Hello, I’m John.

I’m a reformed academic with a penchant for philosophy. Frankly, I’ve had enough of the doom and gloom.

I’m interested in syntropy: making life richer, more energetic, and more coherent. There’s still plenty to understand, create, and make better.

I write and teach philosophy in that spirit, introducing curious people to thinkers and ideas that help us make sense of things and see what else is possible.

John

John Stoszkowski

Background

A little more about me

I spent fifteen years in academia, researching how people learn, think, and develop judgement. My background is in sport and human development.

Outside my work, I paint, play records, and battle the elements on my allotment in pursuit of perfect fruit and veg.

Qualifications

  • Senior Fellowship (SFHEA), 2019
  • Ph.D. in Social Learning, University of Lancashire, 2015
  • PGCert in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education, University of Lancashire, 2012
  • Master of Philosophy, University of Birmingham, 2010
  • B.Sc. in Sports Science, Lancaster University, 2005

Writing

Books

Work

More about working with me

Much of my work happens through Syntropise, which I co-founded. I also teach philosophy privately, shaped around the things you’re curious about.

We might explore what makes a good life, how we come to see the world as we do, or what it means to create something worthwhile. I introduce different thinkers, explain their ideas, and explore them with you through conversation.

There’s pleasure in understanding something for its own sake. Sometimes an idea also gives words to an experience, unsettles an assumption, or opens up a possibility you hadn’t noticed.

You don’t need to have studied philosophy before. Wanting to learn is enough.

If that sounds like your kind of thing, write to me and tell me what’s on your mind. You can also take Thinking Fit to see if we’d work well together.

Influences

Some of my favourite thinkers, painted by me
Heraclitus, painted by John Stoszkowski
William Blake, painted by John Stoszkowski
Arthur Schopenhauer, painted by John Stoszkowski
Friedrich Nietzsche, painted by John Stoszkowski
Henri Bergson, painted by John Stoszkowski
Alfred North Whitehead, painted by John Stoszkowski
Rudolf Steiner, painted by John Stoszkowski
Ernst Bloch, painted by John Stoszkowski
Lao Tzu, painted by John Stoszkowski
Martin Heidegger, painted by John Stoszkowski
Owen Barfield, painted by John Stoszkowski
Hannah Arendt, painted by John Stoszkowski
Clare Graves, painted by John Stoszkowski
Ray Peat, painted by John Stoszkowski
Mae-Wan Ho, painted by John Stoszkowski
Iain McGilchrist, painted by John Stoszkowski

Heraclitus

For Heraclitus, the world’s always changing, but that doesn’t mean it’s a mess. There’s an order running through it, with change, tension, and apparent opposites all belonging to the same whole.

William Blake

Blake’s world is alive with imagination, energy, and possibility. He’s suspicious of anything that narrows our vision or crushes the human spirit. His poetry and art give that spirit room to run wild.

Arthur Schopenhauer

Schopenhauer’s a gloomy counterweight to easy optimism. He sees life as driven by restless wanting, with suffering never far away. There’s relief to be found in art, and a reason for compassion in our shared predicament.

Friedrich Nietzsche

Nietzsche wants to shake us out of inherited ways of thinking and living. He’s interested in how we create values, what strengthens or diminishes life, and whether we can embrace existence in all its difficulty.

Henri Bergson

For Bergson, life’s an ongoing act of creation. Time, consciousness, and change are things we’re living through, and there’s always more happening than our neat categories can capture. The future’s still being made.

Alfred North Whitehead

Whitehead sees a world made of relationships and happenings. Nothing exists entirely on its own, and nothing’s ever quite finished. His philosophy follows the connections through which the world keeps becoming something new.

Rudolf Steiner

Steiner’s interested in the possibilities of human consciousness: thinking freely, developing our perception, and taking the spiritual side of life seriously. He sees these as things to explore through experience and bring into everyday life.

Ernst Bloch

Bloch takes our longing for a better world seriously. His philosophy brings hope, imagination, and political change together. The world’s unfinished, and what we do matters to what it might become.

