Adaptive Leadership essentially means having an Institutional Mindset - seeing your role and responsibility as cultivating environments and communities where technical and adaptive growth happens. In other words, leaders build GREENHOUSES.

Unfortunately, "building greenhouses" is far from safe. It requires pruning and pruning invites sabotage. According to Tod Bolsinger, "Acts of sabotage are not the bad things that evil people do to stop good being done in the world. Acts of sabotage are the human things that anxious people do because they fear they are losing what little good is left in the world." (from Tempered Resilience)

So if leaders should expect change to be dangerous, how do we respond in the moment? How do we SURVIVE leadership?

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Resources

(BOOK) Leadership on the Line, by Ronald Heifetz and Marty Linksy

(PDF) Executive Summary for Leadership on the Line, at Transform Leaders

(BOOK) Canoeing the Mountains, by Tod Bolsinger

If Leadership is "the art of disappointing people at a rate they can handle" (John Ortberg), then how do we think about leadership when everyone's starting point is disappointment? Because "life in a liminal age" is one of unpredictability, disappointment will be far more normative right when we feel far less able to handle it. 

How then, do we rethink leadership in a Liminal Age?

While there is no quick fix or silver bullet, there absolutely is a framework to help us navigate challenges and opportunities with clarity and wisdom. Whether you're trying to lead a team, organization, your family, or just yourself, these principles of "Adaptive Leadership" are as timely as it is timeless. 

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Resources

(BOOK) Leadership on the Line, by Ronald Heifetz and Marty Linksy

(PDF) Executive Summary for Leadership on the Line, at Transform Leaders

(BOOK) Canoeing the Mountains, by Tod Bolsinger

Even before our Liminal Age, Christian orthodoxy is has been largely rejected as too narrow by the culture… and yet, it is now just one of many orthodoxies. Whether the social justice movement, right-wing conspiracy theorists, or both pop and academic humanism, they all function as implicit or explicit orthodoxies. Their adherents sincerely believe the rest of the world should share, with the more fundamentalist among them leveraging social pressure (“cancel culture,” boycotts, etc.) as a kind of non-religious, social excommunication of those whose orthopraxis doesn't line up with a their orthodoxy (i.e. right ideology).

Trevin Wax says that we’re in the midst of an ideological “battle royale” for the right to determine future norms and set consensus. So how in the world can we resist getting sucked into that vortex? How do leaders resist the myopic temptation to just “pick a side” for clarity’s sake? What difference does Christian orthodoxy have a hope of making in that cacophony?

We asked Trevin all those questions and more, and found his answers even more encouraging (and convicting) than we’d hoped.

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Resources

(BOOK) The Thrill of Orthodoxy: Rediscovering the Adventure of Christian Faith, by Trevin Wax

(BOOK) The Multi-Directional Leader: Responding Wisely to Challenges from Every Side

(PODCAST) Reconstructing Faith

“The real problem of humanity is the following: we have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions, & god-like technology.” - Edward Wilson

There is likely no greater catalyst in our Liminal Age than social media. A recent study showed that 57% of teen girls say they experience "persistent sadness or hopelessness" (vs 36% in 2011). Internet expert and author of the new book, The Wolf in Our Pockets: 13 Ways Social Media Threatens The People You Lead, Chris Martin says that's because social media has turned us into consumers not just of content, but of people. This "Darker Consumerism" is deforming our sense of self, distorting our view of reality, and subtly sapping our capacity. Join in as Chris helps us understand the depth of the problem as well as imagine a more hopeful, practical, and wiseapproach to the "wolf in our pockets."

Come for the incredible content

and stay for... John's new "Horse Abscess Charity"?

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Resources

(BOOK) The Wolf in Our Pockets: 13 Ways Social Media Threatens The People You Lead, by Chris Martin

(BOOK) Terms of Service: The Real Cost of Social Media, by Chris Martin

(ARTICLE) Social Media is a Major Cause of the Mental Illness Epidemic in Teen Girls, by Jonathan Haidt

(ARTICLE) How Social Media Fosters Distrust in Institutions, by Brad Edwards & Chris Martin

What does J.K.Rowling’s Harry Potter function as an “Intuitional Religion?" How might "fandom" be scratching our itch for community, ritual, meaning, or purpose? Is “hustle culture” our striving to achieve The Good Life (TM), or a symptom of having given up hope of ever receiving it?

In this wide ranging conversation with Tara Isabella Burton, we explore the slow boil shift of American religious identity from Institutionalism to Intuitionism, and how the vacuum of institutional trust has been flooded with every kind of “weird internet, horseshoe theory land mine.” 

Plus: why we should ALL “touch grass.”

