0:00:00.911,0:00:03.019 So, we all have bad seasons in life. 0:00:03.754,0:00:05.674 And I had one in 2013. 0:00:06.373,0:00:07.719 My marriage had just ended, 0:00:07.743,0:00:10.395 and I was humiliated[br]by that failed commitment. 0:00:10.419,0:00:13.221 My kids had left home for college[br]or were leaving. 0:00:14.045,0:00:16.368 I grew up mostly[br]in the conservative movement, 0:00:16.392,0:00:17.992 but conservatism had changed, 0:00:18.016,0:00:20.008 so I lost a lot of those friends, too. 0:00:20.441,0:00:23.430 And so what I did is,[br]I lived alone in an apartment, 0:00:23.454,0:00:24.654 and I just worked. 0:00:25.417,0:00:28.830 If you opened the kitchen drawers[br]where there should have been utensils, 0:00:28.854,0:00:30.377 there were Post-it notes. 0:00:30.916,0:00:34.131 If you opened the other drawers[br]where there should have been plates, 0:00:34.155,0:00:35.305 I had envelopes. 0:00:35.885,0:00:39.282 I had work friends, weekday friends,[br]but I didn't have weekend friends. 0:00:39.942,0:00:43.542 And so my weekends[br]were these long, howling silences. 0:00:44.268,0:00:45.640 And I was lonely. 0:00:46.395,0:00:49.968 And loneliness, unexpectedly,[br]came to me in the form of -- 0:00:50.399,0:00:53.248 it felt like fear,[br]a burning in my stomach. 0:00:53.272,0:00:55.953 And it felt a little like drunkenness, 0:00:55.977,0:01:00.907 just making bad decisions,[br]just fluidity, lack of solidity. 0:01:01.911,0:01:05.177 And the painful part of that moment[br]was the awareness 0:01:05.201,0:01:08.604 that the emptiness in my apartment[br]was just reflective of the emptiness 0:01:08.628,0:01:10.227 in myself, 0:01:10.251,0:01:13.978 and that I had fallen for some of the lies[br]that our culture tells us. 0:01:15.196,0:01:18.605 The first lie is that[br]career success is fulfilling. 0:01:18.629,0:01:20.466 I've had a fair bit of career success, 0:01:20.490,0:01:23.328 and I've found that it helps me avoid[br]the shame I would feel 0:01:23.352,0:01:25.026 if I felt myself a failure, 0:01:25.050,0:01:27.581 but it hasn't given me any positive good. 0:01:28.201,0:01:31.797 The second lie is I can make myself happy, 0:01:32.484,0:01:34.564 that if I just win one more victory, 0:01:34.588,0:01:38.079 lose 15 pounds, do a little more yoga, 0:01:38.103,0:01:39.253 I'll get happy. 0:01:39.743,0:01:42.061 And that's the lie of self-sufficiency. 0:01:42.419,0:01:45.101 But as anybody[br]on their deathbed will tell you, 0:01:45.125,0:01:48.389 the things that make people happy[br]is the deep relationships of life, 0:01:48.413,0:01:50.480 the losing of self-sufficiency. 0:01:51.804,0:01:54.471 The third lie is the lie[br]of the meritocracy. 0:01:55.591,0:01:58.790 The message of the meritocracy[br]is you are what you accomplish. 0:01:59.133,0:02:01.600 The myth of the meritocracy[br]is you can earn dignity 0:02:01.624,0:02:04.234 by attaching yourself[br]to prestigious brands. 0:02:04.258,0:02:07.063 The emotion of the meritocracy[br]is conditional love; 0:02:07.087,0:02:08.942 you can earn your way to love. 0:02:08.966,0:02:12.387 The anthropology of the meritocracy[br]is you're not a soul to be purified, 0:02:12.411,0:02:14.879 you're a set of skills to be maximized. 0:02:14.903,0:02:16.752 And the evil of the meritocracy 0:02:16.776,0:02:19.434 is that people who've achieved[br]a little more than others 0:02:19.458,0:02:21.744 are actually worth[br]a little more than others. 0:02:22.141,0:02:24.004 And so the wages of sin are sin. 0:02:24.815,0:02:26.699 And my sins were the sins of omission-- 0:02:26.723,0:02:29.191 not reaching out,[br]failing to show up for my friends, 0:02:29.215,0:02:30.730 evasion, avoiding conflict. 