some people in your life thatyou don't trust, but the
relationship just works anyway.
Jesper Conrad (45:35):
I, per default, also trust people, but when I
see where the words come from,then it also comes from a time
where you didn't live in so biga society, so you knew the
people in your local village,where we have grown in such a
way that, oh man, I justyesterday considered how it is
(45:58):
to go into a supermarket.
How many people do I meet goinginto a supermarket I have no
relationship with, I haven'tseen them before and most likely
I will never see them again,and that makes me need to have
some sort of fence around myselfas a person to be present there
(46:22):
, where I just find myself andI'm walking past people I'm
ignoring all the time because Idon't know them, I do not want
to know them, I just want to getthe next stuff on my shopping
list so I can get the hell outand get back home.
Jack Stewart (46:37):
So let me just quick fire.
Why do you not trust thosepeople randomly in the
supermarket?
It's not a joke question.
Jesper Conrad (46:43):
I'm not saying I don't trust them.
I'm saying that I think that wehave come, our societies and
the amount of people have comeso big that when we go to a
supermarket, end up ignoringpeople to protect ourselves and
our sanity.
Because are you crazy theamount of interactions you would
(47:03):
have going to the supermarketif you were to honor the meeting
with everyone?
Cecilie Conrad (47:10):
I think your point if I'm guessing, you're
just saying that in some sort ofhistorical context you would
live your entire life surroundedby people you knew, yeah, and
you grew up with them.
You know who they are.
Jesper Conrad (47:25):
And the words are from them.
There are no real foreignersand the words stem from back.
Knew, yeah, and you grew upwith them.
You know who they are and thewords are from them.
Cecilie Conrad (47:26):
There are no real foreigners and the words
stem from back then.
Jesper Conrad (47:30):
Yeah, that's what I'm trying to say.
Cecilie Conrad (47:33):
The word trust.
Yeah, and trust.
Jesper Conrad (47:35):
Yeah.
Cecilie Conrad (47:36):
Which both are about relationships, which means
you have a stable relationship.
Somehow you know that personthat you trust and that person
will also be able to give youthat comfort when you are hurt.
But I just want to say I'm notagainst the modern world, I love
it.
I have friends from allcontinents and I would not have
(47:56):
met them without the internet.
I love traveling, I love goingto new places, I love meeting
new people, I like big crowds, Ilike gatherings, I like
throwing myself and including myfamily into communities of
people we don't know andtrusting it, trusting the
process, surrendering to it,learning from it, learning who
(48:19):
we are.
When we realize what are ourtrigger points, when do I get
annoyed?
And why do I get annoyed?
Because maybe it's about myculture and the you know the
connotated meanings thesebehaviors would have had where I
come from.
But maybe these people are froma different culture and maybe
(48:41):
even the language.
I just had a conversation todaywith an American about the
language around being proud ofyour children, where I tend to
not say that that I'm proud ofmy children because I would kind
of own them or own theirachievements or have some sort
of I mean, I didn't write thebooks in plural our daughter had
(49:05):
published.
Jesper Conrad (49:06):
Our daughter had published a lot of books.
Cecilie Conrad (49:08):
And lots of people have asked me are you
proud of that?
And I'm like I didn't write thebooks.
I'm not proud of that, but Ithink the words don't really
translate from start to proud.
Jesper Conrad (49:18):
My fascination comes with that words, when they
originated, were originated ina context that is no longer
there, and we use the words in away today where we maybe don't
consider where they came fromand what the word actually
covered.
But we should round up, jack,if you, based on what you have
(49:40):
read the projects you are on,should give people a little
nugget of things they could lookinto from the book, what would
it be?
Jack Stewart (49:52):
It's a tough read, though I think the thing that
stays with me is that the mostcommon solution we have
traditionally brought to thetable for the problem of toxic
members of a community that aremessing everything up is to
(50:12):
privatize.
Common pool resourcecommunities is to privatize.
So everything's about money andit's owned by one person, and
that one person's doing it formoney or it's government
regulation.
And Eleanor Ostrom gives mehope that organizing ourselves
(50:34):
where we have we as a community,whether it's a fishery or it's
just a family or it's just twopeople that we can have easy
access to conflict resolution.
That we can give clearboundaries Just me and you can
give clear boundaries about thiscommon space.
That we can change ourselves,regardless of what money says
(50:57):
and regardless of what thegovernment says.
We can change things to make itmore congruent with our local
conditions.
That we can change the rules.
You know we can build thisourselves from the ground up.
This is the hope that thisgives me well then, I agree with
it.
Jesper Conrad (51:16):
That's a good hope that's a wonderful place to
end today's conversation, gagit's been a pleasure it's been a
pleasure, like always.
Today we are together with Jack Stewart, and
Jack is one of those guys Ireally love to talk to because
he is using his wonderful brain.
He set things in motion in mybrain.
Cecilie Conrad (00:15):
You quote Jack quite often.
Jesper Conrad (00:17):
I actually quote Jack quite often.
Jack Stewart (00:21):
What's the quote?
Jesper Conrad (00:21):
Give me one of the quotes that go around I will
give you the quote as I haveinterpreted it, so it might be
like totally correct, Okay youparaphrase.
I paraphrase it, yes, but let'stake a quick welcome.
Welcome, jack.
Cecilie Conrad (00:39):
Good to see you, hi, thanks for having me.
Jesper Conrad (00:43):
What I'm telling people is that you turned off
the internet and one of thethings you saw in your own life
was that the internet it couldbe podcast, it could be YouTube,
it could be social media hadbecome a social appetite
suppressant.
