So, … why would I offer that?

If it were me reading this letter, this is the question I would ask first. Also, I’d certainly want to know who’s making the invitation, to be able to form any opinion at all. In fact, you might be asking yourself several questions by now.

“If that guy is actually qualified, why would he do this for free? On the other hand, if he doesn’t know what he’s talking about, why would he even bother making that offer? Is it going to be a sales pitch? Fraud? Are there any strings attached?”

Let’s put some of your doubts at ease right away. I have good reasons for doing what I’m doing and I will gladly explain these reasons to you. Let me assure you, I wouldn’t make this offer and commitment if I wasn’t very clear about the value I can create. But also, I can only do this because I’m convinced that my participants benefit from attending the calls. I’m indeed not charging money for these sessions and there are not going to be any liabilities or obligations for you to shoulder. That said, let’s move forward. Let me start with talking about what you can expect, and then go into the reasons why I’m doing it.

Can you see through
other people’s façades?

Most people you encounter every day, if asked, will likely tell you that they consider themselves to be a decent judge of character. After all, merely by living our lives, most of us have indeed gained decades of experience dealing with all kinds of people in a broad range of situations. We certainly must have been somewhat successful in our social interactions, as otherwise we likely wouldn't be where we are at in life.

However, just for a moment, let's consider the idea that most of us are actually not always as good as we would like to be when it comes to seeing through people, interpreting their behavior, predicting how they will act or react in future situations, and identify their motives and hidden agendas. Let's consider the idea that we've all experienced situations, when we had a hard time understanding why somebody acted or reacted in a seemingly counterproductive or illogical way.

Let's admit that, in some situations in our past, we've satisficed ourselves with incomplete and unsatisfactory answers to why certain people show a specific behavior in a specific situation. Even more, let's be honest enough to realize that we've all had situations in our lives when we weren't able to make much sense of our own reactions, upcoming thoughts and emotions, and even behavioral patterns.

Therefore, let’s face the fact that there are likely not many human beings on planet earth who haven’t still a lot to gain from learning about human nature.

Who I am
and what I do

My name is Dr. Stefan Liekam. I’m a coach and seminar facilitator with more than twenty years of experience in this field. At the core of my work, I teach people how to create changes in their nervous system, enabling them to either intentionally modify or let go of unwanted emotional, mental, and behavioral patterns and restraints. In other words, I teach ways to resolve inner and outer conflicts, rid oneself of limiting influences, increase intelligence, build mental, emotional and behavioral skills, and upgrade the programs our body-mind system is driven by. Which essentially means that pretty much nobody has a clue what I’m doing.

Of course, somebody who’s attended a coaching session or a seminar with me will know the effects and personal outcomes they took from it. They will also know some of the techniques and approaches I applied in that context. And yet, they will have a hard time explaining it to others in a comprehensible way. The thing is, we’re all different. We might have certain values and perspectives in common, as well as some overlap in our experiences. However, finding the right words to make a truly personal experience actually relatable to somebody else, who hasn’t made a sufficiently similar experience yet, is a challenging task.

Yet, this is what “Exploring Human Nature” is about: getting access to and comprehending other people’s experiences while having some realizations about ourselves in the process. However, this is an invitation, not a draft to join the military, so let me tell you a little bit more about what “Exploring Human Nature” will likely be able to do for you.

What “Exploring Human Nature”
can do for you

To give you a realistic idea of what the “Exploring Human Nature” sessions are all about, I’m asking you to allow me to guide your attention, so I can hand you the necessary information, bit by bit. In return, I can promise you one thing right away: if, after reading this, you don’t believe that the information I’ve provided relates to you, I hereby apologize for wasting your time. If, however, you realize that you’d like to find out more, I hope that you’ll consider my invitation.