0:02:31.560,0:02:34.688 And the weird thing was[br]that as I was falling into the valley -- 0:02:34.712,0:02:36.416 it was a valley of disconnection -- 0:02:36.440,0:02:38.474 a lot of other people[br]were doing that, too. 0:02:39.014,0:02:41.023 And that's sort of[br]the secret to my career; 0:02:41.047,0:02:42.820 a lot of the things that happen to me 0:02:42.844,0:02:45.002 are always happening[br]to a lot of other people. 0:02:45.026,0:02:48.220 I'm a very average person[br]with above average communication skills. 0:02:48.244,0:02:49.347 (Laughter) 0:02:49.371,0:02:50.837 And so I was detached. 0:02:51.252,0:02:54.514 And at the same time,[br]a lot of other people were detached 0:02:54.538,0:02:57.053 and isolated and fragmented[br]from each other. 0:02:57.077,0:03:00.157 Thirty-five percent of Americans[br]over 45 are chronically lonely. 0:03:00.181,0:03:03.522 Only eight percent of Americans[br]report having meaningful conversation 0:03:03.546,0:03:04.696 with their neighbors. 0:03:04.720,0:03:07.545 Only 32 percent of Americans[br]say they trust their neighbors 0:03:07.569,0:03:09.823 and only 18 percent of millennials. 0:03:09.847,0:03:12.288 The fastest-growing[br]political party is unaffiliated. 0:03:12.312,0:03:14.899 The fastest-growing religious[br]movement is unaffiliated. 0:03:14.923,0:03:17.899 Depression rates are rising,[br]mental health problems are rising. 0:03:17.923,0:03:21.164 The suicide rate has risen[br]30 percent since 1999. 0:03:21.188,0:03:23.364 For teen suicides[br]over the last several years, 0:03:23.388,0:03:26.047 the suicide rate has risen by 70 percent. 0:03:27.249,0:03:29.924 Forty-five thousand Americans[br]kill themselves every year, 0:03:29.948,0:03:32.178 72,000 die from opioid addictions, 0:03:32.202,0:03:35.551 life expectancy is falling, not rising. 0:03:36.985,0:03:39.572 So what I mean to tell you,[br]I flew out here to say 0:03:39.596,0:03:42.524 that we have an economic crisis,[br]we have environmental crisis, 0:03:42.548,0:03:43.913 we have a political crisis. 0:03:43.937,0:03:46.016 We also have a social[br]and relational crisis; 0:03:46.040,0:03:47.379 we're in the valley. 0:03:47.403,0:03:49.006 We're fragmented from each other, 0:03:49.030,0:03:51.622 we've got cascades of lies[br]coming out of Washington ... 0:03:51.646,0:03:52.979 We're in the valley. 0:03:53.466,0:03:55.443 And so I've spent the last five years -- 0:03:55.467,0:03:56.981 how do you get out of a valley? 0:03:57.356,0:04:00.469 The Greeks used to say,[br]"You suffer your way to wisdom." 0:04:01.006,0:04:04.666 And from that dark period where I started,[br]I've had a few realizations. 0:04:05.228,0:04:08.149 The first is, freedom sucks. 0:04:08.998,0:04:11.672 Economic freedom is OK,[br]political freedom is great, 0:04:11.696,0:04:13.497 social freedom sucks. 0:04:14.036,0:04:16.363 The unrooted man is the adrift man. 0:04:16.387,0:04:20.370 The unrooted man is the unremembered man,[br]because he's uncommitted to things. 0:04:20.776,0:04:24.310 Freedom is not an ocean[br]you want to swim in, 0:04:24.334,0:04:26.064 it's a river you want to get across, 0:04:26.088,0:04:28.754 so you can commit and plant yourself[br]on the other side. 0:04:29.270,0:04:30.929 The second thing I learned 0:04:30.953,0:04:33.549 is that when you have[br]one of those bad moments in life, 0:04:33.573,0:04:34.868 you can either be broken, 0:04:34.892,0:04:36.431 or you can be broken open. 0:04:36.905,0:04:38.731 And we all know people who are broken. 0:04:38.755,0:04:41.271 They've endured some pain[br]or grief, they get smaller, 0:04:41.295,0:04:43.675 they get angrier, resentful,[br]they lash out. 0:04:43.699,0:04:44.854 As the saying is, 0:04:44.878,0:04:47.576 "Pain that is not transformed[br]gets transmitted." 