Episode 9
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EPISODE DESCRIPTION
In this episode, Simon Waller sits down with the sweary and sharp-witted Scottish writer Lizzie Davidson to explore the timely and deeply human topic: The Future of Meaningful.
Lizzie shares a bold and hopeful future scenario set in the aftermath of a great global reset — triggered by the trajectory we’re currently on: climate collapse, pandemics, conflict. But rather than dystopia, this is a world where consumerism has been replaced with connection, and the fundamentals of life — housing, food, education, healthcare — are no longer things people have to worry about.
As Simon puts it, this was “easily the most utopian scenario that someone has produced for the show so far.” But the conversation isn’t naive. Together, they unpack the real-world tensions between individualism and community, and the societal work required for such a future to emerge. It’s a vision rooted in deep congruence — a world where people show up the same in their work lives as they do in their personal lives.
They explore the joy in everyday things, the sticky process of imagining a better future, and how we might each become weak signals for the change we want to see — quietly lighting the way toward what’s possible.
This conversation is both deeply uplifting and quietly challenging. Because maybe meaning isn’t something we find. Maybe it’s something we practice.
The Future of Meaningful
The future of meaningful
He’s awake before his home begins its quickening routine, the gentle rise in artificial daylight, the gradual swelling of the chorus of extinct birds. He gets out of bed, slips into running clothes, grabs his headtorch, and leaves the house. It’s still an hour and a half until sunrise and there are plenty of people out and about. As he runs, he passes neighbours walking their dogs before the road gets too hot for paws.
Even thirty years after temperatures spiked in the 2040s, the terrible fire storms, mass heat deaths, and third pandemic that led to the global reset, everyone still rises early to avoid the heat. People move around at dusk and dawn. Essential outdoor labour is done at night.
By 5:00am he’s back home, a cabin in a community of creatives who’ve decided not to have kids. One of the (few) positive fallouts of the great depression in the 30s was the reimagining of the way people lived. After years isolating from each other in homes and cars, people had to band together to afford to live. Lots of people realised they liked it better that way.
He showers (fast, water is still rationed), slips into a thobe, and heads to the communal hub. He has a kitchen in his cabin, but works better after spending time with others, so he breakfasts with friends who do similar coaching work. Breakfast usually evolves into informal mentoring, where people discuss ways to resolve tricky challenges in the day ahead.
Universal income and housing has been global policy since the reset – as is two days a week of community work. He works in a local market garden and the balance between that and the coaching he does the rest of the week suits him well. He got his love for gardening from his grandmother. His grandparents built a cabin in their garden for his mother when she returned from Europe pregnant with him at the start of the second pandemic.
His mum still tells the story of how she just made it onto one of the last planes to New Zealand before the borders closed. His father never got out. His mother made a Memoribot of his dad from social media for him to talk to when he became old enough to ask questions. But when he realised how much it upset her he only talked to the Memoribot when he was alone. Last year he turned 36, older than his dad was when he died, and realised he’d no longer be able to ask his dad’s digital ghost, “What did you do when you were my age?”
After the global reset, people didn’t have to worry about housing, food, education, or medical care anymore. The reset also ended generational wealth. Now when people die, all wealth and resources they’ve accumulated revert to the state. The reset had a seismic effect on the way people work. The obligation to contribute to essential, community work gave everyone a sense of greater purpose. Some chose to dedicate their lives to that work. Others do what he does and split their time between community work and their craft, art, or spiritual practice.
As a narrative coach – he teaches people how to use story as a generative force. Stories can keep people small, or they can inspire and energise. He studied narrative psychology and ethical persuasion before going on to do a PhD in early 21st century commodification of self. His favourite thing is the monthly open mike he organises, where people try on new narratives for size in front of an appreciative audience. Seeing his clients become more comfortable owning what makes them extraordinary, hearing them push the boundaries of what’s possible for them – makes him feel like his life is full of blossoming and growth.
Simon Waller (00:01.454)
Hello and welcome to episode nine of the Future with Friends. Today I’m being joined by, well actually quite a new friend of mine, Lizzie Davidson. Now some of the guests recently, I’ve actually almost struggled to remember the origin story of how we met because it was like a decade or more ago. I’m guessing though with Lizzie it might be a little bit easier because we only kind of really became friends in the last few months. Is that fair enough to say Lizzie?
Lizzie (00:23.938)
Yeah, I mean, I think we met because of the fabulous Col Fink, right, through the community, the solo community of Solo Pro, so we’re both members of.
Simon Waller (00:34.221)
Yeah. Correct. And then I think initially I saw you joined and then I checked out like this, I’m applying them out of stalking on LinkedIn. And I think you do you market yourself or do you kind of position yourself as like the sweary Scottish basically copywriter. And I’m like, Oh, God, the world definitely needs more of them in. I loved immediately this kind of intention that you set with that about by the unconventional nature of it.
Lizzie (00:41.124)
Hahahaha
Lizzie (00:49.1)
Yeah.