Lao Tzu

Lao Tzu’s thought has a quiet confidence in the way life unfolds. Simplicity, humility, and knowing when to leave things alone run through it. There’s wisdom in working with the nature of things and easing our grip.

Martin Heidegger

Heidegger tries to get beneath what we take for granted about being alive. He’s concerned with how we inhabit the world, how we get caught up in everyday life, and what it means to make that life our own.

Owen Barfield

Barfield sees imagination and language as clues to how human consciousness has changed. Our relationship with the world isn’t fixed. We participate in how it appears to us, and he thinks there’s more to that relationship than modern habits of thought allow.

Hannah Arendt

Arendt’s concerned with the world we share: how we think, act, and live alongside people who see things differently. Freedom, responsibility, and our capacity to begin something new run through her work.

Clare Graves

Graves sees human beings as unfinished. Our values and ways of making sense of life can change as we meet new conditions and problems. There isn’t a final form of person we’re all supposed to become.

Ray Peat

Peat’s thinking brings biology, imagination, and a love of life together. He sees living things as active and creative, shaped by the conditions around them. Energy, freedom, and the possibility of growth are recurring concerns.

Mae-Wan Ho

Ho sees life as a coming together of countless activities, with freedom in the parts and coherence in the whole. It’s a view of living things that gives cooperation, responsiveness, and connection a central place.

Iain McGilchrist

McGilchrist’s concerned with how we attend to the world, and what happens when a narrow, controlling outlook takes over. He brings science, philosophy, and art together to explore a reality that’s richer and more connected than that outlook allows.

My philosophy

A few things I believe

  • Reality is always richer than our descriptions of it.

    What might you miss once you’ve put a label on something?

  • Perception comes before prescription.

    Have you understood what’s going on before you try to fix it?

  • Wisdom matters more than knowledge.

    You can know plenty, but how do you decide what matters?

  • Education should make you your own authority.

    How much of what you think have you actually thought through?

  • Freedom comes with responsibility.

    Are you willing to own the choices you make?

  • Life should still feel like an adventure.

    When did you last do something just to see what would happen?

  • Coherence matters more than certainty.

    Can you live in a way that makes sense to you without having it all figured out?

  • The good life is participatory.

    What could you help bring to life?

Allotment

My favourite place
The plot before cultivation, with neighbouring sheds and houses beyond.
A wide view of the allotment before the beds were prepared.
Freshly turned soil beside the allotment sheds.
A newly dug bed seen across the low fence.
Laid-out beds and paths across the allotment.
Freshly prepared beds divided by paths.
Young plants in grow bags inside the greenhouse.
Rows of young plants emerging from the soil.
The prepared beds and greenhouse in late spring.
Green netting around beds filling with summer growth.
Flowering potato plants beside the shed.
Green allotment beds in early summer.
A tray filled with freshly picked red and dark berries.
A handful of beetroot pulled from the allotment.
Bowls of berries beside a courgette and a freshly pulled root vegetable.
Freshly dug red and pale potatoes spread over the soil.
Apples, berries, beetroot and courgettes gathered in bags and baskets.
A colourful harvest of courgettes, potatoes, carrots, tomatoes and berries.
Beetroot, courgettes and berries gathered beside the bed.
An orange pumpkin ripening among its leaves.
Beetroot, yellow courgettes, cucumbers and berries arranged in a tray.
A wide view across the allotment in full summer growth.
A dog beside a bowl of freshly picked raspberries.
A dog beside bowls of strawberries, raspberries and currants.
A dog on the allotment path beside growing pumpkins.
Rows of freshly harvested red and pale onions drying on a board.
Ripening pumpkins among green leaves.
Apples growing on a tree in the allotment.
A box of potatoes, onions, leeks and berries.
A dog beside trailing squash plants.
Beetroot, potatoes, leeks and a few raspberries laid out after picking.
An orange butterfly resting on a round pale flower head.
Freshly harvested carrots with their leafy tops.

Contact

john@johnstoszkowski.com