In part, this was due to a bet having to do with being able to explain what it is that I do. Well, below the most succinct version:

	As a Visionary I work with individuals and organizations to understand future trends, dynamics and how to best position yourself within the new world we are creating together. I help drive out new forwarding long-term visions and together with my clients develop their ideas into shared and exciting concepts and clear executable plans.
	An entertaining and eye-opening Speaker, I love to provide my audiences with more than a talk. They not just gain new perspectives, but frameworks and practical tools they can immediately apply in their daily lives and work. I speak on innovation, relating, and how to drive evolution, and each talk is customized to my client’s needs.
	As an Advisor, I support my clients in turning change into transformation. With twenty years of experience, I provide my clients with frameworks and tools from a variety of traditions such as yoga, alchemy, various esoteric systems, philosophy, NLP and transformational psychology. As a result, they do not just deal with their respective situation, but evolve in their humanity.
	As a Solution Architect I get to live out my German sense of efficiency and effectiveness. I like building systems that work. To do so, I create metaphors and maps with my clients, allowing for shared meaning and language, ensuring everyone is one the same page, progress can be tracked, and the architecture is evolving into a functioning value machine.

I seem to be here right now

No matter which religious, spiritual, or materialistic idea ultimately holds true, the one and only thing I do know as a fact is that I seem to be here right now. With that, I acknowledge, that all my memories of the past and all my projections into the future are in my imagination. “I” seem(s) to be an immediate Point of Perception (PoP).

You seem to be here right now

While I cannot prove to you that either one of us is actually here, I seem to be writing this, and you seem to be reading this. While there is no Turing test for consciousness, nor an effective zombie test, I give you the benefit of doubt, and assume that you, too, are real and an equally valid Point of Perception. I request the same of you.

Experience requires separation

For me to have the experience of writing this and for you to have the experience of reading this, and for any experience to actually be experienced, separation of Points of Perception seems required. While there would logically be an underlying unity, a oneness, of all existence, you and I need to be separate in order for us to have any experience. Within this separation, I realize that if my perception is accurate, there appears to be one universe and one biosphere. As such it would make sense for all of us to collaborate and aim to make each other’s experience as pleasant as possible.

Experience levels

From the level of Points of Perception, we are equals. Anything that appears to perceive would therefore have to be on the same level, of the same value, no matter what kind of bio-robot it appears to manifest in (plant, animal or human of any kind, let alone other possible life forms). It is indeed the diversity on levels below the Point of Perception that makes this life interesting.

Separation can be overcome

On the PoP level, there is “I” and apparent “Other”. In order for there to be experience, this is required. Experience unfolds in dualistic poles. If I remember that ultimately, there is a unity, I can choose to integrate “Other” in my definition of self, embrace the polarity and hold the whole spectrum. In actively doing so, I experience connectedness, love and belonging.

All transactions require agreement

Right now, in this transaction of writing and reading a text, we agree on many things, to begin with, the language and meaning of the symbols and words used to express these ideas. If we did not agree on these things or meaning thereof, we could not have this exchange. At the same time, this agreement is based on probability clusters. We seem to agree on our definition of terms, but even that is to be continuously refined.

An agreeable meaning

All this might seem obvious. If this was a starting point for our actions in this world, though, we would not face many of the atrocities committed every day in the name of noble goals. If we truly accept that we are separate and alone in our Point of Perception, and that we can never even begin to understand someone else’s, our actions would show it. We can strive for empathy and compassion, and as such, we need to start from common ground. I seem to be here right now, I like to feel good, I don’t like to feel bad. Sometimes I am afraid, alone; sometimes I feel confident and connected. I am interested in you because you are different. Through sharing with each other we can enhance our understanding of this world. Each one of us brings something to the table. Each one of us seems to be here to provide their piece to the puzzle. Due to the dualistic principle of experience described above, the universe is full of challenges. Challenges are opportunities for transformation.

How can you and I transform this world together?

…’cause why else would we be here?

We live in a yet another new age. An age where more than ever, it is about the women and children – both outside and inside of yourself.

Love requires “Other”

Whatever lifestyle you chose to live, and however you chose to practice this, a life full of meaningful experiences, a life lived in love, entails putting yourself in service of that which is “other”. Love requires otherness, it requires overcoming of separation, it demands the integration of the paradox of “I” and “Other”, seemingly separate yet one at the same time. To live a life of love means to love that which is other, the unknown, inside and outside of yourself.

Time to catch up

Women are currently ahead in evolution. During the last century, they fought their way into male systems, into schools, politics, even the military. Through that, they have learned to activate their inner male, integrate left and right brain functioning in new ways (some more, some less successful). They have stepped up in the evolutionary development of mankind from barbarism to the great matriarchies, and from currently faltering patriarchies to this new age in which male and female inside and outside ourselves can thrive in harmony.

