The Weave 001 by The Weave Magazine

Human & Planetary Regeneration in Motion • 001

Joe Brewer on

Christine Marie Mason • Mira Cervino • Ferananda Ibarra • Daan Gorter & Hanna Maria Noah Appelbaum • Nicolás Alcalá & Barbara Lima • la tierra • Gaianet Open World Alliance • Sycamore • Moein Nodehi • Biotonomy

Human & Planetary Regeneration in Motion FOUNDER & EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Barbara Lima CREATIVE DIRECTION

Barbara Lima ART DIRECTOR

Flavia Hashimoto COPY-EDITING

Noah Appelbaum Barbara Lima PHOTOGRAPHY

Mira Cervino Bartjan de Brujin COVER ART

SYMBOLOGY

LICENSE: CC BY NC SA

Barbara Lima Foundational symbology created by la tierra The Weave Symbology designed by Barbara Lima based on la tierra’s symbology

HEAL One Light, All Light CHRISTINE MARIE MASON

The Art of Mira Cervino BARBARA LIMA

POETRY

suddenlyskyclad CONTRIBUTORS & INTERVIEWEES

Christine Marie Mason Mira Cervino Ferananda Ibarra Hanna Maria Daan Gorter Noah Appelbaum Nicolás Alcalá & la tierra Joe Brewer Flavia Hashimoto Gaianet Yasmin C. Mark Kane Open World Alliance Sycamore Moein Nodehi Biotonomy GIFTING

Gaianet (talent, social & cultural resources) la tierra (cultural resources)

REWILD Radical Partnership FERANANDA IBARRA

THRIVE Thriving Grows from the Inside-Out HANNA MARIA & DAAN GORTER

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DREAM The Roseto Mystery NOAH APPELBAUM

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YASMIN C.

Meeting an Imagineer WITH NICOLÁS ALCALÁ

la tierra Pre-Showcase NICOLÁS ALCALÁ & BARBARA LIMA

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REGENERATE Saying Yes to the Calling of the Earth

CULTIVATE Soil as a Sacrament SYCAMORE

WEAVE Being the Weave JOE BREWER

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RECREATE Buildings as Living Organisms MOEIN NODEHI

CELEBRATE Growing the Roots of a New Earth GAIANET

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

FROM LIQUIDNESS TO LIGHT A Brief Glimpse Into the Birth of The Weave

s I sit down to write my first letter from the editor for this very first issue of The Weave, I realize what brought me to this moment. It was darkness—and the desire to transmute it into light that emerged in the form of purpose as I listened to its lessons and learned how to become an alchemist. Other than an insatiable thirst for learning, it was also a profound knowing I’ve sheltered in my heart since I was a little being. Somewhere deep inside of me, in my experience as a child, I knew that helping to save our planet was at the core of my mission here. What I couldn’t have known then but would later discover is that I could only help Her by helping myself —by healing through self-compassion, and awakening, layer by layer, as I transmuted that darkness like a seed that faithfully sits in the dark of the soil and becomes a tree by seeking the light. Or like a caterpillar not knowing its true identity until it surrenders to its liquid form. If you had met me twenty-six moons ago, you would have found me weaving a special cocoon for myself with the intention to go deep in my

self-knowledge and, by doing so, further align with my Higher Self and my purpose. Halfway through that journey, I felt my whole being turn to mush. As I looked back in my life trying to contain and resist my liquidness, I found myself at a point of no return to the being that I was. Once again, I needed to surrender to a new becoming—this time like I had never done before. Suddenly I began to feel bits of visions sprout through me in the form of channeling and writing that took the shape of notes, poetry and books I started bringing to life. During that time, I also co-created with regenerative individuals and organisations—which is where this magazine found me. Soon I recognised it as an important part of the creative ecosystem I had begun to cultivate in an attempt to share an overarching lesson in my life: that human regeneration is a prerequisite for planetary regeneration. Here we are, and I feel I have arrived somewhere truly special. A space where my wings can open wide and I may be in service of that message as its cross-pollinating weaver.

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COMMUNITY

INDIVIDUAL

You can listen to the audio version of the letter from our editor by clicking on the icon. The icon gives you access to The Weave’s theme song on Spotify as suggested by Barbara Lima.

heal

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LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

IN THIS ISSUE Our first issue is an invitation to discover the realms of The Weave. We want you to enter our biome of multidimensional ecosystems and feel their climates on your skin and in your heart. To accomplish that, we’ve invited some very special regenerative visionaries and weavers to help us represent each of our nine climates through their voices, visions, and zones of genius. Christine Marie Mason inaugurates the Individual ecosystem by sharing her trauma-healing expertise and showing us how One Light becomes All Light. She’s followed by Mira Cervino and her indigenous-inspired healing art bridging the dialogue between the Heal and Rewild climates. Ferananda Ibarra is next, guiding us through a soulful exploration of her concept of Radical Partnership. Then comes Daan Gorter in conversation with Hanna Maria, offering us their perspective on the colours of human thriving. Noah Appelbaum welcomes us into the Community ecosystem by inviting us to explore The Roseto Mystery and ask ourselves: what is a village? What better to follow than sitting by the

fire with imagineer Nicolás Alcalá as he wraps us in storytelling and his vision for la tierra? From here, Joe Brewer introduces our main feature and honours us with his take on what Being the Weave means as we live through a planetary-scale collapse. Gaianet arrives with a balm for our souls in the form of a photo essay celebrating their community and Ubuntu embodied essence. As we enter the Planet ecosystem, Yasmin C. and Mark Kane await us with an exploration of the multidimensionality of interwoven organisational and technological design at Open World Alliance for a global, regenerative impact. After that, Sycamore takes us on a journey from the soil to the table as he shares his thoughts on how we can cultivate a new culture that honours the alchemy of photosynthesis. We finish our journey through The Weave with Moein Nodehi and Biotonomy’s take on why architecture must have an ecological role in ecosystems.

IN GRATITUDE I’ve been blessed with the unconditional support of regenerative beings and organisations who believed in my vision and, by doing so—and inspiring me with

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theirs—turned it into our vision. Thank-you to all fellow co-creators with whom I sat on countless Zoom calls for your feedback. The Weave grew sharper and more expansive because of you. A special thank-you to Flavia Hashimoto, our super talented art director, and Noah Appelbaum, our copy-editing magician and my second pair of eyes, for donating their talents and time to this project, and making it possible—and to Daan Gorter, for his invaluable, multidimensional support, and Nicolás Alcalá, for his generosity in offering la tierra’s foundational symbology as a base for the creation of our symbology. I wouldn’t have been able to bring The Weave to life without you. Not least of all, my gratitude to the writers who contributed their articles, to Gaianet and la tierra, who made this first issue of The Weave achievable by embodying Gift Economy and Open Source principles—and to you, our first readers, for making it all a manifest reality. Let’s thrive together.

We, The Weave

BARBARA LIMA is the founder, editor-inchief and creative director of The Weave. She is a multilingual multipotentialite who is happiest when she is in nature, connected with Source, and when she is learning, creating, writing, going on adventures, spending time with her dogs and diving in conversations that expand her consciousness and nourish her heart and her mind. A childhood dream of exploring the world and her love of learning languages, culture and spirituality have taken her on a deeply awakening journey around the globe. As a regenerative culture designer, she understands that human regeneration is a prerequisite for planetary regeneration and combines her skills and talents in service of that vision and the thriving of all life.

OUR CONTRIBUTORS

THE WEAVERS All the wonderful beings who have been weaving a New Earth and made this first issue of The Weave possible.

CHRISTINE MARIE MASON

One Light, All Light

Christine builds bridges between cultures. She invested three decades in starting, growing and selling companies while raising a big family, training and teaching yoga and philosophy, trauma healing, and embodied sexuality. A combination of healing practices, plant medicine, a near-death experience and grace have granted her a playful and equanimous way of being. She has spoken or taught at hundreds of conferences and written 8 books on connection, meaning, activism and healing modalities. She is the founder and CEO of Rosebud Woman, a multimilliondollar intimate wellness company, the host of The Rose Woman Podcast on Love and Liberation, and the cofounder of Sundari Gardens, an ecovillage and community center in Hawai’i. Her most recent book, Reverence: Creating Ritual in Modern Life, was released in December, 2021. You can find her on:

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FERANANDA IBARRA

Radical Partnership

MIRA CERVINO

The Art of Mira Cervino Mira Cervino is a fine artist, photographer, illustrator, yogi, and the mother of two boys. Passionate about art and human expression, Mira moves fluidly through the multiple possibilities that life offers her to see beauty in everything. She believes that to create poetry through her art and photography it is first necessary to feel it. She values the connection between the eyes and the heart as much as technique in the creative process. You can find her on:

Ferananda Ibarra is a visionary with a background in collective intelligence, organizational architecture, and entrepreneurship. Her focus is on integral design and the development of new systems of economics, culture and governance that intrinsically incentivize life-enhancing behaviors at all levels of agency. She co-founded The Metacurrency Project, VillageLab and participated in the creation of Holo and Holochain. She currently serves as Director of The Commons Engine—a service agency focused on currency design and decentralized tech for commons-oriented projects. She believes that by rethinking our economic systems we can create a more just, equitable and sustainable world for all. You can find her on:

OUR CONTRIBUTORS

Thriving Grows from the Inside-Out

HANNA MARIA

DAAN GORTER

Hanna’s dream is for humanity to remember that we are nature, that we are life. Her work and offerings speak to and facilitate this remembering. She is a writer, leads body and nature immersion retreats and teaches embodiment practices. She is also a co-founder of Simply Well Written, a communication and storytelling consultancy that champions organisations and businesses contributing to new paradigm solutions and systems, rooted in the knowing that all life is sacred and interconnected.

Wildly fascinated about anything and everything regenerative, Daan believes the world is a play and the way to win the game is to transform yourself. He supports people with that process through shamanic plant ceremonies. He has a botanical heart and a mechanical mind and his purpose is to liberate the human spirit on Earth by building a global network of cities, villages and hubs that can host a communitytype civilization based on truth, harmony and love. With a background in aerospace and automotive engineering, and decades of personal growth, he has set out to gather visionaries and changemakers in the co-creation of a New Earth. He is building an international network of changemakers called Gaianet, which offers help in the form of ecosystem navigation and co-creation support services. If you wish to experience heart-to-heart collaboration at scale around a common purpose, then Gaianet could be your new home.

You can find her on:

You can find him on:

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NOAH APPELBAUM

NICOLÁS ALCALÁ

JOE BREWER

The Roseto Mystery

Meeting an Imagineer

Being The Weave

Noah Appelbaum’s life mission is to never lose his curiosity for the human condition. Since he was a child he has had a profound fascination with the world around him, and this has led him to think deeply, to write, to listen, and to ask good questions. Noah studies liminality—in-between states in the formation of identity—and finds purpose in sharing this concept with others. He believes that liminality is as foundational to the human experience as love, and equally as hard to define. You can find him on his website below and on Facebook by searching his name. He loves connecting with others.