“Exploring Human Nature” is a way for me to teach a significant part of what I’ve learned over more than two decades of working with clients. I offer this with no strings attached to basically anybody interested in listening. In two classes per month, I go into topics that I consider important and relevant. But also, I answer to pretty much any questions coming from the participants. Questions about personal issues are allowed, as long as they don’t make the time frame burst. No replays of these sessions are being made available, as I want people to attend, not just to watch afterwards. Also, I don’t want anything that is being said, by me or the participants, to be taken out of context. And, I want it to be a meeting of people who are actually interested in the topic. Therefore, you’re either in for a session, or you miss out. You may take notes, of course, but you need to agree to make no attempt to create any visual or audio recordings.

So, what kind of topics are being addressed during the sessions? In essence, I talk about situations, occurrences, and phenomena that we’ve all come across at some point in our lives and probably had a hard time making sense of. Even more, I talk about perspectives and practical strategies that will likely turn out valuable whenever we get in similar situations in the future. Which will inevitably happen, as things rarely happen just once when it comes to human behavior.

The challenge of
making sense of people

At some point, we’ve all encountered situations like this. And, we would not only love to be able to make more sense of them, but, based on this understanding, also be able to modify our actions or reaction in the future.

The topics I’ll go into
and my style of teaching

In “Exploring Human Nature” I cover a broad range of topics that, for one reason or another, seem interesting and relevant to me. I explain how all of us are constantly being influenced by other people, and I also point out how we affect them. I analyze why some people easily reach their goals, while others struggle with getting things done. I talk about how imprints from our past affect our present and future and how certain imprints are being handed over from one generation to the next. Furthermore, I talk about those little lies and illusions we make ourselves believe every day and about how our potential gets limited by inner and outer circumstances. I talk about self-discipline, motivation, narcissism, manipulation, intuition, empathy, personality types, the psychology of relationship, learning, as well as cultural and social factors of influence.

I’m not doing this in textbook lecture style. Instead, it’s more like a conversation that evolves naturally, interplaying with the topic at hand. I arrive prepared and I do occasionally use slides, however, for the most part, I just come up with the information I believe is needed for the topic at hand.

This is indeed very different from reading books, watching documentaries, or attending academic lectures. It’s more practical, more time-efficient, and hopefully more fun. In these sessions, I’m condensing the knowledge I’ve collected from a broad range of sources and I’m adding my practical expertise to that. In fact, I’m extensively talking about my own conclusions based on my own experiences, so, basically, I’m doing the work for you. All you need to do is show up, listen, allow the information to sink in, and ask any questions that come to your mind. All for free. Honestly, I’ve never come across any offer like this made by anybody else.

Different perspectives
and some inconvenient truths

I consider it likely that what I talk about in “Exploring Human Nature” is relevant to you and your life. Then again, why should you think so as well? Maybe because with my background in academia and my experience in the field, I’m scientifically legit. I’ve studied psychology, educational sciences, philosophy and medicine, earning a master’s degree as well as a PhD. However, personally, I would probably not consider this too relevant. Academic achievement and significantly evolved people skills, from my experience, don’t come together too frequently. The way I see it, my twenty plus years of experience in coaching are not much of a valid reason for listening to me either. Not only does the existing variety of coaching styles, methods, and techniques make it virtually impossible to predict what you’re going to get, but also, at the end of the day, anyone can call themselves a coach, no matter their level of knowledge, skill and experience. Last but not least, there’s also the fact that I’m teaching practical intuition since the late 1990s, giving me access to uncommon viewpoints and unconventional insights. However, this also leads to me frequently pointing out sore points and inconvenient truths, which, self-evidently, not everybody likes to hear.

Western empirical science is not the only perspective on reality. Despite the knowledge it offers, quite often it is neither the most enlightening, nor the most practical one. In fact, I gained much of the more profound knowledge about human nature from people outside of the scientific community who were somewhat proficient judges of character and had an unusually deep understanding of human nature. Sometimes it seems quite bizarre to me how people who know pretty much nothing about scientific research methods and even less about basic methodological critique cling to what is generally considered as common scientific opinion. The way I see it, studies and statistics never tell the truth. They only tell information based on a specific perspective. In this sense, it requires many different perspectives, scientific and other ones, to get to the core of human nature.