From Protohuman to Prototype

It is also an age in which we need to honor the child within us again, the child, who wants to explore and create wonder in this world. If we allow ourselves to discover awe anew in every moment, if we trust in our ability to create marvelous wonders again and again, we also create a new empathy and care for the children of the world who represent the future of mankind.

Remember to continuously discover both male and female inside of you, learn to love yourself for all that you are and can be, the known and unknown. And remember to live in beginner’s mind no matter what age, and that you affect generations to come in all you do.

In order to love, there has to be separation and the willingness to connect anew in every moment.

Love demands resistance.

To expect safety in our experience of belonging, in love, seems a sure path to enmeshment and co-dependence.

To connect anew again and again allows for our own transformation and that of “other”, and an ever new encounter with an open mind.

Through resistance we grow, and in the dance of love we continue to expand our experience of self.

In oneness there appears no experience of self and no need for love.

INos (pronounced IN-oh-es) was developed in response to the needs of ‘Innovatives‘: of creative producers, corporate catalysts, and lifestyle leaders who evision new ways of living for their community and require new perspectives and support in making them a reality.

The goal is to provide anyone willing to step up as an innovative leader in their community with perspectives, purpose, practices, and techniques.

The immediate focus is to share and spread the concepts behind Vital Innovation as an alternative to current production and consumption culture and to build out our community of Innovatives.

INos brings life to new perspectives. We collaborate with you and your community using a variety of approaches and techniques to create something truly new.

More information on INos and the concept of Vital Innovation can be found at http://INos.biz

In a world of real-time global communications, change is accelerated through the memes, mediums and messaging available today… Providing evermore accelerated paths for transformation.

Shifting into new models

Business within this era has to – by default – be drastically different than before. While economics was beginning with the premise of scarcity, allowing for only two major models to evolve, we have come to a more advanced understanding where scarcity is limited to scarce systems, and where we can look to ecology and integrated systems to provide sustainable solutions – all within a global context.

Taking it personal!

Transformation is usually applied within the personal context. It appears to be used to describe an individual’s path toward a more advanced, empowered and connected experience. It tends to bring forth a shift in meaning.  In the business setting when applied to organizational transformation it tends to describe an attempt to migrate from one system of operating in collaboration to another, focusing much on the mechanics versus the shift in meaning.

A Business is a Community

Most of the time, a business is looked at as an organization, an institution. As Clay Shirky keeps pointing out, institutionalization and collaboration are two very different approaches. One thing a business seems to be, though, is a community, a group of individuals connected through a commonality: employees, vendors, customers, and the extended community of family members, end-users, and the neighborhoods the business operates in and affects.

Weakest Link

As a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, a business is only as transformational as its least adaptable community member. A transformational business must hence embrace each individual within its community and realize that each is crucially important to the overall success of the business, and that for the business to transform, each member of the community has to transform as well.

An attempted Definition

Recently, I was invited to take over the business branch for the Institute for Global Transformation, a community working to bridge perennial wisdom with the 21st century. As part of this invitation, I had to become clear as to what transformational business means to me. Below an attempted first definition and distinguishing factors:

A Transformational Business is a community of individuals which – through products or services – aims to transform the lives of a larger community.

Distinguishing Factors

The primary distinguishing factors between a traditional business and a transformational business are:

Intent

• The primary goal of a traditional business is to create profit for its shareholders.
• The primary goal of a transformational business is to forward how we live on this planet.

Method

• A traditional business applies methods of production aiming to improve the mechanics of the organization.
• A transformational business applies methods of transformation aiming to forward meaning for its customers and the whole community it impacts.

So far, so good…

Obviously, this approach is rather high-level. This is purposely so, as the drastic changes in our environment warrant a root investigation in to how we exchange goods and services as well – and how we live in community.

Would love to hear your opinions about what makes a transformational business and how we can collaboratively improve how we live. Please let me know!

Here a link to the slides

We do live in uncertain times, and uncertainty is gaining in momentum on a daily basis. The illusion of safety, the idea that we can continue to turn our back on the fragility of our lives is being eroded day by day (and we have to remind ourselves that living in a “Western” country is a most cushy experience to begin with compared to the rest of the world).

As artists and alchemists, our lives are about transmuting the muck, turning lead into gold: Using our personal experience and work as a platform for shared transformation, be it through our artifacts or teachings. And we do it as prototypes, so that others can do the same in their own lives. While she agreed, she said it was tough to persist sometimes, and to keep a long-term perspective. I absolutely agree with that, and I think the two are connected.

Long-Term Perspective

We will all die at some point. I know, I know, this might be fatalistic sounding from a transhumanist perspective, but with all the age research and life extension, it’s going to be a while, and maybe death isn’t such a bad thing after all. Because one thing it’s really good for is that it provides perspective.

An exercise I enjoy doing with myself, clients, and people I speak with, is to think of my funeral. Who would be there? What would my obituary say about me? What do I want my legacy to be?

