 You're going to have shared values, but you often don't have shared beliefs, and beliefs divide. Well, you had a window on Phyllis. That's Phyllis Belize. So you're going to talk a lot more about that. I'm Jay Fidel. This is, what is the name of this show? Think Tech Global. We're talking global, and in fact, we're talking today about Peace Through Commerce. That's the title of our episode here on Think Tech Global. And Phyllis is the founder and CEO of Peace Through Commerce, which is a nonprofit she runs in and out of Austin, Texas, like everywhere. And we need to know more, because we know Phyllis from 1972, okay, and if you hadn't done the math, that's 46 years ago, then she has not changed. I, however, I'm not the same, at least in Gestalt, I'm not the same as I used to be. Phyllis, welcome to the show. It's always wonderful to have you here. Thank you, Jay. It's nice to be here. Why don't you move back to Hawaii and give us your nourishment all the time? Oh, well, I'm here every year, almost, and I am president of the UH Alumni Association in Texas. So I'm able to stay in touch a lot. I know you are. So let's talk about Peace Through Commerce. You founded it. Why did you find, found it? Who's in it with you? What is it doing? Well, Peace Through Commerce is an outcrop of a larger foundation called Flow, or Freedom Lights Our World, that John Mackey, the co-founder of Whole Foods Market, funded and co-founded. And we had three programs. One was called Conscious Capitalism. One was called Peace Through Commerce, and the other was Accelerating Women Entrepreneurs. And the idea for creating these programs in the world was to invite people to consider capitalism and business as a force for good. And until they do, it will be left out of peace-building operations. And you're a lawyer, and you know about capitalism and business and tax. You're a tax lawyer, so you know about all those things. So you're taking those skills. This is not dissimilar from Roger Epstein. If you know him, he's one of our hosts from time to time. You know, who is a tax lawyer, but who has sort of transmuted his consciousness, if you will, to higher values and higher, higher callings. And that's you. But I wanted to ask you a question. I don't want to spoil your answer. My question is, but why? To create peace and prosperity in the world, sustainably, not as one-offs, but to do it sustainably, you need the public, the private and the civil society sectors to work interdependently. And until they do, we're going to continue to have failed starts for long-term peace and prosperity. Okay, so you're working in three areas. One is the Nobel Peace Forum, which you're actively involved in, and that's the bulk of our show to talk about, but you're also into women's and gender issues. And that's another similar initiative that you're involved in. And the third is what, peace in Israel in the Middle East, is that it? And so all of these are really focused at peace and better respect in the community, better respect people to people. And it's not just a matter of having beliefs where people can disagree, it's a matter of having values that are common. So I mean, this is very noble, intellectual, high value, but the devil must be in the detail. If you hadn't noticed, we don't have peace. We don't have peace. And some people think we're going further away these days. What are you doing to stop that trend? Well, we're starting with an educational model to begin with, and I don't know if you have it on your screen, but we have a model that can make sense of how you design a peaceful and prosperous society, and that model we call it the Matrix of Peace Systems Model. So as a systems model, M-O-P, Matrix of Peace. And the model incorporates the thinking to date from the thought leaders that we have studied and brought it to bear upon this issue of creating a peaceful society. Going back to Lao Z, Socrates, all the way to this date. So it incorporates the thinking and value systems of thought leaders since the beginning of time who have influenced peace. And also it incorporates best practices of all three sectors of society. So that when you have civil society, that's the general public and NGOs. You have the private sector, the capitalism and businesses, and you have the public sector, which is our legal and governmental system. When you have all three working together to co-create peace, then you can do so. And we have best practices that are built into this model through education and training. We understand what kinds of best practices those three sectors need to follow in order to create a peaceful, interdependent society. And then the outside sphere of this model, the sphere, the globe, the circle, that illuminates the consciousness developmental level of the people in all sectors of society. So that's where we talk about values. That has to be the common denominator of everything consciousness. That's right. So there we look at, we can actually use assessment tools like Barrett's value system and spiral dynamics and integral theory. These are robust systems for measuring the values, beliefs, and world views of individuals that we're working with. And they can use that feedback as sort of an x-ray of where they are consciously and how they mirror or differ from the people they're trying to live with under the same tent. So who's the they? Well, the they in Israel would be, in Israel and the West Bank would be the Palestinians and the Jewish population. How do their values agree or disagree and how do their belief systems keep them apart? And how can their belief systems be co-created to evolve to a place where they actually are living their shared values? And so we say values unite, but beliefs divide. And we can unpack what that means for them, let them understand where their beliefs cause