Instead of finishing his degree, Nico led a team of 200 people in the making of The Cosmonaut, a transmedia experience in a story universe about the space race. It was licensed under the Creative Commons and crowdfunded by 5000 people, raising more than half a million dollars. Nico later became the CEO of Future Lighthouse, one of the world’s leading VR studios. He then founded Cocina Sagrada and co-founded Design Science Studio, an incubator for polymaths of the regenerative movement that aims at creating cultural shifts through art, spaces and experiences. Nico’s life mission is to foster a world that works for 100% of life. As an ontological designer, he creates experiences and spaces to design for improved states of being that can redefine our relationship with nature and each other.

Joe Brewer is a change strategist working on behalf of humanity, and also a complexity researcher, cognitive scientist, and evangelist for the field of regenerative design. He is the author of The Design Pathway for Regenerating Earth and the founder of Earth Regenerators. Joe has a unique background in physics, math, philosophy, atmospheric science, complexity research, and cognitive linguistics. More than a decade ago, he left the academy to trailblaze a path for other research practitioners to follow. Awakened to the threat of humaninduced climate disruption while pursuing a Ph.D. in atmospheric science, he switched fields and began to work with scholars in the behavioral and cognitive sciences with the hope of helping create large-scale behavior change at the level of global civilization.

You can find him on:

OUR CONTRIBUTORS

SYCAMORE

Saying Yes to the Calling of the Earth

Soil as Sacrament

MARK KANE

YASMIN C.

Mark designs Open World Alliance’s organisational architecture and blueprints and project manages OWA’s activities with a holistic whole-systems approach. He is also developing the Phoenix FinTech and cryptocurrency trading software systems that underpin OWA’s financial strategy. A seasoned entrepreneur for 25 years, professional trader, CEO, DJ/VJ and cave diver, he is a strategic integrator and community catalyst with an ability to solve complex logistics, think outside the box and hold an expansive vision for driving transformation.

Yasmin weaves across Open World Alliance’s Operations, Communications and Design departments, carrying out the communication, company branding and creative direction to help crystallise, ground and bring through the vision and projects that are ready to be birthed into the world. With 30+ years of transdisciplinary experience across events, health, academic research, finance, charitable, personal development, photography and various other creative industries, she brings cross-lateral thinking and ensures alignment and integrity between functions. A keen gardener and nurturer of both projects and plant life, she’s passionate about permaculture, philosophy, yoga, chi kung and ever-expanding explorations.

Sycamore roots himself at the intersection of ecological and social permaculture, weaving the relationships between gardens and group process, water stewardship and conflict transformation, ceremonial nutrition and body temple restoration. Five years ago, he co-founded the Loaves & Fishes Catering Collective to articulate the high-integrity and mission-focused hearthtending that he and his closed beloveds have been building at events throughout California, the West Coast, and Central America. Now with a decade of experience managing farms, leading kitchens and living in ecovillages throughout Turtle Island, Sycamore brings an embodied awe for agroforestry and chef alchemy as his Pattern Language for The Great Turning.

You can find him on:

You can find him on: You can find her on:

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Some of our articles come with an audio version which you can listen to by clicking on the icon. The icon gives you access to a song or soundtrack specially chosen by each author to match their article.

MOEIN NODEHI

FLAVIA HASHIMOTO

Buildings as Living Organisms

The Weave’s Art Project

Moein is the founder and CEO of Biotonomy. His passion for the natural world and architecture goes all the way back to his childhood. His admiration and curiosity for ancient architecture led him to study International Architectural Engineering. After working on some of the largest construction projects in the world, he realized how destructive conventional architecture was for the natural world and human wellbeing. This realization gave birth to a new dream of designing buildings and cities that could harness the power of nature. He spent over a decade experimenting with existing construction systems based on nature-based solutions and began to perceive their shortcomings in scalability and aesthetics, so he took on the task of building a scalable concept that would take into account biological design principles and ancient wisdom.

Flavia’s passion for exploring creativity took her on a path into visual and editorial design. She is a dreamer, a creative, and a curious and sensitive soul who has learned to discover and explore the creativity that inhabits all of us by connecting with her own intuition, our Divine Source, which makes us “One”. She has been working with communication, design and photography for 18 years and has learned through different processes and empathy in human relationships to translate other people’s dreams and ideas into visual language. Her professional experience has taught her about the importance of collaborative work and how creation is made of many unique parts. “The realization of this project is an example of the potential of creative humans being The Weave. I’m grateful for being a part of it!”

You can find him on:

You can find her on:

WEAVE WITH US Want to join our team or make a contribution to our magazine? Please reach out! We welcome business developers, editors, writers, poets, reporters, visual designers, illustrators, photographers, filmmakers, musicians, artists and community managers.

connect@theweavemagazine.earth

WELCOME TO THE WEAVE

he Weave is a regenerative, living organism. It is an oracle with the soul of a collective of weavers. It is the voice of our Mother reverberating in unison in the everexpanding tapestry of life. It is a golden thread forming a mycelium of unbound communion. It is one and it is all. It is the Weave, the weaver, and the woven. A unified channel—the embodiment of the Divine and our visions for a regenerative future. The Weave’s editorial was envisioned as an immersive experience in a biodiverse biome of three multidimensional, dialogical and concentric ecosystems with three climates each illustrating ever-evolving facets of a design journey from human regeneration to planetary regeneration. On the micro level lies the water ecosystem of the Individual and its three climates: Heal, Rewild and Thrive. This ecosystem is about taking a deep dive into ourselves. It is where we see with one all-seeing eye instead of two. Where we tend to our inner and outer landscapes as we commit to self-regenerating by regenerating our spiritual, emotional, mental 14

and physical ecologies. In this space we are invited to engage with the awareness that tantalises selfregeneration in a tantric dance with our true, Higher Self. It is where we return to our Nature and reclaim our inherent indigeneity. Where we remember how to embody our wholeness and our fullest potential as multidimensional beings. Here we explore the realms of the holon, of our shared Divinity in its fractalized, one-of-a-kind form, and the bioregions of our individual self. This is where the sun of our unity consciousness rises alight. Get grounded and listen deeply. This ecosystem is full of caves, waterfalls and butterflies in cocoons. We are free-diving into our liquidness here. On the meso level is the fire ecosystem of the Community. Its Dream, Weave and Celebrate climates are the playground of our regenerative co-creation, the house of our mirrors. The flame we dance with in the liminal spaces between death and rebirth, composting degeneration in an ontological alchemy of collective human regeneration. It is the bonfire we gather around to

sing, share our visions and weave communities, whole systems and social technologies simultaneously powered by ancient wisdom and new ways of self-organising and relating to our ideas of culture, education, value, currency, resources—and to each other.

Home outside the Home within ourselves. It is where we become regenerative stewards in service to all life as we disembody the systemic and degenerative ways of being that brought us to this collapsing moment in our collective existence.

This ecosystem is the heart of The Weave. Here we dream, we plan, we do, we celebrate. We explore ourselves in one another and endlessly rediscover that we are One. Here we use duality as an ingredient for creation—not as a way of looking in each other’s mirrors or at the world. Bring your unique gift to this circle and open your mouth as wide as you can when you share it. Here we are bees cross-pollinating across colourful fields as glocal winds carry away our co-creation blueprints and help us recreate our world in eusociality.

Here we find the roots of The Weave and biomimic our Mother’s magical ability to endlessly create conditions conducive to life in synchronised attunement with its self-sustaining language and rhythms. This is where we restore our sovereignty by cultivating our oneness with Her in a healed interdependence with one of Her most giving expressions: the soil. Here we hear birds return in multicoloured flocks of hope as they see the daylight of a sea of green wisdom rebrushed by human hands in lands once raped of their natural sacredness.

On the macro level stands in majestic sovereignty and surrendered stillness the earth ecosystem of the Planet with its Regenerate, Cultivate and Recreate climates. This ecosystem is the expression of who we truly are, where we come from, and the place we yearn to return to. It is our

As their wings expand following the reopening of their hearts in synergy with their regenerated trust in humanity, we notice our own wings and understand that, by rediscovering ourselves in devotion to our Mother’s intelligence, we can also be free—and fly. 15

GETTING TO KNOW THE WEAVE

e believe that authentic sharing of ideas, experiences, perspectives and best practices can only be achieved through wholeness and a synergistic coherence between the heart, the mind and the gut. For that reason, we choose to preserve the biodiversity of the voices that compose The Weave by honouring different expressions and tones of the English language while striving to sculpt a collective voice that is both elevated and accessible. This intention is supported by a copy-editing process which aims to maintain the integrity of the contributing authors’ voices. As you enter and explore The Weave, it will ask for you to engage in a deep conversation. Take your time. Our magazine and its periodicity were designed to allow for conscious reading following the rhythms of nature in an effort to rewild our relationship with time.

Part of that rewilding design process brought us to one of The Weave’s core missions as a publication: to help heal the way we live by healing the language we use to describe it. This means that you may come across manifestation language and terms utilised in ways that may seem novel to you—or novel terms altogether. Having that in mind, a regenerative glossary will be available at the end of each of our issues. Similarly, we strive for access to our content to be as inclusive as possible by providing our readers with a multimedia experience. Whenever possible and applicable, there will be three ways to engage with our content: You can choose to simply enjoy reading each article; you can listen to a song specially chosen by each author which matches their article (before, while, or after reading it); or you can listen to an audio version of the article which was specially recorded by each author for The Weave. Whatever experience you choose, we hope it illuminates you.

heal

rewild

thrive

The eyes I see Are one Bright shining light Surrendered in peace These days of my becoming Arms wide of abundance Equanimous thirst for what is to be Grateful, grounded Gaining foot direction and precipice For wings that learn how to fly Open and certain Wiser In your embrace I have found myself Edge of the abyss, landscape and sky Spacious and serene Crests falling down

Diligently composting Nourishing my own roots Returning to you And to myself Oh, the doors I have opened in my heart Chamber-sheltered pain bottles Dusty of emptiness Unidentifiable Who I once was Evaporated in the alchemy Of water and fire Atlachinolli Clean of chasing storms Transformed I, liquid You, cocoon.

