Roger has lived an eclectic life. He holds a Master of Science in Mathematics from Northern Illinois University and a Master of Science in Management from the Sloan School at MIT.
During his career he taught high school, was a manager for a Fortune 100 company, owned a management consulting company, and, most recently ran the local Chamber of Commerce.
In the midst of his professional career, Roger has volunteered extensively. He chaired the local 4th of July Fireworks for 17 years, has worked with teens in an anti-alcohol, anti-drug program for 13 years, and has spent more than 3500 hours answering calls on a suicide hotline over that past 16 years.
Roger speaks and writes extensively. He spoke at both TEDxIIT and TEDxQuincy, published a collection of his essay in his book “Questions That Matter.” Today, Roger focuses on helping others discover a “Life That Matters.”
He and Judi, his wife of 37 years, have two grown children and live in Batavia, Illinois.
4 topics · no fee, no honorarium, no mileage
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In his book, Questions That Matter, Roger Breisch writes, “Putting aside deceitful questions—whose cadence and tone imply an answer—all questions matter. Sentences that end with the ubiquitous squiggle atop a period open the future to new possibilities. Sentences ending with just a period condemn the future to limitation and constraint. Answers have a way of ending discovery and learning; captivating questions open us to unimagined possibilities.”
After spending more than 3500 hours answering calls on the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, Roger has learned a great deal about what questions truly matter in creating a life that matters.
Neil Postman once said, "Children are the living messages we send to a future we will not see." When we change the life of a young person, we change the course of human history.
In his book "Humanity's Journey Home," Roger talks about the future of the species Homo sapiens and our relationship to the biosphere. It is a provocative view and well received by those who are willing to take off rose-colored glasses and examine the perils we face and the paradigms that got us here. The perspective is hopeful in the long term, but realistic in the short term.
In her highly acclaimed book, Being Wrong: Adventures in the margin of error, Kathryn Schulz says “As far as we know, then, error is uniquely ours. Our fallibility is what keeps us suspended between the kingdom of lessor animals and the kingdom of God.”
How might we be different in the world if we knew a large percentage of what we think we “know” is wrong… or at least off kilter? If we entered the world each day with the understanding there is much to learn and revise about our current thinking, might we be more curious? Better listeners?
The human brain is a pattern making marvel, but the stories we make up based on those patterns are often wrong. We do this every day when we make up stories about others based on very little knowledge of who they really are. Might we find people are far more interesting than our first impressions leave us to believe?
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