Having heard from the masterful wizard that is Alastair McIntosh, we also welcomed the earth-stewarding, foraging genius, who is Miles Irving. Miles, one of the leading foragers in the UK, talked to us about breaking the silence. With song and sensational wisdom, he spun out several threads, before catching us all in his web of interconnected beauty! Watch, listen and embrace the reality of our recoverable relationship to the ecology.
At the start of October, we hosted ‘Love Ecology’ in Morecambe Bay. We started the day by reminding ourselves of the journey so far, through Love People, Love Society, Love Economics and Love Politics (I’ll be writing a separate blog on this soon).
We then welcomed the force of nature, who is, Professor Alastair McIntosh, aka Radagast the Brown (!), who is an incredible mix of Academic and Activist. He took us on an amazing journey of our disconnection from the land and how we can reconnect to it. This is seriously worthy of your time! Listen – this is so good!
In my view, it would be impossible to host a day on ‘Love Politics’ without it including my great friend, Roger Mitchell. He is a brilliant thinker and one of the kindest people I know! His thesis, ‘Church, Gospel and Empire’ (or ‘The Fall of The Church’, if you want an easier to read version!) is vital reading for anyone who wants to seriously engage with the idea of a politics of love. Here, drawing in his own work and that of Luke Bretherton, he gives an absolutely brilliant insight into why love is such a powerful foundation and force for a new politics. This is really worthy of your time and energy!
Following on from the incredible input from Zahra Delilah, we hosted a ‘panel in the round’ as the room was full of great thinkers. Then we had a world cafe conversation in which we asked the question: “What might be possible with a politics of love in Morecambe Bay?” We then challenged each table to write a poem as a summary of their discussion! They had the choice of and ABAB four liner, a limerick or a haiku! There were some truly excellent and amusing offerings.
Here are the links to the panel discussion and the poems. Enjoy!
On July 17th we hosted another conversation in our series on how Love and Kindness might serve as important foundation stones for a reimagined future that is socially just for humanity and sustainable for the environment. So far, we’ve looked at ‘Love People’, ‘Love Society’, ‘Love Economics’ and this time the focus was ‘Love Politics’. We welcomed the incredible Zahra Delilah, political activist and organiser. She took us on a beautiful tour of love and it’s prepositions! Enjoy!
We were thrilled to welcome Prof Katherine Trebeck of the ‘Wellbeing Economy’ to Morecambe Bay for our ‘Love Economics’ event. Katherine is a brilliant economist and has recently released this excellent book, ‘The Economics of Arrival’. You will be blown away by the hope of what Katherine has to say. Please make some time and let’s build a coalition of hope that things can and must change for good!
Is an Economics of love and kindness even possible? It may seem so beyond our current context that it may seem like a dream too far. However, economics comes from the Greek word Oikos, which literally means household. Whoever heard of a household that was really flourishing that wasn’t built on love and kindness? It is true that the simple model of a household is a bit defunct when comparing it to complex economic systems, but the foundational ethical principles need not differ.
Our recent “Love Economics” event in Morecambe Bay was kicked off by the excellent Prof Imogen Tyler, head of the Sociology Department at Lancaster University, who sets out the case for the utter failure of the economics of austerity. Her devastating diagnosis of the current trickle-down economic model to (ever) deliver real human flourishing and environmental sustainability is not easy listening. Her insights and wisdom based on sound data and research set the foundations for our conversation in the current reality and pain which our economic models are causing every day. You will find in parts 2, 3 and 4 loads of reasons for hope. However, our hope must not be based in denial of what we are experiencing now, otherwise, we will go on to repeat the same mistakes over and over again.
Bev Skeggs gave us so much to think and talk about with each other. If you haven’t had a chance to watch her amazing talk yet, then please do so! You can find it in Part 1 of this blog series. She left us with a question – “How can we build value with those who are devalued?”
