We're all sheep. It just depends on the flock.

That's Keith about 26 minutes into this week's episode — and it's the sentence that reframes the whole conversation. Part 1 of a two-part arc on judgment: how we do it, why we do it, what changed, and why our nervous systems weren't built for the scale we're doing it at now.

Gerren opens with a story about a friend's 50th birthday party — two baby mamas, three kids, all the grandkids around one cake. The kind of village most of us don't have anymore, and the level of acceptance it takes to hold it together. From there they get into the imagined audience concept from the 1960s, the infinite ladder we're all climbing without knowing where the top is, why judgment is culturally defined and not just "human," and why individualistic societies feel guilt and collectivist societies feel shame — and what that actually costs us at scale.

Also — the loss of the redemption arc. Why the interview process is one of the worst predictors of anything. Resting bitch face as an example of misplaced confidence in snap judgments. And why positive gossip might be a healthier sorting mechanism than the culture has given it credit for.

Part 2 next week, where we get personal about how this shows up in our own lives.

Key Topics: The imagined audience concept and social media's expansion of it, Dunbar's number and the judgmentscape, the difference between guilt and shame across cultures, moral attribution and intent vs. outcome, sociometric status as a happiness driver, cancel culture and the loss of redemption, and positive gossip as a social sorting tool.

Find Us: 🌐 https://www.moreincommonent.com 📸 https://www.instagram.com/moreincommonent 🐦 https://twitter.com/MoreInCommonent 📘 https://www.facebook.com/moreincommonpod

Gerren Taylor: 🎵 https://www.tiktok.com/@gerrent 💼 https://linkedin.com/in/gerrenT

Thinking out loud about what gets in the way of connection.

Like what you heard? Leave us a comment in your podcast app. See you next week.

You don't have to be happy to be grateful.

That's the sentence Jonathan Pride lands on at the close of this week's episode — the distinction between contentment and happiness that reframes everything the three-part arc has been circling. You can be in a hard season and still be intentional about gratitude. That's not fake-it-till-you-make-it. That's the actual work.

Part three closes out the arc with combat veteran, author, and Caterpillar Leadership Institute founder Jonathan Pride. The why we still do it episode. Jonathan tells the story of the young man in the bathroom before a networking event who never learned how to tie a tie. Chris the welder from New Orleans, who Jonathan pushed into a sales role no one thought he was qualified for — and who became the top salesperson in a 7,000-person company within a year. What Jonathan wants those 37 promoted people to say about him when he's not in the room.

And a moment worth flagging — Jonathan names, live on air, that he might be in a cocoon moment right now, and that this podcast conversation might be the prompt he needed. That's a rare thing to catch on tape.

Practice intentional praise. Never stop learning. Contentment is not happiness. Big brisket energy.

Key Topics: Faith and the unseen outcomes of meaningful work, the individual stories that keep leaders going, systems change thinking, the moment of naming an in-progress transformation, Chris the welder and validating what others can't see in themselves, the difference between contentment and happiness as etymology, and practicing intentional praise.

Guest: 📚 Caterpillars Don't Fly by Jonathan Pride — Available on Amazon 🌐 Caterpillar Leadership Institute → caterpillarleadership.org 💼 LinkedIn → linkedin.com/in/jonathan-pride-831b3875

The Full Arc: 🎧 Part 1 — Who Are You Proving It To? 🎧 Part 2 — Who's Holding Space for You? 🎧 Part 3 — You Don't Have to Be Happy to Be Grateful

Find Us: 🌐 https://www.moreincommonent.com 📸 https://www.instagram.com/moreincommonent 🐦 https://twitter.com/MoreInCommonent 📘 https://www.facebook.com/moreincommonpod

Gerren Taylor: 🎵 https://www.tiktok.com/@gerrent 💼 https://linkedin.com/in/gerrenT

Thinking out loud about what gets in the way of connection.

Like what you heard? Leave us a comment in your podcast app. See you next week.

Who's holding space for you?

Gerren asks it about halfway through this week's episode — and Jonathan Pride, combat veteran, author, and founder of the Caterpillar Leadership Institute, has to sit with the question a second before answering. Because when you're the one everyone else leans on, the question itself lands a little differently.

Part two of a three-episode arc. This one is about the emotional cost of always being the rock — representational weight, the impossibility of redeeming everyone's wrongs, the line between real resilience and quiet suffering, and where a leader actually replenishes. Jonathan gets into a funeral that reframed his understanding of his father, the Obama Fellowship moment that birthed his brand, and a permission slip exercise you can try tomorrow morning.

Also — the SOAR framework broken down (Storytelling, Ownership, Abundance, Resilience) and which pillar Jonathan admits is hardest for him to live personally.

Neither of them settled it. Part 3 next week.

Key Topics: Representational weight in predominantly white rooms, systems change vs. surface change, the SOAR framework as a leadership operating system, the Obama Fellowship, micro-communities as replenishment, the fringes of daily life where identity slips, the permission slip exercise, and a regret about a favor asked and never repaid.

Guest: 📚 Caterpillars Don't Fly by Jonathan Pride — Available on Amazon 🌐 Caterpillar Leadership Institute → caterpillarleadership.org 💼 LinkedIn → linkedin.com/in/jonathan-pride-831b3875

The Full Arc: 🎧 Part 1 — Who Are You Proving It To? 🎧 Part 2 — Who's Holding Space for You? 🎧 Part 3 — [coming next week]

Find Us: 🌐 https://www.moreincommonent.com 📸 https://www.instagram.com/moreincommonent 🐦 https://twitter.com/MoreInCommonent 📘 https://www.facebook.com/moreincommonpod

Gerren Taylor: 🎵 https://www.tiktok.com/@gerrent 💼 https://linkedin.com/in/gerrenT

Thinking out loud about what gets in the way of connection.

Like what you heard? Leave us a comment in your podcast app. See you next week.