Simon Waller (01:00.845)
And almost like the authenticity and the rawness of it, as opposed to kind of this over polished stuff that is almost indistinguishable from what comes out of artificial intelligence, you know, systems. And I was like, Oh, I like you already. And I hadn’t even really met you in the flesh. But we did get a chance to meet recently up in Sydney about three or four weeks ago. And I pitched you coming on my podcast and you said, Yes, so here we are. This is great.
Lizzie (01:14.82)
Mmm.
Lizzie (01:28.684)
It sure is. And I just want to say thank you for that excellent appreciation of my LinkedIn shtick. I appreciate your appreciation. Thank you.
Simon Waller (01:34.477)
So tell us a little bit about why you decided to come on, because I feel like it was a bit of a stretch when I asked you, because I think we’d had like a bit of a very loose conversation. What was it that you kind of intrigued you enough to be a guest on the show?
Lizzie (01:55.246)
Well, I mean, obviously it was you for start, Simon. Like, I mean, you talked about you politely stalking me, you know, vice versa, right? And so, I mean, you must get this all the time. So forgive me for fangirling, but you know, is there a more fascinating occupation than a futurist? I don’t think so. And just before we started this conversation, you were talking about how when you were growing up, you did all the things that the girls.
didn’t appreciate like instead of surfing and playing rugby you were an archer and played the violin and
Simon Waller (02:31.275)
And then the viola, I grew too big for the violin apparently. And so like, can upgrade you, it’s either gonna have to work how to play a cello like this, we’re gonna put you on the viola. So I got the viola. Yes.
Lizzie (02:43.339)
Had you been running around at that age, I mean, you know, as I said to you, you were hanging out with the wrong women and you should have been hanging out with, you know, Renaissance appreciators. That said, had you been running around going, I am a futurist, you know, they would, you’d have been fighting them off. So what I’m saying is it’s fascinating. And I have, I think I’ve deliberately abstained from watching the other episodes in your podcast.
Simon Waller (02:58.614)
Ha ha.
Lizzie (03:09.814)
which has been torture because they all look so good because I didn’t want to a be overly influenced by the brilliance of them and b be horribly intimidated by the brilliance of them so
Simon Waller (03:23.917)
That’s hilarious that you’ve pre-assued though that they’re all brilliant, which I mean,
Lizzie (03:30.06)
Well, I think a pre-assumption of brilliance is fairly fair given what I know of you, Simon. And so, I mean, it was just like, it was asking me to go and play an extraordinarily cool game. So of course I was going to say yes. Yeah.
Simon Waller (03:43.468)
thank you. And to give a little context that conversation we were having before, we’re actually talking about what skills we would have to offer the tribe in the case of an apocalypse and complete societal breakdown. And I mentioned that my kind of, yeah, it was a casual apocalypse, what was the skill? And you, Lizzie, were like, I would be fully in demand, not like blowing my own trumpet, but I can kill, I can cook, I can do it all.
Lizzie (03:56.884)
Right. Just casual apocalypse.
Lizzie (04:04.9)
You
I can garden, yeah exactly, and obviously very arrogant which is in hot demand when you’re in an apocalypse as well.
Simon Waller (04:21.392)
Awesome. Awesome. Now when we did speak up in Sydney, I had, I don’t know, I think I had some probably some pre supposed ideas of what we might talk about, which is exactly what we’re not talking about today. Well, the thing that really fascinated me about, about you, and I suppose the area that you work in is the concept of language. And I kind of had like,
Lizzie (04:33.76)
Hmm. What did we say we were going to talk about?
Simon Waller (04:49.099)
you know, I suppose like decided, even though it’s not my decision, I kind of was like, oh, we could talk about the future of language. And I was thinking about all this different stuff around, you know, the we now have computers making up their own language to communicate with each other that’s not English, because English is kind of not very effective for them. And we talk about the way that, you know, language is changing in copywriting and even your positioning as being the sweary Scottish copywriter, because we need that kind of rawness and authenticity. I was like, Oh, my God, what a great story to explore.
Lizzie (04:58.883)
Yeah.
Simon Waller (05:17.642)
And I kind of pitch this to you and then you came back with a scenario which was entirely different.
Lizzie (05:22.52)
Yeah, I think I know nothing about language really, Simon. So it’s like, it’s the water I swim in, it was, was, and that is a fascinating topic. And yet, I don’t know. I just didn’t really feel I had a lot to say about it.
Simon Waller (05:37.868)
It’s so funny. And look, and this is the thing, right? Like part of me in this, in this podcast is exploring my own assumptions and my own thoughts. And it very much the intent has always been that it should be the guest that chooses the topic. Because on one hand, it’s about them talking about something that is deeply meaningful to them. But also I kind of do offload the hard work to you and say, well, you’ve to go away and write
Lizzie (05:41.764)
Mmm.
Lizzie (06:02.595)
Mmm.
Simon Waller (06:06.827)
the scenario so it seems unfair for me then to dictate what you should talk about.