One of my favourite ways to explore big questions like this (and there are many methods we use through our ‘art of hosting’ training) is Triads. Triads is a simple and effective way of helping people have really meaningful conversations whilst being deeply listened to. It’s a very powerful experience. It involves breaking into groups of three (obviously). One person is the ‘speaker’, one person is the ‘listener’ and the other is the ‘witness’. The listener asks the speaker the question that everyone is exploring. The speaker then has 10-15 minutes (depending on time constraints) to answer the question in whatever way they want to. The listener listens deeply, might ask some more questions, or encourage the speaker to unpack what they’ve said a bit more. They stay curious, trying to draw out the wisdom of the speaker, but not slipping into the role of ‘speaker’ themselves. At the end of the time, the listener reflects back what they have heard. The witness holds the whole process and watches over the time and might offer some reflections of the process or things that have gone unspoken or unheard. Then everyone swaps round into different roles, so that by the end of 40-45 minutes, everyone has had a turn in each role.
When everyone was back in the room together and after a good coffee break, we asked the triads to reflect on the following question (moving from singular to combined wisdom – from ‘me’ to ‘we’), having heard from each person in turn: “What have we discovered that builds value?”
Each triad (or pair of triads) was then asked to come up with one sentence that captured their corporate wisdom. Here are the sentences that were spoken into the room – they are worthy of much reflection. I love how much synergy can come from a diverse group of people!
What have we discovered that builds value?
– Non-judgemental education from an early age builds intrinsic value into everyday life, regardless of circumstances.
– We have found in the Poverty Truth Commission that through listening, understanding develops, people recover value and become actively involved in pathways forward.
– Trusting that we can subvert pre-packaged judgements and values for the value of the common good.
– Accepting that we all make judgements, we grow awareness of how to work with judgments in a positive way that is empowering.
– Positively engage with and welcome ‘others’ without judgement and recognise the value of individual contributions.
– Discovering/Recognising/Empowering/Encouraging/Nurturing the fact we all have unique value and have power in value.
– Value (like energy) cannot be created or destroyed. It can only be recognised/transformed/moved around/flow.
– Removing prejudices, titles and labels – going back to our humanity and finding joy in sharing life, food and experiences.
– In daily interactions, conversations and opportunities by being positive role models in local and regional settings.
– Positive disruption focused on an individual level, driven by a moral imperative and brave vulnerability can create a movement of enfranchised, knowledgeable, solid people focused on social justice not social judgement.
– Eating or talking around a table builds individual and social value through real connection.
– Recognise the common value of humanity and our vulnerability to build empathy and non-judgemental connection.
– Knowing that someone understands, accepts and respects our values.
– Recognising and acknowledging value through relationships and being rather than achievements.
– Awareness of self and therefore others.
Jon Dorsett and Lou Andrews, part of our team and outstanding graphic harvesters (if you ever need any help!) turned this wisdom into a spider’s web of learning. This is a kind of framework for a renewed society, maybe! However, none of this is straightforward and my friend Roger Mitchell has also done some really helpful reflections of his own, in his excellent blog.
If we want to build a society based on love and kindness, we have to examine the value we place on people and the environment and the values which shape our society currently. That guy Jesus, once said, “What you value (treasure) is where your heart will be also….”
To finish the morning we had a reflective panel discussion – it was packed full of wisdom – enjoy!
Here in Morecambe Bay, a very eclectic group of us are having some conversations about how we might reimagine life together based on love and kindness towards people and the planet. In April, we were together around the theme ‘Love People’ and in May, this became ‘Love Society’.
To help us and catalyse us to really think about the issues involved, we welcomed Professor Bev Skeggs (Class, Self, Culture) and Hilary Cottam (Radical Help). This blog focuses on Bev and the learning she brought. There will be more on Hilary in future posts….
Bev is quite frankly amazing and is described by many in her field as the leading sociologist in the UK! She has been, until recently, Professor of Sociology at The London School of Economics, where she ran the Atlantic Fellowship Programme with the equally formidable Dr Kate Raworth (Doughnut Economics) and Dr Jason Hickel (The Divide). We are extremely happy that she has now joined the faculty at Lancaster University, thanks to the canny leadership of Prof Imogen Tyler. She opened our time together with an incredible tour through society, what it is, how it functions, how power relationships are held in place, how our judgements affect our relationships and how we create value and values! It is honestly the most helpful, eye-opening and challenging piece of teaching on society that I have ever heard. So, get yourself a cup of tea, sit back and watch this (credit to Andrew Towers and Purple Videos!) – then watch it again and let your thinking be undone and remade by this remarkable woman!