CORRECTION: At one point Brad said that Hogwarts Legacy was on track to be "the best-selling video game of all time." That was only kinda accurate: it has already broken the best-selling INITIAL RELEASE of a video game of all time (not total sales). A minor distinction, but we care too much about getting the facts right not to correct the record.

Was this episode helpful or encouraging in some way? Great! Then you won't want to miss what's next so SUBSCRIBE now and send this episode to a friend! We appreciate it! 🙏

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Resources

(BOOK) Strange Rites: New Religions for a Godless World, by Tara Isabella Burton

(BOOK) Self-Made: Creating Our Identities from Da Vinci to the Kardashians, by Tara Isabella Burton

(PODCAST) The witch trials of JK Rowling

(ARTICLE) Hogwarts Legacy Breaks Release Records

Now that PostEverything is officially off the ground, we're settling into a biweekly release rhythm... HOWEVER, you'll still want to listen to this short "intermission" for what to expect from the rest of Season 1 and a tantalizing taste of upcoming GUESTS!

Plus: A sincere and overwhelming "thank you" for all the incredible feedback and encouragement you've given so far...

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"So what?" is an important question anytime we pontificate about something as nebulous as "culture" or "society." It's easy (and tempting) to stay in the clouds and avoid having to do anything with the insight or perspective we've gleaned way up there. If Part 1 validated and Part 2 explained our experience of "Life in a Liminal Age," then Part 3 will help chart a rough (but practical) way forward for not just surviving, but thriving in Exile. 

In this episode, we dig into why institutions have become culture war, what "faithfulness" looks like for a people in seismic transition, and the unlikely hope found in learning from a "remnant" living through the even greater liminal moment of Christ's crucifixion. 

Plus: what a particular football (or "soccer" for Brad) tradition may or may not have to do with Jackson Pollack.

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Resources

Read Blinded by Nostalgia, by Yuval Levin

Buy the Misreading Scripture with Individualist Eyes Book, by E. Randolph Richards & Richard James

Is it possible to agree on anything anymore (well, besides getting rid of Daylight Savings)? What are the underlying causes for the symptoms outlined in Part 1, and what do institutions have to do with any (or rather all) of that? It turns out we're in the midst of a perfect storm, a confluence of highly disruptive transitions that compound each other and amplify... well, everything. Join Brad and John as they walk through 3 Macro Disruptions contributing to our present liminality (Social Media, Generational Turnover, and Economic Disillusionment) and explain how they are directly contributing to a rise of Viral Ideologies and Anxious Systems.

We also learned that if you want to see Brad lose it, just ask him if the invention of social media is anything like that of the printing press.

Was this episode helpful or encouraging in some way? Great, you won't want to miss what's next, so subscribe now and send this episode to a friend! Thank you! 🙏

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Resources

Who is Charles Hapgood, anyway?

Read The Six Way Fracturing of Evangelicalism

Read The Church Amongst the Counter-Institutions by Brad Edwards

Watch Bo Burnham: Inside

We all know what it feels like to live in a "liminal age," but describing it is surprisingly difficult. Why? Because it is both an acceleration of something familiar AND it is even more dehumanizing than we thought. In what we hope is an incredibly validating conversation, Brad and John outline the 3 Primary Symptoms of Life in a Liminal Age (Loneliness, Loss of Capacity, and Disorientation) and lay a foundation for a 3-Part mini-series on "remapping culture" in all its surprisingly precedentedimplications... 

Was this episode helpful or encouraging in some way? Great, you won't want to miss what's next, so subscribe now and send this episode to a friend! Thank you! 🙏

We are just getting started! To stay up to date, first and foremost: subscribe! Then follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook to join the dialogue!

Resources

Watch The (Many) Conspiracy Theories About Denver International Airport Video

Read How The Blue Horse ("Blucifer") at DIA Killed it's Creator (no, really)

Buy the Faith Among the Faithless Book

Buy the You Are Not Your Own Book

Buy the Loneliness Epidemic Book

Listen to the Everything Just Changed Interview with Chris Bruno

Buy the Strong and Weak Book

Read the "Locus of Control & Pro-Social Behavior" Study via The National Bureau of Economic Research

Read the Earthquake Causes Fluvial Tsunami in Mississippi Article

It's one thing to experience a change in circumstances, but something wholly different when we experience such a fundamental change in values and assumptions that we no longer HAVE a social consensus to fall back on. It's as if the rules of the game changed at half-time, and now we're playing a sport we don't even recognize.

Welcome to our "PostEverything" world, where what came before is no longer, but what's next is still very unclear... but not without hope.

Was this episode helpful or encouraging in some way? Great, you won't want to miss what's next, so subscribe now and send this episode to a friend! Thank you! 🙏

We are just getting started! To stay up to date, first and foremost: subscribe! Then follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook to join the dialogue!