Latest / Share Your Fire / Share Your Fire, Ep. 11 - Positive Values in Action (Charles Fowler)
Transcript
- John Verrico: Hello, welcome to another fantastic episode of Share Your Fire. My guest today is truly inspiring. It's Charles Fowler coming to us from London, England. And Charles is a proponent for positive values and getting positive values instilled in youth and in our society. And he is behind and the catalyst for so many movements in positive values. Let me just bring him in. You're gonna love this guy. Charles, good morning, how are you today, sir? Charles Fowler: I'm fine John, I'm just a bit worried that I'm a bit dark over here. It's not middle of the night in England but somehow the technology has conspired to make me look a little bit dull but bear with me on that. John Verrico: you're all fine. We can see you, we can hear you. That's all that truly matters. Charles, you have been just very inspirational. I I've known you now for a couple of years, through the World Values Day movement. And I you know, I'd like to refer to you as the catalyst behind that. I think you came up with the idea and first of all, like where did this all come from? Charles Fowler: Well, it's, it came, the story could be a long one, so I won't try and, I'll try and keep it reasonably short. It came because in, about 13, 14 years ago, I joined up with a whole bunch of people in the UK, in England, actually England, Scotland and the whole of the UK. And we all came together because there'd been a big survey done. Same survey have been done all around the world, including the US, Canada, your great friends, lots of countries in Europe, Africa, Asia, all over the world. And the survey usually comes in with the same results. They take a good representative slice of the population and they ask people about their values. it works like this. 60 to 70 percent of population come up with what you describe as positive values. They come up with words like love and truth and respect and gratitude, all these great words. And then they ask them about the society they live in and they come up with words which are just like sort of night after day. mean, words like corruption and blame and violence and oppression. all these words come up. So this happened in the UK in 2012 and it sort of sparked, it was a catalyst to use your word, of a whole bunch of people getting together and saying well what can we do about this because actually if everybody apparently or most people have all these wonderful values, not just in this country but around the world, what on earth is happening really? We obviously are not putting our values into practice otherwise. We wouldn't be sitting here with wonderful values, but looking at our society around us, the country around us, and indeed the world around us, which doesn't really look as though it's got those values, you know, where we see the opposite. I mean, you can say maybe people's views of the world are a little bit negatively influenced by the 24-hour news feeds, all the negativity we get. you know, all the day, every day. But John Verrico: We are bombar we are bombarded with negativity. Yeah. Charles Fowler: even so, the fact is we don't live in societies which seems to show those values. I mean, it's just nowhere. It's not just the UK. It's not just the US. Every country, pretty much the same response. So anyway, just dealing with the UK for the moment. We thought we, you know, you can't just sit and let that go by you and not do something. So We all got together and we started this organization called the UK Values Alliance. But then the amazing thing is we realized that there was so many people operating in this field. I didn't even know it was a field. I barely knew it was a thing, values, at that point. I've been involved, maybe I'll tell you a bit more about that. I've been involved a bit with values before that. But suddenly I realized that there's people doing stuff with values all over the place, using values, using the approach which is basically trying to make people aware of their values, trying to help people put those values into action, just really alerting people to their own values, not to my values, your values, but their own values, and say, you've got these values, and as it turns out, people just as the survey showed, have all these positive values somehow built into them, nature, nurture, you know, another discussion, but they have these values, but they don't put them into action. So we got together and really tried to decide what we could do. As I was saying, I was amazed by the number of people that are using values in terms of, know, work, corporate transformational work, and organisational transformation work. So public sector, private sector, charities, NGOs, non-profits, as you would call them. in individuals, people who are coaching individuals, life coaches and others, people operating in all sorts of spheres of life, using values very consciously. And I also discovered, and we all discovered really, there's a huge amount of research that's been done on values and what values are and what the conscious use of values in our lives can actually do what positive benefits they can have. And none of this was apparent to me at the time or to any of us really. But all these things came together at a particular point in time. So we decided to start up this movement in the UK, which is still going on. And I'm one of the ones helping to run it these days and have been for some time. But a few years later, that was in 2013, in 2016, three years after that. we were thinking, well, it's not just the UK where this is going on, it's all the way around the world. Because by that time, we not only realized there was this really quite large number of people in the UK working in the field of values, but it was obvious to us by that time, was the same thing was