the divisions and help them have the dialogue to get to the same value. And that can happen through our Accelerating Women Entrepreneurs Program. We invite them to study this model and become more aware. The same model applies to the Women's Program. Yes. The same model. That's our common denominator, our technology. And we have a new partner now called Shakti Leadership. And I'm a fellow of Shakti Leadership. This is my Mendalian certification for our fellowship program that teaches the feminine and male wisdom traditions and forces and consciousness that bring both women and feminine values to the boardroom, the legislative decision halls, and help them use both values. So we bring that women's traditions to this dialogue. You're talking about changing the world. Yes. No small task. Yeah. Especially in a time of Trump, you know, because he's changing the world, too. And he's not necessarily ascribing to what you're talking about. Well, yes. And really, when we talk about changing the world, we're not going to create anything new under the sun. What we're going to do is reveal what's already there. So we're talking about using feminine wisdom traditions with Shakti Leadership, which is there but hasn't been invited into the boardrooms and into the decision making, whether it's in a corporation or in society. So we're bringing, we're illuminating what's already available but underutilized or invisible. And the model does that as well. So if I'm, oh, I'll pick a name, AT&T. If I'm AT&T and I want to be involved in this matrix of peace, then I have to, A, at the corporate level, I mean at the management level, I have to make my people, my managers understand what you're talking about and make this kind of analysis. And that means they probably have to sit in a room and exchange ideas about it, maybe have you come down or someone like you come down and share those ideas. And then I suppose I have to filter that down to every last lineman or woman in AT&T. I have to permeate the corporation in order, am I right? Make this work. Okay. Now I have AT&T. I have the rest of them. I mean, you're talking about changing the way people think, you know, in the whole sector, in the whole, you know, business sector, this is no easy task. How far advanced are you on that? Well, we are young in terms of time. We have a, remember that sister organization was Conscious Capitalism. And that, in Conscious Capitalism, there's two annual events that CEOs go to and that the larger tent, the C-suite or consultants in the whole business community involved in businesses can attend the Conscious Capitalism events every spring. And then we have a book out called Conscious Capitalism under that umbrella. And they can start reading about the principles that the lead early adopters in organizations like Whole Foods Market, Southwest Airlines, Costco, Container Store, there are organizations that are already living the truth. These guys are on board. They are conscious leaders. They understand what we're talking about here today. They're the role models. Right. And they're looking for peace in the same way that you want. You want peace. Right. So peace within themselves first. So you have peace within yourself, peace within your company, and then peace as a corporate citizen in the world. All three levels of peace. Well, this is kind of, you know, I've heard this before in different contexts, but the notion is that, you know, the world has gone into multi-nationals and global corporations who don't necessarily have consciences. They're all about the bottom line. And we have to reel that back and we have to make them think at a higher level for the preservation of the planet, the preservation of the humanity of the species in general. And that's not unimportant. That's really important to save us all. Is that part of this thinking? It is. There's another organization, an excellent one, called Business for Peace that gives an annual award, and they talk about wholeheartedness. That's their word for the Matrix of Peace Systems model. And they give an annual award, which gets, it's given in Oslo every year. And that brings worldwide attention to understanding business, not as the bad guy, but as a force for good, when done consciously, authentically, with love, compassion, care. And you've got to get them to actually think that way. Yes. To qualify. And you know, our millennials and our younger generations, that's the only way they're going to do business, I believe, as a whole. And they eat this thinking right up. And so they're no longer concerned with titles, they're concerned with value. What value do I bring in the world and what value does this organization bring in the world? See, we live in a good time then. We do. And the generation picks up on this, you know, that's great promise for us all. Well, you know, I think now we understand in general what you're after here and what Peace Through Commerce means and how it relates to other parts of our society and our planet. And it's time that we take a short break. But when we come back to this, I'd like to talk about your connection with the Nobel Foundation and see what that means and how you apply these concepts and this kind of analysis and this hope through your relationship with the Nobel Foundation. Oh, I'm so excited. We'll be right back. Yeah, let's test your memory. This is Phyllis Bles, Peace Through Commerce. You remember? 