– suddenlyskyclad

BY CHRISTINE MARIE MASON

HEAL

ONE LIGHT, ALL LIGHT: Basic Principles of Collective Trauma, Healing and Expansion

here is a myth in regenerative communities and movements that we can somehow birth a New Earth without dealing with the way current Earth systems live inside of us. In America we are told that we can simply pull up stakes, move away and reinvent ourselves in a new land, and simply turn away from where we came from. This, unfortunately, doesn’t work. We bring the systems that made us along for the ride! Until our traumas, adaptations, habits and beliefs of our families and cultures are brought into awareness, witnessed, felt and integrated, they will persist in any new community. By including and integrating the emotions and energy of our collective past, especially our trauma responses, we can make a healthier present and thriving future. I’d like to offer you a framework for understanding “trauma” and “collective trauma” in the service of creating islands of coherence as part of our regenerative work. Trauma can appear at the individual level—through an accident, for example, that isn’t cleanly felt and processed. Many traumas, however, are not unique to individuals, but are shared human experiences. Occurrences like war, cultural oppression, racial injustice, violence, environmental dislocation, and scarcity exist in the collective frame—much like safety, belonging, and abundance live in the consciousness of healthy societies.

by Mira Cervino

HEAL

SO, WHAT IS EMOTIONAL TRAUMA? In short, trauma is a wounding to the mind or spirit that occurs when the nervous system is overwhelmed: when a cultural, familial, or individual experience is just too much to take. Trauma is not inherent to any one experience: what traumatizes one person can energize another. Responses to experience differ based on individual and collective coping mechanisms and skill sets, prior experiences, and even epigenetic inheritances. While trauma can appear at the individual level (a car accident, for example, that isn’t cleanly felt and processed), that often comes from shared human experiences. Psychological and spiritual wounds from war, racial injustice, mass shootings, environmental dislocation and scarcity exist in the collective frame of unhealthy societies—much like safety, belonging, and equitable abundance live in the consciousness of healthy societies.

SHOCK AND DEVELOPMENTAL TRAUMAS DIFFER There are two distinct types of traumas: shock trauma and developmental (often chronic) trauma. The range of damage caused and the emotions that each elicit can be quite different. For example, they each have different predominant emotions. The predominant emotion resulting from shock trauma is fear; the predominant emotion arising from developmental trauma is shame. In the collective, a sudden natural disaster is a shock

trauma, while chronic poverty or systemic racism are collective developmental traumas. These chronic traumas or stressors upregulate the nervous system over a long period of time. The more we experience trauma, the more sensitive we become to further trauma.

TRAUMA ADAPTATIONS ARE PROTECTIVE INTELLIGENCE The upregulation that occurs with overwhelm can freeze the experience in the physical body and produce a kind of somatic storage. There are often psychic and behavioral adaptations designed to help the person avoid similar experiences in the future. Such adaptations are a kind of intelligence. In fact, they are a survival mechanism, in a way. They allow for short term self-protection, but they come at a cost. These adaptations can cause a person to contract, or even shut down, to run faster, harder: anything to not truly feel. A part of the person, thus, becomes fragmented and lives in the past. New experiences will hit the trauma, trigger old experiences and adaptations and potentially intensify suffering. Trauma-related suffering is multidimensional and contagious. It manifests across the mental, physical, spiritual, relational, and cultural fields. Suffering lives in us as individuals. It sits in the energy field between people and transits through time and space, passing between generations. What is not healed in one generation is passed on to the next in the form of energetic imprints or behavioral modeling, or the repetition of traumatizing acts. Over time, the trauma field becomes normalized and pervasive.

BY CHRISTINE MARIE MASON

The good news is that there remains a part of us that was never affected by the trauma; a part of us that strives towards growth in the same way that plants turn towards sunlight. Unprocessed trauma acts as a “reality distortion field.” When we do not integrate our trauma, it takes us out of the present; a part of us is still in the past, on a time delay. As a result, we may not be able to see people as they really are, in the current moment, or process information with clarity. Our lenses become tinted by accumulated adaptations which, in turn, affect all of our relationships.

don’t go out at night alone anymore, and the place they used to frequent loses a common patron. A punitive justice system puts people into prison at a high financial cost, taking resources away from education and prevention. An even deeper look might reveal complex dimensions of a society that produces criminals. We are never alone, we are always impacting each other.

ALL TRAUMA IS COLLECTIVE TRAUMA

HEALING IS ALSO COLLECTIVE

Almost all individual experiences can be seen through a systemic, collective lens. Let’s take for example the “individual” trauma of being the direct victim of a crime. It doesn’t only affect the individual. While the crime may affect the victim the most, it impacts many other people: the victims’ friends and family, the perpetrators’ friends and family. It may produce a systemic reaction: the victims blame all people who look or act like the perpetrator. The victim may buy more locks and trust people less and carry that energy into all future interactions. Maybe they

The good news is that there remains a part of us that was never affected by the trauma; a part of us that strives towards growth in the same way that plants turn towards sunlight. No matter how dire the circumstances, people (and systems) can heal—they can become whole and integrated again. This can be done together, as a collective, in an exponential manner: from one to many. As Thomas Huebl says, “We don’t have to do it alone.”

HEAL

We don’t have to do it alone. – Thomas Huebl

by Mira Cervino

BY CHRISTINE MARIE MASON

HEALING INVOLVES: •

Cultivating our Ability to Be Present Our nervous system can be trained. We can learn how to tune our body, mind, and heart—and how to stay present within ourselves while remaining attuned to others. Many people achieve this by learning to rest in the inner space through contemplative practice. In both Eastern and Western spiritual practices, there are rich traditions of contemplative practices which give the practitioner insight into their true nature: a part of consciousness, a part of Spirit, existing beyond identity and beyond the physical body. Thomas calls this “resting in inner space.” This type of contemplative practice stops us from over-identifying with the trauma, while also preventing us from disassociating from it. Resting in inner space also improves our relationship with others, as we are better suited to deeply listen and feel their experience—without contracting away from them, or leaning outside of ourselves to comfort them. With the presence this creates, we can have an awareness of both ourselves and others at the same time.

•

of intersubjective awareness. In other words, we are constantly impacted by other people, and we are constantly impacting them as well, in ways we cannot always see. Understanding this relational aspect is the most important part of healing.

Being Met in Relational Presence In contrast to most self-help guidance, many forms of therapy, including collective trauma work, tell us that we heal best in relationships with others. A growing body of work on the social engagement nervous system (polyvagal theory) makes it abundantly clear that we are co-regulating each other’s nervous systems all the time and that we live in a constant current

The energetic impact of traumas are often visible in the body to the trained observer. Trauma may be visible in skeletal or muscular contractions and adaptations; areas of the body that lack energy; imbalances in the left/right, up/down, front/back dimensions of the body; the gaze of an individual being pulled inward; and specific breathing patterns. A skilled facilitator can scan the physical and energetic body of a person and ask relevant questions to direct attention and inquiry to stuck trauma. They can meet not only the ideas, energetics and feelings, but the implicitly embodied holding patterns.

•

Telling the Truth in Presence When a trauma happens and is not able to be processed in real time, it gets repressed. It may go “underground” in the body, and often does in the mind. Unshared traumas become secrets we keep from ourselves. Secrecy is a separation factory: it blocks us from true love and healthy relationships, especially when shame is involved. When we feel shame, we may be resistant to accepting love, even when it is offered. Sitting in presence with someone who is capable of meeting us where we are at is a great antidote to this. When we sit with someone who is keen to deeply listen to us, we begin to reverse the maladaptive responses from our bodies and shift the stories that no longer serve us.

HEAL

Telling non-truths can arouse the nervous system in particular ways, some of which are measurable (e.g., with a lie detector). Healing can be measured in a different way; it calms the nervous system. These are opposite movements—lying arouses while healing calms. Telling the truth is a spiritual and psycho-biological healing practice. When we sit in presence with others and share our truths, we gradually dissolve no-longer-helpful adaptations to trauma and create a bigger container for light. This allows presence and vitality to flow through us. It allows us to remove the fog of our trauma filters—to see the world as it really is, now.

•

Collective Healing and Social Change as an Avalanche Process In mathematics, there is something called “avalanching processes”: where “a cascade of events is triggered by a series of small perturbations.” Nature Magazine explains, “Avalanching processes are found in a wide range of phenomena beyond snow slides, including the popping of champagne bubbles, nuclear explosions, neuronal networking, and even financial crises. Avalanching is an extreme example of a nonlinear process, in which a change in input or excitation leads to a disproportionate—often disproportionately large—change in output signal.”

One to Many Healing In group processes, when a facilitator is working with an individual’s trauma, there is a collective dynamic: those who resonate with the individual’s trauma are able to heal themselves simultaneously. Just as an individual heals through releasing tension in their nervous system, so does a coherent group of individuals, who form a kind of “collective nervous system”. They heal through allowing collective material to express itself and be released.

The non-linear nature of collective trauma work opens up the possibility of healing at scale—a simultaneous collective awakening. Collective trauma work on a larger scale is particularly helpful when working with experiences that are embedded in the fabric of a society, like genocide or climate breakdown. A facilitator in deep presence can be in service to a healing collective, and an entire community can heal together.

REVERENCE: CREATING RITUAL IN MODERN LIFE

CHRISTINE MARIE MASON AND THE ROSE WOMAN COLLECTIVE

BY CHRISTINE MARIE MASON

When we sit with someone who is keen to deeply listen to us, we begin to reverse the maladaptive responses from our bodies and shift the stories that no longer serve us. One place in particular where this occurs is in photon avalanches, when a crystal absorbs a single photon but many more are emitted: “[In photon avalanches] absorption of just a single photon leads not only to a large number of emitted photons but also to a surprising property: the emitted photons are ‘upconverted,’ each one higher in energy (bluer in color) than the single absorbed photon.” As a poet-scientist, I love this concept! When one particle of light is absorbed, it multiplies, uplevels and spreads the light—until the edges are glowing impossibly bright. One light, then all light! In its own way, the container of collective healing is like a crystal that magnifies and upconverts the light, spreading it rapidly to others. I theorize that because consciousness is nonlocal. When an individual wholly absorbs a concept and understands its importance, they are able

to transmit it rapidly to others in our collective field. And it’s not just collective healing that can work this way: social change is an avalanching process, as is universal love. Even small changes can spark movements. Let us build our capacities for presencing, attuning, and feeling together, and increase the likelihood that we will indeed be able to step into the promise of this moment in our collective awakening: the deep desire to see, accept, integrate and improve upon what has come before us in our individual and collective contexts.

CHRISTINE MARIE MASON

BY MIRA CERVINO

HEAL

I feel that art is born in me like my children were. There’s a lot of me in it. After all, my children feed on my body, my blood, my memories, my affections and my disaffections—my soul. But art is not mine—just like my children aren’t. We are channels for life and art to happen. We are sown, we generate, we give birth, And as we grow, art and life lead the way. The night of the first collage went like this: Unpretentious night, children’s day off, prayer music, and the sacred indigenous herbs that open portals. I looked at a reference on Pinterest—and it talked to me. Is this real? I wondered. She spoke again. Maybe if I do what she’s asking, she’ll stop looking at me like that. Photoshop > New File. Suddenly, boom! A quick and sure guide like the beat of the drum led me to the right images. Cut, paste, cut, paste, more flowers, more leaves, don’t stop until it’s over.

BY CHRISTINE MARIE MASON

by Mira Cervino

HEAL

by Mira Cervino

BY MIRA CERVINO

When I thought it would be the end, she said: Now rest, and tomorrow paint me. No! What for? If I try to paint, it’s going to be shit. I already did everything you asked for, I replied. Well, now I’m asking you to paint. I saw myself surrendered, guided by my own creation in my sweet illusion, trying to control everything. Light a candle, and don’t be in a hurry. I will continue to guide you. Painting is not just about you. It’s about you, too, but not just about you. Nothing is just about you. Just let it come through you. Like life, like the river, like music. Listen carefully, allow yourself, have fun, get emotional and follow through to the end. I came with a purpose, and you don’t have to understand it. Not now. You just need to feel and trust.