A more personal story
about why I’m doing what I’m doing

Let me shortly tell you why I’m doing this work. Looking back into my past, I’m realizing how much I wished for something like this to have existed when I was a kid. Seeing other people do things that contradicted what they said, hearing them say things that contradicted what they had said before, and watching them do things that contradicted other things they did, in many cases left me puzzled. I specifically remember a situation at a time when my body height was still below my father’s belt line. I still remember this clearly, although I don’t remember how old I was when this story happened. Somehow it had come to my mind that I had grown quite a bit over the last year or so. I pointed that out to my father. To me it was quite a realization that I now wasn’t small enough anymore to be able to stand upright under his legs. My father told me to stand right behind him. The moment I did, he farted straight into my face. He had a good laugh. As did my sister, who the whole show was obviously meant to entertain. As small as I was, I felt not only disrespected and emotionally hurt, but I was also highly confused why a person I looked up to would do anything like this.

We might prefer to believe that situations we’ve experienced in our childhood, shouldn’t have much of an effect on us today. However, as neuroscience has clearly shown, we’re all highly influenced by our earliest experiential imprints. Obviously, this is true in my own life. Those situations when I felt ignored, treated unfairly, or having somebody else’s priorities, values, and perspectives imposed on me gave me that drive of desperately wanting to know why “shit happens,” in my life or in other people’s lives. Even more, I wanted to be able to read other people, look through their masks, and be able to sense their motives and agendas. I wanted to become one of those people who are able to size up and assess other people with uncanny precision. Therefore, most of my life, I’ve been looking for answers, reading books, having conversations about related topics, attending trainings, and getting myself into situations that I believed could teach me about human nature, starting long before my time at university.

How my professional
background fits into this

Of course, my interest in human nature and behavior reflects in my professional career as well. In fact, it opened doors for me in ways I would never have expected. I didn’t only work as a coach and seminar facilitator, I’ve also become a ghostwriter, marketer and business consultant. I’ve ghostwritten letters and emails in the name of CEOs to help resolve company crises, rebuild shareholder trust, and influence entrepreneurial decisions. Based on my psychological background and experience, I found my way into marketing and public relations, developing my own marketing methodologies (Relational Response Marketing and Expertise Branding) in the process. I got deep into trauma work, learning a lot about how our earliest imprints affect our lives and behavior every day. I also held and organized seminars and occasionally large trainings in this field, creating revenue of up to more than $130,000 in a single event.

That said, what I always get back to is teaching. No matter if I’m working in a group setting or one-on-one, I enjoy breaking down, reorganizing, and synthesizing the knowledge I have in order to make it digestible for another person’s mind and nervous system. I like making connections and explaining cause-effect relations. Whenever coaching is about issues between people, an essential part of my job is to explain one individual’s interpretation of reality to another individual. It’s about creating transparency and comprehension. In this sense, it’s about creating a relation between one person’s inner reality and another person’s inner reality. It’s about explaining why people do what they do, feel what they feel, and think what they think. For inner or outer conflicts to be solved and potentials to be accessed, this is what needs to happen. Ultimately, coaching techniques are not always based on verbal language, but they always need to focus on enabling the nervous system to integrate, reorganize, adapt, and therefore understand. For me, there’s indeed not much of a difference between teaching, marketing, and consulting. In all cases you need to make information digestible to another person’s nervous system in order to create relevance and value for that person.

Who “Exploring Human Nature”
is meant for

As I said at the very beginning, my invitation is meant for anybody who’s willing to listen. If you work in a job or field that requires you to deal with people on a daily basis, you’ll likely gain a lot from these sessions. But also, if you’re mainly interested in coming to a better understanding of those people you encounter in your personal life, you’re equally welcome. And, of course, if your interest lies in finding new perspectives that can help you question your own reality and your habitual ways of dealing with it, you’re in the right place.

As long as you’re open-minded, you can attend. However, you’ll need to be able to handle some humor, irony, and even occasional sarcasm, as I consider it impossible to talk about human nature while making is serious all the time. Also, you’ll need to be ready to deal with some directness as beating around the bush is not necessarily always my thing. On the other hand, you won’t have to agree with what I say. In fact, I don’t even want you to believe anything just because I say it. Instead I want you to use the ideas and perspectives I present to find your own truth.