happening around the world. We'd already begun to tap into each other's networks, little networks, and sort of putting together a big network. And that was really the motivation. behind starting World Values Day, really to try and connect all these people around the world doing just amazing things. The other thing that's been amazing for me is finding out what people are doing that is consciously values-based, values-driven. mean, there is huge, wonderful work going on around the world, either that is very values-based, either implicitly or explicitly. And we started finding out. what we wanted to do was really just bring that news to as many people as we could. And I suppose the way it began to work very rapidly was that we, naturally really, we put the word out to all the people that we knew around the world who were active in this field and got them involved in all countries really, all continents, not quite all countries, but all continents. all around the world. And that sort of caucus of people, that core of people, really is the engine of World Values Day. And then on the basis of that core of people who are, if you like, values activists, it all sounds a bit grand, but that's, I guess, you've got. John Verrico: I like that term actually. Charles Fowler: They've all got their networks, they're all on social media. We were doing this, I suppose. this whole thing just as social media really started a surge in the 2013, 2016, those early years of social media. And we reached out. We were amazed at the reach that we got, really, because it only needs a few hundred, maybe a few thousand of these activists. And suddenly you're reaching millions of people around the world. And that was really the story of World Values. That's how it started. It was sort of my idea, as you mentioned, to do it, but it was basically this whole team of people from not just the UK Values Alliance, but people who became the US Values Alliance, which is still going very strong and thriving, and other similar organizations around the world, notably in Sweden, and I mean, quite a lot of them everywhere, either called alliances or called whatever. been the story ever since that that's what we've been doing just trying to get out and trying to say to people hey you know wonderful work being done by lots of people around the world so because people respond to example don't they they respond to people doing stuff so we were able to we're able to show what people are doing around the world and saying look this is this is what you can do too I mean just be more aware of your values you have these values in you you know them as soon as you sort of interrogate yourself or you know do one of our questionnaires or whatever you want to do you know you discover that you have those values and others have done that exploration already but let's just try consciously to put it into action the third step of World Values Day is to share it with the world so think of the values that are important to you put them into action in some way or other I mean not just once obviously keep on doing it and share John Verrico: Right here. Charles Fowler: the rest of the world that's the campaign so that happens once a year, every year, but it's not something that really we want to just stop doing, obviously, just after one day. It's something that hopefully provides, again, to use your word, catalysts, provides a catalyst for people to do stuff, to get together, to make connections, to make collaborations together and work together through the rest of the year. John Verrico: I think that's the idea behind all of this, right? You want to you you you bring something to light, you kind of show people some opportunities and options of how they can kind of realign their their actions in their daily life to the values that they hold dear. What do you think is the reason why? I mean, you've been in involved in this field for quite a while. What do you think is the reason why we there's such a huge disconnect? in the the values that people say that they have, the positive values, you know, love and and companionship and compassion and all those things. And at the same time, the way they operate, the way they act toward each other, the actions that they take on a daily basis seem to be such a so far out of alignment with those values. Charles Fowler: Yeah, I mean, this is the great puzzle, isn't it? It's not a total puzzle, I think, because I think probably the main reasons, one we've already mentioned, which is that people, and this is actually backed up by the research, when people are questioned about, carefully about this, it turns out that people believe that although they have good values themselves, I have good values. My family has good values, the people, yeah, my neighbors, my friends, they have pretty good values too. But all the people out there who basically the people I don't know so well, the John Verrico: Yeah. Charles Fowler: rest of the city, the rest of the country, the rest of the world, it's full of people, they're out for themselves and not, and that's so that people have an actually a false idea of other people. And that's really part of it. And why do they have that? you've got to go back probably into lots of behavioral psychology, the history of our evolution, John Verrico: Right. Charles Fowler: the negativity bars that we seem to have evolved on the prairies, when we were being hunting the animals, the animals hunting us and we're on the lookout for bad news, something bad coming over the horizon, some hungry lion or whatever it was. And so we respond more to negative things. the fear and fight or fight, we're going to be disposed to run away or at least get ourselves ready for a fight. So that negativity bias is there. The even more primal element there, I think, in our psychology is that we're full of competing