Simon Waller (00:00)
Welcome back to the future with friends. Today I’m joined by ⁓ Anthony Richardson, though I don’t think I’ve ever heard Anthony called Anthony in the whole time I’ve known him. ⁓ Anthony is like, think like in Australian culture, we have a tendency to shorten names and three syllables is way too many. And so most people call Anthony, Richo, but then there’s a whole bunch of people who just call him Cho because we can’t even be bothered with two syllables.

Anthony Richardson (00:29)
Thank

Simon Waller (00:30)
Um, so today it was going to be like, uh, as much as his screenmate name can make up as Anthony. Uh, I’ll probably call him Richo most of the time, because that’s the only way I really know you.

Anthony Richardson (00:40)
Indeed, Bigsy, this is true. I’ve often thought about it, us Aussies, we will shorten your name and add O or something to it to ⁓ be familiar, and then we’ll do something further to it, like call it Cho or call it Richo Man or something like that to add affection. first we shorten, then we lengthen, and you end up with some crazy names like Bigsy.

Simon Waller (01:10)
Yes. So the Genesis of Bigsy, this is my, I’ve never really had, you know, I’ve never really had a nickname. Like apart from Si, like it was just an abbreviation. I’ve never really had a nickname in my whole life until Bigsy came up. And so for the context of people listening, ⁓ Richo and I, ⁓ we spent a lot of time in a kind of a group of people. do a bunch of stuff every year together. go camping on Australia day. go away in the King’s birthday. do degustation dinners.

Um, and there’s a boys weekend thrown in there for good measure. So we do get to spend a bit of time together, but the awkward part of it is, is there’s another Si in the group. And, you know, as again, like our inability to be able to distinguish between different people, we end up with a big Si and little Si. And to be fair, little Si about six, two. Um, so little Si ain’t that little, which is kind of humorous in and of itself. Uh, but recently, I don’t think it was anything in the last year or so.

we suddenly realised that Big Sigh could actually also be abbreviated to Bigsy.

Anthony Richardson (02:15)
Indeed, Look, that takes me straight to the first time that I met you. My first memory of Big Simon ⁓ was one of those boys’ weekends, right? I think we… Well, that’s great. You can tell me your first memory.

Simon Waller (02:29)
Well, it actually did not happen before that.

No.

Well, it was the degustation before that. So we had just moved over to Melbourne from Perth and the only people we knew was some mutual friends of ours, Mark and Lou. And so Lou is my wife’s oldest friend. They’ve known each other since kindergarten. And one of the events that this group kind of shares every year is a degustation dinner. It just so happened that that year Mark and Lou were the hosts of it.

Anthony Richardson (02:38)
Okay.

Indeed,

Simon Waller (03:03)
And

we had literally turned up in Melbourne a month beforehand and they were like, you should come. We’re just going to extend an invitation to you. so back then Degustation, it’s now been, I mean, I don’t, it’s been 20 years it’s been running for I think, but back then everybody had to bring a dish and I was like, okay, I’ve just got to nail the dish. If I can nail the dish, maybe, maybe I’ll get some friends, you know. ⁓

Anthony Richardson (03:09)
Yes.

Well

you must have because you’re still here.

Simon Waller (03:33)
Well, I still remember the dish. did like this slow cooked pork belly with a masala kind of gravy and pickled cabbage. And I do remember because the boys weekend itself is also like a culinary exploration. Yes.

Anthony Richardson (03:46)
It has become that. absolutely. I do recall, think,

correct me if I’m wrong, was that, think Mark and Lou had just sort of finished renovating a house at that time and it was like a big unveil and we were all sitting there going, wow, this is really fantastic. They did a wonderful job. They elevated Degustation and everyone’s contributions like yours to make it special is what has made it last through the years. And I imagine that

during that deagastation, somebody’s whispered in your ear and said, there’s a boys weekend coming, would you like to join? Right? And that took me to my sort of first real, I guess, imprinted memory of yourself was ⁓ your arrival at Apollo Bay ⁓ in Dennis, the, what sort of car is Dennis? The van.

Simon Waller (04:21)
Yes.

Well, it’s actually called a

Nissan Homie. Like, is this actual title. a Nissan Homie. Imagine a Nissan Urvan, like, Van Top on a Nissan Navara four-wheel drive chassis. So, yeah. With flames down the side.

Anthony Richardson (04:46)
Yeah, perfect. You and Mark, I with

flames down the side, pulled in the driveway with the music blaring, you jumped out, how’s it going boys? And here we, I just remember, look at the size of this guy, you know, and that’s maybe where the first real problem of the two Simons came into being. So Bigsy, it’s great to be here. Thank you.

Simon Waller (04:55)
You

Yeah.

Yeah.

⁓ and so this having you on the podcast, came up as a conversation at our Australia day camping event, ⁓ earlier this year. And I was just like, you know, I’ve always really admired you and considered you quite a thoughtful person. And, I, was like, what would it be like? What would we explore? ⁓ if we were to jump on the podcast together onto the future with friends.

Anthony Richardson (05:22)
Yeah.

Simon Waller (05:40)
And I think I might’ve posed that to you while we were kind of swimming in the river near the campsite. I’m like, yeah, so if you came on, yeah, it’s like, you know, if you were to come on the show, what would we talk about? And I think that I, I don’t know if I got a straight answer from you at the time, but I think it just got you thinking and ruminating. ⁓ and then we kind of reconnected maybe about a month or so back and we started floating some ideas. And I really love the way this has evolved, ⁓ this episode and the topic.

Anthony Richardson (05:44)
Yeah, I staring at the stars.

Yeah.

Simon Waller (06:10)
Now I call the topic, the future of our regrets.

Anthony Richardson (06:12)
Yes,

yes. ⁓

Simon Waller (06:16)
Which

which as we’ll kind of find out is not necessarily the whole of the scenario but there’s something in this about I suppose like, you know reflection and You know what it is that we will how will is it that we will honor our own lives? Can I ask you? ⁓ As I know this went through a couple of iterations to get to where it is But can I ask you a little bit about what drew you towards this as a topic?

Anthony Richardson (06:40)
Yeah.

