“Increasing Our Transformative Potential” with Gregory Kennedy
Gregory Kennedy
Gregory Kennedy is the Director of Operations at W(e)IRD World (Wild Idea Research & Development at weirdworld.xyz). They support global charitable initiatives focused on some of society’s most urgent challenges such as food insecurity, sustainable development, and climate change.
Gregory and WIRD work with people who want to do good for themselves, for their communities and around the world.
For the past 15 years he has been developing and producing media, technology and education projects utilizing mindfulness-based solutions to social and environmental issues.
Gregory sees his role as a mentor and mentee who finds ways to include all the people together to serve their best roles in what he calls a Mosaic of people. He believes that Kindness is a superior business model that, within set parameters, can scale better than competitiveness, frustration, pettiness, regret, revenge, merit (whatever that means) or apathy.
In this conversation we talk about being a model of the world we want to live in. We unpack race relations and overcoming prejudice by being exposed to one another. We discuss blockchain as a way of creating trust when there isn't trust. We reflect on how the philosophy and proliferation of nonviolence has changed the world. We also bond about the perspective that's gained by living abroad and seeing how other people live, and then being able to look back at the United States and current political trends from an outside perspective. And get really deep into sports as an analogy for politics. The take home is: Don’t get overconfident, don’t think that any win is an absolute win, and always try to play a better game.
Gregory Kennedy Resources
Find Gregory on LinkedIn and @blockchaindude.
W(e)IRD World is co-founded by Gregory. Their mission is to “Increase people’s capacity for empathy, both online and offline.”
One of W(e)IRD World's first creations is Undiscovered Stories:
You can play Undiscovered Stories, “The Learn and Earn” blockchain Trivia Game, earn UDGT tokens, learn about the achievements and contributions of girls and women in a variety of fields throughout history (like Katherine Coleman Goble Johnson (see: below)), and support girls and women-led initiatives by going here: https://undiscoveredstory.com. To learn more about Undiscovered Story, here is an FAQ, a Medium article and a podcast.
Blockchain:
Among many other things, Gregory is a Blockchain architect and consultant. Blockchain is a distributed, decentralized, public ledger. At its most basic level, blockchain is literally just a chain of blocks, where the “block” is digital information stored in a “chain” (a public database). Gregory and I talk about it as a way to create trust without trust, by using community support and transparency.
Learn more about blockchain with this article “Blockchain Explained” on Investopedia, or this video “What is BLOCKCHAIN?” created by the Centre of International Governance Innovation. If you want to go down the nerdier rabbit hole, 3blue1brown has made this amazing video: “But how does bitcoin actually work?” I highly recommend 3blue1brown for anyone wanting complex math explained in interesting and understandable ways.
Here is Gregory's Medium page, which includes these articles: “Stake Your Reputation Protocol (SYRP) — For a P2P Economy” and “Free Social Benefit Coins. A Blockchain, Crypto, Sharable Prosperity, Giftivism based Airdrop idea.”
Other resources:
Here are some of the people and things we discussed in the episode:
Ed Dwight: handpicked to diversify NASA's astronaut corps, but he never flew.
Ed Dwight: the man set to be the first black astronaut in the 1960s, but racism got in the way (Learn about him here on this podcast and article from the New York Times). He later became an artist. Here you can find his art.
Trailer for Hidden Figures
Hidden Figures is a movie about a black female mathematicians who worked at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) during the Space Race.
The movie is based on the book: Hidden Figures by Margot Lee Shetterly, and features the story of the badass mathematician Katherine Coleman Goble Johnson.
“Kindness scales. It scales better than competitiveness, frustration, pettiness, regret, revenge, merit (whatever that means) or apathy.
Kindness ratchets up. It leads to more kindness. It can create trust and openness and truth and enthusiasm and patience and possibility.
Kindness, in one word, is a business model, an approach to strangers and a platform for growth.
It might take more effort than you were hoping it would, but it's worth it.
- Seth Godin
Jane Goodall's project, Roots and Shoots, is one of Gregory's favorite that he has supported
Nonviolence Resources
Thich Nhat Hanh: “Nonduality and the Consciousness of 'Things'“
Check out this past episode of Fractal Friends: "Power, Love and Nonviolence" with Kazu Haga.
Learn more here about Thich Nhat Hanh here at the Plum Village website. Also check out this amazing video of him that I believe captures what the power of nonviolent force looks like:
Gregory tells the story about how Alfred Hassler of FOR (Fellowship of Reconciliation) introduced Thich Nhat Hanh to nonviolent strategy. For a deep dive into the branching history of nonviolence I recommend OZY's The Thread “Season 3: A History of Nonviolence.” This podcast series tracing the history of Nonviolence From Colin Kapernick to Dr. King and FOR veteran, Bayard Rustin, through Gandhi and Tolstoy all the way back to a ship captain's son’s friendship with a slave.
A Force More Powerful is the classic documentary series about power of nonviolence: You can watch Part 1 and Part 2
Research by Erica Chenoweth "suggests that nonviolent civil resistance is far more successful in creating broad-based change than violent campaigns are."
Here's her Article in The Harvard Gazette "Nonviolent resistance proves potent weapon"
Here's info about her book Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict
You can buy or rent The 5 Powers here.
Gregory was part of making The 5 Powers.
The 5 Powers is a moving fusion of documentary footage, historic montage and vivid animation that send a powerful message of peace. Using modern technology and dramatic storytelling, the film focuses on three true heroes and their nonviolent re-solution of conflict through a mind-ful, compassionate approach. As the film tells the story of seemingly unstoppable violence, it also communicates an ultimate truth. There is no good or bad, no white or black. This ultimate truth has the power to unite us.
Music
“Peace is the Way,” a Plum Village song.
The music in this episode is “Peace is the Way,” aPlum Village Song, sung by Sister Jewel with Lyrics by Thich Nhat Hanh.