And when you turned it off,then what happened was that you
(01:07):
realized that there were timesin your life where you earlier
had filled up your socialappetite by watching YouTube,
being online, doing stuff thatwhen you turned it off, you
realized, hey, those momentsneed to be filled.
And there one of the things yousaid is that you actually went
around knocking on theneighbor's door and was like,
(01:27):
hey, you want to come out andplay, and yeah, that has meant a
lot to me.
It's a funny thing isn't it?
Jack Stewart (01:34):
because on the face of it it's a bad thing that
it caused to tell you off theinternet, which is loneliness.
You know I, I disconnected frompeople and so, if you think
about it like that, it's kind ofa strange thing to speak of
positively because, you know I,I removed something from my life
and then I had appetite for itand then I built up that thing
(01:56):
in my life.
So it's a net neutral questionmark, but that only works if the
relationships that I had beforeare worth an equal amount of
the relationships I have now, ifyou see what I mean.
So I had 10 friends on theInternet.
Got rid of the 10 friends.
Now I have 10 friends in reallife.
The problem is that I didn'tactually have 10 friends on the
(02:18):
Internet.
They were admirers.
Well, that's the way I you knowknow.
As you know, you guys probablyhave a similar thing.
You have lots of peoplelistening to the podcast and
they but they're not yourfriends.
They from a distance, like whatyou have to say or or in some
way, yeah, like admiring ratherthan trusting you closely.
(02:40):
So let me, can I, can I ask you, how do you think about that?
Do you think about.
That is like a social adjacentthing, people who are listening
to your podcast.
Cecilie Conrad (02:50):
No, I actually don't, and I also have noticed I
just wrote something about ittoday for the blog.
15 years ago, when I startedblogging, my blog was a more
social space and a space fordiscussion and the space for
exploring, where the readerswould share their thoughts and
(03:11):
and in the whole thread ofcomments there would be a
continuum of what I would writesomething and then we would have
a conversation about it andeveryone would come out smarter.
Now I don't don't hear from myreaders almost at all If I
explicitly write in the textthat that hurts me, that I feel
(03:35):
lonely, that I feel I'm speakingto a void though I can see in
the statistics I have readersthat this change that has
happened in the intimate, thatpeople don't respond and engage,
it hurts me and it makes itharder for me to share.
And we have the same thinggoing on with the podcast that
(03:55):
only we have a lot of listeners.
We can see that on thestatistics, but we very, very
rarely hear from them.
And you know if you havesomething you're thinking or
want to ask or want to talkabout, or if it had an effect or
whatever, you know we're doingthis for free, spending our time
trying to make the world abetter place by sharing all
(04:18):
kinds of just differentperspectives on mainstream.
It's nice to know that there issomeone on the other side.
So the answer to your questionis no, this is not a social.
It's social because you and Iand my husband we all three are
having a real conversation,though we're using this media of
the internet to have theconversation.
(04:40):
We're having a realconversation, that's the social
part, but besides that we'redoing it.
Real conversation, that's thesocial part, but besides that,
we're doing it because we thinkI think there's some voices that
needs to be heard exactly and Ialso am quite egoistic in my
choice of guests.
Jesper Conrad (04:58):
Sometimes in talking to you it makes me happy
.
And also there's someone whohas written a book and I can be
like, oh, I have some questionsfor that person and then having
a podcast is a good excuse forme getting to talk to them.
Yeah, and the most profoundeffect it has on me making the
(05:21):
podcast is that, a I get to havea good conversation.
B I get to play with a lot offun tools.
I like to edit, I like to makeimages and I all these things I
find interesting and it's itnurtures my, my playfulness and
my lust for exploration andlearning new tools and new stuff
(05:43):
.
But then it is most often, orthe last thing I really enjoy
getting out of it is that it issome of the more deep
conversations I have in my life.
I'm trying to move this outsideof the podcast, also taking a
(06:03):
subject, talking with a friendabout it.
But often everyday life can benot superficial, but it's not
the same trying to go deep intoa subject that I would like to
try more in real life, and thenit lingers for me.
I have last week I mentionedyou in a dialogue and I
(06:25):
mentioned how you had seen theeffect of the internet on on you
and so so it stays with me andI really really like that do you
think that?
Jack Stewart (06:38):
what would it take ?
So you mentioned, for example,that you like having these long,
um, deeper, uh, sort ofintentional chats with people.
What do you think it would takefor you to cultivate that
face-to-face with people?
Jesper Conrad (06:54):
I think it needs a format.
I hope and believe that the,the coming of ai, will make
people want reality more.
We are in Denmark, here insidethe next month giving three or
four talks for free, but thegoal is not us talking for an
(07:16):
hour, but it is that we choosesome subject we try to go deep
in before so we have somethoughts on a subject we
actually want to share.
But what I look most forward towith that is the facilitating
of the meeting.
Yeah, that people show upbecause there's someone's
putting themselves out there andsaying, hey, I've thought about
(07:39):
this, let me share it.
Jack Stewart (07:41):
Yes, so one of the things that I did when I got
rid of the internet to fill upthis space in my life was I made
a book club, a writing club,and like I call a salon, like it
in the 1800s in france, like aconference almost thing.
(08:03):
So.
So book club is obvious aninteresting book, we'll talk
about it.
Writing club you do half anhour of writing Now you bring it
and you read your piece ofwriting and this is creative
writing stuff and you getfeedback.
But the conference is reallyscratching an itch and that is
like.
So I have five or six people whocome twice a year and some of
(08:27):
them fly in so it's kind ofgetting pretty important for us
and give a talk, like a half anhour talk.