Who should stay away
from these sessions

If you don’t see the need to question your own reality, or you don’t like your reality to be questioned, these sessions are probably not for you. I question things all the time. I question situations, as well as people, including myself. You’ll need to be somewhat willing to deal with that. My goal is not to be right, but to find better perspectives. However, I don’t question everything at once. I can still be clear about what I believe and feel certain of knowing, based on my own experience. It’s essential for my work to have strong opinions about a lot of things. However, having the mental flexibility to be able to change perspective and question anything, any time, for any reason is equally important to me. So, in a way, I expect you to either be or get comfortable with looking at one and the same topic or situation from a variety of perspectives.

Also, I require you to respect other people’s points of view and emotional reality. There’s always a possibility that personal topics will be addressed. Occasionally, emotions may come up. However, these sessions cannot be about everybody else commenting and sharing their opinion about one person’s situation. As much as time allows, I will indeed respond to personal questions, however, I’ll need to keep the time frame in mind. Also, if I say something about another person that you don’t like to hear, you probably just need to live with that. I’m not interested in offending anyone, but I can’t please everybody all the time, either.

Finally, if you’re kind of an asshole, please don’t join in. You need to be willing and able to care about other people and their needs to be part of this. If you happen to not know if this is the case, ask somebody who avoids spending time with you. Tell them what you need the information for, just to make sure they’re being honest. The thing is, I don’t want “Exploring Human Nature” to be an intensive training in manipulating people for one’s own gain. So, if there are too many situations in your life when you have a hard time having other people’s best interest in mind, just keep out.

What I personally gain
from offering this

As I said from the very beginning, I have good reasons for offering the “Exploring Human Nature” sessions. Creating value for the attendees and having fun doing so is certainly a big part of it, but there are other benefits as well. The sessions are a way for me to invite anyone interested in my work to get to know me without any obligations. And, of course, they allow others to easily recommend me to anyone they think could benefit from what I do. Also, they are an option for former clients of mine to casually stay in contact with me.

To be able to run this project and make it available for free, it needs to somehow be a part of a bigger picture that is economically viable. Much of the material that I’m going to make use of during the sessions I fully intend to reuse afterwards in seminars or products. Without that, the whole concept of “Exploring Human Nature” wouldn’t be sustainable. Besides, there’s likely no better way to expand your knowledge than to teach. Each time I prepare a session, I go somewhat beyond what I know already, but also, just by getting myself in a teaching context, my brain processes the information in a somewhat new and different way. At the end of the day, the more value I’m able to deliver to the participants, the more I benefit myself.

Some frequent questions
answered in a nutshell

Can everybody invite just anyone to join these sessions?

You may indeed feel free to invite people to join the “Exploring Human Nature” sessions. So, if you know anybody who might be genuinely interested in the topic, make sure to let them know that these sessions exist and what they’re about. New people are always welcome to join in, as long as they’re willing to listen, and also open for making use of the information they get.

However, be considerate about whom you extend my invitation to. Don’t invite people just because you believe it’s what they need. Instead, invite those who will likely be open to what the sessions are about. This is neither missionary work, nor therapy. If you know somebody who has a tendency to drag you into endless discussions about why things are the way they are and why it’s hard to change them, this is likely not the right person. Also, if your mind immediately starts thinking of all those hopeless cases in your life who are in desperate need of saving, this is not what the sessions are intended to do.

Invite people you like to be around and who you believe might possibly be a good fit. If you’re not sure, giving it a try likely won’t hurt. The sessions are meant to be easily recommendable and accessible. Eventually, everybody needs to decide for themselves anyway.

Why is it necessary to register?

A registration process is necessary, as I obviously need to keep some kind of control. These sessions are not public events and there will inevitably be situations when the conversation becomes more personal in nature. I do want to have some kind of understanding who attends and, if I ever feel the need, be able to draw a line to protect the space or other participants. And yes, this does mean that I am able to deny or remove the right to participate if I ever believe I have to.

