IF our belief systems are challenged, how do we move through a multi-dimensional crisis such as the one we are experiencing today?
was first published in September of 2011, and revised in December of 2013,
but it's message is perfectly on time.
While this book is a story of loss, discovery, reinvention and contribution, it is also something more.
We are pioneers of “uncertainty.”
Life put us on a path that exposed us to relentless change and disruption, which consistently jeopardized and impacted our well-being. This inspired us to see the world anew, and navigate our increasingly complex life experiences with a fresh perspective.
Our story demonstrates what it’s really like to face a mind shift when you don't know you need one. When you don't think you want one.
“Pamela Lawson has written a book that explores the ways humans — and humanity — can reinvent themselves after calamities. In ‘It’s Going to be O.K.’ the author examines defeat, resilience, and blazing your own trail. The book comes across as a starkly honest chronicle of failure, recovery, miracles, heartbreak, illness and insights torn from an eclectic life on the edge of mainstream America.”
“Your writing style, the imagery, is amazing that you can take us right there, we can feel the cold and the shrieking … I love the vision, the wording of it, ‘you lost everything, but you found your way.’ I think that is just full of hope and optimism for those who are struggling right now (with) ‘which way do I go?’”
”This book is a combination of two books — first — it is a detailed look into the culture of the 1970′s South, as seen through the eyes of someone inside a conservative, Christian sect. It is the story of Pam and Phil trying to reinvent and rediscover themselves.
Second — and more interesting to me — it is a search for the connectedness of humanity. While reading Adam Smith, Carl Sagan, etc- and experiencing turn after turn in their lives, Pam and Phil make a case for a more holistic approach to problem solving in our age. The transformation from a hierarchical, machine based society to an integrated, information based society is explored. I enjoyed the philosophical discussion and its relation to their personal trials and tribulations. I absolutely recommend it!!”
“I was engrossed from the introduction. It was so personal, but the issues are shared by all. From the beginning I had a sense of hope, keep reading, maybe all will be solved. Loved the historical and national events that anchored readers and the one-liner vignettes. You’re going along reading stories and you come across these powerful paragraphs in the middle of them and you think, 'wow!' time and time again, 'wow!' On consilience, that really struck me, and Phil’s narrative about ‘not knowing,’ and the fascinating medical information from the doctor in Florida, and the Carl Sagan section about Hippocrates. For me this book was very enjoyable, challenging and satisfying.”
“This is the only book I have ever, ever, savored. I can’t quote you anything in particular that moves me, it’s the way it is written, it is your journey, it is your adorable relationship, it is your finally coming to the Promised Land. All of it. It has become a best friend, that when I open the pages every day, I know it’s there and the story is still unfolding. You are blessed with a tremendous talent, you and Phil. May all your dreams come true through the integrity and hard work you gift yourself to this world. It’s a shame that talent has to be offered free before the rewards are showered down. But talent is a reward in itself, and you certainly are filled with your share.”
Pamela is a former award-winning journalist. She is Co-Founder of the Spherit contextual reasoning system.
Phil is an inventor, patent-holder, Co-Founder of Spherit, and co-author of the book, Being Spherical: Reshaping Our Lives and Our World for the 21st Century.
Pam and Phil married young, at 18, and spent a decade together in volunteer mission work in the Deep South, USA.
"This one is a keeper. If adversity builds character, then Pamela and Phil built a lifetime of experiences together that make them eminently qualified for an honorary diploma from the school of hard knocks. This at once a love story and a story of their journey down the path of discovery - down the rabbit hole and back again - to finally see the big picture by integrating their experiences and insights together with modern scientific theories. A thought provoking and well told story, truly a book for and about our times. This is one that you'll be proud to admit is on your bed side table."
“... the setbacks, failures, screw overs, and the way you got here, meaning where you are today, took me on a roller coaster ride of remembering my past defeats. I retreated for six years. I do not have a book to show for it. It made me realize how lost we all are. But we are so busy at pretending we have it all together. CEOs down to me. Thank Pam for that. I cried tears I had needed to cry. I felt the heaviness of the weight I have carried around. The guilt the shame etc. and I now see why we met. I am very tired after finishing the book today but it felt cathartic. I so appreciate the effort. It was a tumultuous funny and very exhausting ride to get here. For all of us.”
“This book shows clearly that “attitude is everything”; through many adversities it takes the reader through the author’s personal life journey, with all its ups and downs. Inspiring to press on even when everything seems hopeless the authors clearly demonstrate what “positive thinking” is all about as well as leading us back to the basics and a simplistic and holistic lifestyle. Thank you for this amazing book!”
Life put Phil and Pam on the path of pioneers. Read their spirited adventure here.
There are moments in time, despite our purest heartfelt intentions, when things are not going to be O.K. Not as we believe they should be, or hope they will be.
That realization occurred to me after a family tragedy in 2007, compounded by a book I read a year later about Abraham Lincoln.
