The Future Thinker’s Dilemma

“We think creatively (not predictively) about the future in order to decide what to do now in order to make possible different futures. There is no reason to be ‘future-oriented’ other than to try to change things, from now on . This means that you must be very careful when trying to ‘future’ to ensure that you are not unwittingly reproducing impl

as Albert Einstein was famous for saying, “ No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it ” Put another way, you can’t solve a problem within the context of that problem.

foresight has (generally) been looking to solve present-day problems that exist as a direct result of the life-draining systems that we presently inhabi t.

challenges to long-held assumptions take place when individuals dive deeper and deeper into anticipatory imagination and provocation, and this opens the door to transformative realities that profoundly change the perspective of the foresight practitioner. Consequently, the possibility of these new worlds become an internal experience that can no lo

I’m reminded of the words of sci-fi author Ursula K. Le Guin: “We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings.” Of course, it was also noted by philosophers Fredric Jameson and Slavoj Žižek that “It’s easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.” Such a statement displays the narrative wei

A world that’s upside down cannot and should not be treated and measured as if it holds the key to creating a world that’s right side up. A new vision and world requires a new way of thinking, measuring, acting, and being

“The Emergent Future” instead challenges us to “ think transformationally, act transitionally ” to manifest futures-empowered landscapes of care, empathy, reconciliation, and love in our organizations, governments, and social entities, allowing us to align with much healthier expressions of our biological, psychological, and sacred experiences

Neither of these individuals are saying that we should not be working with organizations, businesses, governments, for-profits, non-profits, or any other entities where people work and live — and neither am I. What we are saying is that our thinking and acting toward the future must challenge the systems that would seek to short-circuit the very fu

Why are we futuring to find solutions to the problems created by extrapolative, exponential, and extractive systems, when we should be futuring to imagine emerging novelty and construct transformative realities that would allow us to elevate our human, planetary, and universal experience above and beyond those systems?