0:04:47.927,0:04:49.756 But other people are broken open. 0:04:51.125,0:04:54.226 Suffering's great power[br]is that it's an interruption of life. 0:04:54.250,0:04:57.019 It reminds you you're not the person[br]you thought you were. 0:04:57.043,0:04:58.580 The theologian Paul Tillich said 0:04:58.604,0:05:02.021 what suffering does is it carves through[br]what you thought was the floor 0:05:02.045,0:05:03.428 of the basement of your soul, 0:05:03.452,0:05:05.962 and it carves through that,[br]revealing a cavity below, 0:05:05.986,0:05:08.478 and it carves through that,[br]revealing a cavity below. 0:05:08.502,0:05:11.511 You realize there are depths of yourself[br]you never anticipated, 0:05:11.535,0:05:14.486 and only spiritual and relational food[br]will fill those depths. 0:05:16.173,0:05:19.141 And when you get down there,[br]you get out of the head of the ego 0:05:19.165,0:05:20.847 and you get into the heart, 0:05:20.871,0:05:22.633 the desiring heart, 0:05:22.657,0:05:26.288 the idea that what we really yearn for[br]is longing and love for another, 0:05:26.312,0:05:29.358 the kind of thing that Louis de Bernières[br]described in his book, 0:05:29.382,0:05:31.280 "Captain Corelli's Mandolin." 0:05:31.304,0:05:33.283 He had an old guy talking to his daughter 0:05:33.307,0:05:35.325 about his relationship with his late wife, 0:05:35.349,0:05:36.736 and the old guy says, 0:05:36.760,0:05:40.458 "Love itself is whatever is leftover[br]when being in love is burned away. 0:05:40.482,0:05:43.339 And this is both an art[br]and a fortunate accident. 0:05:43.704,0:05:45.387 Your mother and I had it. 0:05:45.411,0:05:47.950 We had roots that grew[br]towards each other underground, 0:05:47.974,0:05:50.903 and when all the pretty blossoms[br]had fallen from our branches, 0:05:50.927,0:05:53.379 we discovered that we are[br]one tree and not two." 0:05:53.696,0:05:55.569 That's what the heart yearns for. 0:05:55.593,0:05:58.354 The second thing[br]you discover is your soul. 0:05:58.932,0:06:01.810 Now, I don't ask you to believe in God[br]or not believe in God, 0:06:01.834,0:06:04.421 but I do ask you to believe[br]that there's a piece of you 0:06:04.445,0:06:06.421 that has no shape, size, color or weight, 0:06:06.445,0:06:09.371 but that gives you[br]infinite dignity and value. 0:06:09.395,0:06:11.752 Rich and successful people[br]don't have more of this 0:06:11.776,0:06:13.141 than less successful people. 0:06:13.974,0:06:17.156 Slavery is wrong because[br]it's an obliteration of another soul. 0:06:17.180,0:06:20.014 Rape is not just an attack[br]on a bunch of physical molecules, 0:06:20.038,0:06:22.966 it's an attempt to insult[br]another person's soul. 0:06:22.990,0:06:26.036 And what the soul does[br]is it yearns for righteousness. 0:06:26.060,0:06:29.639 The heart yearns for fusion with another,[br]the soul yearns for righteousness. 0:06:29.663,0:06:32.948 And that led to my third realization,[br]which I borrowed from Einstein. 0:06:33.655,0:06:36.141 "The problem you have[br]is not going to be solved 0:06:36.165,0:06:38.879 at the level of consciousness[br]on which you created it. 0:06:38.903,0:06:42.776 You have to expand[br]to a different level of consciousness." 0:06:42.800,0:06:44.014 So what do you do? 0:06:44.038,0:06:47.148 Well, the first thing you do[br]is you throw yourself on your friends 0:06:47.172,0:06:50.133 and you have deeper conversations[br]that you ever had before. 0:06:50.157,0:06:51.514 But the second thing you do, 0:06:51.538,0:06:53.672 you have to go out alone[br]into the wilderness. 0:06:53.696,0:06:56.768 You go out into that place[br]where there's nobody there to perform, 0:06:56.792,0:06:59.172 and the ego has nothing to do,[br]and it crumbles, 0:06:59.196,0:07:01.355 and only then are you capable[br]of being loved. 0:07:01.712,0:07:05.049 I have a friend who said[br]that when her daughter was born, 0:07:05.073,0:07:08.676 she realized that she loved her[br]more than evolution required. 