You've Invited: The Foundations of Agency Workshop

A 6-Week Experience for Anti-Mimetic Leadership

It’s been 9 months in the making. THE FOUNDATIONS OF AGENCY—a new workshop that I developed with novelist Jordan Castro—is now open for enrollment. The first 6-week cohort kicks off the last week of September.

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When I was 14 and starting high school, my dad told me that no matter what stupid things I did, if I ever called him at 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning, in a bind, and needed him to come pick me up, that I shouldn't hesitate to call—because, he promised me, we wouldn't talk about it that night.

We would eventually talk about it and deal with it—maybe even the next day—but he wanted to remove all fear in me of calling and asking for help, in the moment. It was a "no questions asked, I just want you to get home safe" policy.

I took him up on it one night, and he was true to his word. I've never forgotten it, and I've never forgotten what would have happened to me if I hadn't trusted in it.

Sometimes, when I visit him in the dementia wing of the Veterans Home, I look into his face and see that he trusts in my promise to him, too.

I’m sharing this short story with you because I’ve realized, in the many years since, that my dad cared deeply about cultivating a sense of agency in me—making sure that I knew that, “no, I don’t have to get into the drunk kid’s car”, and that I had the courage to face the consequences of my actions, even if it meant social ostracization or criticism. As a writer today, I can’t tell you how important that skill set has become.

The sense of agency my father was trying to teach me wasn’t the tech bro kind—to do what I want, when I want, or to achieve things that other people tell me are impossible. There is a kind of obstacle-obsession inherent in that view of agency that brackets out the question of what is actually good.

The kind of agency my dad was trying to teach me—anchored more deeply in the classical tradition—was deeply relational. After all, everything I do affects other people, including I express my very desires. The idea of individual agency is largely an illusion. Our freedom always has limiting factors, but it also is ordered toward love and responsibility.

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I lost this sense of agency during the rough years of my twenties, at the very time when I imagined myself to possess a large quantity of it.

In reality, I was insecure. My voracious appetite for “building” (start-ups) was often an elaborate self-deception to convince myself that I wasn’t actually terrified of what other people thought of me, or what I needed them to think of me. It was as if I was trying to build reality, trying to become real through my companies. But that, I eventually learned, was a fear that could be overcome by facing the truth.

And that is the third element of agency that is hardly ever even articulate: truth. It is the truth that sets us free—makes us “high agency”. Not agentic A.I., or life hacks, or “trying harder.”

What We Did About It

To address what has seemed like a gaping hole in the agency frameworks and discussions (they are increasing in frequency…), we decided to design a workshop to offer a more foundational, person-rooted approach to agency.

The origin of this workshop was a 1-semester interdisciplinary course in the business school at The Catholic University of America which I developed and taught with my Cluny Institute colleague, the novelist Jordan Castro, to undergraduates (primarily juniors and seniors). We took major risks and challenged students to do things that most university courses do not ask them to do—like engage in solid-self communication with someone they might be afraid of.

Seeing its transformational power—not only for the students, but for me personally—convinced me that we needed to extend the reach of the experience, and I began to get excited at what professionals would bring to the table as part of a collaborative workshop format.

Jordan and I, with massive support from the entire Cluny Project team, have been hard at work this summer turning The Foundations of Agency into an abbreviated, virtual, professional workshop. The 6-week workshop begins the last week of September. At the end of the workshop, we will likely propose an optional celebratory meet-up in D.C.

You can learn much more about the experience and the commitment involved at foundationsofagency.com.

While we have not yet decided on a cap for the total number of participants in this first cohort, I expect somewhere between 12-18.

There is a competitive application process that I encourage you to begin immediately if you have any interest—applications are due July 15, but we will be reviewing them on a rolling basis. If your application is accepted, you will have 10 days to pay the full tuition in order to lock in your spot. If your application is not accepted for this cohort, we will keep it on file for future cohorts in 2026. This first cohort is a unique opportunity, and I do not expect tuition ($995) to ever be this low again. We are compensating you, in part, for being will to be a part of version 2.0 while we refine things.

I absolutely cannot wait to see the group that comes together for this. We are looking for a stellar cross-section of talented, dedicated, generous people with diverse life experience who want to be a part of building something new together. While the framework, ideas, and challenges will come from us, I am confident that the majority of the learning will be peer-to-peer—and you will be among the best. If my engagement with readers here over the past four years is any indication, you will be inspired and supported.

Lastly, patron-level supporters of this newsletter will receive priority consideration for their applications. If accepted, the full amount of your patronage will be deducted from your workshop tuition.

I hope to see you soon,

Luke