They're all researchers apartfrom me I'm the layman, but I
organize it, so it doesn't count.
So a researcher in townplanning she comes, a researcher
(08:48):
in biblical studies, aresearcher in Arabic and Muslim
studies, a researcher inphilosophy and a psychologist,
and they all come in and givelike here's 20 minutes of
something that I'm reallyinterested in at the moment and
we talk about it.
Cecilie Conrad (09:04):
And this has been such an invaluable thing in
my life who do you need to knowto get a ticket to that evening
?
Jack Stewart (09:12):
well, you have to give a talk of 20 minutes or
something you're interested andthen you can definitely be part
of it.
And I think people have abarrier of thinking.
That's going to be cringy toask someone.
To ask just a friend, like ifyou're not into the whole
research, academic thing, tojust ask like, look poor people,
let's really get dive into asubject.
I'm no good at biology, I'mjust interested and so let's do
(09:35):
something about it.
So it's almost like I have kindof like a pancast.
But I'm like guys, I either wedo this by letters or I fly a
pigeon over or you'll have tocome twice a year.
And I think actually if I wastalking to these guys on
whatsapp every day or every week, I probably wouldn't be doing
this, because on whatsapp itwould be scratching the itch or
(10:00):
that's not the right, it wouldbe an appetite suppressant.
So it be like it wouldn't bequite as good quality as this
conference I'm doing right now.
We would have a little chat oh,what are you interested in at
the moment?
We wouldn't really get into it.
But now that I'm not doing thatand I can't have those chats,
and once a week I might do anemail, but it's really not the
same, because I feel like Ireally need some thoughts from
(10:25):
Hans.
You know, it's been six months,we haven't had a good chat, and
so now we need to organize thisthing, and so it's a bigger
thing than it would be.
Cecilie Conrad (10:34):
That makes a lot of sense.
I'm sitting on a point herewhich is I think you, my husband
, you have a lot of very deepconversations and you made this
point even before we met JackSome years ago.
You said I don't likechit-chatting, I like talking
with people, I want meaningfulconversations.
(10:56):
That's a long time ago.
You put that.
You put a list on the fridge offive things that were really
important to you and it wasactually number one and it was
not a prioritized list yeah butit was a list of the five most
important things in your lifeand and well, the obvious health
, and you know me and the kidswere on, but so were my top five
(11:16):
passions from yeah, you wantget all the rich conversations
with people and doing thepodcast is part of that.
But you also are the one to ina in a cozy social setting, that
we, we're very social in reallife, all the time, to the point
of social marathon.
(11:36):
But you are the one to say, ohyeah it's for those listening.
Jesper is now sobbing no, butyou're the one to say to people
you know are your parents alive?
And if the answer is yes,what's your relation with them
these days?
How do you feel about yourparents?
(11:57):
Or, if it's no, you know whathappened and how did you get
over it?
You ask those questions, youknow that start a real
conversation.
Jesper Conrad (12:07):
It would be really, really boring to me if I
didn't.
Cecilie Conrad (12:10):
You and I both read that book right now, and we
keep bringing up thatconversation with everyone.
You know what do you thinkabout this problem and how do
you handle it.
And so we just both read thebook Superstimulated.
It's a Danish author, so wejust both read the book
Superstimulated.
It's a Danish author.
So in our language the title isCreatures of Habit, which is
(12:33):
and the core hypothesis isaround the concept of super
stimuli how we can hack our ownbiology, how we are being
basically manipulated by well,whatever some other interests
than maybe the best ones, byhacking our instincts.
And this can be done on animalsas well as humans.
(12:54):
And he's writing, he wrote thisbook about it.
It was really a page turner.
It took me like three days toread it because I couldn't stop
reading.
Jesper Conrad (13:01):
We will put the link in the show notes and
recommend it for your book club.
Couldn't stop reading.
Cecilie Conrad (13:05):
We will put the link in the show notes and
recommend it for your book club.
Same book, but we do bring upthese conversations.
I feel like I have them alsoall the time, but mostly around
children, unschooling, freedom,all these things.
People want to talk to me aboutthese things.
So it's just when you say thatyou need that, not that I don't
need the podcast for this, butyou are doing it in real life.
Jesper Conrad (13:28):
I am all the time but I love the connection there
is when people are togetheraround listening to a subject
and the talks that comesafterward.
Like that is how we met you.
We gave a short talk on ourworld schooling thing at HIF and
(13:50):
you came over and chatted withus afterwards and that was for
me bigger than giving the talk.
It was a bit of deeper dialoguethan me standing and sharing.
But someone needs to go thereand arrange, someone needs to go
there and share, and that is athing I've been wanting to do,
(14:12):
besides a podcast, in real lifemore and more.
And it's one of the subjects wewill take up to do at our
forthcoming what we call WorldSchool Village, which is where
people come and find an Airbnbor whatever that suits them, and
then during that month we willdo some conference part as well,
(14:35):
because we miss this wisdomsharing or sharing of a subject
that can be the focal point fora dialogue that day.
Jack Stewart (14:45):
Wisdom sharing.
That made me think of aroundthe bonfire.
You know, it's been there awayfor thousands of years.
Someone has a really good storyto tell and everyone huddles
around to hear it.
I wonder, I suppose, like inAthens or something, it'd be the
(15:05):
Parthenon or some sort of likewhat would be the equivalent of
a podcast before books.
Cecilie Conrad (15:12):
It's a deep human nature and that's actually
one of the points of this book.
Jesper and I just read both ofus and also another book.