And so I did. And I keep doing it. And I don’t ever want to stop. For with each art, with each birth, with each eye that opens, with each life that is created and recreated, a wound is healed in me. With each color, with each gesture, with patience, persistence, with each mistake, I realize that in art you can’t make mistakes. In art, you learn. It transforms itself, it starts over— in art we play to create lives and give birth to worlds, as many times as we want. If it’s for me to choose how I want to live, I choose this way: channeling the best of me to the world.

MIRA CERVINO Translated from Portuguese by Barbara Lima

REWILD

by Flavia Hashimoto

BY FERANANDA IBARRA

RADICAL PARTNERSHIP A Relationship with Self, Culture and Nature THE FIRST SPIRAL OF QUESTIONS: Diversity asks, “who is at the table?” “Who is not at the table, and what barriers do they face in order to get there?”, equality replies. Inclusion wants to know, “Has everyone’s ideas been heard?” – while justice provides – “Are ideas that are not part of the majority taken seriously?” Decolonization is curious, “who built the table and why was it built? Can we deconstruct it?”

invite you to an “all inclusive circle”; one that honors all yet heightens those who have been disenfranchised, neglected into the shadows of society. Think of those on the edge—the indigenous, the women, the minorities. I invite you to find larger meaning and connection here. To explore radical partnership in an “Ancient Futures Café”—to co-create a new partnership for us all. You are focused, present to the room, to others, connected through the heart. Women from different walks of life and the Indigenous Grandmothers are here. They hold a container filled with their wisdom and the knowledge of ancient social technologies. Intentions have been blown in spirals into the wind, permissions have been granted, and the spirits have been called forth with their native names. The water prayer is being sung by the High Priestess, as she guides you into the river, opens the emotional space within you—and you feel united in the waters of the Great Womb of life. Men hold the sacred space from the riverbank, moving the energy

inwards and outwards to allow for the feminine to dance in all its glory. Clearing and purification take place. Your heart beats to the rhythm of the collective body of Spirit and you feel your self-presence and inner listening growing. Then it comes, the second spiral of questions: How are you perpetuating patriarchy or privilege? Where are you enacting or enabling extractive behaviors? Suddenly you are asked to get naked. To reveal your hidden behaviors and conditioning. Are you willing to dismantle the self-constructs you diligently learned? Patriarchy has stopped the free-flowing nutrients women provide. It has blocked the sacred purpose of half the population and mutilated cultures out of existence for thousands of years. Yet, perhaps the greatest damage of all is that it has prevented healthy partnerships nourished through the field of love.

REWILD

I notice that when I peel back the layers of fear, including the fear of being judged, there is a deep ocean of in-quiry available to me. Will I let the grief in? Will I let shame propel my evolution? Am I willing to open myself to raw vulnerability? Don’t judge me for my highs or lows, allow me to be me.

AM I TOO BLUE FOR YOU? As people open, their experience in the field shifts. A river runs through us! Stories of grief and trauma float in the collective stream. Vulnerability is in the water. Hide and Seek are present, too. Our energy peaks, rushing down into a whirlpool of e-motion. The Grandmother of love bursts into tears. From the edge of my chair, I wonder— what have we done to offend her? Should we feel shame? Are we colonizing the space, imposing an unwanted, unrequested emotional labor on the Grandmothers? The indigenous elder, the one I appreciate and cherish, the one I hardly understand, has spoken through the water. In holding space, there is the practice of “Being with all that Arises”: Do you have the patience to wait till your mud settles and the water is clear? Can you remain unmoving till the right action arises by itself? The Master doesn’t seek fulfillment. Not seeking, not expecting, she is present, and can welcome all things. – Lao Tsu

It is a dance in the field of the now. There are ebbs and flows. The Grandmothers sit in Circle together. They listen. Their tears call for the fire to be lit. When you tune in to the elements of nature, they speak to you. Fire—our great companion which enables us to endure the heat and intensity of our experience—fuels the deep transformative work to which we are committed to. I repeat to myself, “Stay conscious and practice grounding the electricity that runs through us like lightning seeking a target.” By working with fire, we form the alchemical vessel through which deeper individual and collective transmutation can occur. You remember that every one of us is a living organism that is alive to the energetic field of those around us, and alive to the energetic field of the whole. The spiral keeps moving inwards, and the third set of questions arrives: How can de-rooted people find community and re-plant themselves in an ethical way? What is the transitional ethics involved to integrate and define a new culture where we become indigenized into place? What does it mean to leave behind a culture of oppression? Give me a moment of unedited creative courage,

BY FERANANDA IBARRA

if you will. A moment where you speak your mind, not hiding anything—completely opening your mind and heart to another through sincere discourse. We each know about the potential that arises from sharing the innermost substance of consciousness within the Heart. We have placed our awareness in service of the whole. We are able to speak the truth and listen. We are open to the winds of influence; receptive, allowing. The whole room breathes at a rapid pace, there is nowhere to hide. Who would want to hide anyway? Isn’t this a sacred moment where we regenerate our culture through courage and vulnerability? The Grandmothers whisper to our hearts. Those open to receive free, fierce love and radical truth find connection to self, place and each other.

Be present. Be respectful. Be you. Dive in. The indigenous cultures honor their ancestors in ways that others have forgotten. They invite you to bring this back into your world. To recognize in others their true being. Their freedom and creativity. The indigenous remind us that no species has the right to disrupt the sacred purpose of another species. Polyculture is a word, but it is also a vocabulary, a composition and a creation. The Ocean is animate; it has a soul. And it isn’t a token for your rituals. The Fire has a divine purpose and a seat in the circle as well. The Wind communicates change and the Earth

REWILD

breathes through the lungs of the collective. The hum of our voices reveals the sensible engagement of those who are ready to release the old operating system, which has tied us to very narrow ways. How can we become better listeners to all that is animate? If you are still sitting in the circle, and you haven’t received a self-revealing truth capable of transforming you by now, then you are probably being hesitant. In radical partnership participation is key. As Thomas Huebl says, stop overthinking where to participate. Walk the path and illuminate it as you go. We aren’t getting “somewhere”—we are following the evolutionary impulse. Immerse yourself in a new narrative that brings the best of you to light. Create a field of expanded possibility, not for you, but for all the generations to come. A polyculture model requires us to practice an “aware way” of communicating. We are tasked with utilizing the strengths of every voice in a conversation, which brings us direction, wisdom, information and illumination. Your perception is your participation, your interplay. Offer the ancestors everything that wants to be released inside of you. Transmute the shadows. Let’s metabolize our collective trauma into joy, as we give ourselves the opportunity to move from them to we!

What does it take to become the kind of human beings who break through the stuck patterns of our social, political and economic systems to engender the transformation of human culture? I have wondered this for a long time. Perhaps growth happens in-between comfort and panic, because it moves us into action. Wendell Berry says that, “[The community] is not a sum of individuals. The sum of individuals is not the community.” Self, culture and nature are a representation of “The Big Three”, which is also known as I, we, and it; the good, the true and the beautiful; or art, morals and science. The spirals of conversation in the Ancient Futures Café move us from the realm of culture into the exploration of other realms. Where one has leverage is always an interesting question. This seems like a very particular thing. Yet, when large scale systems change in the universe, we can observe that it only happens when a new expressive capacity shows up. An example of such a capacity is DNA. If we want to talk about systems, then we need to look at the grammar of DNA and social organisms like organizations, cities, and even families. We need to look at living systems to understand flow. Isn’t this what the indigenous have done all along? We have dismissed ancient wisdom for centuries—can we rewind? There is also the technical challenge of scalability that needs to be addressed.

BY FERANANDA IBARRA

Think about what resources are needed for optimal flow and well-being. Think about what makes an ecosystem of organizations thrive. If money is the only thing you can think of, then you are being lazy. It is not about money, it’s about the resources that you want to use money for. What needs to circulate and then recirculate and how can that happen? Living things are in a ‘state of flux’—they are constantly changing. The perfection of nature’s flow allows for an economy where deep wealth is possible. It is about honoring all that is beyond measure, beyond transaction. Nature’s economy is sacred economy. “The world is interdependent. We are interdependent. The current economic system is designed to extract resources from and exploit people and the environment.” Can we redesign our systems of governance, economics and society to meet the current and projected needs of all species, while restoring their inherent right to thrive in their own habitats? The room is breathing in a different light. We have journeyed from the inner dimensions to the outer ones. People now feel more comfortable when speaking about what is “out there”.

The economies we design will determine our capacity for collective intelligence. It’s all about the DNA, folks. The emergence of speculative new forms of currency has created a new “gold rush”. Yet, if you think about the currencies in terms of DNA, can we truly create thriving social organisms using them? As a currency designer, I know that abundance and prosperity can be induced through “current-sees” that follow the principles of living systems. You must follow nature’s cues and design currency flows that enable anti-fragility, learning, balance of power, listening, radiance, generosity, and management of the commons. The indigenous societies thrived because they understood the power of community and the universal flows of life. They lived in shared economies, meaning the abundance was shared. A ‘commons’, a “commonwealth”, or a “de-colonized mind”, as Thomas Berry says, understands that everything in the universe is interconnected. There is no creation without destruction, and there is no destruction without creation. Life is about flow. It is interesting that some indigenous cultures managed to separate financial wealth from power. Let’s think about that. It is the paradox of sovereign nations—how money can be redesigned so it’s not a black hole that sucks everything into it. It’s about life and death.

REWILD

A “commons”, a “commonwealth”, or a “de-colonized mind” understands that everything in the universe is interconnected. There is no creation without destruction, and there is no destruction without creation. Life is about flow. – Thomas Berry

BY FERANANDA IBARRA

The indigenous cultures have taught us that the deepest truth about civilization is that it was never meant for us humans. It has always served another species, another environment, another cosmos. We claim to be stewards of the land, yet today we are destroying the biosphere. The indigenous tribes have taught us that if we listen to the water, to the wind, to the animals, to the plants, to all the animate voices inhabiting the cosmos, we will learn how to live in harmony with the whole. “If we lived our lives in harmony with one another, and with the natural order, there would be no reason to make war with one another.” – Chief Seattle The circle has created so much choice, so much love, connection, and intimacy. The more love has unfolded, the more love has kept flowing among us. All-inclusive Love that continues to choose love. The plenary from the Café was not a “report” of insights alone—it was a fulfillment ritual. Water keepers from around the world placed their water into a container and our Hawaiian Grandmother released it into the river. The water included tears shed, as well as many prayers. The miracle of the “we” was palpable and as soft as the skin of the beloved! Let’s arrive together into the present time. Let’s heal our pain, embrace the shadows, and claim our potential as harmonious societies. Can we release our shame, clear the victim/oppressor complex with compassion and patience and face our fears? Can we create mutual sovereignty and open societies? Can we create information systems that

allow us to have the intelligence of cells in a body? Let’s create new DNA for our social organisms. Our future is exciting. Our energy doesn’t need to be sucked into the past, and we don’t need to run away into the future. We can be strong, wise and full of abundance. Radical partnership begins with the self. It begins by tuning ourselves like a fine instrument, and tuning in to the precious melodies that nourish life. As you commit to be “all in” with the multifaceted ecology that holds and sustains life, you will experience, more and more, the revelation of your genius, and you will attract co-creators. Togetherness opens us up to service and play. It creates a unified source-field where we may dance with our tantric energies, our love energies, where sparks of bliss and joy and the rapture for all creation ignites the possibility of thriving polycultures and virtuous systems. We can experience an embodied, ecstatic collaboration with all the animate world! ●

FERANANDA, in radical partnership with life and Spirit. ⁕⁕ Join Ferananda at The Independent National Convention in Austin, Texas, on October 29-30! ⁕⁕ Ferananda also invites you to support the indigenous Grandmother Ana Iris—who inspired this article— in raising funds for her community Los Guardianes de las Esferas.