46 years, I know her. It's really fabulous to catch up. So Phyllis, you know, we kind of explained what Peace Through Commerce was and what its concept was and how it operated and how it extended to our society in general. But now, now the big one, now the connection with the Nobel Peace Prize. Can you talk about that? Can you sort of unfurl that for us? Yes. Alfred Nobel left a will and in that will he left some money and some intentions and one intention was to give a prize each year in the disciplines that he believed would influence peace the most. And there's another intention he had in the will, which was to have peace congresses, which would be a year or longer in which you would discuss social evils and solutions to those evils. But that intention has never really been operationalized. In the last, except academically, for about 35 years, there was and has been a Nobel Peace Prize forum on the campuses of Lutheran colleges in Minnesota. Interesting. Yes, and it's the culminating event for peace scholars. And that has been going on for a very long time. There was a new director of the Nobel Peace Prize forum in Minnesota called Gina Tori. And she wanted to take these dialogues global and make them year long peace dialogues as envisioned by Alfred Nobel. And in her second year, she engaged our organization, Peace through Commerce, because we talked about business as well as academia as well as the civil society sector. And she knew we had a robust model that would really push the laureates' work further if all three sectors were engaged in carrying out their good ideas. So she invited us to co-create the second Nobel Peace Prize forum that she oversaw in Minnesota. We did so, and that was on child trafficking. And we used our model to make, her name is Gina Tori. And under that forum's auspices, we worked on the issue of human trafficking globally, which is a $2.5 billion business. And unless you talk about the business aspects of trafficking, you're not going to solve it. And that work was around Kailash Satyati's Nobel Peace Prize. And he helps children get in orphanages and picks them up and helps them get into homes. But that doesn't stop trafficking. That is prophylactic. Our model talked about the causes of human trafficking and business is the largest cause of all. So for the first time, we are providing an analysis that incorporates what the public sector can do and even made more sense of what the private sector was doing. And some laws that are passed to stop trafficking only make it worse. And with our model, which looks at the interdependencies and the unintended consequences of action to stop a problem like trafficking, they didn't understand it. Some of the laws passed cause more harm than good. But a systems model looks at all aspects. So this is really planning at a very high level. It is. And you focus it around a particular laureate who has received, at some point in his or her life, the Nobel Peace Prize, and you look at the issue for which that laureate received the prize, and then you try to actually take steps or at least formulate a plan by which the problem that led to that prize can be resolved. Yes. It's pretty ambitious. It is. And Gina convinced, I think, the Nobel Peace Prize Institute in Norway to have the same forum happen the day after the Nobel Peace Prize ceremonies. So we've done two now in Oslo. And the first year was with Henry Kissinger, who had received the Nobel Peace Prize. And it's a big news, Zabrinsky. And they had a dialogue. I think you have a photo. Let's look at some pictures. So we brought. I want to see the one with Henry Kissinger. Oh, let's look at this one first. This was last year's forum. This is very important. This is the first year that we really engaged with the Norwegian Institute using our model. And that's me talking to the Nobel Laureate, Rigo Bertha Menchu. She was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize 25 years ago in Indigenous Peoples' Rights. And I'm sorry to say that I didn't have enough lead on the theme of the forum to engage our Hawaiian knowledge and our Hawaiian rights leaders and leadership and learnings and outcomes. So I am working now to create a year-long peace Congress with Peace through Commerce and my team to engage this first nation's discussion. To continue the discussion from last year. Right, with Rigo Bertha Menchu's work. But we also brought in the Semi population, which is in northern Norway and Sweden. They are in First Peoples' Nation. We also brought in the Nakota, Dakota and Lakota populations last December to discuss what's happening to the Indigenous people in that area. So you adopted this issue going forward. Yes. It wasn't over when the group met last year. It continues. Right. We were the lead partners on that forum last December in Oslo. And that was pretty powerful. So there is the annual academic forum that is still happening, but now this is taken to a global stage. This year we have a three-year contract with Nobel. This year's upcoming forum will be December 11th, following the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony. And that will celebrate the work of the Nobel laureate, Al Gore, and on sustainability and global and climate changes. And we will be there. We will be helping on the thinking, convening and analysis of those issues using our model. So again, you're looking for, I mean, it's the whole dichotomy between values. We know what the values are, but it's the beliefs and the implementation and so forth. You're going to try to implement what Al Gore is recommending. Recommending, or look at it and see if he's missing something. Almost all... Because things change. They change and they're also invisible. When he's looking at it from us, maybe one sector, and I haven't studied his work yet, so I don't know this. So let's say that he was looking at what the public sector can do in terms of laws. Is he looking at what the private sector is doing? Is he looking at what civil society sector is doing? And how can we engage all three sectors to work interdependently to solve that problem? Until we do, it won't get solved. And he'll be there. And he'll be there. To help you, to show you where he was coming from and