steamHouse is a 10 year project promoting a universal mentoring model
for young people doing team and project-based activity.
At the core is thinking, relationship & fitness, and
purpose, project, team & tribe.
steamHouse
In every moment, in every context of every human's life,
three tools are always at work—your head, heart and body.
Thinking, relationship and fitness
are fundamental elements
of every moment, and every decision
—and so, at work in every project and team.
Every Now Tools
A Point of Leverage for
Mass Individual Benefit
Every human on the planet uses the same basic tools
—head, heart and body.
Yet no educational program explicitly focuses on best practice use of
these always used tools—thinking, relationship and fitness.
More than that, all humans on the planet
use these constant tools in every kind of context—
so any educational resource developed for anyone,
would be relevant for all.
SuperTribe
Conduit for Global Connection
In focusing on what is known to be fundamental, reasonable and broadly shared,
some common attitude, language and space for connecting and relating is created.
This common space gives better framing for our differences—
we might more accurately discern folk who are friendly
from those who truly offend or threaten.
Story
Strategy for Emotional Relevance
We care about what we emotionally connect to.
We focus on what we care about.
Story is how we connect ourselves and others to what is important.
Historically, educators, marketers, and story tellers have not collaborated.
We suggest we do, and leverage all techniques to
robustly convey and utilize these most essential lessons.
Every Now Tools — SuperTribe — Story
In a decade’s time, we hope to use these three leverage points
to persuade more capable, and better resourced others,
to advance and implement what we do not.
steamHouse is a 10 year project promoting and developing a
universal mentoring model for project and team based activity.
We start with these assumptions:
Aren't we all decision-making humans in a space of things we care about-
-and for anyone, can't that space be usefully thought of in layers of
self, others, world and one's greater personal and spiritual whole?
From there, aren't these ideas among the most reasonable and broadly valued:
Personal Agency, Mutual Respect, Objective Reason and Reflective Thinking?
Doesn't everyone's “Care Space” include a set of best or favorite ideas?
Doesn't everyone have a set of “Gold Star Bests” they reference,
a personal “Ten Commandments”?
Don’t each of our moments, each of our decisions, run through
our "Every Now Tools" of head, heart and body?
Shouldn't we be well schooled in the capabilities, biases
and maintenance of these always used, Every Now Tools?
Over 10 years, we will promote the idea of a new kind of Boy Scouts
…a kind of “Global Scouts”…that focuses on thinking, relationship and fitness.
This model is relevant for any context of project and team based activity,
from soccer team to dramatic production…or other educational setting.
Over 10 years, we will make the case that such a model should be
promoted and supported through a fictional club setting that includes a
"SuperTribe" of aspiringly Effective, Reasonable and Fun folk.
We are developing a video production to make the case and give example for such a mentoring club model.
A universal paradigm for decision-making
Ultimately, we are driven by what we care about…which might be our emotions, beliefs, or larger purpose.
Each of us has a range of things we care about—our Care Space. For each of us, that space includes ourselves, others, the physical world, and probably a whole bunch of other things, that are maybe even more important to you than yourself, others or the world.
Few would dispute that the first principle of self is that we each choose what we believe, think, say and do. We have Personal Agency.
When considering others and their Personal Agency, most of us also believe others deserve Mutual Respect.
Objective Reason has proven to be the most statistically reliable explainer and predictor of the physical world.
Reflective Thinking counters our default attachment to instinctive, first and familiar thoughts, and ways of seeing and doing things. Learning, meditation/prayer, and emotional awareness empower us for growth and purposes larger than those of self and the immediate now.
Psychology tells us we primarily think on one of two tiers. By default, and so most of the time, we manage with an Automatic thinking mode. Easy and familiar decisions are readily handled out of habit or simplicity…but often enough we are subject to various kinds of bias and errors. For complex tasks, and for better quality results, an effortful Conscious thinking mode provides a greater context of consideration .
Most effective people have a curated set of Gold Star Best Ideas. Any Conscious thinking that also references these Bests would be acting in a Purposeful thinking mode.
Curricular Purpose — Thinking, Relationship & Fitness
1. Think Big (Purpose & Possibility) Perspective
Purposeful, Inclusive, Global & Perennial Skills
Contexts – Purpose, Decisions, Projects, Teams
Tools – Head (thinking), Heart (relationship & purpose), Body (fitness)
Principles – Gold Star Bests, Personal Agency, Mutual Respect,
Objective Reason, Reflective Thinking
Community – SuperTribe
2. What We Care About is Always First
Emotion—safety/acceptance, love
Identity—values, purpose
Communication
Creativity & expression
Relationship & team
Story
3. Conscious Thinking is Often Best
Automatic thinking & habit
Conscious & purposeful thinking
Objective & subjective thinking
Flexible thinking
4. Body as Instrument
Health
Nutrition
Fitness
Skill
Draft Curriculum Outline
Gold Star Bests
Think Big then Be Real
Serious Play
Great Grit
SuperTribe
Prime Paradigms
steamHouse Real & steamHouse Big:
Think Globally, Act Locally
The Fairmount steamHouse is a neighborhood project serving both our kids and a global context.
Club Real — A here and now experience and community for kids near Fairmount, Colorado—functioning as a family cooperative STEAM club doing monthly-ish activity including potlucks, game nights, classes, summer camps, LEGO robotics team, and (soon) story-making team…and having framing from, and mini-connections to Club Ideal.
Club Ideal — Developing curriculum to support a Boy Scouts kind of club superstructure and milestone credentialing system. In a decade’s time, some proposal for follow-on activity will be put to the world as professional presentation, web series, and feature length production.
Fictional Ideal — “steamHouse, Interuniversal” is the Google/Facebook/Amazon of team and project-based mentoring models and networks. steamHouses are human ateliers, in use by members of a SuperTribe of aspiringly Effective, Reasonable and Fun folk (TeraTerraTribe). Emotional hook, example club design and implementation, lesson vehicle; video/movie series with principled pitchman, white knight, and multi-media global influencer, Orlo E. Goshwilder.
Reading List
Mischel, Walter. The Marshmallow Test: Mastering Self-Control. 2014.
Kahneman, Daniel. Thinking, Fast and Slow. 2011.
Mlodinow, Leonard. Subliminal: How Your Unconscious Mind Rules Your Behavior. 2013.
Clear, James. Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones. 2018.
Duke, Annie. Thinking in Bets: Making Smarter Decisions When You Don’t Have All the Facts, 2018.
Dweck, Carol S. Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. 2007.
Duckworth, Angela. Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. 2016.
Goleman, Daniel. Emotional Intelligence. 1997
Brackett, Marc. Permission to Feel: The Power of Emotional Intelligence
to Achieve Well-Being and Success. 2019.
Rosenberg, Marshall. Non-Violent Communication: A Language of Life, 3rd ed,. 2015