0:07:09.041,0:07:10.184 (Laughter) 0:07:10.208,0:07:11.613 And I've always loved that. 0:07:11.637,0:07:12.779 (Applause) 0:07:12.803,0:07:15.760 Because it talks about the peace[br]that's at the deep of ourself, 0:07:15.784,0:07:18.489 our inexplicable care for one another. 0:07:18.513,0:07:21.457 And when you touch that spot,[br]you're ready to be rescued. 0:07:21.815,0:07:24.131 The hard thing about[br]when you're in the valley 0:07:25.300,0:07:26.648 is that you can't climb out; 0:07:26.672,0:07:28.829 somebody has to reach in and pull you out. 0:07:29.331,0:07:30.486 It happened to me. 0:07:30.510,0:07:34.037 I got, luckily, invited over to a house[br]by a couple named Kathy and David, 0:07:34.061,0:07:35.466 and they were -- 0:07:36.196,0:07:38.871 They had a kid in the DC[br]public school, his name's Santi. 0:07:38.895,0:07:40.997 Santi had a friend[br]who needed a place to stay 0:07:41.021,0:07:42.887 because his mom had some health issues. 0:07:42.911,0:07:45.593 And then that kid had a friend[br]and that kid had a friend. 0:07:45.617,0:07:47.625 When I went to their house six years ago, 0:07:47.649,0:07:50.546 I walk in the door, there's like[br]25 around the kitchen table, 0:07:50.570,0:07:52.919 a whole bunch sleeping[br]downstairs in the basement. 0:07:52.943,0:07:55.006 I reach out to introduce myself to a kid, 0:07:55.030,0:07:57.634 and he says, "We don't really[br]shake hands here. 0:07:58.331,0:07:59.779 We just hug here." 0:08:00.323,0:08:03.299 And I'm not the huggiest guy[br]on the face of the earth, 0:08:03.323,0:08:06.902 but I've been going back to that home[br]every Thursday night when I'm in town, 0:08:06.926,0:08:08.470 and just hugging all those kids. 0:08:08.494,0:08:10.379 They demand intimacy. 0:08:10.403,0:08:14.013 They demand that you behave in a way[br]where you're showing all the way up. 0:08:14.442,0:08:16.236 And they teach you a new way to live, 0:08:16.260,0:08:18.561 which is the cure[br]for all the ills of our culture 0:08:18.585,0:08:21.531 which is a way of direct --[br]really putting relationship first, 0:08:21.555,0:08:24.725 not just as a word, but as a reality. 0:08:25.557,0:08:29.628 And the beautiful thing is,[br]these communities are everywhere. 0:08:29.652,0:08:33.299 I started something at the Aspen Institute[br]called "Weave: The Social Fabric." 0:08:33.323,0:08:34.479 This is our logo here. 0:08:34.503,0:08:38.236 And we plop into a place and we find[br]weavers anywhere, everywhere. 0:08:38.761,0:08:41.278 We find people like Asiaha Butler,[br]who grew up in -- 0:08:42.056,0:08:44.873 who lived in Chicago, in Englewood,[br]in a tough neighborhood. 0:08:44.897,0:08:47.850 And she was about to move[br]because it was so dangerous, 0:08:48.173,0:08:51.041 and she looked across the street[br]and she saw two little girls 0:08:51.065,0:08:53.141 playing in an empty lot[br]with broken bottles, 0:08:53.165,0:08:56.347 and she turned to her husband[br]and she said, "We're not leaving. 0:08:56.371,0:08:59.347 We're not going to be just another family[br]that abandoned that." 0:08:59.371,0:09:02.579 And she Googled "volunteer in Englewood,"[br]and now she runs R.A.G.E., 0:09:02.603,0:09:04.400 the big community organization there. 0:09:04.424,0:09:07.403 Some of these people[br]have had tough valleys. 0:09:07.427,0:09:11.132 I met a woman named Sarah in Ohio[br]who came home from an antiquing trip 0:09:11.156,0:09:14.918 and found that her husband[br]had killed himself and their two kids. 0:09:15.815,0:09:19.195 She now runs a free pharmacy,[br]she volunteers in the community, 0:09:19.219,0:09:22.211 she helps women cope[br]with violence, she teaches. 0:09:22.235,0:09:25.299 She told me, "I grew from this[br]experience because I was angry. 0:09:25.323,0:09:28.093 I was going to fight back against[br]what he tried to do to me 0:09:28.117,0:09:29.863 by making a difference in the world. 