to help you move it forward. And we will help him, because when you get into that silo thinking, sometimes you miss what you don't really target the right outcome that you think you're getting to. So it's a think tank. So it's a think tank. And we will use the model. And I don't know what... The model doesn't lie. The rest of us are still struggling with silo thinking. But the model will help illuminate what's going on in all three sectors. And from a consciousness developmental awareness, that's a lot of words. But we will use it all to help all of us learn from each other. When it's over with Al Gore, when it's over, what happens? What's the payload? What's the takeaway? Where do I learn about this? How do you actually disseminate the conclusions you've reached? Well, the Norwegian Nobel Institute is making our analysis available to... And we make it available. And I'm hoping it will work as a springboard for year-long, at least one year-long dialogue session. For instance, on last year's forum, Indigenous People's Rights, we spent a lot of time on justice. That's part of it, isn't it, for sure? Right. But what the model brought forward was that in the public sector, there is no clear voice for who has the legitimate rights to speak on behalf of two different populations living in one territory. So from a model standpoint, we call that a divide in the public sector. So we need to really come to grips when you have two nations living under one tent, one territory, who has the legitimate authority? It's going to be a blended answer. You also need dispute resolution practices and facilities to decide who wins when the two populations disagree on how to use the water, how to use the air. So it brought attention with the cleanliness of a model, and not he said, she said, or legacy anger and issues or wars or takeovers. We don't need to address that when we're using the model. We need to address simply how are we going to come up with who is the legitimate leader and voice for two populations living legitimately in one territory? That's a really big question, and it applies in many contexts. It does. But one thing seems clear. So you've got to have all these groups, these groups on your model, talking to each other. You've got to have their attention. If they ignore the conversation, they want to participate in it, that leaves you with a stool that has fewer legs than you need. Right. So there's two things about that that I love about the model. One is the model allows them to use new language, like legitimacy, like dispute resolution process. They're not talking about you stole it, you've got it. We are using new language and the model is full of it to allow them to feel less triggered talking about what the issues are, and our other facility using our consciousness tools is that we can provide consciousness developmental assessments, use assessments, beliefs assessments, which are agnostic. They just give you understandings about where you're coming from. And they can use that before, during, and after their dialogues to hear each other better. Oh, when you say water, you're thinking of the water gods. You're not thinking of a tool or a profit center. And just knowing that, coming from good-willed people, really slows them down to talk about the water as sacred, not as a tool. It's psychology, sociology, diplomacy. It's all these things rolled into one to try to understand the human condition and improve it. But before we go, fellas, we've got to see the rest of your photos. And the one I'm particularly interested in is the one with Henry Kissinger, because I have long believed that he has bad posture. And I think this photo proves that. And I think if you have bad posture, you'll probably wind up with a gravelly voice. Can we show the picture? Oh, there he is. What's this picture about? And why is he not sitting up straight? Well, he is about 92 in that picture. OK. Yes. Mr. Kissinger was listening to me describe this Matrix of Peace systems model, along with my colleague and a co-founder of Peace through Commerce, Joyce Beck, on the left. And this was in the Aula, A-U-L-A, of the University of Oslo. And they hosted the forum that had just taken place and a conversation between he and Subbigno Zabrinsky. Then we went into the reception area. Right. So there was about 30 of us in this same room where I was speaking last December. I was sitting in that same room with Henry Kissinger in the prior December. And we were dialoguing about the systems of the Matrix of Peace systems model. So it was pretty exciting. We have that picture of you speaking, I think. Yes. Can we see that picture now? Yes. Not that one. Not that one. That's another one where I'm with... His name is Olaf Nasslung. And he is the Norwegian Nobel Institute Director to my right. And we're talking about the Indigenous People's Rights Forum and this picture with Dr. Chirinjeev Kothuryev. And he is our partner in New Generation Power International as our partner in this three-year contract. It's more than three years, fellas. It's for life, don't you think? Yes. You know, you are so committed to this. You're going to keep on doing this as long as you possibly can. Yes. And we have to have you back. You have to come and tell us the progress of PTC and your organization and your connection with the Nobel Peace Prize. And maybe I will nominate you myself. Well, or we could nominate Think Tech Hawaii as well. And Think Tech Global, because this is only getting out there because of the work you've done for years. So I thank you for that. I think we'll have to leave it there, fellas. Okay. Thank you so much. Okay. Phyllis, please. Thanks for coming down. You're welcome, Chirinjeev. Thanks for all the things. Thank you for having me and us. We appreciate it. Yeah, we're going to have you again. Thanks.