Well, I guess it did evolve as I was thinking about it. It’s an honor to be asked to put forward a scenario and to be, I guess, creative and to ponder the future. It’s a wonderful exercise. And yeah, you’re right. I didn’t really have any idea what

what I would offer and I didn’t want to offer something that might be obvious to my career in e-commerce or something like that. And so I went to school sport, my youngest son plays volleyball and while he proceeded to kick the butts of the Mentone Grammar volleyball thirds, I sat out and ⁓ had a coffee and just started writing. ⁓ And maybe it just came from my own

⁓ ponderance of what life is like, ⁓ the things we worry about as a parent, as a person and as a friend. ⁓ And I guess some things just started pouring out of me that led to where we’re going. yeah, it was.

Simon Waller (08:02)
Yeah.

Yeah. And must admit this scenario

is one, like I’ve been thinking, is this the one that I’ve actually found in some ways personally the hardest? And in, in it, as people are about to hear, there’s a bit of a self reflection in it. And, ⁓ obviously we’re both too good looking middle-aged white guys. And so in some of your own self reflections, I hear my own.

Anthony Richardson (08:32)
Yeah.

Yes.

Simon Waller (08:38)
And

I think there’s some great questions that get asked of us in this scenario, which we will explore in a little bit. ⁓

Anthony Richardson (08:48)
Indeed. And you

asked, you did mention to me that as we, as I sort of write it, what I’m talking about will evolve and will probably reveal itself more than what my initial thoughts are. We’ll hear it shortly, but that original blurb of just pouring stuff out is actually word for word in the scenario. ⁓ So I like that.

to some extent I’ve stayed with what was an original gut feel. ⁓ But you’re right, I think it, like many things, it probably raises more questions to consider than answers.

Simon Waller (09:30)
Yeah. Now the last thing, when you kind of get given the task, the only other real requirement is that you can choose any topic you want to talk about. ⁓ The second thing is it must be said at least five years into the future. We need to give ourselves space to imagine something that’s different. ⁓ Also, there’s not something else magical about this kind of five year to seven year horizon where we stopped taking it so personally.

like allows us to look at the scenario somewhat in a third person perspective, even though in this case, you’re like the protagonist of the scenario. It allows us to be perhaps a little bit more thoughtful and critical of what happens than if it’s in the present. Like I said, in the present, there is a deep need for self-protection. And it’s hard to be very critical and to be really open about.

where we’re at, when we go into the future, that kind of gives an opportunity. Now you’ve taken this and run with it. Like you’ve not gone five, not 10, not 20. You’ve gone, was it 42 years into the future?

Anthony Richardson (10:31)
Yeah, yeah.

42 years,

it’s, well, yeah, yeah, 42 years.

Simon Waller (10:42)
And, ⁓ I mean, that seems like, ⁓ is that an arbitrary thing? Like why 42 years of all of the years you could have chosen.

Anthony Richardson (10:52)
Yeah, yeah, because I wanted to base the scenario around generations talking to each other. I had been wondering, you know, if and when and hopefully if I meet my great grandson, what conversation might take place with that great grandson? ⁓

And so that, yeah, they’re the two characters in the scenario, myself and my great grandson. ⁓ And I think that really helped pull me into a deep wisdom type of thinking and why there’s such a reflection in the scenario.

Simon Waller (11:42)
Okay, let’s let’s move and let people hear your scenario. So what I do is I’m going to throw the mic to you. The stage is all yours, Richo. Please tell us about the future of our regrets.

Anthony Richardson (11:53)
Thank you.

Thank you, Bigsy.

Having finished my morning movement session, I sit comfortably looking out over a quiet coastal view. I feel a sense of contentment reflecting on my 94 years. I made choices. I’d sought fulfillment through shaping my life, career and identity to do, to own and to experience. Sure, I’d sacrificed, yet I felt those things foregone had given me a future that I was now enjoying. I take a sip of freshly poured espresso.

and feel a lot, feel a tinge of excitement thinking about how much I will enjoy this afternoon’s cycling adventure. Not bad at 94. Then again, life expectancy had increased 30 odd years. How would I maximise my time during my last 30 or 40 years? Didn’t I have everything I needed? Was it just what I thought I needed? Or could I find something new? I look toward a nearby screen and see the headline, famine continues in. I look away.

as the familiar tinge of guilt passes through me. Gigi, it’s my great-grandson, James. He’s just finished his morning tutorial with the droid. I hate that thing. But it seems to do a wonderful job of educating him. To me, society’s decision to allow automation to reorient so many of our social constructs had created so much isolation, personalised homeschooling.

Singular person transport was a one person disco on wheels. Communication was manicured and stylised by the bots. I craved authenticity. My generation had delivered these improvements in spades. They’d seen me through to retirement and a comfortable future. But would future generations be better off?

James continues, what was it like having to go to school? Didn’t you have to go for like hours on end and they didn’t really teach you much? I resisted the urge to tell him of my triumphs, the relationships, the laughter and the misery of school

Simon Waller (14:02)
You .

Anthony Richardson (14:04)
days again, because he’d heard them before. Do you feel sorry for me? I ask. This stops him in his tracks. He considers the question for some time.

Simon Waller (14:13)
.

Anthony Richardson (14:18)
I suppose I do, but I don’t understand why. You’ve always told me of the things from school days that you were proud of, the things that made you laugh or that you got in trouble for, and you have all these storied friendships. You seem to recall it all so fondly. Then again, you’ve told me how lucky I am just to use the droid. It’s like you’re

glad I don’t have to go to a school. They sound like a prison to me, yet it seems there was good and bad.

Simon Waller (14:43)
You

Anthony Richardson (14:50)
You know what mate, I say? I was just thinking about something similar. James took a seat. He knew this was when old Gigi was gonna go off on a rant. I begin. We are contradiction. We sit in places of privilege, yet we complain for what we believe we lack. We know what needs to be done, yet we don’t act.

Simon Waller (15:01)
Thank

Anthony Richardson (15:12)
We make excuses for why we can’t. We feel guilt. We try to be better, yet we revel in indulgences.

We ask ourselves, am I a good person? The voices in our heads offer arguments of why we are not, yet we know deep down we are. We know we are flawed. We know we could be better. We are perfectly imperfect, yet we wrestle with ourselves. That struggle permeates our every moment, conscious or unconscious. We are human, yet how do we put up with ourselves? James Blinks, Jeepers, Gigi.

Simon Waller (15:48)
Okay.

Anthony Richardson (15:48)
Sounds

like you need to lighten up. But I think I understand. The droid told me about the human condition. It told me how humans have to balance the things that are joyful with the things that are woeful. Didn’t you know that?