0:09:29.887,0:09:31.942 See, he didn't kill me. 0:09:31.966,0:09:33.151 My response to him is, 0:09:33.175,0:09:37.371 'Whatever you meant to do to me,[br]screw you, you're not going to do it.'" 0:09:38.029,0:09:41.402 These weavers are not living[br]an individualistic life, 0:09:41.426,0:09:44.799 they're living a relationist life,[br]they have a different set of values. 0:09:44.823,0:09:46.243 They have moral motivations. 0:09:46.267,0:09:49.395 They have vocational certitude,[br]they have planted themselves down. 0:09:49.419,0:09:51.006 I met a guy in Youngstown, Ohio, 0:09:51.030,0:09:53.061 who just held up a sign[br]in the town square, 0:09:53.085,0:09:54.236 "Defend Youngstown." 0:09:54.260,0:09:56.133 They have radical mutuality, 0:09:56.157,0:09:58.690 and they are geniuses at relationship. 0:09:59.180,0:10:00.855 There's a woman named Mary Gordon 0:10:00.879,0:10:03.002 who runs something[br]called Roots of Empathy. 0:10:03.026,0:10:06.291 And what they do is they take[br]a bunch of kids, an eighth grade class, 0:10:06.315,0:10:08.054 they put a mom and an infant, 0:10:08.078,0:10:11.102 and then the students have to guess[br]what the infant is thinking, 0:10:11.126,0:10:12.277 to teach empathy. 0:10:12.301,0:10:15.407 There was one kid in a class[br]who was bigger than the rest 0:10:15.431,0:10:19.014 because he'd been held back,[br]been through the foster care system, 0:10:19.038,0:10:20.664 seen his mom get killed. 0:10:20.688,0:10:22.569 And he wanted to hold the baby. 0:10:22.593,0:10:25.228 And the mom was nervous[br]because he looked big and scary. 0:10:25.252,0:10:27.847 But she let this kid,[br]Darren, hold the baby. 0:10:27.871,0:10:29.720 He held it, and he was great with it. 0:10:31.014,0:10:34.500 He gave the baby back and started[br]asking questions about parenthood. 0:10:35.015,0:10:36.944 And his final question was, 0:10:36.968,0:10:40.269 "If nobody has ever loved you,[br]do you think you can be a good father?" 0:10:40.642,0:10:42.309 And so what Roots of Empathy does 0:10:42.333,0:10:45.053 is they reach down and they grab[br]people out of the valley. 0:10:45.077,0:10:46.930 And that's what weavers are doing. 0:10:49.300,0:10:51.487 Some of them switch jobs. 0:10:51.950,0:10:54.481 Some of them stay in their same jobs. 0:10:54.982,0:10:57.482 But one thing is,[br]they have an intensity to them. 0:10:57.982,0:10:59.365 I read this -- 0:10:59.389,0:11:05.376 E.O. Wilson wrote a great book[br]called "Naturalist," about his childhood. 0:11:05.712,0:11:08.411 When he was seven,[br]his parents were divorcing. 0:11:09.291,0:11:12.458 And they sent him[br]to Paradise Beach in North Florida. 0:11:12.482,0:11:14.318 And he'd never seen the ocean before. 0:11:14.731,0:11:17.062 And he'd never seen a jellyfish before. 0:11:17.086,0:11:21.177 He wrote, "The creature was astonishing.[br]It existed beyond my imagination." 0:11:21.596,0:11:23.257 He was sitting on the dock one day 0:11:23.281,0:11:26.018 and he saw a stingray[br]float beneath his feet. 0:11:26.365,0:11:30.445 And at that moment, a naturalist was born[br]in the awe and wonder. 0:11:30.469,0:11:32.614 And he makes this observation: 0:11:32.638,0:11:33.855 that when you're a child, 0:11:33.879,0:11:37.026 you see animals at twice the size[br]as you do as an adult. 0:11:38.162,0:11:39.936 And that has always impressed me, 0:11:39.960,0:11:44.720 because what we want as kids[br]is that moral intensity, 0:11:44.744,0:11:47.688 to be totally given ourselves[br]over to something 0:11:47.712,0:11:50.046 and to find that level of vocation. 0:11:50.480,0:11:52.449 And when you are around these weavers, 0:11:52.473,0:11:55.441 they see other people[br]at twice the size as normal people. 0:11:55.465,0:11:57.198 They see deeper into them. 0:11:57.997,0:12:00.155 And what they see is joy. 0:12:01.315,0:12:04.719 On the first mountain of our life,[br]when we're shooting for our career, 0:12:04.743,0:12:06.902 we shoot for happiness. 