THRIVE

by Bartjan De Brujin

he time is now for humanity to wake up from its nightmare of separation, scarcity, competition and exploitation of each other and the Earth, our home. Wake up to what? To the truth that we are an integral part of something bigger than ourselves and that we can, if we so choose, create a world where everyone thrives. When I sat down with Daan, one of the co-founders of Gaianet, to document a conversation for The Weave, I was surprised that our discussion was not going to be about the role of networks and communities in that awakening process, but about the individual as its catalyst. “My heart goes out to the inner transformation of the human being! But even more of my heart goes out to asking what makes us thrive. That question led me to wanting to build cities, villages and living environments.” - Daan Gorter

The result of living your purpose is the feeling that you are living a meaningful life–and that is the prerequisite to being becoming a Thriving Individual.” – Daan Gorter

BY HANNA MARIA & DAAN GORTER

THRIVING GROWS FROM THE INSIDE-OUT Bring Your Colour to Action

Not long into our chat, it became clear that Daan had picked the perfect topic to speak about. I was touched as his entire body and being lit up when mentioning the Thriving Individual! And it makes so much sense. The vision for healthy and thriving communities must start with healthy, thriving individuals. As Daan put it: “Many people have tried to introduce systems, start communities or build new projects with a beautiful vision of how it would work out when people arrive, but they forgot that they need to arrive inside themselves first before they physically arrive in the communal space. We can build as many light-cities as we want where life is free and everything is transparent and open, but if we have not made the internal transformation, we will bring the old paradigm into the communities, into the shared space. We need to help people thrive

individually first before they get together to build and manifest New Earth cities or centres.” The obvious question then is, what is it that makes us thrive? Over the past ten years, Daan has been called to a deep exploration of this topic: “Thriving is 99% inner game. It is about having the courage to take our rightful place in the world despite the programming we may have according to which we should stay small and fit in. It is about claiming our power and allowing that to expand into the world. This takes courage!” We both acknowledged that we still notice traces of conditioning and programming in us that say that it’s okay to survive and be like all the others, but it’s not okay to stand out and thrive. I agree— thriving really does take courage.

THRIVE

Mainly and foremost, Daan believes that a Unity experience is a prerequisite for the individual to thrive: “To me, it seems that if people have never had a profound Unity experience (an experience that shows us without a doubt that we are woven into and loved by something bigger than ourselves), it is not possible to thrive”. Daan shared with me a story from his own life: his journey from being stuck in a knot inside the small space of his mind to inhabiting and feeling the rest of his being—his body, his heart. A journey from the illusion of separation to the embodied knowing that all is One. We hear this often, but what does it mean? Daan offered me a beautiful image as a reminder. He lives in Brazil and said that the Portuguese word for mind, mente, is related to mentira, which means ‘lie’. The word for heart in Portuguese is coração, which means ‘colour in action’. “If you’re mostly in your thought process, you’re listening to the programming of society, your parents, what you learned. The mind is constantly comparing your current situation with whatever other situation and you’re listening to a lie, as there is no comparison between you and anybody else, because we’re all so unique. When we make the journey into the heart, we learn to listen to its colours and see that we are all shining the same colours!” As he spoke, I witnessed again how Daan’s whole being brightened, ‘expanded’ and shone wildly from the inside out. It was really beautiful to see.

“There is no comparison anymore from that perspective. There’s just resonance! There’s a huge difference in experience when I get away from the illusion of separation into the beingness of oneness, by feeling instead of thinking and analysing. When you are in a group of people and everyone is shining and radiating, the barriers and masks are down, and we’re in this energy together, there’s this feeling of... it’s indescribable, there are no words, but there’s this vibration or sensation of…ah... beingness. This is the best I can do for an answer. This is the key to thriving, the lived and felt experience of Oneness.” I loved the Portuguese meaning of heart, ‘colour in action’. What are your unique colours? What is your unique gift? What is yours to be and bring while you are here? “To thrive, you need to find Meaning in your life, with a capital M. What is it that gives you energy? What is it that makes you feel more alive? Once you’ve found something, then go and do more of that. Keep exploring. Keep it playful. This is not very big or very difficult. If it becomes difficult or big, you’re probably stuck in your head again. The result of living your purpose is the feeling that you are living a meaningful life—and that is the prerequisite to being and becoming a Thriving Individual.” Meaning and purpose, alongside the Unity Experience, are the pillars of a Thriving Individual. We must embody a state of consciousness which is a lived awareness that we are part of something

BY HANNA MARIA & DAAN GORTER

Thriving is 99% inner game. It is about having the courage to take our rightful place in the world despite the programming we may have according to which we should stay small and fit in. It is about claiming our power and allowing that to expand into the world. This takes courage! – Daan Gorter

bigger than ourselves, where we no longer focus solely on our own needs and agendas but have the ability to relate to the complexity of all life.

And so Daan’s passion for the thriving of the individual led him toward the creation of thriving communities.

Daan continued: “Thriving also means having healthy boundaries and speaking up when we do not agree with what is happening—from a place of love, compassion and maturity. In order to get to a place of thriving, we need to get out there and ‘test’ ourselves, get out of that comfort zone and go into the stretch zone, because that is where we grow.”

Ultimately, what came from our conversation is that the key to thriving is to trust the colours of our heart to guide us to the actions that are ours to express while we are here. Knowing that our truthful colours and actions will weave perfectly into the tapestry of everyone else’s is part of that trust we embody as thriving individuals gathering together to co-create thriving communities in support of a thriving world.

“In my heart, I wish for all of humanity to thrive. Yet I find it unlikely that all of humanity is going to thrive in my lifetime. That being said, I believe we can create pockets, groups of people who are in super coherence with each other, and they will ripple out and exhilarate all of consciousness. So that’s worth living for: creating thriving examples, thriving environments—blueprints of how it can be different.” - Daan Gorter

HANNA MARIA – at Simply Well Written

dream

weave

celebrate

In its horizon Her losses lined up Side by side One by one Some of them Having never been given rightful recognition Appeared to claim their status

THIS LUSH GREEN OASIS SHE WAS SITTING ON

This lush green oasis she was sitting on (Rapidly she realized) Was surrounded by a deep, vast desert

These layers of denial you’ve clad us with, they said Here, watch us throw them in the wind We won’t let you close your eyes this time, they said Feel the coldness of our nakedness in your heart Rip off your sanctuary of goodbyes Release them from your self-protection Touch, taste them Playing drums of solitude and despair Past, present and future Swarmed her The sounds she heard: – Where do I belong?

-suddenlyskyclad

DREAM

THE ROSETO MYSTERY Dreaming Village Life Into Our Modern World

BY NOAH APPELBAUM

by Bartjan De Brujin

DREAM

“They had to look beyond the individual. They had to understand the culture he or she was a part of, and who their friends and families were, and what town their families came from. They had to appreciate the idea that the values of the world we inhabit and the people we surround ourselves with have a profound effect on who we are.” – Introduction to Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers

hat makes “village life” so appealing to so many people across the globe, even in modern times? Despite all the advantages that modernization has given us, many people still crave and seek out the recreation of a “village” they can call home. This begs the question: When people talk about “village” life, what exactly do they mean? Defining what a “village” is can be a challenge. For some, a village is defined by the number of inhabitants in a certain area. Some geographers would say that a village is defined as a place containing between 500 and 2,500 inhabitants. However, the Census of India designates a place with 5,000 residents as a village—if a habitation grows larger it begins to qualify as a town. In the Netherlands, the word dorp (lit. “village”) is typically used to refer to settlements with less than 20,000 people. A German dorf (village) usually consists of at least a few houses but can have up to a few thousand inhabitants. In the United Kingdom, historically, the primary distinction between a hamlet and a village was that a village contained a church. In Malaysia, a kampung is determined as a locality with 10,000 or fewer people. In urban areas of the Philippines, the term “village” most commonly refers to private subdivisions, especially gated communities. In fact, as you look around the world, it is quite difficult to find definitions for “village” that are coterminous.

The United States continues this trend. Here, the meaning of “village” varies by geographic area and legal jurisdiction. The Tenth Amendment to the Constitution is actually the cause for the lack of uniformity in defining what a village is. It maintains that the federal government only has the powers delegated to it in the Constitution— everything else falls under state rights. Thus, what a “village” refers to varies state by state. Each state is free to define a village as a type of municipality, to designate it as a special district, or even to use the word to refer to an unincorporated area. States may define it as they wish, or in fact, not define it at all. The area of New England, however, provides us with a profound clue in the search for what truly defines a village. In colonial New England, villages usually formed around the meetinghouses that were located in the center of each town. These meetinghouses provided a tangible place for people to come together and feel like a community. In many areas, these meetinghouses still stand as modern town centers. In colonial times, the infrastructure of the United States wasn’t nearly what it is today. People had to rely on simpler architectural structures and functionable conveniences—such as meeting at the intersection of roads—to source their community functions. This meant that places such as meetinghouses dominated village

BY NOAH APPELBAUM

life and served as multifunctional spaces. People felt like they were a part of something. While there, they could interact with other members of their geographical tribe, and feel a sense of stewardship for the lands they collectively shared. Civic organizations were introduced. People felt a sense of kinship and shared purpose with the proliferation of groups and organizations, each one only deepening an ever-expanding experience of communal life. Colonial New England recognized what made a village a village— it was that powerful feeling of community. Could the feeling and experience of community be so powerful that it extends a person’s life? To find out, let’s consider the introduction to Outliers, where the author, Malcolm Gladwell, explores the “Roseto Mystery.” Around the turn of the 20th century, immigrants from Roseto Valfortore, Italy, came to the United States to work in the slate quarry near the town of Bangor, Pennsylvania. In their new home, in a foreign place, they chose to aptly name their fledgling village after the diaspora they represented: Roseto. In Roseto, Pennsylvania, they established a new community, much like the old one they had left behind. They built schools, shops, more than a dozen factories, and a park. They preferred to keep to themselves and hardly interacted with the towns around them, which were predominantly German and English. They lived in relative obscurity until the 1950s. During this time, Stewart Wolf, a researcher who was the head of Medicine at the University of Oklahoma, discovered a unique oddity about

Roseto that made him curious. While conversing with a local doctor, he found out that hardly anyone in Roseto under the age of sixty-five had heart disease. This was a notable aberration because, at the time, heart disease was the leading cause of death in the U.S. for men under sixty-five. Furthermore, from 1954 to 1961, Rosetan men over 65 had a death rate of 1%, while the national average was 2%. He decided to investigate. He performed blood draws and did EKG scans; he analyzed death certificates and perused physicians’ records. The results shocked him: almost no one under the age of sixty-five showed any signs of heart disease. Wolf was stumped. He could not figure out a cause for this curious abnormality. He decided to enlist the help of a sociologist, John Bruhn. They searched through common causes of death, but found no evidence of suicide, alcoholism, or drug addiction in Roseto. Somehow, everyone seemed to be dying of old age. Roseto was an outlier, but why? The Rosetans smoked heavily, ate poorly, and many were obese, which forced Wolf to rule out diet and lifestyle as an explanation for their low instance of heart disease. It didn’t have anything to do with their occupation either, as many of the men worked in the slate quarries where they contracted illnesses from gasses and dust. Considering the genetic component, he looked at relatives of Rosetans who lived in other areas of the country to see if they were in comparably good health. They were not. He was forced to rule out genetics as well. Wolf began to realize that there was something about the town itself, something perhaps less tangible, that was leading to its inhabitants dying mostly of old age.