values, if you like, John Verrico: Yes. Charles Fowler: and not all values are positive. which is why you carefully phrased, put the word positive before values when you introduce this. Yeah, I mean, we have values that are more difficult and more antisocial. They're all about selfishness. They're all about what we want. So it's ego really, isn't it? So our John Verrico: Right. Charles Fowler: ego drives our selfish ego drives us to really pay more attention a lot of the time to our immediate desires or our immediate fears for that matter. So we often are more motivated by, you know, sometimes good desires, desire for security, desire for safety, you know, and those make us predisposed to be hostile to you know, being strangers and possible threats or make it opposite. John Verrico: Right. And perceived threats exactly from other sources. Charles Fowler: Exactly. Or make us want to, you know, accumulate. We want to look after our families very naturally. We're nothing wrong with that. But, you know, we therefore we tell ourselves, you know, just we need to get more money. We need to get more whatever it is to look after my family. That's what I need to concentrate on. OK, yeah, I mean, but I've got this job. I need to keep this job. I need to do this. So we're driven by competing. I mean, they are values-based, whether consciously or unconsciously, but they're not positive values. They're not what people call the prosocial values. What I like calling the human values, I think the human values are really what I feel are the positive values. They are our common humanity, John Verrico: There we go. Charles Fowler: what connects us together, and they're what make us compassionate entities. We look at someone else and we don't just say, what's in it for me if I go and help that fellow over there or that whatever it is or that animal over there. But we just do it because that's wired into us. So I think all these are really what is stopping us. It's negativity. It's just short-sighted egotism, selfishness, I think. We can be very self-centered. And this is not like, I'm like this and you're like that. It's all tied up in one, each of us, isn't it? We've all got these impulses. We would be ridiculous, we probably wouldn't still be there, we'd be floating in some sort of flapping our wings in some angelic sphere if we were perfect human beings. We're not. We're John Verrico: Ha ha ha. Charles Fowler: not perfectly virtuous. We are complicated beings and the connection with other human beings can absolutely transform us for the better and does. Many people that are people working in compassionate roles, all of that is true, but it can also be something that makes us competitive, that makes us overly anxious, fearful for our own security, our future, and that makes us, you know, that creates that. John Verrico: You you you you bring out a good point and so many of us have the same same positive values, but the way we enact them, we we kind of limit because of competitiveness, we kinda limit who we use those values with and we put up these barriers and walls and maybe treat the people Charles Fowler: Yeah. John Verrico: outside of those things differently and completely counter to what our values may seem to be. because we're trying to protect our own values within our own little ni. Charles Fowler: No, think you've put it very well, John. I think that's absolutely where we are. We're human beings with all the fallibilities of human beings. Which means that this is probably a never-ending battle to get us, you know, get all of us to be constantly more more aware of our values. You you get there a bit and then you lose it. It doesn't stop. But that's why I think One of the aspects of our campaign, which is very important, is trying to take that out into places where people do get together. So it's not just really directed at individuals. We're trying to get organizations of all kinds that are saying in the public sector, in the private sector, governments themselves, which is tough. But there are signs of progress, amazingly, I think. I'm not saying it's challenge of our campaign necessarily. But there is movement. My background is I'm a lawyer by training, which some people will roll their eyes at and say, well, not a very values-based profession. I don't. I don't entirely John Verrico: I was I was going to hint that, but I didn't Charles Fowler: agree. But yeah, know why people say that. It is a profession where there's a search for the truth. The truth is very important. And that's one of my top values, personally. But then I went into another profession which was as a lawyer initially, but really as a manager quite quickly, which is financial services. And again, you might think, aha, okay, nor are always the best values. John Verrico: Different set of values. Charles Fowler: So, I mean, I speak from experience really, and I know how easy it is for people who I know. you know, wonderful family people, they're looking after their aged parents, they're looking after their children. They're actually strong pillars of the community, the local community. But when they are at work, they've got all sorts of pressures on them and they don't necessarily behave the way they do. It's not the face they show to the rest of the world. And, you know, I think that is, and that does mean that there is an opportunity in addressing organizations. So we do address them because that's where people are a lot of the time. That's what drives a lot of the behavior and that's what drives our societies, a large chunk of it. So, and the change there has been amazing. mean, when I was in the law or when I was in business, people didn't talk. I never heard anyone mention the word values, I think practically the whole time. I mean, admittedly, this was probably when I was there. I haven't been really involved in business for 