I was born in 1979 and raised in Germany with German and British parents and 3 siblings. I studied linguistics, literature and history, in Tübingen and Bologna, graduating with the counterpart of a PhD in linguistics for work on syntax and semantics.

What does linguistics have to do with sociocracy? Linguistics studies how the human mind works. Language and communication are humbling and complex – and still we are able to form sentences no one has ever formed before us. For linguists, it takes considerable effort to understand something that our mind seems to do so effortlessly. It is intriguing to think of group decision-making as an extension of language processing and how we can think together. How can we practice mutual understanding and shared decision-making so that it feels just as effortless?

To me, there is a social mission in linguistics. Linguistics is not grammar-police: linguistics studies how people speak, not how some people think they should speak. Everyone’s voice matters – and anything we say is always a perfect expression of the human mind. My mind loves concepts, and even more I love switching back and forth from concrete examples to the level of concepts, and back again.

I moved into a cohousing community in 2012 as this community had just adopted sociocracy (they refer to it as Dynamic Governance). I soon became interested and involved. It was sociocracy that brought Jerry and me together, and together we founded Sociocracy For All (SoFA). Within SoFA, I currently hold several roles, mostly around content production, tech and networking.

The cohousing community is home to my children, Helena, Sophia, Antonia, Julia and Emilia. They grow up knowing their 70 neighbors and being known and loved by them. Although not all of my children can even pronounce the word sociocracy, every dinner conversation involves at least one round of highlights and lowlights from their day.

Love is the only resource without limit, endlessly renewable. Yet so many experience shortages. It is like water. There is plenty of it. But there are distribution problems. And there are contamination problems. The sadness that human beings are more clever than they are wise. We do have answers to all our problems. Except we have not yet figured out how to work together consistently and effectively. That is what has attracted me to sociocracy and Non-Violent Communication.

I was born in Cuba and moved with my family to New York City in 1961 when I was 8 years old. From my parents, I got the love of nature and love of mind. What I learned outside the classroom as a young adult was that there was hope that we could model community living in a way that demonstrated healthy relationships with other humans and the land. What most influenced me was my 12-year involvement with Movement for a New Society (MNS). We were a network of small groups dedicated to revolutionary nonviolence, which meant seeking to help build a just and joyful world through direct action to challenge whatever systems were generating pain, through training activists in all the skills needed, and through valuing the sense of community in how we lived.

The reality of trying to live these ideals is humbling. What I can say for myself is that I am still trying. And the gift has been the sharing of this journey with the principal author of this book, Ted, and the amazing energy and capacity Ted has brought into creating Sociocracy For All. The gift is also now being part of the world-wide weaving of so many threads seeking to live the understanding that all people are one and that everyone’s needs matter.