This update will cover the following topics:
- Community: Please Share Feedback
- Interview with Chris Niebauer
- Podcast? Book Club?
- Share Your Story
Community: Please Share Feedback
Our member count increased from 34 to 77.
As we grow, I am constantly wondering:
- Is this actually helping anyone?
- How can we make this community more interactive?
- Is actually applying Self-Investigation in your own life confusing?
Personally speaking, this project is endlessly helpful. Why? I am reading books I love, finding great conversations, and putting the most central questions of human existence under the microscope. This informs how I live my life. What an incredible gift and a great joy. I see no end in sight. THANK YOU to everyone who has participated.
The million dollar question:
How many others can experience this joy?
I know at least a few people have. It comes in the form of comments and emails. But it’s only about 2-3% of the people who sign up as members.
So I wonder, how do the other 97% feel? Is this helpful? Confusing? Irrelevant? Does it make you think? Does it make you curious? Is your life too busy for this?
If we haven’t interacted yet, we’d love to hear from you. It doesn’t matter if the thoughts are good or bad. Tell us how you were drawn to this project in the first place, and how it’s meeting your expectations or not. Tell us what you like and don’t like. Is it just more noise in your inbox?
Interview with Chris Niebauer
This isn’t the most epic interview on the internet. But, it IS significant for us – that we were able to email an author, present the project of SI, and use that as a platform to host a conversation. That’s pretty incredible, and I hope we do this again and again.
Further, Chris’s book and ideas are VERY close to the heart of SI – using science to reveal the illusions of the mind and providing some tools to explore.
No single book or author or interview can fully portray the landscape and essence of Self-Investigation. That said, Chris’s book covers a lot of relevant ground in a short time. And Chris has been enthusiastically exploring over the span of 38 years, teaching university students in neuropsychology along the way.
If you’ve not watched this yet, PLEASE give it a listen and share feedback!
Podcast? Book Club?
Podcast
We now have a handful of interviews of people, either sharing their story of Self-Investigation, or speaking about Self-Investigation from their perspective, such as Chris. Would anybody prefer a traditional podcast feed? Would that be an easier way to consume some of the long-form spoken interviews?
Book Club
Is anyone interested in this? Reading together is really friggin’ powerful – to understand the material and point out each other’s blind spots.
We just finished the “Myth of Sisyphus” by Albert Camus, and summarized it here:
The next proposal is “The Stranger” by Albert Camus – a work of fiction based on MOS.
Share Your Story
Ongoing reminder: each of our stories of “Self-Investigation” is unique. We can all learn from each other’s experiences.