10, 15 years, but... It's changed hugely since then. We now have a situation where any company around the world or any organization of any kind, as public sector too, if you say, you have values, they would just look at you and say, of course we have our values. And they may even be able to list them with a bit of luck. John Verrico: Right. Charles Fowler: Do they put those values into action? Well, That's the interesting issue. But at least they're aware that they need to have them. And that's a big change. In England, actually, they're audited. The top 100 companies in the stock market are audited on their values. mean, they have to prove that they're not only gotten them somewhere sort of on the report in accounts or on the reception desk, but they actually have to show what they do. to make sure that they're put into practice throughout their organization. Is there a thorough system for assessing impact and effectiveness of the values? So this is a remarkable change around. So the organizational area is great. We have a lot of organizations of every kind, private and public sector involved, multinationals, small, local businesses, of every kind. And lot of health care organizations. and local governments, state governments, federal government, we have all sorts of people involved in World Values Day. And that's amazing to me because I think that's the big movement I see. mean, last year, last World Values Day, it's October every year, as you know, I was just looking through the social media feeds after the day and I saw, what's this from Kenya? The government at Kenya were backing World Values Day. They're celebrating World Values Day. I hadn't realized I had this whole values program through the government. This is one of the ministries that I got on the website and I just had no idea. Isn't that amazing? And so it's a sort of it's a viral thing, this campaign, but it's uncovered all these amazing things. And they're not the only government and a lot of governments that consciously are trying to embed values throughout the whole government structures. And, know, what degree of success, how do they monitor that? Lots of questions. It's still a pretty good start, think, in many ways. John Verrico: You know, as we were talking, I was listening to some of the things that you were talking about and the way people operate and businesses operate, and you talk about the financial sector. Let me ask you this, because this comes up in conversations that I've had with people about values. What would you say would be the difference between ethics and values? Charles Fowler: I'm probably not the person to talk about this because I try and the definition. A lot of my work, more recently especially, is with academics because I find this whole area of research and values so interesting and important because people want something that's evidence-based. So it's best to ask the academics. I'm now a bit more careful about what I say about these things, but I think values are what underlie ethics. So ethics are really values in action, it seems to me. And it's judgmental, it's labeling, it tends to what ethics tends to get put into codes of ethics. All of that is good, but I think it's a step on from values. Values are fundamentally what lies behind ethics. What's the difference between values and morality? That's another interesting question. But again, I think I'd say the same. values is really what underlies it. Where do values come from? I think, again, a very interesting question, which the academics probably have, well, actually, of course, they have more than one answer because that's the John Verrico: Of course they do. Charles Fowler: nature of it, and hotly debated. But, you know, for me, they clearly come from a mixture of nature and nurture. I think they're hardwired into us, at least to some extent, probably to large extent. But clearly the research does show that the early years, that your experience in your early years has a huge impact. And that as you go through the John Verrico: Yeah, the formative years, yes. Charles Fowler: early years, the formative years, and then as you get older through the teens, still, you're still, they're still being molded by what you experience, what you read, what you learn, role models that you observe, and obviously your parents, but also family members, but also teachers, peers, all of these, all of these people are going to have a big impact. And then of course, you're these days what you're seeing or experiencing on social media, sadly, and media, which are not all bad. Of course, that's not all bad, but it's still, you know, another very potent influence. all this is. Yeah, I just want to. John Verrico: A absolutely, and it seems to be a a gr great source a great source of a lot of the negativity that we talked about early on in the discussion. Yeah. Charles Fowler: Yeah, so I think our values form really mostly and don't shift that much subsequently, but they do shift. mean, people can shift, they can become more aware. I mean, myself, I really was, I was living a values based life, but I certainly wasn't consciously living a values based life until I came across the charity, which I, you know, they wrote me into. help raise some money for a charity. My wife introduced me to someone and they were running this educational charity and I said, okay fine, I'll help and I helped. And then they said, well come and help a bit more. And I ended up being a trustee of this charity, a non-profit in your terminology. And that's John Verrico: And which one is that? Charles Fowler: called Human Values Foundation and they use programs based on values. to help children grow up in a healthy way, essentially. All that side of education that's not the academic side but to do with personal development, Social skills, understanding yourself, understanding others, relationship