Loving the world like Socrates, and HumanKind Challenge #3.5

Photo by Quan Nguyen (Many thanks, Quan)

I've been thinking for a week about how to celebrate Valentine's Day the HumanKind way. We say HumanKind Media is about touching the longing in all of us to heal the world, but really it's about loving the world, and I somehow wanted to write about that. But most of my ideas were too corny or they were too trite. (Liz refused to let me put the Michael Jackson "Heal The World" video up, but you can find it on YouTube. Shhh!)

I had given up on writing anything and just leaving you all to your own devices for Valentine's Day when I serendipitously stumbled upon Christopher Phillips, author and founder of the Society of Philosophical Inquiry. Last night, crazy as it sounds, I had dashed into my local bookstore to find something to read, when I overheard him speaking to the largest crowd I'd seen for an author in that spot, on the subject of the five kinds of love identified by the Greek philosophers. Though I had no idea who he was or what he was talking about at first, what caught my ear was the phrase "loving humankind." He was talking about the fifth kind of love -- agape or unconditional love which, for our purposes, we will call loving the world. Yay! How cool was that?

Utne Reader dubbed him "Johnny Appleseed with a master's degree." Phillips and his wife founded the Society for Philosophical Inquiry, traveling and working with groups of people all around the world -- in schools, prisons, senior communities, on reservations, and in bookstores, gathering and asking questions. They created "Socrates cafes," enclaves of discourse encouraging dialogue based on the dialogues of the Greek philosphers (Socrates, especially). Many of these stories and the Greek philosophy that supports them are chronicled in his trilogy of books about exploring the Socratic method of questioning. His latest book, "Socrates in Love," is described on his website like this:

Taking as his springboard for modern Socratic inquiry the five traditional forms of love as practiced by the Greeks of antiquity -- eros (erotic love), storge (family love), philia (friendship love), xenia (stranger love), and agape (unconditional love) -- Phillips sets out to explore, in a wide variety of venues around the world, with people of all walks of life, how we can become a more loving world today, and how we can and even must learn about the wise, loving ways of the Greeks of old--particularly those of Socrates, who embodied all aspects of Greek love at a time when his own beloved society was in deep decline, seeking to resuscitate those loving practices that might once again set his society on an evolving course.

Since I was still in my workout clothes from the afternoon, and had a cap on to cover my hair, there was no way I was going to approach this fascinating author about his work, in spite of the fact that it was for a blog. (But I did e-mail him today). So, after the crowd dispersed (happily, a hugely diverse crowd and many young adults, too), I snuck up and read as much of "Socrates in Love" as I could before they kicked me out. It was filled with provocative questions and stories of thoughtful people of every kind imaginable wondering about those questions -- the scholarly, Socratic version of caring conversations.

Just with the brief sampling from last night and a jaunt through his website, I am left excited and hopeful now that I know about Christopher and the 300+ groups around the world who have followed his lead. In my coaching and my life, I am always amazed how everything comes down to how we converse and connect -- finding fulfilling work, starting social change, getting along with our teenagers, creating groups at work or in the community, and loving the world.

You can check out Christopher's site here and his non-profit, Society for Philosophical Inquiry, here (you can find or start your own Socrates cafe). Hopefully we will get him to talk to us or write us a blog, but in the meantime, I am inspired by his work and his conviction that we can connect and love the world like Socrates did.

For Valentine's day, I hope you'll consider loving the world by having a good, open, wonder-ful conversation with someone, and imagine it rippling out through the world.

And speaking of connecting -- this post to its title, and us to one another -- check out how our little map is doing! We've had visitors from all over the world to our blog -- Ceylon, Kenya, Mexico, and our dear but anonymous friends from Arhus in Denmark. Not everyone is on the map, though.

Our peace map, HumanKind Challenge #3, is slowly growing, but we could give it a kick. In honor of Valentine's Day, we're now calling it the Peace and Love Map, HK Challenge version 3.5, and we invite you to join. If you want your pin to stick (I want it to), you need to put your name or an alias on the pin, make sure it's moved to your real location, not Wichita or Dayton, unless you really live there, and we'd love it if you can upload a picture -- any picture: your dog, your car, your Mom or your swingset -- or a heart, hearts would be good. If you've got friends far away, now's a great time to send them a Valentine with this blog or our HumanKind Challenge #3 blog link, . I invite them to join you in this fun experiment on the map. Fun, free, and a great way to state our intentions for this world we love.

Click here to go to the map. Use the + and - to zoom in and out (you can almost see streets!) Click and slide the map to see our friends in Singapore, Connecticut, Australia, Canada, California, Minnesota, and more. But where are the Montanans, the Floridians, and the Peruvians? What about Greenland? and Italy? Tell your friends.

New to HumanKind Media? You can read about what we're up to by clicking the links on the upper right and you can scroll through our archives on the lower left. Get our free updates here.

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