DREAM

The answer may not solely be to create more villages in the world, but rather to weave village-living into modern life.

Wolf began to look deeper and think outside the box. What could be causing this strange aberration? He noticed some peculiarities that began to paint a fuller picture. He found that many homes had three generations living under the same roof, which was uncommon in the U.S. with the prevalence of nuclear families. He discovered there were twenty-two distinct civic organizations in a town of just two thousand. He observed that people said hello to each other on the streets, would stop for a while to chat and seemed to genuinely care about each other’s wellbeing. Eventually, he decided that what made Roseto so different, and its inhabitants so healthy, was the town itself—its culture and social structure. There was something almost magical about this place. In Roseto, there was a remarkable sense of community. This landmark understanding towards the causes of good health was greeted with much skepticism amongst the medical establishment. It took time to convince them that the values and structure of the community we live in, along with the quality of the people we surround ourselves with, has a significant impact on our wellbeing.

Over time, the miraculous impact of community on the individual began to be known as the Roseto effect—the phenomenon by which a close-knit community experiences a reduced rate of heart disease. The initial study was followed by a 50-year longitudinal study, comparing Roseto to the nearby town of Bangor. Just as predicted, heart disease rates in Roseto increased (becoming similar to the rates of neighboring towns) as it became more Americanized and Rosetans lost touch with their Italian social structure. Wolf attributed Rosetans’ previously lower rate of heart disease to lower stress and a cohesive community. He noted that houses were close together, and everyone lived more or less alike. Elders were valued and respected, and incorporated into community life. In fact, Rosetans had a direct experience of community—every day. There existed a strong sense of belongingness. And this seems to have had a renowned impact on their ability to remain healthy and avoid heart disease. It is poignant, too, that it was their instance of heart disease that was low. Of course it was—their everyday routine was filled with heart-to-heart connections. People in villages

BY NOAH APPELBAUM

learn to embody a sense of interdependence, due to the often-rural nature of their communities. While these neighborhood relationships serve an important function in village life, they also form bonds that are strengthened every day as needs are met and relationships are deepened. There is a reliance on and a responsibility towards one another. This differs from modern life in the “society” of cities, which can often be filled with isolation. Village living lends itself to community support. Mental and emotional health is vastly improved from the daily interaction with loved ones. People show genuine care for each other, listen deeply, and give advice. They split duties and share skill sets. They share meals with one another. In villages like Roseto, villagers are engaged in community from the moment they wake up until the moment they go to sleep, and that helps them live a longer life. Villages like this may be a token of the past, but they are also the way forward. The answer may not solely be to create more villages in the world, but rather to weave village-living into modern life. We can do this by understanding that what truly “defines” a village is the feeling of community— and that the experience of community can be woven into modern life by role-modeling our intrinsic interdependence and challenging our understanding of what family is; by moving beyond the concepts that feed our illusion of separation. When you are part of a community, you understand what it is like to be part of a village—and this may even improve your chances of remaining healthy as you age.

Villages like Roseto are characterized by the preponderance of informal, long-lasting relationships. One of the greatest benefits of this village structure is having many hands to help raise the children, who are surrounded by a “family” beyond their blood bonds who genuinely care about them. This kind of shared responsibility exemplifies the often-heard saying of “It takes a village.” But it doesn’t matter whether that “village” has 500 people or 5000 people. Ultimately, what matters is whether the villagers interact with a sense of community. The modern world we live in today has brought us many conveniences that make our lives easier, but with those conveniences comes a price. We no longer need to interact with each other the way villagers did in less-modern times. This has resulted in more separation and isolation, which has many negative health effects. Most people who seek out a “village life” have probably never heard the Roseto story and don’t know about the potential benefits to physical health. Rather, they are drawn to the village concept because they crave a connection with others and a sense of community that we don’t easily find in our modern way of living. As a wonderful bonus, the Roseto example gives us yet another compelling reason to integrate village life into this complex modern world of ours. . ●

NOAH APPELBAUM

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WATCH NICOLÁS ALCALÁ’S “THIS IS ME”

BY BARBARA LIMA |

WITH NICOLÁS ALCALÁ

MEETING AN IMAGINEER Nicolás Alcalá on Life-Changing Moments, Food, Giving, and Ontological Design

hat is your biggest fear?—Nico asked me the first time we met. We were both at the re:build conference in Costa Rica back in March—him, as one of the organizers, and me, as a participant.

His question arose as part of an authentic-relating exercise in which the attendees of the conference were split into small groups for a round of hot-seat questions. I remember feeling deeply impacted by it yet not disconcerted. I fully embraced Nico’s question as an exercise of vulnerability, and it was liberating. As the event unfolded, I saw Nico in corners here and there—often with a focused demeanor in front of his computer and an observing, kind presence when interacting with others. This time, months later, we are continents apart. I’m in Mexico, he’s in Spain—we’re on Zoom. As Nico turns his camera on, his background gives me a peek into the aliveness of the space he is in. He is sharing a house in Ibiza with his business partner and a group of close friends for a mastermind week. It’s my first summer in Europe in a long time—he joyfully shares before he starts telling me about his family origins and the stories that shaped the way he sees the world.

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I was raised in the magical land of Andalucia in the south of Spain. On my father’s side, Spanish traditions; on my mother’s side, Ukrainian, Polish and Jewish ancestors, mostly exiled from Europe, with stories of adventure and migration. Nico tells me that many of his family members died in concentration camps during the Second World War. My mother, who was born and raised in Argentina, left the country to escape war and dictatorship and exiled herself in Spain, where she spent most of her life. Stories of my family members running away from war and violence and fleeing countries definitely had an influence on me. From working in advertising and filmmaking for fourteen years and organizing one of the largest, most successful crowdfunding campaigns in history to fund his first feature film when he was only twenty years old—to starting a VR company and then quitting everything to cook and create immersive experiences at scale, Nico later decided to enter the realm of regenerative villages, where he embodied his multipotentiality in the form of la tierra.

THE WEAVE Is there a childhood memory or

transformational moment that has informed your path as a village builder? NICOLÁS ALCALÁ I’ll share one I feel is related

to village-building in a beautiful way. I was raised in a small town on the coast of Granada called Salobreña. I was biking with my father in the afternoon through crop fields, kilometres of them. We were hungry, so we broke into a property and started picking delicious fruits from a tree. At some point, we were caught by the owner of the land. We got really nervous and were going to run away, but he told us not to worry. He shared that there was an unwritten law in these fields—you were allowed to come and could eat whatever you wanted, as long as you didn’t take it with you. That felt like such a beautiful way of gifting and inviting us to his table. Another transformational moment I had that has definitely influenced much of how I approach the creation of things was my first Burning Man experience and one of its principles, the Gifting Economy. At Burning Man, you’re in a constant process of receiving gifts from people who are committed to giving, and that leads you to feeling completely taken care of. You feel nourished, and that just changes your entire system, how you are in the world.

BY BARBARA LIMA

When you’re commited to giving, that leads you to feeling completely taken care of. You feel nourished, and that just changes your entire system, how you are in the world.

What catalysed your relationship with food and the way you perceive it? From an early age, I was lucky enough to have not one but two passions: film and food. At some point, I chose film over food and started a career as a filmmaker. But food was always there, and I think it began because my mother was very passionate about cooking. I used to cook with her on weekends since I was very little. Eventually, I started hosting people and cooking for them. When I was finishing editing my first film—I had spent almost four years on the project, seven months of which were in the editing room—I was really exhausted and wanted to create something that I could begin in the morning and finish in the afternoon. I had friends who also loved cooking, so I asked them why don’t we start a secret restaurant on the weekends? So we started this secret restaurant with just one table for six people which was highly curated. There was an opening time, but we didn’t have a closing time (most dinners finished around 7am). We ended up having a waitlist of hundreds of people. That’s when I transitioned from filmmaking to cooking and

founded Cocina Sagrada, my third company, and started organising these immersive experiences around food. This is where my passion for telling stories with food emerged. I have to say that cooking is my biggest passion and is where I feel like I am most in a flow state. Unfortunately, I don’t do it for a living, but it is a fundamental part of everything else that I do and everything I design. That seems to be very much linked to your artistic expression as well, right? I feel like art plays a fundamental role in your life, both personally and professionally. Yeah, I think art is the fundamental language that explains our reason for being here. We can’t exist without art. It helps us to ask the questions we need to be asking ourselves, to connect with the Divine. It is our way of tapping into something that, to me, is the fundamental language of being human. Art is everywhere. And it should be everywhere, but the moment you frame it under a capitalistic model, it becomes corrupted. So, the question is, how can we treat it more as a property of the commons? How can we treat it

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as something that is part of our fundamental nature—which should be created more frequently and with less constraints? That’s a great question. Would you say that art is your main vehicle for connection with the Divine? Or is there something else that allows you to connect with Source from your experience? In what kind of moment does that happen for you? I think art is one of the vehicles. Sex is another one. Breathing is another one. Psychedelics are another one. Meditation is another one, right? I think each one of those allows us to enter processes of ekstasis, to zoom out and see the worlds behind the veil. They are difficult to explain, and science has a hard time measuring them, but they are part of the fabric of the world. Art is our attempt at looking behind the veil with words, images and sounds. I can agree with that. Since we’re talking about connection, how do you see re:build, Cocina Sagrada, Design Science Studio and la tierra interconnected through you? All of them have a strong wireframe of design that I only really discovered recently. It has allowed me to describe a little bit better what I do, which is ontological design—the science in which everything we design designs us back. Everything from architecture, to light, to picture, to sound, to experience has an impact on how we feel. I’m an ontological designer—but we all are. Every time you have a bad day and grab a glass of wine and have a bubble bath, what you’re doing is designing your environment to feel different. In everything

that I create, you can see my will to design for states of being. I believe in doing this by using tools that affect our emotions and impact the human condition—our ontology. I do that through sound, texture, colour, taste... So, through what you just described, what is the ultimate state of being that you are trying to foster in people? One of the villages of la tierra is called Ataraxia, which is a Greek word that describes a state of happiness through contentment. It is by not having any particular needs beyond your current ones that you achieve happiness. This is fundamental wisdom in many of the philosophical traditions and religions of the East. The less you need, the happier you are. I think the ultimate state of being is in that perfect balance between not needing (the ascetic ascension) and engaging in the full spectrum of hedonistic pleasures (which also defines us as human beings—we are here to enjoy). If you are able to find that balance, tap into it, because most of the time you’re here to just enjoy being, and I think that’s the perfect spot. I love that. I know you’re an Adventurous being with a capital ‘A’. How did adventure acquire so much importance in your life? That’s an excellent question. It was definitely by watching many movies when I was a kid and reading many books. I thought about that the other day when I was talking to a friend. We found out that the Neverending Story was our favourite book. Adventure is so thrilling! Humans are designed for discovery and for travelling;

BY BARBARA LIMA

In the end, it’s gonna be okay. If it’s not okay, then it is not the end.”