between you and others, all that sort of stuff. And children are just brilliant. And when I saw children responding to, in such an amazing, pure, yet quite sophisticated way, having discussions, kids of five, six, seven, you know, any age obviously, but even these very young, young children talking about values and yes, what do you do when something, somebody does something unpleasant to you, someone takes your toy or bashes you or, you know, and they come up with, you have, don't bash them back. No, no, we don't bash them back. do and they explain why and how, isn't that amazing? And if the kids are John Verrico: Well, yes. Charles Fowler: running well, that would be, that'd be quite something. By the time they are, course, they've changed quite a lot because they've been through adolescence. They've experienced the world a more and they're different by that time. And they're much more in business. For about 11 years on, they start this business of, I have good values, but other people don't. That starts to come about at that age. John Verrico: Yeah. And that's what that's what children kind of start trying to feel their way into how they fit into society and they want to try to stand out more. they're looking for their individualism less than the than the playmates. Charles Fowler: Yes, all sorts of things kicking in, think. But I think what happens is that the trust goes. They realize that the world is less of a, you know, more of difficult place, a place that they can't entirely trust. But it happens pretty consistently for almost all children. So the evidence seems to show in every nation, culture, continent, you know, it's pretty much the same process, pretty much the same age. And again, all these things keeping it as you're saying social media John Verrico: Right. Yes. Yeah. Charles Fowler: and the news cycle, is most of the news we see is bad news. That's always been the case. But now it's just so much more omnipresent. John Verrico: You know, like you said, you got in you got involved with the Human Values Foundation and you you chair that organization now, is that not correct? Charles Fowler: Yeah, after a while they wanted me to chair it. And so that was really why I got involved in what I described to you earlier, the UK values aren't, then world values are. So that was the way I sort of, it opened my eyes to values. I hadn't realised they were a thing before. Suddenly I realised, wow, you know, isn't that amazing? And not only that, I experienced it. It's an experience really, because I actually experienced talking about values, like the kids experience. I was experiencing the energy that you get when you talk about nice John Verrico: Nice. Yes. Charles Fowler: things like that, about compassion, about being how you behave. It's not just the words, it's how those words translate into real life actions, know, what we do when we're inspired to help other people, to help ourselves too. And that's the magic, really, it's experiential. That's John Verrico: And and that's the magic right there. Yeah. Yeah. Charles Fowler: why I'm sort of, you know, I want to have all this academics. evidence backing all this up, which is accumulating amazingly. But the real driver is experience. People, once you experience this, living according to your value, this goes back. It's not a new thing, is it? It goes back to the Greek for Aristotle. know, life, happiness in life is all about leading a virtuous life, doing what's worth doing for its own sake, for John Verrico: Yes. Charles Fowler: its intrinsic value. That's what makes life worth living. John Verrico: That's exactly it. And and Charles, you really are a a classic example of this. You you really are. You're very inspiring. And I wanna talk before we run out of time, I wanna talk about and your conversation is leading us there too, the this doing for others and and and all of this. And I know the theme this year is on volunteering. Charles Fowler: Values and volunteering is the theme. It's a bit different. try and have a different theme every year. We try and have something that will re-energize, reset, refresh the campaign each year. As I say, it's an annual campaign, so you need to just have some different way of looking. And volunteering just fell into place because this year is the UN year of volunteering, it turns out, although... We didn't know that until we started doing the research. But this is fantastic. And suddenly, when you start researching it, you see all this amazing work, volunteer work that's going on around the world. And we wanted to frame it as volunteering, which is not just volunteering in the formal sense, which is great. mean, a lot of us do formal volunteer work in organizations, structured. But actually it's volunteering for us, the way we frame it is it can be informal as well. So it's actually putting your values into action in a way that brings, does something helpful, doing something, it's really doing something helpful, doing something good for other people without expecting any reward or recognition. So it's just doing, if you like, an act of kindness or an act of helpfulness or something good for others. And that can be just spur of the moment. can be just, you you're in the street and you see something happening, which may be unspectacular. You know, someone needs help with a bag or getting onto a... John Verrico: Just just holding a door for somebody. Charles Fowler: holding a door, getting onto a public bus or whatever it is. John Verrico: I I I I love it. So World Values Day is on October fifteenth. Charles Fowler: Yeah. John Verrico: It's the same day every year, correct? The same date every year. Charles Fowler: Well, no, it's the same formula. It's the third Thursday of... So it means John Verrico: Third Thursday, that's what it was. Okay. Charles Fowler: that, you the day changes