I suppose I talked about it onprevious podcasts with you,
because I was very fascinated bythe book Stolen Focus.
I read it a year and a half ago.
This fact that the fact thatwe're overly stimulated, that
(15:36):
you know, you call it a socialAppetite suppressant.
Appetite suppressant.
Maybe it's also or not, maybeit's very much an intellectual
appetite suppressant.
The internet, it's so bad thatit freaks me out.
To be honest, the people can'tread any longer.
(15:57):
They think something is long.
They tell me oh, you're writingso long things.
It's like page and page.
I tested it.
It takes not page and page andI've tested it.
It takes about 10 minutes toread a block of post.
That's not a long time, it'snot a long time.
Jack Stewart (16:13):
It's not the place .
Don't you think that thearchitecture, when you step into
a room, the architecture kindof wants you to do something.
It wants in a church, it wantsyou to look up.
Or in a library, it kind ofwants you to do something.
It wants in a church, it wantsyou to look up.
Or in a library, it kind ofwants you to get a good library.
It wants you to go into thenooks to settle down with a book
(16:33):
.
Or in a farmhouse, it wants youto go to the hearth or the
kitchen.
You know places want you to dothings.
And I just wonder if thedigital architecture that is
most prevalent on the internet,I wonder if it wants you to look
at the, the highlight, theheadlines rather than read for
10 minutes.
(16:54):
So I I wonder if you'refighting against the actual
architecture, that, as it were,the infrastructure that you are
putting your work into.
Cecilie Conrad (17:05):
But I think I am , but I also think we all well,
all the rest of us who are notJack Stewart, completely off the
internet.
We're fighting against the wayit works.
Jack Stewart (17:18):
How suppressive, oppressive and how anti-human
does the internet have to getfor you to say that you know
what this is just like anabusive.
This is a like an abusivepartner or something that it's
like you can take enough from itand yes, he's helping me by
doing this and that, but howabusive does it have to get for
(17:40):
you to say no well, I think I'vesaid no to quite the extent.
Cecilie Conrad (17:45):
I don't spend a lot of time on the internet.
I don't spend a lot of time onmy phone or my computer.
I just notice that it'sbecoming increasingly
complicated to spend time on mydevices without being distracted
by the device itself, the wayit works.
(18:07):
We just got a new iPhone,jesper and I.
We bought new iPhones and Inoticed that the basic setting
could be an update, could be thenew phone, I don't know.
There's this button on the side.
I can press it and then thescreen goes black.
So when I'm done with what I'mdoing, I'm turning it off.
I can't see anything.
But with this new setting itdidn't turn off, it just got a
(18:30):
little more discreet and I waslike you're kidding me.
You know it just wants myattention.
I've got all notifications off,nothing.
You know I choose what I'mdoing.
I think I've got it to quite alarge extent down that it's not
hacking me as such.
I just noticed that I have tobe more and more aware of how I
(18:52):
navigate that architecture,because it's like being in a
mall looking for the onlybookshop you know and among all
the other bullshit that I don'tneed, and it's a big mall and
there's a lot of flashing lightsand noise and smells and things
on sale.
Jesper Conrad (19:13):
I think it's a very interesting question how
abusive does it have to bebefore we can turn it off or at
least be in control of it?
Today I was actually just outtrying to look for an old school
clock, because I have taken anew tool in my fight against
(19:33):
being seduced by the internet,which is no phone.
In the bedroom I have my Kindle, I read, and that is wonderful.
But then I realized that somemornings I can be like oh,
what's the time?
I don't know what time it's,maybe I need to do stuff, maybe
I have a meeting soon, and thenI walk into the other room to
look at my phone to see theclock.
(19:53):
So I actually just need like ananalog clock and I was out
looking for that in asecond-hand shop today because
time is still relevant, becausewe have arrangements and
dialogue with other people.
Cecilie Conrad (20:07):
So can I ask you , is the analog alarm clock so
extinct that they're not even inthe thrift stores?
Jesper Conrad (20:18):
There was none.
That's amazing.
There was no clocks in thethrift stores?
Cecilie Conrad (20:20):
There was none.
That's amazing.
Jesper Conrad (20:21):
There was no clocks in the thrift store.
Jack Stewart (20:24):
Really.
Yeah, there's a couple ofthings I've had to buy, I mean,
apart from paper maps and thedumb phone, but the typewriter,
that's been an interesting one,because sometimes I do writing
for various things.
But I had a big projectrecently.
It was 40 pages.
So I had project recently whenit was 40 pages.
So I had to write this thingwith 40 pages.
But when you write a thing andyou want it to be good enough to
(20:45):
sell you, there's it's not just40 pages, it's 40 page draft,
and then one word, and then like50 on every page you know
there's 15 words that need to bechanged, and then there's
that's the next draft, and thenyou have to do the next, and
then on the next draft there'sfour words that need to be
changed, and then two, and thenI'll flip back to eight and then
(21:07):
one word on the last one andthen you know you've got six
drafts.
So that's six, nine, forty maybenot quite that much, but it was
a lot.
It's a lot, but it was reallygood because it changed the way
I thought about the whole page.
Like I had to think about thewhole page as a piece, if you
see what I mean, because this isa piece of paper that I can't
(21:28):
just take one thing out of.
This is a whole print that Ihave to think about how this
works as a page and I have to bemuch more carefully about.
I have to think much morecarefully about selecting words
and I have to think much morecarefully about selecting words.
So it was good and there wasmuch more note-taking on a piece
of paper, like just with a pen,to think about structure of the
(21:50):
page and thinking through howcould I phrase this.
