A Letter From CoGo’s Co-founders
Peace is the art of navigating conflict from love. Conflict is simply an encounter with difference and it exists everywhere people do. Rather than something to be avoided or denied, conflict is an opportunity for growth and transformation—everywhere. Learning to navigate it well is a worthwhile investment of our time, energy and resources because conflict fractures our closest relationships and can cause irreparable damage.
Relationships are essential to a flourishing life and can change in a single moment. The kind of moment that presents a choice of how to respond—that marks the difference between moving closer to another person or creating more distance. This moment is the atomic unit of conflict, when even those of us with substantial relationship training often fail to choose connection.
Every choice matters. And trillions of courageous choices for authentic connection will grow a network effect leading to peaceful and flourishing humanity. We are fortunate to live at a time when advances in AI technology present a tremendous opportunity to help us pause and choose connection in these crucial moments.
We’re starting with couples because it’s personal for us as a married couple ourselves. We see firsthand how many opportunities we miss for connection because we fail to navigate conflict constructively. After interviewing dozens of other couples and therapists, we know we’re not alone and this is an area where we can make an immediate impact.
From there we see this tech enhancing the extraordinary work of violence interruptors on the streets of Chicago to the peacebuilders standing in the fire of the world’s most entrenched large-scale conflicts and even wars.
We are uniquely qualified to lead this mission, having the heart, grit and direct experience to bring cutting edge advances in technology to the most intimate areas of our lives. We’re humbled to be joined by a team of experts across humane technology, psychology, human connection, conscious business and peacebuilding.
If you share our mission, please reach out and let’s see how we can collaborate.
Love,
Rachel Zargo & Andy Swindler
Relating AI
Relating AI is a paradigm shift. It’s a new era of human-computer interaction that goes beyond solo apps into a prosocial experience aided by technology. We require human connection to thrive, so why is it that our digital experiences are so isolated? Even so-called social media feels like a solo experience of sharing bits of information through a little window rather than truly connecting with people in real time.
In order to connect more authentically, we don’t need a new layer of technology between us. Our technology needs to remove the artificial barriers that exist between all of us—the stories we tell ourselves and the fear of being hurt that block love’s impulse to connect. This is what Relating AI is.
Relating AI is available at all times to help us choose love in the moments when it feels hard or risky to do so. It plays different roles based on what is needed for the unique circumstances of the interaction—for one person, two people or a group who are committed to deepening their connection. Relating AI is making a stand for enhancing and strengthening human relationships, not replacing them.
Theory of Change
By leveraging agentic AI to transform conflict into connection, we expand relational flourishing and emotional agency, which serve as force multipliers to foster global peace.
CoGo Values
Lead From Love
Be Clear
Choose Courage
Embrace Difference
Build What Matters
Make Others Successful