I reply, I’ve spent most of my life knowing that and still I struggle to come to terms with it. I reply to truly engage with life. You have to accept the choices and trade offs that you make, but you’ll never know the extent of the difference your choices might have made. What’s the future of this human condition thing for you? James replies, I don’t know either Gigi, but I know I am going to live it.

Thank you.

Simon Waller (16:35)
Thank you. Thank you. That is, it is great. And it’s so, I find this such an interesting exercise I give people and the difference in what people create. Like way back at the beginning when I was first, when I first kind of conceptualised The Future With Friends, the very, very first version of it that came into my head was this one where

I was going to write the scenarios and I was going to invite people on to dissect them with me. And very quickly I realised that if I was to do it, eventually it would just run out of energy because I’d all feel a bit the same. ⁓ and so this, this, this shift of going like, know, like as the guest, you get to do this. What I, what, but what it really has shown me is there’s such diversity in, in terms of how people approach that task.

Anthony Richardson (17:13)
Yes, yeah.

Simon Waller (17:28)
or that ask and also yeah, also such diversity in how they go about it. Can I get you to share a little bit, you mentioned a little bit this kind of, you know, contemplation by the side of the volleyball court. What was this like? Having given this to you as a request, how did you go about crafting this?

Anthony Richardson (17:30)
Absolutely.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, I think firstly, a little sidetrack is, as you know from our many times sitting around the campfire or elsewhere, I like to sing. I love a bit of performance. It brings me joy. ⁓ And I did notice as I was sort of polishing the scenario that

I was really more acting it and performing it. And it surprised me that, that I was doing that yet. It, it, ⁓ it kind of makes sense that, ⁓ that I’ve, just naturally sort of taken the opportunity to, to try and bring some of, some of myself to the scenario. And that, that when I was sitting by the volleyball court, mind you, I was out in the, ⁓ out in the cafeteria because the volleyball courts are very loud.

that, was my overriding thought is as I sat down to commence was how can I bring myself authentically to this conversation? and you know, your first reaction is, gosh, what am I going to talk about? What have I got to offer? ⁓ and so I really found that I needed to just let that go and just let something

something come out and let it evolve. As you start to project your thoughts into what could the future be, what are the things that have happened ⁓ as a result of things that are happening now, ⁓ and how does that shape the environment and the way that I think and the way that the world is, that really helps give you a few golden nuggets that sort of start to shape the

the foundations of such a scenario. And then you try and colour in the lines with your own experience and what seems to be ⁓ coming out of you.

Simon Waller (20:02)
Yeah, so the first thing is it does it sounds so authentically you. Okay. And I can’t help but picture it in my head while you play this out. So from that context, and I think this is one of the power of scenarios is, we are as human beings, are a storytelling story, listening story, remembering machines is how we pass down knowledge through generations. And.

Anthony Richardson (20:23)
Absolutely. Yes.

Simon Waller (20:26)
And that’s why it is, is that when we tell story, we can picture it, we can create mental memories of it. And those things serve us to recall the lessons that are embedded in it as well. And I feel ⁓ more so than some of the scenarios, like this really captures that intent really beautifully. And just the light humor and stuff in it, it’s something I really enjoyed reading. And again, whether or not it just be that we’re probably two people with like in a similar

⁓ place within life at the moment. It was also something that resonated very strongly with me. There’s some of these kind of deeper philosophical questions that you’re posing, which are again, I imagine a reflection of some of the questions you’re asking yourself now, ⁓ are the same questions I asked myself as well. And you know, that, that to me, was saying that really kind of like, go, ⁓ wow. Like there’s so much for us to explore in this.

Anthony Richardson (21:11)
Yes.

Simon Waller (21:24)
And I feel a little bit, ⁓ a touch nervous about it, like, because some of those things may be a little bit uncomfortable. I gave it this working title, the future of our regrets. And again, that’s not the title you gave it, but that’s some of the stuff that comes up for me. like, ⁓ I worry about the regrets. I worry about what happens when we get to this point in our life and we’re reflecting on it. What are the things that.

Anthony Richardson (21:46)
Yeah, absolutely.

Simon Waller (21:53)
We might look back on it go, ⁓ gosh, maybe, maybe that could have been done differently. know?

Anthony Richardson (22:01)
Absolutely. think, well, as parents and as friends, we experience that every day. There’s so many times where I might talk to my own children and I think you have that step back moment of, okay, I’m going to try to impart some wisdom here, I hope I do it well. I hope it’s received. How do I avoid just being an old nagging parent?

How do I level with the people that I’m talking to? Which is why often with me there’s light humor in what I talk about. And that there is an underlying tone of how do I avoid making a mistake? Or how do I avoid what I am talking about having a negative effect?

Simon Waller (23:02)
Yeah. Yeah. And let’s, let’s jump into the scenario a bit, because I think you capture this really well through some of the examples that you give. And I want to start with the one around the, the, the droid, the tutor droid. So you’ve got this premise that in the future, your great grandson, James.

doesn’t go to school anymore, that he has his personalised learning experience delivered to him by a droid. And my assumption from my read as well is that the droid is so efficient that he doesn’t have to go to school for many, many hours a day. He can kind of knock that lane off quite quickly. And

At the same time, you’re looking at the same technology through your own lens and going, ⁓ but there’s also an unintended consequence of that. Is this kind of social isolation piece.

So this is, so the moment, this is what I, what I take from this is right now there are conversations going on within education about the value of personalised learning.

But as this kind of indicates is that with such a change and we have personalised learning, which means that people then learn more one-on-one and we have AI used as a tutor and all these things. And suddenly we’re not learning together anymore because it’s hard to do. It’s almost impossible to personalize learning in a collective that we start doing it individually or more and more individually. Right. And you end up with this unintended consequence of it. And

Anthony Richardson (24:48)
Absolutely.

Simon Waller (24:52)
So this is what I kind of see in this whole example is how often when we talk about innovation and change, we focus so heavily on the positive, but don’t think through the consequences of things and identify the possible negatives associated with this. that, am I reading this correctly?

Anthony Richardson (25:18)
Yeah,

yeah, this, I think you are. There is a constant wrestle, I think, that goes on for humans that sometimes we just ignore, ⁓ which is, there is always consequence of our actions and our decisions. And we, on the most part, we make all of these choices with the best of intentions.

