30. Rebuilding Meaning (w/ Ellie Hain)

Social imaginarian Ellie Hain joins me to talk about her new project, Rebuilding Meaning, a multi-layered endeavor to rethink meaning, value, and the sacred in a way that can help bring color and vibrancy back to existence and cut through the proliferation of b******t in modern life. We talk about moving from paradigm thinking to the crafting of ideology, the nature and reality of the meaning crisis, what is meant by "the sacred," the idea of "the void," social norms vs. emergent value, and what it looks like to architect new cultural realities for the future.0:00 Introduction0:58 From Mapping Social Imaginaries to Articulating Ideologies7:36 New Myths10:30 Is There Actually a Meaning Crisis?17:01 The Sacred, the Profane, and the Meaningful22:46 The Void: Chaos and Possibility28:34 Rigid Social Norms vs. Emergent Autonomy35:10 Creating New Systems41:37 Follow-Through46:32 Imagining a Beautiful Future55:25 A Values-Driven Pluralism Get full access to Brendan Graham Dempsey at brendangrahamdempsey.substack.com/subscribe