So how do people from two different cultures begin a conversation and create a language and a doing that supports the reality of both vantage points?
In the fall of 2014, a few of us met in Victoria and I once again incorporated the time line into the overall design of our two days together. It began slow but as our conversations warmed up to different thoughts it became more and more apparent that thinking about the future, playing long term, was at the core of our process and method.
"Anyone can talk to a tree but not everyone can carry on a conversation because they will not stay still for long enough. Sometimes it takes a whole day for a tree to tell you its name." Tokien
Joanna Macy speaks of the great turning... our turning away from a world no longer working to something more fit, more thriving for all those who are part of Universe, and in particular, Gaia, our Earth planet. In my day to day life, it is difficult to see the changes happening ... the great turning in the becoming. Rather, I keep wondering when it will begin. And then I think of Turn Around Sam one of the many characters in Tom Robbins' Skinny Legs and All.
The next time you plan an event, consider changing the game so that the participants have the freedom to think creatively and differently. Let the collective intelligence surface and cohere so that the expert has an opportunity to learn what is already known and can therefore add only the difference that makes a difference.
It was during my second year of teaching 2nd graders in a public school that I first connected with the concept of group genius. I had 22 students and each of them had chosen a subject that they were curious to study and then share their learning with the rest of the class. This was 1965 so there was no Internet and the research was difficult. They had two weeks to prepare. The only question I can remember with clarity was "Why do soap bubbles have colors?" Many of the questions like this one, were questions that I could not answer without doing my own research.
With great sadness, we share the news here that Tomorrow Makers Founder Gail Taylor passed away in her home on Sunday, November 5, 2023. You may have already seen posts on Facebook, LinkedIn, or heard through friends and colleagues. Below is her full obituary.
Here are a few, but certainly not all groups and individuals activating initiatives bringing them alive beyond the page. They are mostly comprised of “We the people,” ordinary people, learning to reach beyond ourselves for mutual benefit of Earth and all life into a new and far-reaching paradigm. As readers and followers of Tomorrow Makers, I am sure you will recognize many and, in fact, see yourselves here.
We know several things: 1) We have more opportunity now, than in our lifetimes to shape and bring about systemic change. This is true with any major crisis is that crisis and opportunity go together. The center begins to fall apart, dissipating the energy of failing strategies. 2) This transforation will be largely self organizing by we the people as no politicians can lead us where we need to go. 3) We can only do this by working together. That’s why I am so excited by the upCreation offering which will begin on July 20 and continue for seven moons. We will meet formally seven times on the day of the new moon. In between will be personal work, journaling, and small team interactions.
Why is it that we are so willing to accept bad news? What keeps us from believing we are worthy of good news? These questions are vitally important to consider as we go about creating a world that works for all of us… to design our collective well-being by design, not default.
This is my first journal entry that features another project. I find Michaels project so compelling and aligned with my beliefs. It models our axiom "You can't get there from HERE but you can get HERE from there. In other words, today is too full of baggage, fear, frustration, and talk of what we don't want. Leaping out and having the courate to create a "new world" is the only way to go. While I have every person, every client I work with learn to do backcasting and gain an ability to play with the future, to design possibilities and potential, to explore the natural emergence that will erupt and disurpt our thoughts, making room for viable fresh ideas that can create a better future.
Another one of the MG Taylor axioms is "The future is only rational in hindsight" rings true. This is why any robust project like 2030 needs to attract people to come together and model preferred future. Together we have tremendous energy and know how to work with ideas, to mix and match, to integrate, and explore how to procede with the least negative unanticipated consequences.
I'm looking forward to how Tomorrow Makers can play a role as an organization and as a tomorrow maker. Together, we can help 2030 be rich and vital for all species. This is going to be quite an adventure!
In assembling complexity the bounty of increasing returns is won by multiple tries over time. As various parts reorganize to a new whole, the system escapes into a higher order. Ilya Prigogine
There I am reading along when suddenly I read
‘In assembling complexity the bounty of increasing returns is won by multiple tries over time. As various parts reorganize to a new whole, the system escapes into a higher order.” — Ilya Prigogine
Its like I’ve fallen into the white rabbit’s hole and the entire universe changes shape. I first read these words in the late 90s and to this day, it still speaks to me as fresh and wondrous as the first time I read it. These 30 words speak from the heart of the universe and can teach me more than some of my university semester-long courses…
The list below was one of the first set of assumptions that Matt and I created together when we first met in 1976. We have used and evolved it over time. It defined many of the first principles we used in creating our way of working. It is form these shared beliefes that we proceeded to created our process and method. While it seems painfully simple today within the midst of a dying, fighting paradigm, and our radical either/or mentality, to me it still holds true. I've shared this list before along with the URL about "We the people" being the second super power. Both, along with my recent posting for what is a Tomorrow Maker, I think I have the bare begining of a form for engaging others in the creation of a healthier world. We can't afford to merely tweak the existing infrastructures and cultures and expect to transform ourselves or others. While we are building on ten thousand- or more - years of history, ours is a new story, one just being born. Our history will be reframed from within the anthroposcene era. We won't throw it away, nor do we let it control how we design, decide, and create....
Matt and I had such high hopes in the late 70's when we began designing a way forward for a new way of working. But we have been practicing, event after event, and waiting somewhat patiently for Earthlings to wake up and realize what we the people are actually capable of doing for the good of all species on Earth. We have had fabulous mutual learning experiences with each engagement taking us further into our coming to knowing process.
It is only now that we are beginning to see signs that there are others, many others working to make a difference. We are all pretty invisible now but ready to spring forth.
Enjoy our Creed and find yourself within it.
"Funktionslust means the pleasure of doing, of producing an effect, as distinct from the pleasure of attaining the effect or having something. Creativity exists in the searching even more than in the finding or being found. The word enthusiasm is Greek for filled with theos – “filled with God”." Quote from the book Free Play: Improvitazation in Life and Art by Stephen Nachmanovitch.
"What do ideas become? Big things, brave things, smart things, silly things. Things like stories, artwork, journeys, inventions, communities, products, and cures. Every thing we see around us was once an idea." From What Do You Do With an Idea? by Kobi Yamanda and Mae Besom. (find more in our bookshelf.)
People ask me "What is up creation?" For me it is a word that says a lot. It has hundreds of stories hidden within it. It teases, appeals, speaks a rhythm and a pattern. It speaks to infrastructure, frameworks, culture, and sets me toward a long view, a big hope, and an audacious task.
A previously unpublished journal entry recently discovered…
Gail writes, “I've been hearing a lot about things we MUST unlearn lately and it has gotten me to weighing and considering... What follows is a somewhat disjointed thought process about unlearning and the processes that go with it…”