Yeah, it was definitely givingme some extra muscle in a part
of my brain that I hadn't usedbefore when all of my all of my
university work was on a laptop.
So I hadn't.
I've never done this beforewhen I was a typewriter so this
is one of the things.
Cecilie Conrad (22:09):
I think I'm a bit older than you and this is
one of the things I think is agreat improvement, great
improvement where I love mycomputer.
My first computer obviouslywasn't on the internet because I
had it more or less beforethere was such a thing as
internet for the public, butjust the fact that you could do
text editing.
(22:30):
I did the typewriting I learned.
I took typewriting in schoolwhen I was something like 14.
Hours I've put into all that youknow rewriting the page and all
the things, the fact I stillwork with pen and paper.
I can't.
I even have pen and paper nextto the computer right now.
I have to.
There's something different forthe brain with pen and paper.
(22:52):
I structure my work with penand paper, I plan it with pen
and paper.
I sometimes need to even printand comment with pen and paper.
But the fact that I can writethe actual text and make
mistakes and edit and movethings around without having to
rewrite and rewrite and rewrite,I find that that is one of the
(23:12):
reasons I'm not getting rid ofmy computer.
I think it's great, great and Ithink we need to look at how
well I'm not trying to changeyour opinion, but I think I need
to look at how is the computera great help and what's getting
in the way of me using it onlyas a great help and a great tool
and not as a distraction?
Jack Stewart (23:34):
Yeah, that's good.
Jesper Conrad (23:35):
That's good thinking.
What inspired me what you said,jack, was the amount of time
you put into the words youworked with, and sometimes when
you have a computer and just canedit it, it goes very fast and
you don't put the same hours ofthinking into it.
Cecilia sometimes says thatwriting is the greatest form of
(24:00):
thinking.
I don't know if it's a quotefrom somewhere, I can't remember
, but that it's a really goodway to structure your thoughts.
Cecilie Conrad (24:10):
It organizes my mind to write and I enjoy
writing on the computer.
I'll just say it again it's agreat improvement in my life
that I can do it that way.
I enjoy that For some, somethings.
There are a few things I stillwant to write by hand and I
cannot find a tool that willhelp me on the computer.
So I do both is?
Jack Stewart (24:30):
is most of your writing for blogs or journals
that go online or that sort ofthing, or is it like well, I'm
also in the process of writingtwo actual books and a cookbook.
Cecilie Conrad (24:39):
so three books, okay.
So I also do even longer format.
Jack Stewart (24:44):
Will that be printed like an old-fashioned
book?
Cecilie Conrad (24:48):
When I'm done, yeah.
Jesper Conrad (24:50):
I would like to dive into the subject of
community spaces and some of theother things you, before the
recording, set that you werelooking into.
So what are you doing, jack,with all that time you have
gotten by dropping the internet?
Jack Stewart (25:07):
My end goal is to set up some sort of community
farm, residential monastery,education center thing,
education center thing, and soI'm doing some research into how
(25:28):
common pool resources work andhow common pool resources can be
best governed.
So a common pool resource is aresource that a community has in
common, that nobody owns, thatis not privately owned, not
owned by the government, likethe ocean or like a community
garden.
I'm interested in how do we setup these spaces where everyone
(25:48):
gets a piece of the pie,everyone's happy, and there are
no like in a community garden.
Nobody takes the tomato.
Nobody, no one person takes allthe tomatoes.
Because this is, you know, somecall this the tragedy of the
commons where in a communitygarden, there's always going to
be someone who is going to takemore because, because human
nature is that you're going tobe greedy and so you're going to
(26:09):
want to take all the tomatoesand then nobody else has
tomatoes.
Part of the reason I'minterested in this, not only
because it will feed into my inmy future plan farm thing, but
also, in a way, the life and theearth is a community resource.
So maybe trying to figure outthe principles by which we can
govern a community garden willhelp us think about the
(26:31):
principles by which we cangovern the world, or ourselves
or something, or maybe evenfamilies.
My friend is doing research intotown planning.
She's in the salon, she's inthe Jack conference and she's
she put me onto someone who isher intellectual hero, eleanor
(26:51):
Ostrom.
And Eleanor Ostrom wrotegoverning the commons and it won
the Nobel prize a couple ofdecades ago and it's blowing my
mind.
She basically did lots ofresearch in empirically, not
just theoretically, but incommon pool resource
institutions that actually existand have existed for a long
time.
What are the principles, whatare the characteristics of these
(27:17):
longstanding common poolresource institutions that work
and have worked for a long time?
And so clear boundaries aboutwithdrawal of resources is one
of them.
Collective choice about therules is another.
(27:39):
I could go into easy conflictresolution easy, quick, rapid
access to conflict resolutionthat you don't have to go to
like HR, you don't have to callthe police, you can start small
with a conflict resolution.
I can go into more, but to meit's blowing my mind because us
hippies I don't know, maybe notyou guys, I don't know how
(28:00):
you've grown up, hippie or notbut us hippies have always said
that I've always liked to thinkthat we could organize ourselves
without private ownership, withless of a at least at least
less of a dependence on privateownership and less of a
(28:21):
dependence on the government.
And it's always been sort ofairy-fairy and Eleanor Ostrom
comes along and says yes, theseare the characteristics you need
for your institution to worklike that if you want it to last
.
And so it's a good, like she'sa real scientific thinker.
It's been helping me ground my,my wishy-washy hippie isms.
Jesper Conrad (28:46):
Cool and two questions.
First a short one when is thenext Jack conference taking
place?
Jack Stewart (28:58):
Next one is, uh believe, next month, july Cool.