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NICOLÁS ALCALÁ’S PORTFOLIO

Design Science Studio An incubator for polymaths of the regenerative movement

re:build A gathering for building regenerative villages and futures

Cocina Sagrada A collective of versatile storytellers, experience designers, chefs and artists

for feeling things and creating magic in the process. The moment you understand that the journey is the destination, you can live all these adventures. It’s about commiting to adventure, jumping in, and not looking back. It makes life much yummier. I don’t understand the world without adventure. Now I’d like for you to imagine that your life is a piece of fabric, and that you can pinch it and pick it up to create circus-style tents, to feature three moments or experiences that changed your life. If you were to showcase them, what would they be? The first one would be my first Burning Man experience. It was my first time trying LSD, and it was starting to kick in when we arrived at this lavish camp decorated with expensive Moroccan rugs, filled with the most beautiful people I have seen in my entire life. There was this gigantic table with massive amounts of food and a woman on top of it playing the violin. There were singers, dancers, a Balcan orchestra… It was one of the most surreal moments in my life and something that completely changed me—it began to influence everything I did afterwards in terms of designing experiences,

la tierra A village of villages prototyping the numan of the 21st century

The Cosmonaut (2013) A transmedia experience in a story universe about the space race

spaces and tapping into the magic of the circus. The second one happened a couple years before my mother passed away. It was right before the premiere of The Cosmonaut, which was an incredibly stressful time. I was definitely not the person I am today. I had sent this stupid email to someone who was looking for a job, and they responded in a really bad way. Because the project was very popular and there were a lot of people against it, my response to that email went viral. I ended up receiving thousands of death threats, in an intense wave of hatred. In the middle of that process, we lost one of our sponsorships. I was having dinner with some friends when I got the news and remember experiencing this moment of complete peace in understanding that that moment with my friends was more important than anything else. Whatever drama was unfolding, we could solve it the following day. My team wrote to me asking to meet, but I decided to turn off my phone so I could be with the people around me. In that moment I finally understood all those times when I had gotten upset with people who didn’t make a deadline or chose to be with their friends

BY BARBARA LIMA

on a Friday night instead of finishing whatever was more important to me. It was a lesson in compassion which greatly influenced my character. The third one has to do with some of the experiences I’ve had with plant medicines, especially Ayahuasca and 5-MEO DMT. Through these medicines I was able to touch the Divine and understand other realms. I was raised an atheist, so these experiences were life-changing for me. Understanding that the fabric of reality is very layered and is way more complex than what science can explain opened me up to a lot of changes which influenced my work and the way I approach life. What plant medicine was most impactful for you? Both Ayahuasca and 5-MEO DMT have, in different ways, been the most transformational for me. With 5-MEO DMT I had a direct experience of what you might describe as God and oneness, not as a conscious entity, particularly, but as the source of everything that exists. That allowed me to realise things about myself and see the world through a different lens, one that showed me all those layers of reality. In those layers of reality, what does community mean to you?

the easier life becomes. Community is at the centre of all of my work. It’s what I design for and around. The thing that has changed my life the most, and makes me the happiest, is that I belong to many communities in which I feel very held; and that allows me to do all the things that I do. What can we do to live more regeneratively in our home? I’ll bring you back to food. Not only is it our direct connection with nature, but it also has so much to teach us about regenerative principles… We can regrow vegetables, such as celery or carrots, whatever it is that can sprout again in water, and compost scraps of food. To me, it’s about using food as a means to understand that we are part of nature. If we change our food systems—how we understand food—then we can change the way we think and act as a result. To finish our conversation, I’d like you to imagine that you were asked to create one last collective experience for all the inhabitants of planet Earth on our last day on the planet. What experience would that be? It would be something similar to Bosch’s Garden of Earthly Delights—a gigantic garden where we could dance, feel at peace, have orgies, laugh, party together (hopefully naked), love each other, and say goodbye. ●

Community is the act of choosing to be together. It’s the understanding that we are designed to be living together and that life is much better when we do. The more we design our lives as a community,

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la tierra Designing How to Numan in the 21st Century

BY NICOLÁS ALCALÁ & BARBARA LIMA

e are going through a turbulent time of systemic changes and planetary challenges. The Hopi call it Koyaanisqatsi—life out of balance. What we do today will ripple throughout the next centuries and set the foundation for a new way for human beings to be on Earth.

It’s time to go back to a different way of connecting with each other and the Planet. At la tierra, we aim to create a safe haven for travelers, thinkers, philosophers and (r)evolutionaries. A village of villages that can become a beacon of hope, a blueprint for a more equitable, more just, more nature-connected society. A space to live, think and embody the regenerative values of Earth 2.0, where we can be an inspiration for the artists, thinkers and planetary solutionists that are contributing to the design of a new world. Our vision is to steward the collective commons (land, resources and knowledge) while redesigning our shared systems under regenerative principles. This means taking the lessons of thousands of years of human evolution and rethinking our social, financial and governance systems. It means to redesign intimacy, connection and how we interoperate—all under a principle of giving more than we take. We want to build a place that can architect minds and change how we see the world. We want to build a home for the regenerative movement—to give birth to the headquarters of the Regenaissance.

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CULTURE la tierra is a decentralized Village of Villages, which means that no behavior, communal way of being or consensus is forced besides some basic construction and living agreements outlined in our bylaws, the only set of rules that citizens agree to commit to. Everything else will be inspired by our Guiding Principles. Each group of humans living at la tierra will self-organize in the form of neighborhoods or villages and have their own agreements beyond our basic bylaws.

EKSTASIS “To step outside oneself”. A peak experience that connects us with the Divine which can be achieved through breathing, sex, altered states, dance, music... Many of the rituals and immersive experiences that will unfold at la tierra will be designed to achieve ekstatic states. We will pay special attention to rites of passage, comingof-age ceremonies, and other shared rituals.

We believe in Ekstasis, Catharsis and Communitas as three fundamental principles for healthy communities. We believe in ritual, symbols and collective celebrations; in community and selforganization, in trusted mycelial networks of support—and we will create the conditions for them to happen. Our villages and roads will be designed to privilege serendipity, collective experiences and human interaction. We will foster awe and wonder through a dialogue between art and the land, and by encouraging creativity through the multiple spaces dedicated to it.

CATHARSIS A deep sense of healing, usually with respect to trauma, and often energetically released. From temples to yoga shalas to healing practices, catharsis will take place in the different communities and spaces at la tierra.

BY NICOLÁS ALCALÁ & BARBARA LIMA

COMMUNITAS A deep sense of connection with others— the experience of sharing profound, ineffable moments with others. This is at the core of the la tierra experience. From communal kitchen spaces to weekly potlatches and communal tables, the entire land is designed for connection.

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Our culture is defined by our principles, our bylaws and our commitment to being stewards of the land instead of its owners. We pledge allegiance to the Earth, Nature and all Her inhabitants. We believe our culture is defined by our narratives and our origin stories. la tierra aims to help design the culture of the next iteration of humanity. A place to learn together how to be better humans, how to be in better relationship with Nature and each other. A place to create the foundations of a new civilization that thrives at the expense of no one and designs for global equity consciousness. la tierra is a place to engineer culture, craft new rituals, myths and ideas. We believe it is time to get back to the temples—temples for art and knowledge and music and honoring the Earth. We aim to create a new MythOS: an Operating System of myths, origin stories and ideas that can serve as guiding principles for our social agreements. A new cosmology.

BY NICOLÁS ALCALÁ & BARBARA LIMA

TRUST We move at the speed of trust. Trust is the glue of communities, and its erosion is creating polarized societies. We believe in returning to core values of cooperation and belonging.

BETTER HUMAN BEINGS We believe in Equity. Consent. Freedom. Non-violence. Compassion. In treating others from a perspective of oneness.

HUMAN STEWARDSHIP We operate under seven-generation thinking principles: what we build should last seven generations—and then seven generations after that. We believe in having an ecocracy mentality: Nature has the same voting rights as humans.

FOOD SYSTEMS We believe in rethinking our food systems—not only through abiding by permaculture practices but also by sharing our practices with others. We believe in reestablishing food sovereignty and in healthier ways of feeding our bellies and souls.

INTERDEPENDENCE We believe in Decentralized Interdependence and Cooperative Bioregionalism between the communities inside our village—and also with other villages in our bioregion and other parts of the world. We believe in having a diversity of communities that represent different aspects of life, and we aim to provide them with interoperating principles so they may benefit from what happens within them. We believe that systems-thinking provides a hopeful, creative, peaceful, and ecologically harmonious framework to understand that everything is connected. In other words, we believe in progress through interdependence.

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ENVIRONMENT

Sustainability is no longer enough. It’s time we become net-positive in relation to our Planet and start giving back more than we take. We intend to do this by creating a blueprint and are committed to prototyping regeneration at la tierra.

BY NICOLÁS ALCALÁ & BARBARA LIMA

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by Connor Sailes & Rachel Mann

BY NICOLÁS ALCALÁ & BARBARA LIMA

A LITTLE GLIMPSE INTO THE LAND

THE LAND The property is located in the Southeastern region of the Nicoya Peninsula, a zone surrounded by the Pacific Ocean and characterized by a dry tropical forest ecosystem—the most endangered ecosystem in the country. Its regeneration is of great importance. The vegetation in the land is incredibly lush and is home to a diversity of species: howler and capuchin monkeys, colorful tropical birds, zapotes, insects and other fascinating creatures. The property is also located next to a 1400acre natural reserve. Our goal is to preserve all this wonderful ecosystem by creating biological corridors, fostering regenerative practices, and planting as many trees as we can. la tierra is a living organism. We are building resilient systems by taking care of our relationships with one another. This was deeply understood thousands of years ago by indigenous communities who have been taking care of the land and developing their own communities in harmonious relationship with nature and each other. In these indigenous lands, “owners” were stewards. That’s why Traditional Ecological Knowledge is at the core of our design principles in relation to our environment.