The number of participant spots is limited and also, these sessions are not meant to be lectures in front of an anonymous crowd. We’re using video conference software to get together. Nobody is being forced to join the conversation or ask questions, however, I don’t want identities to be hidden or falsified. So the basic rules of conduct include the cameras to be turned on.

Is there any way to give back?

The fact that it’s important to me to offer “Exploring Human Nature” free of charge, doesn’t mean I wouldn’t accept donations. I want to be very clear, however, that these sessions are indeed meant to be free and nobody should feel obliged to donate. Then again, I like the idea of offering a possibility to give back and I’m grateful for any support and contribution, be it small or big, financially or otherwise. Therefore, if you feel you get value from what I do and want to show your appreciation in a tangible way, you may choose one of the donation options that I offer for that.

That said, if you want to make a big difference for me and really support the project, there’s something else you can do: write me a testimonial for “Exploring Human Nature” that I can use to reach more people and raise more interest. I have a procedure for that, so you’ll presumably find out that the questionnaire I offer will allow you to find your own way of describing your experience. Your opinion as an attendee is powerful, so by writing a testimonial you can do many people a big service. Also, you’ll make a small but relevant contribution to hopefully making the world a better place, just by helping to create more awareness for “Exploring Human Nature.”

How does the registration process work?

Simply click on the registration button on this page, fill out the small registration form and click on “send”. After that, you’ll receive an email, containing a confirmation link that you need to click on, thereby giving me permission to send you information. By doing this you automatically sign up for the email newsletter, so I can inform you about dates and times.

Generally, the sessions are being taught twice a month. However, you only have to register once, to have permission to attend any future session. At this point I’m offering each of the bimonthly sessions separately in English and German (so for me that’s four appointments per month). I address a different topic each time, however, in some cases, I need to split a topic between several sessions. The exact length of the sessions depends on the flow of conversation and on how many questions are being asked, although I try to not take more than 90 minutes. As people from different continents and time zones are attending, it’s unavoidable that scheduling requires some willingness to compromise.

Do the sessions build on one another?

The sessions are supposed to be as independent from each other as possible. Therefore, you can attend as often as you want or as rarely as you want. It’s not a requirement that you take part in each and every upcoming session, so in case you’ve missed one of our meetings, or even several ones, that’s a good reason to definitely be there again next time. On the other hand, it is indeed a good idea to make it a habit to attend on a regular basis. “Exploring Human Nature” is an ongoing training in people skills and knowledge that gives you some new insights and perspectives each time you show up. The more often you attend, the more your life will reflect the knowledge you integrate and the more you’ll find out how things can be different just because you start seeing things differently.

It is not part of the concept to offer replays or make recordings available. As you might expect, I have a number of reasons for that. First, I’m very aware that there’s a difference between actually being present while a session takes place compared to just watching or listening to a recording afterwards. For the “Exploring Human Nature” project, I prefer the participants to have the mindset that goes along with attending live. Also, I want the sessions to create a safe space for getting in contact, asking questions and receiving immediate answers. Eventually, I want to avoid bits and pieces of these sessions being taken out of context and shown to people who haven’t been there themselves.

Most of the material that I come up with for the sessions will indeed be used in other contexts or products later on. Of course, the sooner you learn something, the sooner it will affect, and potentially change, your life in a positive way. Attending a session, self-evidently, is likely always better than missing out. I’m very clear, however, that there will be other opportunities to get access to much of the information offered, sooner or later.

This is what you’ll get
when you accept my invitation

One question that I repeatedly asked myself in the run-up of this project is what I can promise to deliver. Naturally, what I’m offering here is different from one-on-one coaching. I can offer knowledge, of course, and I can occasionally demonstrate how to resolve deeper issues. However, although I’m occasionally addressing individual topics on request, the “Exploring Human Nature” sessions are first and foremost about giving insights that are fundamentally relevant to pretty much anyone.