Cecilie Conrad (29:06):
We need to have a conversation about that, Jack,
because we will actually be onthe island in July.
Jack Stewart (29:12):
Really, you'll be in Brennan.
Jesper Conrad (29:15):
Yeah we will come to FN.
Cecilie Conrad (29:18):
Yeah, we'll see you there.
Jesper Conrad (29:20):
Yeah, let's talk, yeah.
The second question is so goingfrom researching to being
fascinated by, to learningthrough your research, adjusting
some of your former beliefs,going from there to making it
(29:40):
happen to what is your nextfirst step?
Jack Stewart (29:43):
so next step is more personal research into
these communities that are doingthis sort of thing.
So I've had some experiencegoverning common institutions.
But so, basically, in a in afew weeks time, I'm going to go
on a trip and go go aroundvarious communities who are
doing this Not necessarilylongstanding one that's
(30:05):
longstanding and I'm going to dointerviews on what do you have
common?
Do you have clear boundaries,do you have congruence with
local conditions?
Do you have these things, andhow does it work for you?
Is it working?
And really, what I'm mostinterested in is trying to ask
(30:25):
what happens when you're reallyangry at someone, what happens
when there's someone in thiscommunity that you feel like
isn't doing what they need to door is causing loads of problems
, or what happens with theconflict resolution.
So, anyway, next step is to tryand figure out real life, me
step into and live with for alittle bit.
These community residentiallike permaculture-y type places.
Jesper Conrad (30:52):
I would recommend and highlight one of the former
projects I've been involvedwith, which is Gaia Education,
that have created four greatbooks on both the economic side
of it, the worldview, the socialaspect and one more Earlier.
I could it all by.
I was helping with themarketing and the organizing and
(31:16):
had a short stint as theinterim CEO for them when they
needed that.
What is interesting is thatthey talk about that.
These ecovillages are more orless living laboratories who are
exploring new ways of livingand working together and a lot
of them is actually writing down, analyzing, looking at how it
has been done is actuallywriting down, analyzing, looking
(31:39):
at how it has been done.
Then Gaia Education havecollected a lot of this
knowledge into those, the GaiaEducation curriculum which
people can take and dive into.
I would recommend you to lookat it.
Ross Jackson, who is thephilanthropist who gave a lot of
money to Gaia Education duringmany years I've worked with him
(32:00):
in Denmark fantastic, inspiringman.
He said something about theecovillages.
He said that the ecovillagesthat were for something ended up
being the longstanding wherepeople had connected around
being against.
They ran out of steam at somepoint and I mentioned this
(32:23):
because you mentioned thecounterculture and I can feel it
in myself that the angeragainst the current society can
be there.
I can feel that there's so muchwrong with how people live and
the way society is and howpeople are in this everyday.
Nine to five, but that powerwill run out, so we will stand
(32:47):
longer, being for than against.
That's a great point.
Jack Stewart (32:51):
Yeah, I should keep that in mind.
Cecilie Conrad (32:54):
I can't help but think about.
So Jesper, who actually has alot of meaningful conversations,
has been handing out a littlepamphlet in the community where
we're actually living right nowfour families together for the
month.
Someone wrote a doctorate andthen you always write the short
(33:15):
version, just 25 pages, and he'sbeen printing old-fashioned
printing and handing out becauseI think he wants to discuss the
points.
So I'm currently reading it andit's on the Scandinavian
concept of hygge, which is, youknow, there's the book and all
the things, and the Danes arevery proud of their hygge
concept.
(33:35):
But this is a more intellectualand critical way of thinking
about what is this and how is itand when?
You, when you said that you'reresearching how to have these
communal things.
I mean, we're very good atcommunal things because we do
community all the time and I'veput a lot of thought into what
makes it work and and whatsometimes can be harder.
(33:57):
And then I'm reading this fuggething and one of the things
there is about the concept ofhygge is the concept of equality
, that we're all equal and oneof the norms inside of the
concept of hygge is thateveryone, everyone, have equal
space.
So a thing that would ruin thehygge, the cozy space of hanging
(34:22):
out together in a good waywould be someone taking center
stage all the time.
That would be hygge, becauseeveryone, you have to step up
and be part of it.
You can't just sit in thecorner and do your own thing
that would be read a book orwatch your phone or whatever.
You have to be present for themoment of being together, so you
(34:43):
are contributing with yourpresence, but at the same time,
you cannot be the one to talkall the time and especially you
cannot be the one to talk allthe time about yourself.
That would ruin it.
And I think this concept, thisway of sharing time, we grow
(35:06):
into it.
This is something you learnfrom your parents.
It's something you learn whilegrowing up.
Your parents will teach youthis is not the moment to read
your comic book, because we aretogether and this is a moment
that's supposed to be a sharedpresence, which is part of the
concept of hygge.
And if you have a child whotends to talk a lot or share a
(35:28):
lot of his or her own stories,then you also take that child
down a little bit and say, hey,maybe make space for your
siblings to speak now.
Or thank you for sharing,please hold back to speak now.
Thank you for sharing, pleasehold back.
And I think this is actuallyspecial, not for the Danes, but
(35:55):
for the people who can do this,and hygge is one way of just one
word and one way of holdingthis sort of space.
For those who can do this,having community is easier
because we are used to showingup for shared presence, which I
think is the basis of of arespect.
Because I think, I actually dothink, that if I share a garden
(36:20):
with someone, a group offamilies, and someone takes all
the tomatoes and I come and Iwant tomatoes in my salad that
day and there are no redtomatoes come, you know, I can
only see green tomatoes.