basically by day each year. And it's always on a Thursday. It's always the third one in the month. And the idea really is just so that we don't... We want to it on a weekday and we don't want to, you know, if you just have it a fixed date each year, quite quickly you get into a weekend. And that's John Verrico: Right. Yeah. Charles Fowler: fine. but we want to get through to people at where they are during the week, in their organizations, in their schools. Schools are big part of this, schools at all levels, universities, workplaces. I mean, that's where we've confined people and get through to them a lot. And we want those organizations to get involved, not just to be a personal thing at the weekend. John Verrico: And how could people get involved with World Values Day? Charles Fowler: They can get into that. mean, you go to the website, which is very simple worldvaluesday.com and you'll see lots of there's a how to get involved page. And essentially what we ask people is every year it's the same thing. I mean, there's all sorts of different ways you can do it, but this is the same thing. It's what I said earlier. It's think of the value or a value, the value that's most important to you at the moment. Do something to put that value into action. make it come to life for you, for others. can be something just on your own, but it can be with somebody else. It can be in a work context, home, family, recreational. Do something to put into action and share it. So that's basically what we ask people to do. But we do have a lot of resources. We have lot of resources with suggestions. We've got a pack for schools. We've got a values challenge. We've got values guides. We've got all sorts of stuff on the website. A lot of John Verrico: They Charles Fowler: people do it, they also have some templates. can write this out, and people do this for social media. You can either do it digitally or print out a form. I value XYZ, whatever it is. I value love, gratitude, doing good or whatever it is. And so I, what do I do? I'm going and doing a kind thing, random kind act or I'm... to smart it everyone today or whatever it is. And then share it by, and you can hold up this or you can paste it on electronically onto a selfie. And people do that every year and it's good because it's people, the power of example, you know, an image, people do it. John Verrico: Exactly what I was gonna say. The power of example, right? And you're helping to bring light to all these great examples around the world, through World Values Day, through your work with the Human Values Foundation. And you're also doing something we've mentioned multiple times now, you know, youth and education. And so there's another organization that you're with called the Global Alliance for Values Based Education, which a nice nice acronym of GAVE. I'd love to let's just spend a quick moment on on what that is and Charles Fowler: Yeah, Gabe, it's something actually that's been going for now almost four years. I got involved after about a year. It was set up after a sort of academic conference in Australia. lot of people involved in values education, using values systematically in all educational contexts. There was a conference held in the Gold Coast in Australia and out of that came the So much energy came out of this conference, they wanted to form a movement. In a way, values is lacking that. It's institutional identity. It lacks a sort of John Verrico: Yeah. Charles Fowler: World Values Day and a few other things. So let's all get together, which is sort of man at my ears. I mean, that's absolutely what I believe in. So I got an invitation actually at the time of the conference, but I couldn't go to Australia. I joined them a little bit later. And so it's a mixture of academics and practitioners. So leading academics are doing amazing work in values education around the world, some major, major studies, some big initiatives actually backed by these studies. And a lot of teachers, head teachers, educators of all stripes, all involved, very distinguished, lot of people. I sort of came in as... I'm not an educationist, I'm just someone who accidentally sort got into an educational charity and John Verrico: Ha ha. Charles Fowler: converted to values really like one of the kids. But somehow... John Verrico: you know, I don't Charles, I don't know if this is a this is a value of yours or if it's just a a a trait of yours, but I think modesty is pretty high on you. Certainly we noticed that about you. Charles Fowler: Okay, you may be right, I don't know, let's hope so. John Verrico: Ha ha ha. Charles Fowler: So I, not as an educationist, not as a practitioner either, I got on board and I'm actually, they asked me to chair, we take chair, the chair, the chairship, if that's right word. rotates every year. I took it on last year, and actually I'm going to do it next year as well, because it's sort of, although it's been going three years, it's sort of got a launch. We needed to get it to launch, and really that's where I came in a bit to help do that. So we did a sort of public launch, actually at the time of World Values Day last year, and we'll do something again with World Values Day again this year, but really the idea is to Bring together all the work that's been done around values education. We're not just talking about educating kids too, we're talking about educating grown-ups, training, all that stuff. And massive amount of research done. And there's a massive amount of practice that the two need to sort of knit together. People need to know what it is, you know, and know what it looks like. a big project is to pull together all this research, all the best practice. not necessarily to judge it, but just to put it together coherently and show people what you can do and how many wonderful people are doing these things and the impact it can