And sometimes those, the implications of that is completely out of our control. In the case of the Droid, I guess I noticed that, you know, we are constantly optimizing and looking for more productive methods of doing everything.

Yet.

When will we know that enough is enough as such? So for instance, how long should a child be in school if the learning has been more optimised? It’s not saying that, the kid might have only two hours worth of learning a day and that’s enough. And I’m not saying what they’ve done with the rest of their time, but.

At some point, I think we do need to consider, you know, what’s the right amount of information going into our heads?

Simon Waller (26:56)
Yeah. And even then what comes up for me in that is that still this assumption that school is about information. And while that the reason what or what underpins that is ⁓ the assumption that how we assess success at school comes back to your VCE. So your basically university entrance scores. And it’s called a different thing in different parts of Australia, different parts of the world.

But that is ultimately the measure of success at school is what was your score? Interestingly enough, must be now about maybe 10 years ago. I, um, I, I, I ran into the headmaster of my old school. So he wasn’t the headmaster when I was at school. Um, I went to, uh, was on a scholarship to a private school in Perth called Scotch college.

spent 12 years there. ⁓ And I left and somehow the new headmaster, Dr. Alec O’Connell, he was in a CEO mentoring group that I was the speaker at, I was the presenter at it. And it was kind of funny to have him on in the room and we had a joke, it’s like, I don’t know, am I meant to call you sir still? How does this go down? ⁓ And anyway, he invited me back in to have a chat with his executive team.

Anthony Richardson (28:12)
Yeah.

Absolutely, the master and the apprentice.

Simon Waller (28:23)
He goes, I’d really love them to meet you. I’d really love you to come and have a talk. And what this conversation was about was a big conversation about how do we actually, how should we be assessing the success of the school? And he said to me straight up, he goes, look, I kind of almost wish we weren’t in the top 20 schools for, in W.A. it’s called the T.E. Because if you’re in the top 20, you get published.

And if you’re published, people watch whether you go up or down each year. And he goes, the hyper-focus on that by parents means that we can’t talk about other things, but more genuinely, like how would we actually talk about it? What would long-term success, if we really believe our job is to raise good young men or to support the growth and development of good young men, right? What does that even mean? And how would we measure it and how would we be accountable to it? And

The problem is, is we don’t have those things and we don’t have those measures that we fall back on the simple ones like what was your TE score or VCE score, right? And I think you can see how that hyper-focused on it leads down the path of, course everyone should have a personalised learning droid. Like that’s how we’re going to achieve it, right? And it ignores all of the other learning, the other developmental stuff that happens at school.

Anthony Richardson (29:34)
Yeah.

Or maybe it’s an opportunity for a great outcome. I’m sure that there are, there might be a teacher listening to this saying, you two old buggers, you don’t know what it’s like. I’m sure that there is, that for a teacher, they might have a class of 27 kids. And while they can see the objective measure of academic performance and scores, I’m sure that teachers are thinking about what is the developmental.

you know, the human side, the developmental needs of these kids and how can I influence them and mentor them to appreciate learning or just to treat each other with more respect? I’m sure that that goes on and thinking about that in a future context is the delivery of the academia side will continue to optimise.

And what does that mean for the role of a teacher? I’m imagining a world where a teacher truly does become more of a mentor. And maybe there can be a shift that the family and the friends take a more open role and conscious and obvious role in the mentoring of their children. There’s often this sort of parental

I send my kids to school and they should raise them. And I’m sure the teachers feel, hey parents, how about you get involved every now and then. Both sides actually are involved, but maybe there’ll be a conscious coming together of how can we develop better developmental outcomes for our kids, which would be a great opportunity that’s come from the optimisation of the academic learning that

Simon Waller (31:22)
Yeah.

Anthony Richardson (31:44)
as an unintended consequence actually created more space for deeper, more meaningful learning.

Simon Waller (31:52)
So I think this is an interesting theory. obviously, neither of us work in education. We’re not teachers. And so we may be kind of speaking out of school, so to speak. ⁓ We work in parenting. So we do see one side of this. I do get that. My feeling, though, and I would love to do an episode on the future of education, I think in and of itself would be amazing. ⁓ But my feeling is that’s not the path we’re heading down at the moment.

Anthony Richardson (32:03)
Yeah, but we work in parenting. Yes.

Simon Waller (32:21)
This focus on efficiency is actually what it’s really created is a greater demand on reporting. We want more data, but all of the data sits inside the stuff like we’re trying to make learning optimised still. And what I’m interested to do later on in your scenario, you allude to the stories that you tell about your own schooling experience.

And I’m kind of curious a little bit what that was like. And I don’t like, I know we could spend a lot of time exploring that, but almost like there’s a way that we capture our memory. Like there’s almost a shorthand for our own time at school that we use. Like there’s a way we summarise it in our own head. We’ve distilled it down. Can you tell me what the distilled version of your own school and experiences?

Anthony Richardson (33:22)
I went to a local primary school and a ⁓ like self at well for high school. went to a private boys school. and yeah, if if I really boil it down, primary school was

was actually much more developmental. I just look back on primary school as a fun, easy time and I love the teachers and I love my friends and even saying that I can remember times where I didn’t, but in general, absolutely love that time.

high school had had extra demands for academic performance.

but it did have some specific focus on development as well, right? So camps, that the fun you have on school camps is unbelievable. Like that memory of just laughing for three hours in the deep of the night with your friends over the most ridiculous things is just, it’s such a sweet, joyous core

Simon Waller (34:24)
You .

Anthony Richardson (34:39)
memory. ⁓ I think that

Simon Waller (34:40)
Okay.

Anthony Richardson (34:46)
There is in this, guess, conversation about education and you could have another

episode all about that. It does lead me to this sort of position of what

What is it about education and where we’re taking it right now that a future generation, my grandson will say to me, why the heck did you guys do that? Why didn’t you do this? That’s that future of regret part of thing is, those regrets are forming now.

Simon Waller (35:20)
Yeah.

So that was, I suppose what I’m, I was trying to understand was in some ways is this future that you talk about with personalised education, a response to the deficiencies that you experienced or hold onto from your own schooling. So my version of this is, so I went to a private boys school for 12 years. and I was the

perfect candidate for such a school. was academically minded. I loved activities. I got involved in everything. And yet my memory of school isn’t positive. Like there’s so much positivity in that. And yet my memory isn’t positive. And I look at some of the deficiencies that I experienced. People think it’s like literally hilarious that every Friday we used to march into assembly to a full pipe band.