“It’s going to be okay,” were the final words of a distant relative, the day she lay dying in a crushed SUV on a two-lane mountain road in Colorado. A spring blizzard was spitting cold at the windows as she consoled her 2-year-old son, who was crying. A damaged 18-wheeler sat cockeyed nearby, having slammed to a stop in the head-on collision.
But things were not okay.
The young woman, a nurse by profession, was soon dead — her tiny boy, motherless; her husband, widowed; her carefully planned life, derailed.
I recalled her haunting words — passed on by her sister, who was driving that fateful day — when I was immersed in a historic anthology about Abraham Lincoln.
Lincoln was forced to deal with what author Joe Wheeler described as a “ticking time bomb” set 85 years before he became president, at the birth of our nation, when American democracy was too delicate and the colonies too divided to disarm it. That centuries-old issue was slavery, and it blew up in Lincoln’s time, costing the lives of more than 620,000 countrymen in the American Civil War.
Lincoln could not escape his destiny. And neither can you or I. Something is amiss: a widespread disturbance, cumulative in nature — bequeathed to us by previous generations. Unavoidable, like a semi in your path as your car slides on ice.
— — —
As you will read in this book, I’m all for living in the now; living life purposefully; choosing my actions carefully and thinking positive thoughts (though that last one took some work). I know it’s possible to experience quantum leaps in awareness and lifestyles. You will read about it here.
But what happens if our lives are suddenly and permanently changed, despite the power of our intentions?
If our beliefs are challenged, how do we get through a multi-dimensional crisis, such as the one we are experiencing today?
Things are not okay — as we have known them. But there may be another way for things to turn out okay. And that makes this a scary but exciting time for you and me to be alive.
Pam and Phil met at the age of 6, married at 18, and kicked off their enigmatic partnership with a decade of volunteer mission work in the Deep South.
Eventually, they lived and worked in Hollywood; traveled abroad on business; worked in leadership roles at companies that were deploying cutting edge online technologies; and they've launched their own start-ups. They've even endured two historic natural disasters within 18 months of each other.
All of this netted them abundant life experiences. But it also perplexed them.
They realized a.) the world doesn't work the way they were taught it does, and b.) humans, as a species, are not adapting well to the realities of our times.
It's Going to be O.K. (but not like we thought) is a book-writing odyssey full of heart and surprising breakthroughs that was 20+ years in the making.
“I was reading this morning about our lack of spiritual role models and leaders in this world today. Knowing your full story has made me realize what a difficult path you have walked, yet stayed in a place of love, intelligence, learning, courage and above all working to benefit mankind. Thank God you are going out to bombard the world — we need you!”
“I read it in two sittings. I laughed. I cried. I thought deeply about what you wrote — very moving. It took balls to write this. What an amazing read. I don’t know what your present market will be but I have no doubt this book will do well. I know it will, I just do.”
“This book is very, very, very inspirational. On target for the times. I couldn’t put it down. My husband had just returned from a week away on business and I had to tear myself away from your book to spend time with him. I took notes. It made me stop and reflect all the way through it about my own life.”
“Let me just throw out for all our listeners all across the country, this System Science, [Pamela, you're] not talking about a hokey smoky, weird kind of spooky spiritual science: ‘Systems Science …’ this is, according to everybody’s resource, the Wikipedia, ‘… an interdisciplinary field of science that studies the nature of complex systems in nature, society and science. It aims to develop interdisciplinary foundations which are applicable in a variety of areas including engineering, biology, medicine and social sciences.’ Okay, so it’s not wacky stuff.”
[Excerpt]
Little did we know it then but a door was opening for us, if ever so slightly, to another place. And it happened after this harrowing chain of events: I nearly died. Our lives came to a full stop. We sought help but conventional routes failed us. Someone unexpected came to the rescue. We were forced to ask tough questions. We were transported outside our comfort zone by the answers. All of which, caused us to shift our perspectives and engage in the process of change.
”It’s the American Dream. You go out there, you hack it out in the f--king wilderness, you make sh-t happen, you learn as you go. I think a lot of misconceptions people have is ‘go to college, get this 4-year degree and I’m set.' What they’re living is a lie. Constantly learning, refining, taking risks, that’s what this country was built on. And that’s what we really don’t have a lot of anymore. Everyone is looking for the stability and how am I going to be set for the next 40 years. You had your ups and downs and lows, but it’s human, and people can relate to it.”
"You’ve presented a true picture of the life of those of us who tried ... You presented the insanity sanely.
And this is something I really wanted to say, your themes are just masterful. You did your homework and it holds the story together exquisitely in a neat little Compact Bento Box. Absolutely agreeable to the soul.”
“On very rare occasions I’ll get a book that is truly unique … If I can “see the story” and imagine that I am right there “going along for a once in a lifetime ride,” then I will make the time to read it, write an honest review, and share it with my readers. It’s Going to be OK (but not like we thought) fits perfectly into that category."
Pam and Phil are part of a consilience of dynamic thinkers emerging from the limits and lessons of the 20th Century, who know if humans are to live well, and meaningfully, in this dawning era of interconnection, it will require a dramatic transformation in the way we see, think and act.
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