have. And that's the value of course of the academic research too. And, you know, just have an impact on the way the world's educational systems work. Our aim is to make a difference really. So, but to do that, we've got to have this combined firepower. We've got to get together. You've got to put together the research, the practice, all of it, and just try and get government and super governmental bodies to understand. It's not as though they're resisting it. I they're all paying lip service, but just to really get behind it. John Verrico: Right. Charles Fowler: I mean, there's a lot of people around the world who are absolutely on the same side as us on this, but it's really just making it joined up and making it into more of a movement. Yeah, we're collaborating already with one particular government in putting values into their educational system, at least through some universities in that country who are collaborating with the government, I should say more accurately. So we're already kicking off doing this, but really what we want to do first is produce this what we call a model and method. This is what values education is, and this is how it can be done. And, you know, guys, let's do it because it makes children healthier, happier and academically more able, frankly, because a well-balanced, healthy, emotionally healthy child is more able to evolve John Verrico: Absolutely. Charles Fowler: academically, of course. And the data is all there. The evidence is all there. So it's a win-win. Why don't we want to do this? Of course we should. John Verrico: This has been absolutely fantastic and so enlightening. And I think well, I I know that it is probably one of the most important movements in the world, I think with the greatest potential for global impact. the work that you're doing, the people that you've coordinated and pulled together from around the world, it's supremely inspiring. And I you know, once you see or hear about these things, you start to notice them in others too. That's whole that's his whole awareness campaign, right? And you start seeing, wow, you know, there there are good things out in the world. There are people doing wonderful things. You know, there's a young lad here in Pennsylvania that I was fortunate enough to meet and get to know, and maybe he'll be on my show at some point too. you know, when I met him, he was 13 years old. He started a nonprofit. His name is Miles, and he calls it Go the Extra Miles. And it his non profit is designed to encourage his and his children and his age group to stop sitting around playing video games and get outside and volunteer and do something nice for other people. Charles Fowler: Yeah, brilliant. mean, they're just, but they're just millions of people like that. mean, I'm not saying everyone is John Verrico: Th exactly. Exactly. Charles Fowler: like that. Clearly, I mean, wouldn't it be a wonderful world if they were? But there are millions of them and we just don't know, we don't see them. You know this guy because he's near you. I mean, and just all the time there's a schoolgirl in Florida who's doing this amazing initiative, which we're going to be featuring in World Values Day this year. She's just doing it on herself, off her own back. I she's got some... network behind her and the school behind her, but she's, you know, there's a lot of these kids and that's wonderful, isn't it? I mean, people of all ages doing wonderful things, I mean, we need to the young people really outsmart them. John Verrico: And and we need to bring we need to bring these things to light and so that we can see them, we can we can feel them, we can experience them, and we can learn from them and be inspired by them to do our own acts of of kindness and and start living in alignment with our values. Charles, this has been a fantastic conversation. I don't want to to take up more of your time, but I truly appreciate your taking the time to get on the call and to get on on the podcast and to share this, to share your fire about values. And I think that Charles Fowler: Thank you. John Verrico: we have a great opportunity. I'm going to post in the show notes information about World Values Day, about the Human Values Foundation, about Gabe and all those things. and then I will also, if it's okay with you, put in your LinkedIn so that people can reach out and get in touch with you. Charles Fowler: That'd be fabulous. I'd love to if anyone wants to reach out. That's great. And thank you so much, John. It's been great. John Verrico: Well thank Charles Fowler: It's always a pleasure to talk to you, but this has been really, really good a conversation. John Verrico: I've I've loved it and you know, this is why I do this podcast, by the way, Charles. It is to highlight people who are doing good things like this around the world because I think the more we see the good things happening in the world, the more we can overcome all the negativity that we're being pumbled with every day. Charles Fowler: That's wonderful. Share our fire. That's a good parting note, I think. John Verrico: I love it. Thank you for and thanks for the plug on that. Folks, listen listen to this listen to this episode a few times. I know you'll hear me say that quite often, but you know, we we get some really wonderful gold nuggets in these conversations. there's so much inspiration and Charles, you are a a font of positivity and and living your values and I really appreciate that. And so does the rest of the world. Charles Fowler: Yeah, and I have to say the same about you, John. So thank you very much. It's been a great pleasure. And maybe we'll do it again one day. John Verrico: We will. Absolutely. And I'll see you for some of the World Values Day activities as well. All right. Take care. Charles Fowler: Perfect. See you soon. Thanks a lot. Bye John. John Verrico: Thank you.