Anthony Richardson (36:12)
Yep. Yep.

Simon Waller (36:23)
And we would get marked. Like we would get scored on how well we marched. And I kind of, look back on that and go like, wow, really? Like this is, this is what edu, that’s education. and again, probably a more powerful memory for me. my brother, ⁓ Matt, he’s 18 months older than me. he was, I think the first person in WA to be diagnosed with ADHD. He’s got ADD at the time.

Anthony Richardson (36:24)
Yeah, sure.

Yeah, okay. Wow.

Simon Waller (36:53)
He also had dyslexia. and for him, that school was the worst place he could possibly be. It did not fit him at all. And I didn’t really understand that initially. I just thought that he just, to be honest, I used to think he was dumb. And, and it was, wasn’t until he actually checked himself out of that school, you know, he said to my parents, I want to go somewhere else. And they go like, well, you do the application, you do it all. We’ll sign it.

Anthony Richardson (37:12)
Yeah, sure.

Simon Waller (37:22)
He ends up being the only city boy boarding at a agricultural college in year 10. Maybe year 10 he went, yeah. It was extraordinary, the transformation. Like his grades went up, his level of engagement went up. And I just realised that that environment is actually not an environment for everybody. In fact, it’s not a good environment for most people. Like I was the exception, not the other way around. And

Anthony Richardson (37:31)
Yeah, okay.

Simon Waller (37:51)
You know, so one of the things I, if I look at it, even with the choice I made about my own kids schooling, it’s like, it will not be that traditional. It will not be religious. I don’t believe that religion and education should necessarily coexist. and finally, you know, it has to be something that offers, has a much broader, ⁓ belief around what education development looks like.

Um, and, and again, ironically, my own kids, I’ve got the same thing. I’ve got one very academic one who has been diagnosed with ADHD, dyslexia, dyscalculia. And I’m just so grateful they’re at a school which fully acknowledges and supports this. Right. And again, what I’ve kind of come into though, is that I made choices in response to the deficiencies that identified in my own education environment. And I wonder like, this is kind of what we keep playing out.

Anthony Richardson (38:34)
Yeah.

Yep, absolutely.

Simon Waller (38:47)
is that somehow we look not at the strengths all the time, what was great. We find the problems in society, the problems in our own upbringing, the problems we’ve experienced and go, I just want to change the bad bits.

Anthony Richardson (39:02)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. can see that in, well, I can see it in my approach to parenting. How do I want to be as a parent? well, you know, dad might have hit me with a wooden spoon, so I’m never going to do that because that’s wrong. ⁓ I think that comes out in the scenario. ⁓ I guess, you know, I’ve just explained to you that my

core feeling about school was a positive experience. And yet, and there it is in the scenario on playing out this pining for the good old days. And so we do have this bias towards what our experience was and that, and for a, it that future generations pick up on that and somehow, you know, they wanna reverse it or flip it.

Simon Waller (40:00)
So then when it comes in here then, so I almost feel like the next part of this though. So we have this intent to try and fix the bad bits of what came before us. You know, we push back on perhaps what we see as being the deficiencies of our parents’ generation. And we go, I think this very plays out very strongly when we talk about concerts of parenting, but as we’ll talk about in this scenario, I think it’s bigger than that. think there’s global aspects of this, but.

Anthony Richardson (40:19)
Yes.

Simon Waller (40:29)
You know, we look at parenting, we’re like, well, I’m not going to make the same mistakes my parents made. But in the, like that’s kind of hyper-focused intent, we then don’t think through the unintended consequences of the choices that we will make. And later on we may explain them away as like, yeah, but who could have known, right? And my question is, but could we have?

Anthony Richardson (40:54)
That’s right.

Simon Waller (40:57)
Like if we just thought it through a bit deeper and a bit longer rather than being so hyper-focused on, I’m definitely not doing that. And even potentially in doing so missing some other reasons why those things were done. Not understanding the deeper rationale as to why our parents parented us the way that they did. And our kids maybe not understanding why we’re parenting them the way we are, you know.

Anthony Richardson (41:10)
Yeah.

Absolutely, yeah, lot of the choices we make in the present are based around what happened in the past or what might, or a fear of such of what might happen in the future. How do we become more conscious in the present that there is consequences of our decisions and that that is, that is how it is.

It’s always gonna be that way but bringing it into the conscious might actually have us not make choices based on past and future necessarily, but on what we feel is correct and or not correct but authentic and appropriate for the moment for the person, you know, can that bring us more to a to a more human outcome for the people that we’re

making choices on behalf of, and even ourselves. I think, you know, for me…

Simon Waller (42:23)
Mmm.

Anthony Richardson (42:27)
That’s the main crux of what I’ve been thinking about in building that scenario is that the human condition is there, wow, there’s good and bad and they can’t exist without each other. And how do you bring that into your life ⁓ and your day to day, even though it feels like it sucks a little bit, but the more you…

lean into it, the more sweet sorrow there is in it.

Simon Waller (43:09)
Yeah, when you, so let’s go back to the opening of this and you kind of offhand make this comment about lifespans have been expanded, extended by 30 odd years.

Because that was the first time I picked this up, which was around, yeah, but what would that mean? Like, and I’m curious when you wrote it and you wrote it as like, yeah, like the benefit being I’m now 94 and still going out for a bike ride with my mates. Right. So active participating in society. ⁓

Anthony Richardson (43:31)
Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

And that’s my hope for the future for me.

Simon Waller (43:47)
Do you, how did you think through or have you thought through it all what the unintended consequences of that might be?

Anthony Richardson (43:55)
So doing this exercise certainly brought that to my attention. What could the consequences be? Yeah, thinking about those things is kind of exciting. I think that we already know that we have an aging population ⁓ and in that future scenario,

We sure do have an aging population. It’s gonna be much, much larger than what it is today. And what burden might that place on future younger generations? Or do we, if we’ve got an extended lifespan, should we be working longer and being more productive? Do we just get to still retire at 65 or 68, wherever it is?

and enjoy a 70 year retirement? I don’t think so. I don’t think that’s practical to think that that’s gonna happen. ⁓

Simon Waller (45:00)
I think also

though, in some of those social norms and even legal frameworks and other things about when people can access things like pensions should things still exist or when you can draw on your superannuation, they lag. So they lag behind what’s happening in terms of longevity. So even in that situation, I think there’s a catch up that gets like, has to be played. think people ⁓ still think

Well, I, I want to retire when I’m 65 or 70. I’m definitely not working by 70. Like that’s crazy. But you know, as you said, you kind of have this period of time afterwards. It could be another 30 or 40 years that, um, how does that even look? Yeah.

