There are an infinite number of possible futures that lie ahead of us—quantum threads stretching out into the distance. Rob Hopkins, cofounder of the international Transition Network, invites us to travel to future worlds we would actually want to live in.
In 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted every aspect of daily life, Rob responded the way a lot of people did: by starting a podcast. But it wasn’t any ordinary podcast. In each episode, Rob and his guests would “time travel” together to the year 2030—walking down imagined future streets, talking with imagined future neighbors, visiting imagined future local businesses. While Rob’s guests came from all walks of life—economists, politicians, bakers, comedians, novelists and more—they all shared a willingness to suspend their worries about the future long enough to mentally inhabit and then describe a world they were thrilled to be a part of.
What Rob discovered was no less profound: this simple exercise of visiting a positive future forced him to rethink the work he’d been doing as a climate activist for decades. From the life and writings of musician Sun Ra and the history of Black utopian movements to the latest neuroscience on what goes on in our minds—and hearts—when we “time travel,” Rob brings essential new thinking to anyone overwhelmed with dread and anxiety for the future. In this talk, he asks us to consider: what would the world look like if we all got to work imagining—and then building—a world we were deeply in love with?
This event was held in partnership with Chelsea Green Publishing.