Lizzie (06:10.42)
you should and I remember you said to me that it’s not necessarily a podcast about work related things even although I think that might have been where our conversation started that often what people end up talking about is the thing behind the thing behind the thing.
Simon Waller (06:30.025)
Yeah, it’s like the tangent or the tangent of the tangent. think that I, you know, both of us are privileged to work with a bunch of people who feel a deep intrinsic motivation around their work. And yet I would still suggest that that work that they do is tangential to the thing that they really care about. Because often the thing that we really care about, there’s kind of no money in it. Or it’s hard for us to be able to articulate it.
Lizzie (06:41.304)
Yeah.
Lizzie (06:50.062)
Hmm.
Lizzie (06:54.37)
Yeah.
Simon Waller (06:57.451)
You know, for me, a lot of the work I think rotates around concepts of belonging and community. The way that plays out is I’m the president of the basketball club and I’m the chair of the library business because libraries are a place for people to gather. And I do work with local government because those people do stuff around. So like you can’t get a job in belonging, but you can kind of get a job in all the areas around it. And I think that’s quite
Lizzie (07:04.098)
Mmm, that’s beautiful.
Lizzie (07:10.05)
Yeah. Sure.
Lizzie (07:23.758)
Totally.
Simon Waller (07:25.161)
common and I feel that’s a little bit of what you’ve also come up with with the scenario we’re going to be talking about.
Lizzie (07:31.788)
Yeah, I mean, tangentially, you definitely want librarians on your apocalypse team as well, don’t you? So that’s important. But, you know, that thing about belonging that you just mentioned, I feel like that’s possibly at the heart of what we’re going to talk about today as well, because again, before we started this episode, we were talking about what the title for it was and spent 15 minutes fairly unproductively.
Simon Waller (08:00.81)
And I was like, but you’re a copywriter, you’re meant to be good at this.
Lizzie (08:01.316)
sharing words and retching at each other. And I am good at it, but I’m not good at instant brainstorming. It’s like,
Simon Waller (08:17.694)
But I think we have landed on something which I do really like to be honest. And so the topic that we have landed on is the future of meaningful. Are you still happy with that?
Lizzie (08:30.692)
Mmm.
I mean, now I’m like, do we call it the future of belonging? But no, I think the future of meaningful is good. And I think belonging and meaning are, of course, so intrinsically linked, Mm-hmm.
Simon Waller (08:41.778)
Yeah, so talk us through why like why what what was it about this particular topic? And obviously, we’ll hear this now in a bit in terms of that how you’ve interpreted, or how you’ve articulated that concept of the future of meaningful. But can we just start with a little bit about why? Why this topic? What does it mean to you?
Lizzie (09:02.838)
Hmm, yeah. I’m going to take it back to work again for a minute because what I do is I help solo pros articulate their business better, right? So that they can attract people and make more money, right? So that’s my profession. And in doing that for five years,
I’ve had the privilege to work with, as you say, a bunch of people who are extremely invested in what they do. And it has been fascinating seeing the difference between people who have managed to design a life where they have meaning at work, they have meaning outside of work.
but not only that, that those barriers don’t necessarily really exist, that their whole…
being is kind of an expression of who they are and what matters to them. And so their work is just one expression of that. The stuff they do outside work is one expression of that. Their routine is an expression of that. And those people just seem to vibrate on a different frequency. You know, like they are very magnetic. They are obviously having a hell of a lot of fun. You know, it’s like
I feel like you have unlocked a code here without sounding too much like, you know, some sort of hustle bro idiot, but you get what I’m saying. And so I think that unlocking of meaning, having meaning expressed congruently, sorry, having what is meaningful to you and what is authentically you expressed congruently.
Lizzie (10:58.893)
in all angles of your life is a real critical element of wellbeing.
Simon Waller (11:04.731)
Interesting. Now, with these scenarios, and we talked about this as part of the briefing is obviously, as we go further into the future, the space of possibility grows. And so I’ve asked you, like, I mean, in this scenario, you kind of explore quite a big space of possibility.
Lizzie (11:06.019)
Yeah.
Lizzie (11:20.024)
Mmm.
Simon Waller (11:28.621)
And I think as a result of that, guess from you haven’t shared this with me before, but I guess from what I’ve read in this scenario, we are pitching this a little bit into the future. Do you have a year or that you kind of see that this scenario plays out in?
Lizzie (11:29.208)
true
Lizzie (11:42.308)
Yeah, I think it’s the late 21st century, so we’re talking probably around 2075, thereabouts. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Simon Waller (11:49.98)
I guessed around that yeah, the mid 20s, 70s, the mid 20s, 70s. So 50 odd years from now. Okay. Or we will be kind of just inhabiting a some type of robot exoskeleton and we’ll have had our consciousness uploaded. Hope not, but
Lizzie (11:55.838)
Mmm, like you …
Lizzie Davidson
https://lizziedavidson.co.nz/
Thinking Fast and Slow
https://www.amazon.com.au/Thinking-Fast-Slow-Daniel-Kahneman/dp/0374533555
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