Article on Intelligensia Magazine

Dialogue Elio D’Anna is an Italian author, philosopher, economist, entrepreneur, poet, musician and the Founder and President of the European School of Economics. Elio D’Anna’s latest book called ‘The Technology of the Dreamer’ came out recently. He is a renowned international speaker for conferences and seminars all over the world. Through his foundation and international philanthropic initiatives, he organizes annual fundraising events aimed at advancing research and expanding access to education for deserving students across the globe.

The European School of Economics (ESE) which has its centers in London, Rome, Milan, Florence, Madrid, the USA, is the only business school where students are taught to be ´pragmatic Dreamers´; that is, educated to see that their life (and business) is a perfect reflection of their inner being. Instead of changing things outside themselves, the key to success is for them to work on their own integrity.

We met in Istanbul at the headquarters of LIVE Academy and spoke about Elio D’Anna’s philosophy in life and about the art being a true Dreamer.

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“The Dreamer remains invisible to your eyes because of what you have made visible to yourself. Only those who have the courage to leave behind their mediocrity, their meaningless life may one day meet the Dreamer. However, only those who are prepared will be able to recognize the incomprehensible. Only those who have a real Dream can access the inaccessible…Only those who have eyes to see, can see the Dreamer and know that He is the real Doer.”

Elio D’ Anna

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Tofig Husein-zadeh: My first question is: What is the most important message that you would like to pass on to the next generation of leaders?

Elio D’Anna: We need to pass on the message about a new kind of education, what I call the Second Education. We have to turn today’s educational techniques and out of date teachings upside down. We absolutely need to have an educational evolution. This is very very important.

Tofig Husein-zadeh: Could you elaborate more on the Second Education?

Elio D’Anna: The second education means that you don’t learn from outside anymore. You don’t need it. You have to discover within each young student something that is unique that has to come out. This is something that we have neglected for centuries.

Because leadership is to be in charge of yourself and only then it means to lead others. Otherwise you are just getting techniques and disciplines from outside. But they are not yours.

Tofig Husein-zadeh: Yes, it is more of the same…

Elio D’Anna: Everybody is teaching the same thing in schools and universities. And there are no schools and no universities that are teaching this second education. The word ‘education’ derived from Latin means ex duco, which means to bring out. What we are all doing is

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we are pushing in… But it is all the way around. We have to do something that is completely upside down. Only few people can do this and probably only few people can understand something like this. But this has to be an inner evolution. It cannot be a mass understanding or revolution. You have to dedicate schools and universities to small groups. This, in my opinion, is very important at this moment. That’s why the European School of Economics is here to teach a new economy, that I call an inner economy. You have to understand and you have to own your inner world if you want to govern the others who are in the world outside. If you don’t know yourself, I mean, it’s impossible.

Tofig Husein-zadeh: You do a lot of writing. What do you feel when you write? Because you are not just writing in the typical way. Yours is a special kind of writing. How do you feel when you write?

Elio D’Anna: I give many speeches. My speeches are all registered. And I have a group of people assisting me by writing everything that comes out.

Tofig Husein-zadeh: So it is very acoustic.

Elio D’Anna: Yes, very much. I have little time to write. Most of the time I think of what I can get from within. From within I get intuitions and the dream that can be very original to listen and, let’s say, to learn.

Tofig Husein-zadeh: What kind of books do you prefer reading most of the time?

Elio D’Anna: I don’t read any books anymore. I haven’t read any for the last ten years. The only thing that I can contribute to other people is my inner silence, which is very original. We can express through silence something very important. It is beyond language and knowledge. It is not meditation. I’ll tell you it isn’t because some people think that it means I am meditating…No. I don’t believe these kinds of exercises or disciplines. I believe in understanding. If you understand…

Understanding belongs to you. It is a sort of an organ that we forgot. We have to remember and when we remember ourselves we will see that we get closer and closer to our Selves. You will receive from your Self something very remarkable.

Tofig Husein-zadeh: How about the years of your youth? What adventures do you remember?

Elio D’Anna: I was a rockstar when I was very young. I was and I am a musician. I play flute and saxophone. When I was young I had a rock band that became very famous in Europe.

Later, we even entered the American charts too. So were popular and I felt lucky, touched by fortune, so to speak. But I was very upset about the fact that I was very famous. Fame and money and all that a young man can desire was happening without my participation. It was something that was happening by chance. I was so disappointed

with fame and the riches. Because I was afraid I could lose it all just in a fraction of a second. I wanted to possess it and I wanted to have it permanently. It was all false ego and personality within myself. But that was very interesting because I wanted to know how to change the world outside myself and not to be conditioned or influenced by something.

Success was a condition that didn’t come because I was the greatest musician or a great composer. It came by chance. This is why I was very much concerned that I could lose everything. Then I wanted to conquer something that was permanent and I tried that with all my might to change the world outside myself. To change some of the people who were close to me… And I realized that you cannot do that. It’s impossible. After many years I turned towards myself and realized that I was responsible for everything.

