Our guest today is Dr. Riane Eisler, social systems scientist, cultural historian, futurist, attorney and internationally bestselling author of many notable classics, including Sacred Pleasure and The Chalice and the Blade, which I read recently and LOVED—while it came out in the ‘80s, it is incredibly prescient—prophetic really—and more relevant than ever. In it, and all of her books, Riane explores the ways in which hierarchies of dominance—which are NOT our natural state—inform how we live now. “What we’ve been told is simply a false story of our past, of our present, and most importantly today, the possibilities for our future,” she explains. Dr. Eisler joins me today to discuss her newest work, Nurturing Our Humanity: How Domination and Partnership Shape Our Brains, Lives, and Future. In the book, Eisler implores us to awaken to the notion that injustice, inequality, violence, and domination do not tell the full story of human possibility. “We humans were really wired more for partnership than for domination,” she says. Guided by the ethos of partnership, Dr. Eisler’s work challenges each of us to play a role in the construction of a more equitable, more sustainable, and less violent world through investment in human infrastructure and a dedication to raising future generations by different scripts and constructs than those given to us. People’s minds can be changed, she reminds us, but a change in consciousness starts with the knowledge that there are different, better, possibilities.  

EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS:

• Exploring caring economics, human infrastructure, and the alienation of caring labor (Approx. 5:09)
• The partnership model and the fight against sticky myths of domination (Approx. 11:00)
• Replumbing our dysfunctional operating system (Approx. 29:35)

MORE FROM RIANE EISLER:

Riane's Website

Nurturing Our Humanity: How Domination and Partnership Shape Our Brains, Lives, and Future

The Chalice & The Blade: Our History, Our Future

The Real Wealth of Nations: Creating a Caring Economics

The Power of Partnership: Sevens Relationships That Will Change Your Life

Breaking Out of the Domination Trance: Building Foundations for a Safe, Equitable, Caring World

RIANE’S PICKS:

My Octopus Teacher - Netflix, 2020

Grandfather's Garden: Some Bedtime Stories for Little and Big Folk - David Loye

DIG DEEPER

More on Partnership Systems and the Partnerism Movement

Courses in Partnership - Changing Our Story, Changing Our Lives

Sexual Dimorphism in European Upper Paleolithic Cave Art - Dean Snow, Society for American Archaeology, 2013 

A World Without Women: The Christian Clerical Culture of Western Science - David Noble, 2013

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