My goal is to

• give you insights, tools and perspectives that will expand your understanding of other people’s behavior, modes of thinking, and emotional reality
• introduce viewpoints and practical knowledge coming from all kinds of traditions and schools of thought
• enable you to see through other people’s masks, defense shields, and superimposed behavior
• increase your capacity to handle difficult, tedious, annoying, or manipulative people
• help you gain a deeper understanding of your own behavior, reaction patterns, coping mechanisms, inhibitions, as well as unused skills and potentials
• give you insights that will allow you to improve your relationships with other people, be it in your professional, or your private life
• enable you to unveil self-sabotage and self-deception, as well as those kinds of littlelies that we tell ourselves to feel ok about things we shouldn’t feel ok about
• debunk misconceptions about what works and what doesn’t work when it comes to dealing with other people
• give you practical strategies and approaches that can significantly change the outcomes that you create in your personal and professional life

Sign up now
if you think this might be relevant to you

So, when you click the button below, you get right to the registration form. After filling it out and sending your registration, you’ll receive an email asking you to confirm. By clicking on the confirmation link you give me permission to send you information and remind you of times and dates of upcoming “Exploring Human Nature” sessions.

P.S.:
In case you’re still in doubt if you should give the “Exploring Human Nature” sessions a try, ask yourself a simple question: “Do I really want to experience that feeling of not knowing what I’ve missed? Do I want to never have a clue what difference it would have made if I had attended?” Seriously though, I cannot know if the “Exploring Human Nature” sessions are right for you. Of course, I do consider the knowledge I offer to be universally relevant, but this doesn’t mean that everybody wants to study these topics with this kind of a focus. You might have different priorities or prefer doing things in a different way. However, as you’ve read this far, at least part of what I wrote must have resonated with you, in one way or another, and I’m assuming you agree with me on that.

In case you eventually decide that you’re not up for “Exploring Human Nature” now, you might be at some point in the future. We’ve all experienced situations in our lives when we had enough on our plate, were too busy, or even temporarily struggled with handling everyday life. Also, you might have a time-consuming job, one or more kids, or other commitments. One might well argue, of course, that all this should be considered even more of a reason to get into “Exploring Human Nature”, as the sessions are aiming on making your life easier and less stressful.

For me, personally, two conclusions have become increasingly relevant over time. Firstly, when it comes to learning new things, I prefer to avoid postponing as much as I can. Secondly, whenever I’ve postponed something, I keep in mind to actually get back to it later, no matter how much time has passed, as long as it is still relevant to me. So, regarding the “Exploring Human Nature” sessions, you might well want to give them a single try right away, even if you are not ready to become a more regular attendee at once. That way, your own experience can tell you if the sessions might be worth keeping in mind.

P.P.S.:
Of course, I’d prefer you to avoid postponing and I certainly want you to show up more than once. I want you to give “Exploring Human Nature” a real chance and allow the sessions to make a difference in your life. In these sessions, I put a lot of focus on offering knowledge and strategies that can be applied right away, but you’ll need to attend frequently enough for the pieces of information to add up and true knowledge to build. Eventually, the more complete your picture becomes, the more the sessions will be able to do for you. Therefore, I truly believe the sooner you start, the better.

From the very beginning, I’ve been asking myself for how long I’ll be offering the “Exploring Human Nature” sessions. Not least because I’m not planning to repeat any sessions in this series, except if I have new material or ideas regarding a topic that I’ve already talked about. The answer is: I don’t know how long I’m going to do this. I likely won’t offer these sessions forever. Also, if it grows too big, I might well have to change the basic concept, if only for technical reasons. I intend to keep the sessions going for a long time, but my abilities to predict the future are somewhat limited. Everything evolves. So, let me be dramatic about it: At some point “Exploring Human Nature” will become history, then legend, and eventually myth. So, here’s your chance to be able to one day teach your grandchildren and your children’s grandchildren what you’ve learned from being part of it.

P.P.P.S.:
In case you, quite understandably, took a shortcut by scanning through the headlines and then starting to read this letter from the very end, well, there’s a lot I’ve said in regard of what the “Exploring Human Nature” sessions are about and whom they’re meant to create value for. So, if you’re in doubt if what I’m offering is for you, you might just want to get back to reading some of the information I’ve given.