This was my main realization and discovery in life. Whatever was happening outside myself, good or bad, had to have my inner consent, my inner approval to happen.

Tofig Husein-zadeh: This is key. Could you tell more about which direction did this realization take you to?

Elio D’Anna: With this realization I wanted to create something that young people could understand that they have to discover within themselves the real thing. Not from outside.

No school, no university can give something like this. No one can help you from outside.

Everything must come from you if you want some permanency in whatever you do. When it comes from you, no one can take it away.

No one!

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Tofig Husein-zadeh:

Elio D’Anna:

It’s true. Even if they try to steal it, it’s going to be misused and misunderstood. It will go in the wrong direction.

I met a very spiritual person in the US. He was a musician, a guru, a writer, a poet, a runner.

He was almost everything – a universal man.

He was a great friend of mine. His name was Sri Chinmoy. But your inner uniqueness does everything for you so you don’t really need take the examples from outside. You have to continuously turn towards yourself for any answer to be given about life. This is not about taking from outside. Not even knowledge. You cannot find all the answers in the external world. The answers are within you.

Elio D’Anna: Yes, it’s like taking second hand knowledge and second hand ideas. You can do something that others have done before but you have to do something no one has done before. This is the real you and your ideas are unique. The thing is that we don’t have the courage to reach that real part of ourselves. So we have to have schools that can tell you. There is no way that you can be helped, not even a large loan from a bank can help you. The bank says yes when you say yes within yourself. It’s when you have this certainty, this yes-attitude and security. Then you feel safe. All doors open in front of you. This is very very important. It is you own inner understanding that can do this.

Tofig Husein-zadeh: It’s exact science.

Elio D’Anna: That’s right, yes.

Tofig Husein-zadeh: Can I ask who were your favorite leading figures? The inspiring individuals who set an example for you when you were young?

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Tofig Huseinzadeh: They are in a dream beyond language.

Elio D’Anna: Absolutely. It is inner responsibility, which is about response. It is to be able to answer within.

Because I understood that the outer life is not the separate reality from the inner world. Then if you want change something in the outer life, you have to intervene on yourself. That is the secret. If you know how to touch that fiber of yourself, the center within yourself, you see the answer, the solution to everything outside yourself. The thing is we are not able to do that because we have never been taught to go inside.

It’s coming always from the external world. I understand that your external world depends upon your inner world. You only have to touch something that is so close to you, not going far away to change things.

“A Visionary Being, a Man of Integrity, embodies within himself something subversive, unexpected, and impossible to grasp: something that violates the ordinary course of things.

He is free from any sort of role, description, influence or constraint, both within and without. He walks among ordinary people, He mingles with the crowd, carrying out His activities, completely sealed in His integrity, staying invisible to those who, having not yet abandoned their personal history, feel not the need for a commitment to reach a higher level of understanding.”

Elio D’Anna

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In the House of Lords

Tofig Husein-zadeh:

Tofig Husein-zadeh:

How do you prefer spending your time during vacations or in your spare time when you don’t work?

Yes, I am on the 70th page.

Elio D’Anna: I don’t work at all. I don’t think that a man has to work. I don’t believe work is for me. Humanity should never work. Men should only dream. This is his real nature – dreaming. You will read about it in my book The Technology of the Dreamer.

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Elio D’Anna: All right, you will arrive at that part soon. The art of dreaming is the only occupation of a man.

This is strange to say today because we are in an era when so many young people are unemployed, looking for a job. I am telling them that you should just dream and you will see that everything will come to you. This sounds abstract at first sight but for me this is very solid.

Tofig Husein-zadeh: Nature predetermines the direction of a man’s life. Did you get any hints from nature when you were a child? The kind of hints that you don’t understand right away or you are not conscious of yet you still receive them?

Elio D’Anna: Yes, yes. I will write about this in my next book.

It will be about my childhood. There are all the signs and signals that tells you what is coming.

It is one of the many discoveries – the fact that in this very moment you are building and creating all your past. This is strange to say but even though we think that we are coming from the past and going towards future but in this very moment we are imagining all our childhood, adulthood, our aging. This is something that is difficult to accept because how can you create in this very moment the past and the future and not only just yours.

Tofig Husein-zadeh: What do you think is the most special part of what you do? There are many special parts but what is the most special part of what you do?

Elio D’Anna: I’ll tell you. The most special part of what I do is to be here now with you in the very moment because I am totally here with you. I am getting all these questions from you and then they arrive to many young people like you. This very moment is very precious. In the next moment I will be talking to 30 managers. Delivering a speech to them. That will be the most precious moment.

“The slightest change within ourselves will move mountains in the outer world.”

Elio D’Anna: I really believe that we are forgetful Gods. We forgot our possibilities and powers. We have to remember. We cannot achieve this realization.

We have to remember something that we already possess.

Tofig Husein-zadeh: Elio D’Anna, thank you very much for participating in this interview!

Elio D’Anna: Thank you too.

Tofig Husein-zadeh: What is your final message for the readers of The Intelligentsia. ?

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