It’s easy to get caught up in our daily lives: Bills, rent, partners, kids, people, work, entertainment… One way to deal with this is by setting goals, by planning our time, by executing against winner scripts. But usually life is what happens when you make other plans. While we have all been reasonably successful in setting goals for ourselves and achieving them to the best of our ability, maybe there is a better approach, one that honors uncertainty in new ways?

Purpose and Progress

Recently, I have decided to replace goals with purpose and progress indicators for my life management. I found goals not motivating enough. Too short term, too limiting – and not flexible enough in our world of instant communication, sharing, networks and clouds, and accelerated evolution. If I think of the goals I have had in my life, many have drastically changed again and again. Sometimes because I realized that it wasn’t what I wanted after all, sometimes because the times changed around me (I remember the dotcom era too clearly), sometimes because I banked on the wrong tools or people, sometimes because I had set my expectations too high or too low… And sometimes, because they felt more like “shoulds” than “wants” – and who wants to should on themselves?

Focusing on purpose creates a bigger game. Instead of looking at goals for a few years out (and who knows how long I will ultimately live  – I could get run over by a truck this afternoon), instead of analyzing the derivates of the function that is my life, I look at the integral and ask myself “what does this function cover?” With that, the ups and downs along the curve become much easier to manage, as they become part of a larger holistic picture.

As progress indicators, I look to my values. Having clear core values provides me with a wonderful framework for performance management, as I can look at any activity and see how it affects my values. All of them are intangibles, values we reach for, but as Ingeborg Bachman said, values that keep moving further out of our grasp each time we take a step toward them. Regardless, in any situation, I can measure if what I am doing has a positive or negative effect on my values. And I can ask myself at any point “Am I advancing toward any of my values with this action?”

Having a clear purpose

Thanks to a great mastermind group I have been in, I have become much clearer around my purpose. It’s “to consciously and creatively serve my soul, be visible doing it, teach others and have fun.” Simple. Even felt a bit like a cop-out at first, as I thought I needed to know what that looks like. I don’t.

Instead, I have a wonderful tool to constantly calibrate my actions in every moment. In any situation, in every minute of my life, I can look into this mirror and ask myself: “Does this conform with my true will?” “Am I doing what I can to show up?” “Is there something I have learned that I can share?” – and most of all “Am I enjoying myself?”

Dharma

In eastern thought exists the concept of Dharma. I keep using it as a great framework, not just for personal, but also for business performance measurement.

Dharma means “the natural order of things.” Birds fly in the sky, fish swim in the sea and everyone here does what they are truly here to do. It is often translated as “duty” or “personal responsibility.” Makes sense. If there is a natural order of things, doing what I am here to do would be my duty and responsibility.

There are five indicators that let you know whether or not you are in alignment with Dharma:

• Whatever you do gives you tremendous joy. You love doing it, it’s fun, you would do it for free and all day long simply because it makes you happy. There have been studies that show that people begin to lose interest in things they love doing once they get paid for it. Think about that for a moment.
• Whatever you do utilizes your strengths and neglects your weaknesses. We live in an ecology, in a world where special flowers attract specific insects and repel others, where each of us has gifts and talents and things we are not so good at, which in turn happen to be gifts and talents of other people – in business they refer to this as “focusing on core competency”
• Whatever you do benefits others. Like force in physics, you can measure your actions mostly by the effect they create in the world you are perceiving. Simply do good. If you have a business, make sure all your stakeholders benefit. Your customers first and foremost, but also your vendors, employees, the community you operate in, and even your competitors.
• Whatever you do sustains you. It provides you with what you need. Not just materially and physically, but also emotionally, mentally and energetically. Who wants to feel worn out and drained, exhausted and sucked dry just to make a buck?
• And finally, whatever you do is supported by synchronicities.

Seems like a pretty good guideline for living your purpose. Somehow thousands of years of empirical study have brought forth some good ideas… Thank you writers of the Vedas. Great legacy!

Legacy

My friend asked me what the legacy I would like to leave behind would look like. I told her that I want to do what I can every day to leave a world behind where people get up every day, do what they love, do what they are good at, that uses their unique perspective, gifts and talents  and that fully supports them with all the physical and spiritual sustenance they need. And it all felt like a magical carpet ride along the way…

I know I can’t do it by myself. But I know I can act on my purpose and focus on my dharma in every moment. Writing this blog was part of it. Now you know.

What do you want your legacy to be?

When I started this project last year, I had no idea I would actually get such lovely responses from people and hence have plenty of reason to keep it up and running. Thank you for watching monkday, for recommending it, for tweeting it, for your encouragement and support!

Here are some of my favorite episodes over the last year:

• Cha-cha-change – Episode 14
• Silly Songs – Episode 22
• Kids – Episode 20
• Get drunk! Episode 23
• 4-fold Paradox – Episode 40
• Worry be gone! Episode 43
• Tooltime – Episode 46

Thank you for the inspiration and the opportunity to not take myself too seriously

Smiles

philip a.k.a. joy(monk)ey

Thank you Alfonso for filming, Barry for recoding audio and Vanese for editing the video! All of you are wonderful gifts to my existence…