Anthony Richardson (45:42)
Yeah. Yeah.

I think at one point in my career, I was doing some IT contracting for ANZ and we were working at the bank ANZ and we worked on the ANZ app and it was intended to be a whole of life ⁓ app where it talks about helping you get used to saving money and it starts to bring in, you know,

portfolios and superannuation within the same app and take you through sort of what’s called in financial terms, the wealth accumulation phase and the working phase and the preparing for retirement phase. And then the last phase or the second last phase, actually, they call it legacy and then, and then dying in the, in a world where life expectancy may well increase, I think an

and unintended, hopefully positive consequence is that it actually increases our ability to create a legacy. ⁓

touched on religion a little while ago, I had this belief personally that, as we know in a lot of religions, it can be about living a good life now, so that when you die, you live forever in heaven or eternity in bliss, whatever that is, ⁓ where other religions will be much more about the now.

as opposed to saying, let’s get out of the trap of thinking about everything has to be in preparation for a blissful eternity. Let’s just focus on the now.

Simon Waller (47:40)
even when I was sharing this yesterday, after we spoke, I was talking to my wife, Nomes, about it. She mentioned a podcast that she was listening to, which is a diary of a CEO. And they had a guest on Professor David Sinclair, who is a biologist, he works in longevity, professor at Harvard University, who has been saying for a long time,

that we can reverse aging, ⁓ acknowledging that there is a fair bit of evidence that some of the things that claims he’s made in the past have not turned out to be true. Okay. But it has raised a number of ethical considerations when we talk about longevity and these are like the, we start talking about the unintended consequences. Cause on the surface, ⁓ living another 30 years sounds delightful. You know, because partly because of our,

our fear of death. So we get, it’s almost like we can, we can put off the fear for longer. Yeah.

Anthony Richardson (48:38)
Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, absolutely, and that’s exactly where I was going, so thank you for helping to pick me back up. yeah, where I was going is, personally, I don’t really think of it as life after death. I think of it as life before death. I think that creating legacy and your influence on people now is the concept of life after death, your legacy, how you’re affecting.

call it humanity or the world now and how that lasts in the future is the thing to think about. And by being more actively conscious about our choices and the consequences now helps us to achieve, I think, a better legacy or some legacy ⁓ more effectively.

Simon Waller (49:41)
I’m going to come back to the term legacy because I question whether it’s the term we should be using. But before we do that, I want to finish off this thread about longevity because you’ll find out in a second that legacy is going to segue us beautifully into the next part of this conversation. But ⁓ with the longevity piece, when we start to look into some of those ethical challenges of it, the things that do come up is, first of all, this medicine is expensive. Not everyone will be able to afford it.

some people will be able to live longer and other people won’t.

Anthony Richardson (50:17)
Yes, yes, yes, yeah.

Simon Waller (50:17)
Like, right.

Just think about, you know, even this David Tinkler, well, he likened it to, ⁓ you know, this is like the similar to the work that the Wright brothers did about airplanes. Like at one point we couldn’t imagine airplanes. And the next thing you know, we’re flying around the world, you know. ⁓ And then, but if you were to actually be honest about that is like, no, no, no.

Anthony Richardson (50:23)
That tinge of guilt, that tinge of guilt, yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

Simon Waller (50:47)
You’re a middle-class Westerner. fly around the world. And if you are 90 % of the world’s population, you’ve never been on a plane. So the creation of the technology doesn’t mean it then gets equally distributed. And I imagine it’ll be the same 10 % of the world’s population. You know, we people in Australia who cannot afford longevity. Both in terms of the medicine required.

Anthony Richardson (51:13)
Yeah. Yeah.

Simon Waller (51:17)
for it, but also in terms of being able to support yourself for that period of time without working. Like that again is a hugely costly burden. And maybe we’re going to find that in this future of longevity is that if you’re a, you know, what do you describe? Almost like a life maximizer.

Anthony Richardson (51:38)
Yeah.

Simon Waller (51:40)
that if you’re one of those group of people and you take drugs or medication to extend your life, you are ineligible for any type of social safety net or medical safety net. You get taken off Medicare, you get taken off any type of social support network. It’s like, cool, you’re on your own now because we cannot afford to support people who are going to live for an indeterminate amount of time.

Anthony Richardson (52:06)
Yeah, and this touches on what could be, well, I regret or something that future generations blame on us right now.

10 % of us who could, who were in that position of privilege, raced ahead with progress, yet did that with what might look like complete disregard to the other 90%. And things like wealth distribution and the unequalness across the globe may well be worse than it is now, much more extended.

Simon Waller (52:35)
Yeah.

So, so this is,

yeah. And this is what came up for me when I read your scenario for the first time is this concept of like, of these regrets. And this is a potentially a regret in the making. We’re not there yet. The technology isn’t arrived. We still have time to think through what the unintended consequences are. But when I first read your scenario, it was like, wow. What, what will be the things that.

Anthony Richardson (52:58)
Yeah.

Simon Waller (53:15)
we get blamed for by our kids. I feel like there’s certain things that we blame our parents for a bit, right? We, we blame them for, you know, some of the climate change and environmental destruction bit. and yet somewhat ironically, even though we have grown up knowing this somewhat to be true,

Anthony Richardson (53:22)
Absolutely.

We do, yeah.

Simon Waller (53:44)
we haven’t even done a better job than them. Like I did some research into this cause I was like, okay, did we learn anything? Like did we change anything from what we knew? And it turns out that, you know, like from an energy consumption perspective, we are used slightly less energy than our parents did at an equal time in their life. And the way we’ve done that is more efficient cars, ⁓ more efficient houses.

You know, we suddenly think about insulation and a whole bunch of stuff like that. But anything that we achieved in terms of that small reduction in energy use, we completely destroyed in terms of consumption. Like the amount of things in our house, how often we change our devices, upgrade our car, like the embodied energy in all of those things that we buy and replace all the time. It’s like, like

Anthony Richardson (54:29)
slowly.

