Great news! I co-authored a book, and it finally got published! It is called Humanity 2.0 - 10 Principles for a Compassionate Society. I wrote it together with Aviram, the founder of Sadhana Forest, the community in India where i lived for 7 years.
In a nutshell, it is a book about the vision and values behind Sadhana Forest. It offers an in-depth discussion of the ideals of Aviram and his family, on which he built Sadhana Forest and which he has been putting into practice for over 20 years. So it is not a book about Sadhana Forest as such, but about how to create an inclusive and compassionate life and community, in terms of parenting, education, health, economics, community etc. Quite broad and ambitious! The book is based on Aviram's experience, combined with a lot of research.
What was my role in the birthing of this book? When i came to Sadhana Forest, i always felt so inspired to hear Aviram talk, and i wanted everyone to be able to receive his wisdom. I approached Aviram, and turns out, he already had had the idea to write a book since a long time! In fact, he once spent a week in a French country house for a series of in-depth interviews that would become the foundation of the book. To those interviews i added insights from the Q&A sessions Aviram regularly gives in Sadhana Forest. I transcribed all of those, with the help of some volunteers, and tried to compile it into a comprehensive whole.
I also did most of the research for the book. Aviram wanted all the claims in the book to be backed up by literature and scientific research. I did this work very diligently - the endnotes are about one third of the book. It almost felt like writing a PhD, but one where i was not limited to just one field of research and could dive into a broad range of topics that all interest me very deeply.
The bulk of the editing and research took me almost two years, between 2018 and 2020. After that, the pandemic happened, i left the forest temporarily, got locked out, and Sadhana Forest took on a series of new projects in India and Namibia. So the book ended up being sidetracked for a few years.
When i finally left Sadhana Forest last year, the new projects were well established, and Aviram knew it was time to finally finish the book. He was traveling in Europe at the time, and so, on my way to my new life in Plum Village, we sat in an apartment in Budapest for two weeks to edit the final version of the book together. Creating a book felt like running a marathon, or even multiple marathons, because then we still had to work on the lay-out and discuss the publication. This happened in the beginning of this year when i briefly visited Sadhana Forest. It was a real journey, and i feel so lucky and blessed to have been on it with someone so inspiring, thoughtful and insightful as Aviram. I learned so much and got to take a deep dive in some the things that fascinate me the most!
The book is offered as a gift - obviously - gift economy is one of the themes of the book. You can download it free of charge at www.sadhanaforest.org/humanity2. The 3rd of August we will do an online book launch. You can find the details at www.sadhanaforest.org/book-launch. Do share your thoughts about the book below. I would be happy to find out which parts inspire you. (The book is kind of like a recipe book, you can choose which topics interest you and read each chapter separately. So you don't necessarily have to read the whole thing).
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