About

Hi, I’m Nicolas Endres, but most people call me Nicki. I’m fluent in both German and English.

My work and life revolve around fostering environments that support healthy states, traits and spaces – whether within ourselves and with each other. This journey has taken me from studying the mind and brain to exploring how we collaborate and create meaningful change together.

Bridging Inner and Outer Worlds

In my early twenties I became extremely fascinated with the mind, the brain and existential questions. This curiosity led me to explore these topics from both Western and Eastern perspectives – combining scientific inquiry with contemplative traditions.

To understand the Western (outside) perspective I studied psychology, neuroscience and philosophy and worked in academia, for example within the ReSource-Project, a large, longitudinal study on the effects of meditation at the Max-Planck-Institute for Human Cognition and Brain Science.

Exploring the Eastern perspectives I dove into the teachings of ancient contemplative traditions, especially Buddhism and Daoism, and the meditative techniques associated with them, e.g. meditation, Yoga and Qigong as well as breathwork, plant medicine and other healing modalities. The more I practiced these internal techniques the more I understood their value for individual and collective mental health and well-being.

I had the chance to combine these two perspectives on the mind, the inner and the outer, in designing and teaching an experimental inner science course at the Berlin School of Mind and Brain at Humboldt-University, Berlin.

Inner Science

I am generally fascinated by the idea of applying the scientific method and ideals that we have used so successfully in investigating and transforming the external world and applying them to our inner worlds. I work towards integrating the wisdom of ancient contemplative traditions with the insights of modern science and technology. The ultimate goal of this endeavour is to raise our collective level of consciousness and become more mindful, compassionate and wise as a whole. Towards this lofty goal I give talks at festivals and scientific conferences, teach courses on inner science and meditation and direct The Garden, an organisation focussed on integrating inner, interpersonal and systemic regeneration.

Creating Wholesome Spaces for Collaboration

With the goal of creating The Garden in mind I got more and more interested in organisational design and facilitation. Working in different contexts in scientific and other organisations I have again and again seen well-meaning, highly intelligent people having difficulties working together in constructive ways which I now realise was mainly due to a lack of healthy processes and structures. Seeing the need for wholesome spaces which enable joyful and efficient collaboration I trained as a coach, mediator and agile manager.

A lot of my work at the moment focusses on supporting teams and organisations in their transition to new ways of collaboration, participation, relating and being. I am particularly focusing on psychological safety, sociocracy, self-organisation, the agile mindset, iterative-incremental workflows, decentralised organisational structures, collective decision-making and transformational and regenerative leadership. I apply and explore these practices in my work as an organisational coach and consultant.

I also co-founded and for three years co-directed a cooperative, self-organised coworking community in Berlin-Kreuzberg, Imago Space (formerly CoopSpace). Our goal in this coworking community is to create a space that enables community, connection and collaboration and to create a model that we would like to see in the world.

For more info you can check out my CV here.