Simon Waller (54:42)
deeply outstrips any small little smug savings that we made in, you know, in insulation.

Anthony Richardson (54:47)
Yeah. Yeah. I can, I can

see a future generation saying to us, you lot thought you were, you were so much about change and, and bring and fixing the ills of the world yet. You were just, you were kidding yourselves. Things, things continue to get worse. ⁓ Look, hey, social media. ⁓ we know that it’s an obvious one that already we’re seeing that

future younger people are struggling with social media and I think we’ve got to continue to put our hand up to say that. ⁓

that the unintended consequences around that are already manifesting and they’re negative. I’m sure there’s some positives there somewhere. ⁓ I would like to hope that…

Simon Waller (55:38)
Yeah.

Anthony Richardson (55:46)
future generations will applaud the women of our generation for the finding of their voice and the, ⁓ let’s call it the needling of men to take a more conscious role in how women are treated in society. I don’t think we…

People might look at it and say, you made ground as a generation. And I think we know as men that the future generations might say to us, you didn’t do enough.

Simon Waller (56:32)
Yeah, think, I think there’s, there’s, agree that there is at least a portion of society that we are familiar with. There’s a level of, almost like there’s a, we’ve taken some of the good ideas from, from our parents’ generation, from the boomers. like, we didn’t come up with feminism, but we’ve gone, actually it’s fairly solid. Let’s run with it. Civil rights.

Anthony Richardson (56:57)
Yeah. Yeah.

Simon Waller (57:00)
You know, things like that again, I think that we’ve got a more mature understanding of that. I also acknowledge within that, like one thing that has really struck me, you know, is how different the education around, for instance, like ⁓ the colonisation of Australia, what that looked like when I was at school versus my kids being at school. Like we got a pretty rosy picture of it. You know, there was not really much of a massacre conversation.

Anthony Richardson (57:24)
yeah, yeah.

Simon Waller (57:30)
⁓ so I do think as well, in some ways, you know, we’ve had to come to terms with the fact that the educate. So we’ve done a better job ⁓ of educating our kids about those types of things that perhaps we got educated. I think we can take some credit for that too.

Anthony Richardson (57:46)
Yeah, absolutely, think.

I guess if you look back through generations there, take the example of women, women had to fight for the right to vote, the fight for the right to go to work. that occurred sort of pre the boomers. And so a lot of what

we might think that we’re doing and achieving now, know, it’s the old, stand on the shoulders of giants who fought before us. And I think what actually happens is that our collective memory, we forget some of the stuff that has gone before us and then claim it as our own, as our own victories. I think that

It’s like, it’s, if you imagine you’ve got a balloon and there’s a little pinprick in it. And so the balloon is slowly deflating. And so we always need to have some air going into the balloon to keep it going. And I think that’s what kind of remaining conscious of consequence and what, you know, the human condition.

is all about is consciously trying to put air into that balloon. So it doesn’t deflate too much and we don’t lose memory of things that have gone before us and what we’re trying to achieve and what we stand for.

Simon Waller (59:25)
So this brings me back to the conversation now about legacy. Cause I go, what are the, one of the things that I wonder whether or not we will be blamed for, one of the regrets we may hold 30 years in the future is this kind of like hyper-focus on individualism.

and the reason that kind of comes back to legacy is I feel that legacy is a very individualistic concept.

Right. So if we want to talk about the collectivist concept is more like stewardship. So stewardship is, I use this language when I work with clients, especially within councils, often, you know, the counselors get asked, what’s your legacy going to be? We’re talking about like, what name is your building going to be on? As opposed to stewardship, which is our collective responsibility to leave this place in a better state than we found it in.

Anthony Richardson (1:00:15)
Yeah.

Simon Waller (1:00:23)
But I do wonder, it’s like we are this hyper focus of individualism and a shift away from a kind of collectivism or collectivist view. And again, I know these terms get so warped. It’s like, you’re saying socialist, you’re saying communist. I was like, no, no, no, we are part of a society. There are some things, some of the great things that have ever been achieved in the world because we’ve done them collectively. So ironically, this is one of my takes by way of our camping that we do.

So ⁓ for the listeners, every Australia day we go camping. It’s a tradition now that’s been running for about 12, 13 years. I think it’s been running for, ⁓ it’s a very collectivist experience by people who I would say in their day to day life, a lot of them are quite conservative in their leanings. So they’re kind of, you know, you wouldn’t describe them as being communists in any stretch, but

we have a communal, a very, very communal way of camping together. More so than I think most people would do. I just came up our last ⁓ camping trip that they do with other people. So to give context, it’s like we get there, we actually hire a spare campsite just to set up the communal space on where we have a communal kitchen, a massive communal table that gets donated to the collective group. We then put all of our cutlery and our crockery

Anthony Richardson (1:01:24)
We do.

Yeah.

Simon Waller (1:01:50)
into communal tubs for anyone to use. ⁓ We have communal food. We have communal drinks. Like for the sake of the three or four days, everything is everybody’s. And whenever we need somebody, something, somebody will go and get it. And when we never need something done, somebody will do it. No one even seems to care. And at the end of it, we just divide our stuff back up again and we leave the campsite. Like.

Anthony Richardson (1:01:58)
Yep. Yep.

Yeah, and it’s amazing

how quickly every year we just fall into it. Like there’s not even a, gosh, I’ve gotta be communal. It just automatically happens. It’s a great experience, yeah.

Simon Waller (1:02:32)
I think we can’t wait for it. This is the truth. It’s the opposite.

It’s like, it’s not like we do it under duress. We do it because it creates the best experience. It’s like, we just get to be amazed all the time at how generous everybody is. Like that’s what I’d really take away from it. Yeah.

Anthony Richardson (1:02:38)
No.

Yeah. And hey, you know, it,

yeah. And that’s, mean, it’s still a small, it’s not quite a global scale, but it is 40 to 50 people who are really on the spot creating legacy that is shared, shared legacy. Yeah. That knows those kids of ours who we, who we spend so much more time talking to with kids who aren’t our own kids on that particular camping trip.

Hopefully, they love it. It’s part of a core memory and it’s hopefully influencing them to relish and enjoy a broader community.

