Postcards from the Future

A few years ago, my friend and talented artist Xena Ni led me in a reflection exercise: what could my neighborhood in Washington, DC, look like 100 years into the future? She calls this Futuretelling . We traveled together, and through the meditation she guided me in, we dreamed up the future of my neighborhood. Because the meditation activated all my senses—she asked me, what does it smell like when you open your front door? —the vision I left with was vivid. And I liked it

In May 2025, I was interviewed by my dear friend and gifted storyteller, Lia Weintraub, for The Interwork . Our conversation explored what it takes to build the kinds of relationships and structures that can truly change our world. What I kept returning to was trust—specifically, trust that we can make decisions together. That trust isn’t abstract. It’s built by doing things together. One place to begin is close to home: forming meaningful relationships with our neighbors thr

Distributing responsibility in groups that aim to have a flat power hierarchy is one of the most recurring challenges in collectives I’ve been part of. In Cerbère, France at Can Decreix I was introduced to an approach to sociocracy (in which decisions and management are done by committees that reach consensus) that sparked my imagination. To skip the discussion of sociocracy and go directly to the silly stories, jump to the video at the bottom. My (quick) overview of Can Decr

Growing up in the United States—and studying at the University of Chicago, famously associated with free‑market economics—it can be hard to imagine an economy that isn’t capitalism. We’re taught refrains like “competition drives efficiency”  or “humans are innately competitive.”  Over time, these ideas can make capitalism feel less like a choice and more like a law of nature. But it isn’t. Alternative economic frameworks exist—and they have existed for a long time. While stud