These Laws affect our daily lives whether we are aware of them or not. Those who live without respecting the Law of Balance soon realize the costs of imbalance, for instance. By studying the Universal Laws, and trying to live by them, these Laws can work for us rather than against us. This benefits everyone we interact with.

Even before the worlds’ first universities opened, thousands of years ago, people were taught the concept of Universal Law. Establishments of higher learning focused upon the overarching principles, which govern everything, as the way to better understand our Universe, its energies and forces.

Trial and error wisdom of timeless truth is our great unifier. We could say Universal Laws are the code words for what matters to us all. I wish children were taught these Laws in grade school. Until I was in my thirties, I never heard of them, despite being a college-educated, well-traveled executive woman. They’ve since provided the essential understanding that was missing.

Because Universal Laws describe humanity’s shared values, you can find approximations of these words in most languages. The need for Balance, Awareness, Cause & Effect, Trust and Integrity is obvious. If more of us pointedly used this vocabulary, it would make it easier to get to know each other.

Perhaps our relationships would improve too. Having a more basic understanding of our foundational beliefs would illuminate the reasons for our behaviors also as these form our ground of being and motivate all our attitudes and actions.

Cross-cultural research demonstrates that if you want to create lasting bonds with people of different ethnicities, religions and cultures, these basic shared principles are the best subject to discuss. But how many of us know that, or how to do it? This is why I created the Wisdom Wheel.

I know these things because I was a pioneer in the field of global management development for two decades after I left my first career as a journalist, at CBS News. A long time expatriate, I spent the first third of my life traveling, living and working in eight countries.

My need to relate to people, from all sorts of backgrounds, forced me to focus upon figuring out how to do this. Small talk matters! And the topics we bring up, to get to know another person, can actually be the keys for ensuring Right Relationships.

If we do not know what unites us, how can we talk about it? Our tendencies to focus upon our differences instead, creates serious challenges. The purpose of the 36 Laws on the Wisdom Wheel is to help you identify, articulate and understand what unifies us. The Laws help you map out our common ground.

Regardless of your culture of origin, or where you were raised, you can benefit from learning about these Laws. Many books have been written about them. I am hardly alone in my belief of the importance of Universal Laws! My personal library includes works by diverse authors. Here’s a partial list: Deepak Chopra’s The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success, The Book of Secret Wisdom by Zinovia Dushkova, Ryuu Shinohara’s The Magic of Manifesting, The Law of Attraction by Ester Hicks, Cosmic and Universal Laws by Margo Kirtikar Ph.d and Robert Green’s The 48 Laws of Power, to name a few.

Notice the range of backgrounds reflected in those names? This proves my point about the universal appeal of these principles. But, until you learn to put these Laws into practice, they remain locked inside the books. They won’t do us much good as mere mental constructs. We have to put them to the test. We have to put them into action. The Wheel can show you how to do that. You might want to start by discovering your Birth Law and how that can orient your explorations.