Posted in Sustainability

May 4, 2011

Steps to an Ecology of Change

ecology

|Photo by chucklepix (Steve)|http://www.flickr.com/photos/42507736@N02/5094175658/in/photostream|

I love great writing, and for that reason always look forward to reading the newest issue of the Whole Thinking Journal from the Center for Whole Communities. The most recent issue can be found here, and features beautiful and thought-provoking pieces from my Whole Measures co-trainer Mistinguette Smith, former Ruckus Society Executive Director Adrienne Maree Brown, and CWC board member Tom Wessels, among many others.

I wanted to spend some time here reflecting on the Wessels article in particular, “Resilient Communities: An Ecological Perspective.”  Tom Wessels is a natural historian, a professor at Antioch University, and a keen observer and student of the landscape of New England.  He is also a proponent of understanding the dynamics of various kinds of complex systems, from eco-systems to organizations, as a pathway to knowing what constitutes more sustainable behavior.  Read More

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March 29, 2011

Dance Lightly

Photo by: Munana

The following is a letter by Akaya Windwood, President of the Rockwood Leadership Institute and member of the IISC Board of Directors…

Tsunamis. Unemployment. Volcanoes. Cote d’Ivoire. Homelessness. The Middle East. The Midwest. Pirates. Earthquakes. Drug and human trafficking. Union busting. Collapsing economies. Dropout rates. Nuclear fallout. Foreclosures. Floods.

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March 21, 2011

The Practice of Belonging

Several years ago I worked with a friend who is an outdoor educator to put together an orientation session for a group of high school students who had signed on to be part of a youth activism project I was directing.  The program invited young people to explore issues in their community and to select and address those that spoke to them.  As part of our orientation, my friend put together an “alien test,” something he learned from the tracker and educator Tom Brown.  Just before the session we scoured the school grounds gathering leaves and bark, plants and nuts, a bird’s egg, soil, and other sundry items and brought these into the classroom where we met after school, along with a series of prepared questions.  One by one, my friend laid the objects and questions out in front of the students: What is this? Is this plant edible? Can you tell me whether this soil is healthy or not?  Where does your water come from?  Do you know which, if any, of the items you ate for lunch today was locally grown? There was a marked silence after most of the questions.  The point was made poignantly clear – in many respects we are aliens to our immediate surroundings.  For us to do meaningful community change work, we suggested, it behooves us to really get to know our community, or as someone once put it, take a step towards inhabiting it not just residing there. Read More

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October 6, 2010

Going Wide and Upstream

I’m writing this post from St. Louis where I’ve been working with a team from Conservation International to facilitate a meeting of their Business and Sustainability Council.  This three day convening is focused on sustainable agriculture and has featured presentations from content experts including Dr. Jon Foley from the University of Minnesota’s Institute on the Environment, who offered the short video above to summarize “the other inconvenient truth” we face around feeding a growing population against a backdrop of stressed water and land resources.  As the clip indicates, the challenge of sustainably feeding a global population of 9 billion (projected by 2050), if doable, will only be accomplished through extensive collaboration.  Furthermore, it is going to take going beyond many of the either/or debates (local vs. global, GMOs vs. organic) to embrace a full spectrum of strategies.  In other words, it’s not about finding a silver bullet, but rather the “silver buckshot.” Read More

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August 27, 2010

Movement Time

Six weeks from now, on October 10, 2010, 350.org is sponsoring a global work party to spread and deepen awareness about and inspire further action around our growing climate challenge.  This grassroots movement is spreading at a time when most governments and businesses seem inexplicably stymied about how to make fundamental commitments toward shifting unsustainable behaviors.  And it feels like we are on the edge of a tipping point, perhaps spurred by this summer’s record breaking heat wave and dramatic weather events in places like Pakistan and Russia.  So consider signing up for or hosting a local event if you have not, and take a moment to read this call to action by co-founder Bill McKibben following the failed climate bill in Congress – “Get mad and then get busy.”

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August 12, 2010

I Despair, Therefore . . .

“The seeds of Reunion are sprouting everywhere. That which was hidden for millennia is coming to light. Soon, fertilized by the detritus of our decaying civilization, the sprouts will mature, bloom, and bear fruit. Our job is first to receive them, then to spread them everywhere and to guard and foster them with every ounce of our love.”