Simon Waller (1:03:33)
Years and years ago, I read this book was very influential on me is called the origins of wealth, ⁓ which talks about the whole concept where there’s actual where does real like wealth or value come from? Like, it’s a very thick book, but the very short answer to it is it comes through order, like we actually pay or we’re willing to value order. So ⁓ but one of the things in it, there’s a little piece at the end, and talks about ⁓

Anthony Richardson (1:03:53)
Okay, yeah.

Simon Waller (1:04:00)
what actually creates the influence on our children. And ⁓ they kind of did some research around it. We understand obviously our parents would be an influence and their teachers would be an influence. But there was almost a big gap in understanding about where, like what were like those core influences that led to like positive reciprocal relationships when they were older. And the missing part of it, it seems, was the relationship.

between your parents and their friends. The modeling of what you do or what you say as opposed to the saying of what you say is actually a massive influence on them. And I have no doubt that beautiful energy, this sharing, this generosity that we both involve ourselves in, but just so deeply enjoy.

has, there’s no doubt that doesn’t have a huge influence on them. And I know my kids, like every year is like, almost like the highlight of their year is the time that we’re going to spend in, you know, with roaming gangs of kids and roaming gangs of parents at a campsite in Euroa. Yeah.

Anthony Richardson (1:05:15)
Yeah, yeah, we’re fortunate to share that. hope other people get that sort of joy somewhere in their life.

Simon Waller (1:05:25)
⁓ which interestingly kind of brings me to where I came to in my own thinking about this whole scenario, right? Like there’s so much of it. I focused on this regret bit. And then when I got to the end of it, I was like, well, but, but what, what will actually do we value? You know, we, we focus on the deficiency and the deficiencies of our parents, ⁓ parenting of us.

And we focus on the deficiencies of, you know, the, global situation that we find ourselves in. And we don’t always give credit to what was actually created. And, you know, when, yeah. And so when we look at that and go, you know, with, ⁓ without parents generation, as I said, you know, things like feminism and the civil rights movement and a whole bunch of stuff, it’s like, I put a man on the moon. Like, wow, that’s pretty.

Anthony Richardson (1:06:08)
Yep, or to ourselves.

Simon Waller (1:06:23)
pretty freaking impressive, but well done guys, you know, and, maybe it’s like, ⁓ maybe the other question is what will we re not so much regret, but what will we actually really actually pat ourselves on the shoulder about? And I, and I think like at an individual level, think the stuff that we’re talking about, ⁓ is part of that, you know, you know, and, even, ⁓ you know, at a personal level, I speak so highly, ⁓

Anthony Richardson (1:06:26)
Yeah, yeah.

Simon Waller (1:06:51)
of the family dinner tradition that my mom created when I was in my late teens, which basically was an open invitation for all my friends to come to our house and eat dinner once every couple of weeks. And how positive that has influenced my intent to do something for my children in a similar way, to create a space of kind of intergenerational, ⁓ kind of collective engagement and socialization. So I kind of like, that was where I got to the end of all this. was like, actually there is…

There are really positive things that we will look back on as well when we’re kind of, you know, 94 about to hit out for a bike ride.

Anthony Richardson (1:07:27)
Yeah, well, that’s what that’s what sort of shifted for me in doing the exercise was once again, I found that I need to stay engaged with with sort of with myself and with, you know, with with the choices that I’m making. You I find

that at times as you get caught up in life, the air in your balloon does decrease and decrease. And the more you can remind yourself or put yourself in situations that ⁓ take you there to really more deeply think about what some of the consequences are or ask yourself the question is what am I gonna regret in the future that I’m currently doing? I think that

That will help us all and myself to deal with this constant wrestle that goes on within us.

Simon Waller (1:08:38)
Yeah. And I think it’s, it’s a wrestle that not that we shouldn’t shy away from that we actually need to have. Cause somewhere in there, is also the, some of the truths we talked about earlier on in this episode was around, yeah, sometimes we don’t think through the unintended consequences of our actions. And it’s not fair just to say who could have known when you could have known if you’d just been a little bit more thoughtful. ⁓

Anthony Richardson (1:08:45)
That’s right.

Absolutely.

Simon Waller (1:09:05)
And at the same time,

don’t let that take away from the positive intent and, you know, the stewardship and legacy that we have also, we’re now starting to, ⁓ to provide, right? Like it’s that kind of almost responsibility has been handed to us now by our parents. In fact, many of us are now looking after our parents in their old age. It’s like up to us now, there’s no one else to blame. It’s like that moment when you realise you’re the adult in the room, you’re like,

Wow, how did this happen?

Anthony Richardson (1:09:36)
Yeah, that’s right. And I think as a member of Gen X, we probably don’t acknowledge as much that we are effectively the ones in charge, so to speak, at the moment. ⁓ We’re kind of in our 50s and that’s a real prime of lifetime. And that’s the time that we started calling our parents boomers.

Simon Waller (1:10:03)
Yeah. Hey, this has been a delight. had one of the very early pieces of wonderful feedback or that I got on this podcast ⁓ was a friend of mine, Chris, who listens to every episode. And he said, it’s like you’re out of, you’re sitting around a fire listening to a few of your friends have a really intelligent conversation. And part of you wants to kind of budding and say something. And part of you just wants to sit back and listen.

Anthony Richardson (1:10:30)
Hahaha!

Simon Waller (1:10:34)
And for you or for us, that’s actually a very real analogy because we have had these conversations about a campfire. We’ll undoubtedly get to have them again. I’m truly grateful ⁓ for the friendship, but for you coming on to the show and sharing this and it’s such a personal, both a personal scenario, but a personal conversation. It’s been awesome having you, Richo.

Anthony Richardson (1:10:34)
slowly.

Thank you very much for inviting me. ⁓ It’s a real honor. ⁓ I have been a fan for a long time. I love all the various formats that you deliver, not only on this podcast, but on others and your speaking engagements. Some of the education you’ve provided people over the journey. I really admire the vulnerability that you bring to it, ⁓ the authenticity and the creativity.

So well done you, and I look forward to gazing up at the stars and coming up with some more crazy ideas.

Simon Waller (1:11:39)
Well,

let’s leave on that compliment. Thanks again, Richo. Make you feel a little bit uncomfortable, but I do appreciate the intent. And for those listening out there, thank you so much for listening in. We’ll be back with another episode in the very near future. Until then, bye.

Anthony Richardson (1:11:44)
Good man.

Thank you. Bye bye.