0:12:07.649,0:12:10.696 And happiness is good,[br]it's the expansion of self. 0:12:10.720,0:12:12.466 You win a victory, 0:12:12.490,0:12:16.483 you get a promotion,[br]your team wins the Super Bowl, 0:12:16.507,0:12:17.657 you're happy. 0:12:18.149,0:12:21.870 Joy is not the expansion of self,[br]it's the dissolving of self. 0:12:22.764,0:12:27.002 It's the moment when the skin barrier[br]disappears between a mother and her child, 0:12:27.026,0:12:30.335 it's the moment when a naturalist[br]feels just free in nature. 0:12:31.232,0:12:34.177 It's the moment where you're so lost[br]in your work or a cause, 0:12:34.201,0:12:36.201 you have totally self-forgotten. 0:12:36.649,0:12:39.535 And joy is a better thing[br]to aim for than happiness. 0:12:39.559,0:12:42.600 I collect passages of joy[br]of people when they lose it. 0:12:42.624,0:12:44.871 One of my favorite is from Zadie Smith. 0:12:44.895,0:12:48.205 In 1999, she was in a London nightclub, 0:12:48.229,0:12:51.324 looking for her friends,[br]wondering where her handbag was. 0:12:51.348,0:12:53.451 And suddenly, as she writes, 0:12:53.475,0:12:56.797 "... a rail-thin man with enormous eyes[br]reached across a sea of bodies 0:12:56.821,0:12:57.997 for my hand. 0:12:58.021,0:13:01.760 He kept asking me the same thing[br]over and over, 'Are you feeling it?' 0:13:01.784,0:13:05.633 My ridiculous heels were killing me,[br]I was terrified that I might die, 0:13:05.657,0:13:08.105 yet I felt simultaneously[br]overwhelmed with delight 0:13:08.129,0:13:10.440 that 'Can I Kick it?'[br]should happen to be playing 0:13:10.464,0:13:12.810 on this precise moment[br]in the history of the world 0:13:12.834,0:13:13.989 on the sound system, 0:13:14.013,0:13:16.141 and it was now morphing[br]into 'Teen Spirit.' 0:13:16.165,0:13:19.323 I took the man's hand,[br]the top of my head blew away, 0:13:19.347,0:13:22.747 we danced, we danced,[br]we gave ourselves up to joy." 0:13:23.680,0:13:27.486 And so what I'm trying to describe[br]is two different life mindsets. 0:13:27.998,0:13:32.466 The first mountain mindset, which is about[br]individual happiness and career success. 0:13:32.490,0:13:35.053 And it's a good mindset,[br]I have nothing against it. 0:13:35.077,0:13:37.371 But we're in a national valley, 0:13:37.395,0:13:40.228 because we don't have[br]the other mindset to balance it. 0:13:40.252,0:13:42.815 We no longer feel good[br]about ourselves as a people, 0:13:42.839,0:13:45.529 we've lost our defining[br]faith in our future, 0:13:45.553,0:13:48.935 we don't see each other deeply,[br]we don't treat each other as well. 0:13:49.538,0:13:51.529 And we need a lot of changes. 0:13:51.553,0:13:54.259 We need an economic change[br]and environmental change. 0:13:54.902,0:13:57.847 But we also need a cultural[br]and relational revolution. 0:13:57.871,0:14:02.141 We need to name the language[br]of a recovered society. 0:14:02.553,0:14:05.291 And to me, the weavers[br]have found that language. 0:14:05.593,0:14:08.694 My theory of social change[br]is that society changes 0:14:08.718,0:14:11.363 when a small group of people[br]find a better way to live, 0:14:11.387,0:14:13.062 and the rest of us copy them. 0:14:13.765,0:14:16.403 And these weavers have found[br]a better way to live. 0:14:16.427,0:14:18.380 And you don't have to theorize about it. 0:14:18.404,0:14:21.633 They are out there as community builders[br]all around the country. 0:14:22.277,0:14:24.554 We just have to shift our lives a little, 0:14:24.578,0:14:27.309 so we can say, "I'm a weaver,[br]we're a weaver." 0:14:27.999,0:14:29.365 And if we do that, 0:14:30.079,0:14:32.428 the hole inside ourselves gets filled, 0:14:32.452,0:14:35.277 but more important,[br]the social unity gets repaired. 0:14:35.301,0:14:36.468 Thank you very much. 0:14:36.492,0:14:40.557 (Applause)