“Three Seeds” by Charles Eisenstein

It’s awfully hard to read the news these days, especially if one is tuned in to the scientific and environmental communities:

“Northern Hemisphere Temperatures Shatter July Record

“Declining Phytoplankton Another Sign of Climate Catastrophe

“Climate Change and Illegal Logging Could Wipe Out Rainforest Wildlife by 2100” Read More

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August 11, 2010

Thoughts on My Bike

This is our last week in the Cambridge office – as of Monday, we’ll have moved to South Boston, in the Seaport area.  Most of the IISC staff have been driving to work over the years we’ve been in Cambridge (with a few taking the bus or riding bikes).  Once we’re in our new office, we’ll be switching to most of us on public transportation or on bikes.  It’s good news for the planet!  I’m looking forward to shrinking my carbon footprint.  Thought you might enjoy this video!

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August 6, 2010

Attitude is Everything

permattitude

|Photo by sarniebill1|http://www.flickr.com/photos/sarniebill/4723746702|

Picking up from where I left off yesterday, I want to share some additional insights gleaned from my tour of Lauren Chase-Rowell’s permaculture garden and land.  Something else that struck me was when Lauren said that beyond her training and intuition as a master gardener, “attitude is everything.”  Illustrating this statement with stories it became clear that while she is incredibly skilled in her craft, Lauren’s psychological and emotional approach take it all to another level.  In essence, permaculture starts with your self.

Channeling Lauren, I offer these three attitudinal guidelines for your consideration and application to your social change/leadership efforts, especially those geared towards leveraging the potential of systems and collective intelligence: Read More

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August 5, 2010

Bio-Mastery

Lauren's Garden

Last week I was in the presence of a master.  For more than 25 years, Lauren Chase-Rowell has skillfully and intuitively cultivated the land around her house in Nottingham, NH to the point that it exists in great harmony with the beautiful farm house, people and fauna occupying that space.  Lauren is an ecological landscaper, organic farmer, and permaculture design teacher.  Her home, Dalton’s Pasture Farm (not pictured above), is a vibrant classroom and testament to the possibility of practicing earth-centered living.

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July 1, 2010

Leadership for Sustainability

For the better part of the last year and a half, my colleagues Ashley Welch and John McGah and I have been moving forward an IA/IISC cross-sectoral practice to bring Interaction methods + to the support of sustainability endeavors. Our early meetings around this budding practice included conversations about how best to frame leadership development for sustainability. We arrived at the graphic above, which combines what we see as the core elements needed for leadership to embrace and enroll others in sustainable pursuits.

With a foundation (watermark, if you will) of content knowledge about what sustainability is, the three elements are as follows:

• Systems Thinking (Seeing) – This is all about helping individual leaders and collective leadership see the whole, to understand that nothing stands in isolation, and that we must have a deeply felt sense of the interconnectedness of phenomena in order to make truly informed decisions. We take both our inspiration and instruction in this realm from the likes of the Sustainability Institute, the Center for Whole Communities, and The Elumenati.

• Self-Awareness (Being) – What we do is informed by who and how we are in the world. Awareness of our own beliefs, mental maps, and inherent tendencies is a powerful lever for making the sustainability shift, for aligning thought behind action. Self-awareness might also be cast as mindfulness, or the ability to be present to what is. Here we build upon our existing work around the inner side of leadership with the contributions of the Pachamama Alliance and John Milton.

• Collaborative Capacity (Doing) – With the whole in mind and awareness of our inner state, leadership will have a greater understanding of the need to work collectively toward more sustainable lifestyles and ways of doing business. Collaborative skill is key, including knowing how to frame sustainability efforts, create the right conditions for innovation, build agreement, structure decision-making, and design life-affirming experiences for diverse stakeholders. This is the heart and soul of the Interaction Method, and it is supplemented by the work of Keith Sawyer, CRED, and the many pioneers of large group methods and network-building.

Another key element and overlay for all of these is leadership’s ability to understand and navigate power dynamics as they play out in systems, in ourselves, and in our chosen methods for working together.

Eager to hear your reactions, tweaks, and additions.

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May 13, 2010

Collaboration for Sustainability 4: How?

green

|Photo by Flowery *L*u*z*a*|http://www.flickr.com/photos/luchilu/747345256|

For the past few weeks, in a series of Thursday posts, we’ve addressed what it takes to tap the full potential of collaboration to shift to more environmentally sustainable ways of living and working.  We’ve explored the importance of bringing diverse systemic perspectives together and developing shared identities and values as a way of achieving greater ecological intelligence and commitment.  And as a friend of mine says, you can bring great groups together with the best of intentions and still end up with nothing or a mess.  So what else can we put into place to help ensure we reach the sustainable ends we seek?
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