I'm like what happened?
I actually do think that thatperson clearing the plant
probably needed the tomatoesmore than me that day.
Okay, if I can't trust that, Ido not want to be part of that
(36:46):
community.
Jack Stewart (36:48):
If you can't trust that person, so this is if all
the people that are in yourcommunity you otherwise trust.
So you come to the gardenalready trusting these people.
Cecilie Conrad (37:03):
Yes, otherwise I wouldn't put my labor in there,
but I think I would trust thembecause we were doing this
together on the basis of doingit together and I'm rambling
about Hugel because I come froma culture of a very egalitarian,
a very we want to have Hugeltime.
(37:24):
You know.
We want, want to be this.
Jack Stewart (37:26):
this is a gold standard of our national
identity so what part of what Iwant to explore is whether there
is, whether you can createtrustworthy participants through
that culture about trust andhow you create it.
Jesper Conrad (37:45):
There's an interesting point, linguistic
point, in the thesis or thepiece of paper he wrote about
Hygge and we will link it in theshow notes.
It's in English and it's quiteinteresting.
What he mentions is that theword trust have a linguistic
(38:06):
root together with the Danishword trust, and trust is meaning
comfort, to give comfort tosomeone.
If someone is sad, I wouldtrust them and it made me think
about if the relationship withthese two words originally were
(38:26):
that you trusted someone whogave you trust, you trusted
someone who gave you comfort.
So can you have a communitywhere you, being comforted by
another person, would maybecreate the feelings inside of
(38:55):
you where you give trust to them?
I believe trust is somethingyou give.
It is not something you candemand.
Trust is given and it's givenon the base of some kind of
exchange.
Why have you made me trust you?
Jack Stewart (39:14):
But if they haven't earned your trust,
that's the end of the communitygarden.
Cecilie Conrad (39:19):
Yes.
Jack Stewart (39:20):
Yes, maybe.
Cecilie Conrad (39:23):
I'll buy my own tornado plot.
Jack Stewart (39:29):
I think you're right and I'm interested in how
you might set up a communitygarden that can not withstand
but can make the untrustworthypeople trustworthy.
Jesper Conrad (39:42):
I just will go out and make everyone sad, and
then I will comfort themafterwards and then they will
trust me.
Yeah, there you go.
Cecilie Conrad (39:50):
So I was rambling about hygge, because
it's a cultural trait and it'snot unique to Scandinavia we
just have this word and becauseI was actually thinking what you
need is citizens, participantswho have grown up with
unconditional love, who do nothave an ego that has been under
(40:16):
pressure their entire life,because the ego under pressure
will try to well, will be veryvulnerable to the problem of
greed.
It has to do with upbringing.
That's why I'm talking beforein the Hugo talk about how
you're taught in big and littleways by your parents and by your
(40:38):
extended family growing up, howto participate in an
egalitarian way of sharing timeand space, and that means it's a
cultural thing, it's a deeplypersonal thing, and I think the
only way to educate participants, trustworthy participants for a
(41:00):
community garden, is to face itinside yourself.
Do not try to teach everyoneelse how to be, but be that
person and also be that personwho can handle an empty tomato
plant or someone not showing upthat's quite a nourishing thing
to hear actually be the person.
Jack Stewart (41:22):
And I can't teach, I can't tell someone how to be
or I can't demand trust, I justhave to be.
Cecilie Conrad (41:29):
I give trust and be trustworthy and also never
do anything you don't want to do.
That sounds very egoistic orhow do you say it in english?
Egocentric.
Don't do things if you don'twant to do them.
I mean, it can be soself-righteous to be the guy to
broom the pathway to the gardenbecause you think it should be
(41:51):
very nice and cleared of leavesevery day, and then you get so
annoyed when the other peopledon't do it all the other days.
You know, do the things thatyou think makes sense to do,
that you want to do.
That gives you happiness andjoy, and and if, if the
community garden doesn't do that, then you're going to have to
leave it.
(42:12):
This putting in work, expectingother people to put in the same
work or an equal work, is, Idon't know.
I mean I have a few friends whoare actually communists good
old-fashioned communists andthey mean I have a few friends
who are actually communists goodold fashioned communists and
they, well, I admire it.
I don't agree with it, but Iadmire it and they still say the
(42:34):
thing that was in the originaltexts that we could have
communism.
The problem is the people isnot educated for communism, and
it is a little bit the samething I'm saying here, with the
growing up with unconditionallove, not growing up with an ego
under pressure, everyone beingready for community, everyone
being ready for that emptytomato plant or for feeling I
(42:58):
think I'm putting in more thanmy.
You know, if we just do the mathI'm doing more work than I
should.
Are you open for that?
Are you doing the work that youenjoy doing and are you happy
to contribute?
You know, maybe some of themembers of the community garden
just had a baby or have a momwho just got cancer, or you know
(43:19):
they thought they could put ineight hours a week but they
actually can only stretch it tofive.
Or they work half as fast asyou, but they do work.
They do.
I mean, give what you can giveand take what you need.
Jack Stewart (43:33):
I find it interesting, though, that
Eleanor Ostrom she did her workin poker research over various
decades over various culturesand so like all the continents
nearly and she didn't find thatit was some cultures who or so
(43:55):
far it wasn't.
The common characteristics ofsuccessful, successfully
governed common core resourceswas not those who are culturally
brought up to not have an egoand to love and to be ready to
leave the tomatoes.
It was something about the waythe it was governed.
It was something about theorganization, which sounds
(44:18):
pretty cold when we're talkingabout these things.
