Heather Radke

And stuff that was coming out of his mouth.

Really surprised me.

And I don't remember exactly what we talked about, but towards the end of that conversation, I asked him, I said, would you be willing to be my mentor?

I've just not had exposure to anybody as wonderfully strange as you.

He agreed, and that became the beginning of quite a partnership over time.

You know, that was, that must have been 82, I guess.

And, you know, from then to the time he died in 2014.

It was his way of articulating the through line from psychology and how we are formed as human beings, you know, through family, religious, and, you know, all the various influences that come in to influence who we are and how that plays out in the world.

And then the thing that really intrigued me was how he was...

applying that or extending his philosophy to the world of politics.

Because for him, everything began, all policy, if you really unpack it, is based on some really fundamental assumptions.

The politics we do is who we are.

And John's message was this, the title of his talk at that time was A Liberating Vision.

For John, if we are to have a people-first culture, and if we are to ask people to grow, we need to orient all our policies, all our efforts.

With the beginning view that humans are at the root.

He really embraced Carl Rogers' view of humans being like plants.

That given the right conditions, they'll almost always orient to the sun.

That humans will, you know, if they're not screwed up, will orient to what's positive for them and those around them.

But the problem here is... He's espousing this liberating vision for everybody.

Yeah, exactly.