"I'm on a journey. Trying to make sense between soul and shadow. Getting out of my head. Seeing in new ways. Dropping into my heart. Feeling in new ways. Unlearning, to arrive at states of naked, fearful innocence. Fascinated by how our path to a greater collective consciousness might emerge from a radical witnessing of our intimate, interior truths."
- John Oliver
John Oliver was born in the UK and lives in SW France with his wife and two daughters. After a degree in engineering (as a sponsored employee of a large aerospace group), John worked for an overseas aid charity (Nepal and Ghana), an Internet Start-Up an electronics multinational (with 2 years in the USA). Having completed a MBA (EDHEC-France), he created and ran an organisational development consulting brand Human-Equity Ltd for 10 years, specialising in developmental psychology and the Sensemaking school of complex adaptive organisational change that leverages narratives.
Why do I film?
To make art, in intimacy with another.
To dance with the crazy poetry of our lives.
Engaging with the deep ironies
Turning the wheel of self / no-self to arrive at a new wholeness
Playing with the felt sense of time
Inviting voices from beyond
Not to find answers, but to hold our struggles and our joys
My inquiry and adventure is that through the radical 'holding' or witnessing of our individual, unique souls, we can come to a revelatory collective consciousness. It's almost as if the "narrative" has a life of its own, wanting to emerge, evolve and enter into our inner conversations.
I have found that the camera and editing process provides a magical and faithful window into our consciousness.
I feel the world needs more 'listening' than 'telling' - in other words creating space for participatory knowledge vs propositional knowledge (ref. John Vervaeke). My hope this work provides a container for the voices of our infinitely unique experiences and sense of self.
From this quality of sense of self, I believe is a wonderful opportunity for our collective humanity to create a new level of union. It is with these deep ironies, balances of polarities (almost koans) in life that I want to engage and dance with - how thanks to our differences and unique experiences in life, we can come together
A recurring remark of participants at the end of the filming, is that even they are surprised as to which narratives arose in the moment and (especially after the editing process) the clarity they brought. I get to know them with a type of intimacy that even the closest people in their lives don't often have.
This "witnessing" experience integrates training from the Inner View Method (nicaskew.com), and inspirations from Integral Theory (Wilber), Focusing (Gendlin) and Sensemaking (narratives).
The filming is alongside my organisational development work in narratives (based on Sensemaking principles) and developmental psychology (Business Bio - LinkedIn) and my art projects (www.Tyler.world).
I have particularly interest in working with artists in exploring the future of art and it's role in the development of our societies.