But before reading ellis ellenostrom, I would totally agree
with you that those things seemlike those would be the marks of
a community garden that wouldlast a long time.
But it seems to me that shefound that even if you do have
an ego and you're really hurtfrom your childhood and you
(44:40):
don't love and you're not readyto leave the tomatoes, common
pool resources can still workunder some circumstances.
Cecilie Conrad (44:48):
It probably can, and I'm probably not smarter
than someone who researched itand won a Nobel Prize.
I'm not trying to claim that atall.
I'm just saying it wouldn'twork for me.
Jack Stewart (44:59):
Really.
Cecilie Conrad (45:01):
In all, I'm very humble.
I know I'm one of what ninebillion trillion a lot of.
I would personally notparticipate if I did not trust
people.
Jack Stewart (45:13):
But maybe you wouldn't.
You don't trust Period youdon't trust.
There are some people that youwork with, or you have some sort
of back and forth with, oryou're next to, or there are
some people in your life thatyou don't trust, but the
relationship just works anyway.
Jesper Conrad (45:35):
I, per default, also trust people, but when I
see where the words come from,then it also comes from a time
where you didn't live in so biga society, so you knew the
people in your local village,where we have grown in such a
way that, oh man, I justyesterday considered how it is
(45:58):
to go into a supermarket.
How many people do I meet goinginto a supermarket I have no
relationship with, I haven'tseen them before and most likely
I will never see them again,and that makes me need to have
some sort of fence around myselfas a person to be present there
(46:22):
, where I just find myself andI'm walking past people I'm
ignoring all the time because Idon't know them, I do not want
to know them, I just want to getthe next stuff on my shopping
list so I can get the hell outand get back home.
Jack Stewart (46:37):
So let me just quick fire.
Why do you not trust thosepeople randomly in the
supermarket?
It's not a joke question.
Jesper Conrad (46:43):
I'm not saying I don't trust them.
I'm saying that I think that wehave come, our societies and
the amount of people have comeso big that when we go to a
supermarket, end up ignoringpeople to protect ourselves and
our sanity.
Because are you crazy theamount of interactions you would
(47:03):
have going to the supermarketif you were to honor the meeting
with everyone?
Cecilie Conrad (47:10):
I think your point if I'm guessing, you're
just saying that in some sort ofhistorical context you would
live your entire life surroundedby people you knew, yeah, and
you grew up with them.
You know who they are.
Jesper Conrad (47:25):
And the words are from them.
There are no real foreignersand the words stem from back.
Knew, yeah, and you grew upwith them.
You know who they are and thewords are from them.
Cecilie Conrad (47:26):
There are no real foreigners and the words
stem from back then.
Jesper Conrad (47:30):
Yeah, that's what I'm trying to say.
Cecilie Conrad (47:33):
The word trust.
Yeah, and trust.
Jesper Conrad (47:35):
Yeah.
Cecilie Conrad (47:36):
Which both are about relationships, which means
you have a stable relationship.
Somehow you know that personthat you trust and that person
will also be able to give youthat comfort when you are hurt.
But I just want to say I'm notagainst the modern world, I love
it.
I have friends from allcontinents and I would not have
(47:56):
met them without the internet.
I love traveling, I love goingto new places, I love meeting
new people, I like big crowds, Ilike gatherings, I like
throwing myself and including myfamily into communities of
people we don't know andtrusting it, trusting the
process, surrendering to it,learning from it, learning who
(48:19):
we are.
When we realize what are ourtrigger points, when do I get
annoyed?
And why do I get annoyed?
Because maybe it's about myculture and the you know the
connotated meanings thesebehaviors would have had where I
come from.
But maybe these people are froma different culture and maybe
(48:41):
even the language.
I just had a conversation todaywith an American about the
language around being proud ofyour children, where I tend to
not say that that I'm proud ofmy children because I would kind
of own them or own theirachievements or have some sort
of I mean, I didn't write thebooks in plural our daughter had
(49:05):
published.
Jesper Conrad (49:06):
Our daughter had published a lot of books.
Cecilie Conrad (49:08):
And lots of people have asked me are you
proud of that?
And I'm like I didn't write thebooks.
I'm not proud of that, but Ithink the words don't really
translate from start to proud.
Jesper Conrad (49:18):
My fascination comes with that words, when they
originated, were originated ina context that is no longer
there, and we use the words in away today where we maybe don't
consider where they came fromand what the word actually
covered.
But we should round up, jack,if you, based on what you have
(49:40):
read the projects you are on,should give people a little
nugget of things they could lookinto from the book, what would
it be?
Jack Stewart (49:52):
It's a tough read, though I think the thing that
stays with me is that the mostcommon solution we have
traditionally brought to thetable for the problem of toxic
members of a community that aremessing everything up is to
(50:12):
privatize.
Common pool resourcecommunities is to privatize.
So everything's about money andit's owned by one person, and
that one person's doing it formoney or it's government
regulation.
And Eleanor Ostrom gives mehope that organizing ourselves
(50:34):
where we have we as a community,whether it's a fishery or it's
just a family or it's just twopeople that we can have easy
access to conflict resolution.
That we can give clearboundaries Just me and you can
give clear boundaries about thiscommon space.
That we can change ourselves,regardless of what money says
(50:57):
and regardless of what thegovernment says.
We can change things to make itmore congruent with our local
conditions.
That we can change the rules.
You know we can build thisourselves from the ground up.
This is the hope that thisgives me well then, I agree with
it.
Jesper Conrad (51:16):
That's a good hope that's a wonderful place to
end today's conversation, gagit's been a pleasure it's been a
pleasure, like always.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.