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ONTOLOGICAL DESIGN Ontological Design is the discipline concerned with designing the human experience. It operates under one essential assumption: that by designing objects, tools, spaces and experiences, we are in fact designing the human being itself. If we were to reduce la tierra’s mission and vision to one principle, this would be it. The entire experience at la tierra—from architecture to sound design, from workshops and immersive experiences to each dwelling and piece of art—is designed to transmute the human experience. This is why we so strongly believe in common spaces, communal kitchens and places for leisure, exercise, ritual and collective healing practices—with nature present in our design. Everything at la tierra is designed with intention. Our goal is to engineer as many elements as we have agency over, to create the perfect conditions for communal life to flourish. Both biophilia and biomimicry are incredibly important principles in that process at la tierra .

ATARAXIA A SPACE TO LIVE, TO THINK AND TO EMBODY THE REGENERATIVE VALUES OF EARTH 2.0 Ataraxia was a key concept in the four philosophical schools of ancient Greece. It can be translated as “unperturbed”. It sought to find a balanced state of mind, especially in times of uncertainty or crisis. It is, literally, the lack of mental disturbances—a state of equanimity characterized by ongoing freedom from distress and worry.

BY NICOLÁS ALCALÁ & BARBARA LIMA

THE PORT A CO - CREATED, CO - LIVED VILLAGE FOR THE 21ST CENTURY The Port is the heart of la tierra—a heterotopic space that invites everyone and keeps no one for too long. This primary livingspace of la tierra is designed as a safe haven for travelers, thinkers, philosophers and (r)evolutionaries. It is a village with short, medium and long-term residencies and co-living spaces. Its playful architecture, ethos and vibrant tree-house-village essence represent co-creation, art, culture, cooperation, creativity, and community.

MYCELIA: A Village of Villages A SERIES OF ETHNI- CITIES: SMALL REGENERATIVE VILLAGES THAT LIVE WITHIN THE LARGER PROJECT

We will develop paths, basic infrastructure, common spaces and principles (bylaws) for Mycelia. Then we will invite existing communities who are enthusiastic about the idea of grounding their practices in a space where they can create their own world within our nested whole. Each village will be able to expand like a mycelial network. It will grow, as needed, using regenerative principles, new governance mechanisms and interoperability to amplify coherence and bring multiple skills, offerings and visions into our project.

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THE MAGIC BEHIND THE VEIL

AGORA

LAND OF O

la tierra will be a living laboratory for the design of the regenerative future. Two of our foundational partners are the Buckminster Fuller Institute and the Design Science Studio, whose goals are to create the conditions that allow for the healing and restoration of the Planet.

Land of O is a gigantic immersive experience inspired by Burning Man. It will be a permanent exhibition surrounding the village and will allow residents and visitors to submerse themselves in a magical storytelling universe.

Agora seeks to be a school of thought for the regenerative movement. Buckminster Fuller defined a trim tab as the smallest part of a system that can have the greatest amount of impact. In an aircraft, a small piece is responsible for changing the direction of the entire vessel. He believed each individual had the potential to be a trim tab and alter the course of history in the quest to make the world work for 100% of life—without ecological offense or disadvantage to anyone. So do we. la tierra is designed to be a trim tab, and Agora’s mission is to amplify this and share it with the world.

We believe this will become one of the many important reasons to come visit la tierra. The letter O comes from the Phoenician alphabet, where it was called Eyn, meaning ‘eye’. It is also a circle, the most perfect geometric shape, and considered divine in many cultures. Above all, O is a portal, an all-seeing eye into a different world. A world of mystery and mystique, where nothing is what it seems and everything is possible.

BY NICOLÁS ALCALÁ & BARBARA LIMA

BUSINESSES

Apart from our hotels, restaurants and bamboo school, one of the businesses we are most excited to start is an interior design concept store. We will create a design workshop that will birth biophilia-inspired furniture, drawing inspiration from the natural world. We will also provide interior design services and help new homeowners design their spaces with locallysourced materials and products from our recycling and upcycling facility. We also intend to consciously import other pieces that were inspired by different locations around the world, in order to serve the needs of the residents who will be building their homes at la tierra.

FOUNDATIONAL SYMBOLOGY HERE IS LA TIERRA’S SYMBOLOGY, WHICH SERVED AS A FOUNDATION FOR THE WEAVE’S SYMBOLOGY.

BY NICOLÁS ALCALÁ

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BY NICOLÁS ALCALÁ & BARBARA LIMA

HELPING US BUILD A NEW WORLD Do you think there should be more projects like la tierra? We do too. This is how we will transform the world! That’s why we want to make most of our foundational documents public and share the lessons we are learning along the way—so others can learn from our mistakes and get inspired by our ideas. So we can build the world we imagine together. If you are thinking about starting a similar project somewhere else in the world, and would like to partner up in such an honorable endeavor, please reach out.

6 5

2 3

4 HOW TO NAVIGATE THE LONG VERSION OF OUR MIRO BOARD 1. THE POLIS 2. VILLAGES 3. THE LAND 4. GOVERNANCE 5. BUSINESSES & PROJECTS

There are many ways to help build la tierra, and we are working on a system to document contributions. From volunteering to professional work, on location or remote, we will have a system through which anyone will be able to contribute based on their capacity and skills—and be compensated for it either in cash or in tokens. Want to dive deeper into the la tierra universe? The portal above takes you to our Miro board, which we are publicly sharing for the first time here in The Weave Magazine. There you will be taken on a tour of our master plan to discover all the magical facets of la tierra. Welcome! We are thrilled to have you.

6. PROJECT DEVELOPMENT 7. PARTICIPATE OR CLICK HERE TO NAVIGATE THE SHORT VERSION OF OUR MIRO BOARD

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by Barbara Lima

BY JOE BREWER

Connecting to the Deeper Tapestry of Life

or a long time, I sought to make a difference in the world with my words. Traveling as a speaker and workshop facilitator. Writing blog posts and research articles. It did make a difference, of course, but later I found the stillness within myself to discover a deeper truth. The most important differences I could make were in my way of being as an embodied human who could relate to others in novel ways. It was never the words that made a difference, but rather it was that the words flowed forth in a kind of relationality that sometimes made change possible. It is into this subtle web that I use my words now in the hope that they might serve. Humanity is in a critical moment. We are living through the middle of planetaryscale collapse. The breakdowns are so familiar and well documented that they scarcely warrant mention in September of 2022. Ecological breakdown. Collapse of climate stability. Loss of biodiversity. Hoarding of wealth and extreme economic inequality. Dysfunction of institutions across the board. A plethora of words has been expressed about these convergent and interwoven processes. Yet, it is our relationship to this poly-crisis that has yet to fully reveal itself.

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When I am pondering something, I find it helpful to sink into a deeper place of knowing. The best scientific knowledge we have at the moment tells us that the Universe is 13.2 billion years old. Our solar system was born from the scattered dust of a prior stellar explosion. We are, literally, born from stardust that settled back into gravitational pools to make life possible on our magnificent spinning rock, which is the third planet in our solar system, accompanying a typical and otherwise mediocre Sun. Earth itself is four and a half billion years old. Life emerged somewhere between 3.6 and 3.8 billion years ago. Once rooted into the ocean—even prior to the emergence of land—life has continued to exist for vast spans of time leading up to the present. It is in this context that we can place ourselves as a humble species among billions that have come and gone throughout the great history of our home planet. We are the cause of the Sixth Mass Extinction for there were five previous rounds of rising complexity and cascading collapse for the biodiversity of the Earth. The current round is a pattern of instability and emergence that

accompanies a new capacity for evolution to unfold—which I have called Runaway Cultural Evolution in the hominid lineage. What do I mean by this? In a few choice words (if they may serve): Runaway Cultural Evolution is the cumulative and exponential take-off of cultural change that occurred in the lineage of Homo Sapiens. When the most recent ice age came to an end, there arose a period of warm and stable climate called the Holocene that made agriculture, urban centers, empires, and all manner of human civilizations possible. The explosion of cultural complexity arose with a parallel degradation of ecological complexity as landscapes filled with flourishing diversity were simplified into monoculture crops to feed a growing human population. The end game of this pattern has been the collapse of every single civilization from the last 10,000 years. Only in the last 500 years has this pattern achieved the planetary scale.

BY JOE BREWER

Why do I begin an article titled Being the Weave with a story such as this? It is because we, humans, were born into an immense tapestry of life that is well beyond our comprehension. We simply cannot know the immensity of history that made it possible for us to arise. And yet, it feels important for us to make use of our capacities as storytelling animals to embody and feel the significance of the moment we find ourselves in. The logic might work something like this: 1. The Universe gave rise to life that is precious and rare. 2. At least one planet with life has given rise to a storytelling animal, capable of feeling and caring, having the ability to hold love in its heart. 3. This means the planet itself has the capacity to feel and care, because we do. And so we hold a profoundly rare gift as humans—we can give reverence and share love like no other species on Earth.

ON THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING FULLY HUMAN DURING PLANETARY COLLAPSE There is a part of this story that many of you will know. More than 99% of human history was lived out in hunter-gatherer societies which were indigenous to a specific place. The anomaly has been all models of civilization—an exception that reveals the ecological rule. While it may not be the case that all indigenous cultures have been sustainable, the truth is that all sustainable cultures that we know of are indigenous. This matters because we need to remember our ancestors if we are to survive the convergence of crises that we are living into right now. Let’s bring forth their threads of wisdom about how to treat rivers and mountains as sacred. Feel into the harmonies of right livelihoods that span

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generations into both the past and the future. Name our communities as the landscapes themselves. Recall that we are kin with the rest of life’s diversity. Our best scientific knowledge about ecology finds a home in the best anthropological knowledge we have about right livelihoods. For it is the case that Biology affirms what our ancestors knew to be true. Life is a web and we are merely a strand within it.

Being the weave is knowing that we are already interwoven, and always have been. There is more to be said here. In his magnificent book, The Social Conquest of Earth, E.O. Wilson takes great care to show us that a special biological category of social behavior exists with a particular evolutionary history. You don’t need to know the scientific name of “eusociality” to appreciate its significance. We can all easily observe that the world is filled with a diversity of social behaviors. Everything from whales and elephants to flocks of birds and herds of deer—not to mention the deeply social slime molds who gather individual spores in great collaborative feats—hold the truth that being social is a winning strategy for many diverse expressions of life.

BY JOE BREWER

Yet, Being the Weave is distinctive, for it is the mindful awareness that we are both the weaver and that which is being woven at the same time.

Yet to be eusocial is a whole new level, one that very few species have achieved. Eusociality is about having a diversity of social roles within the same biological economy for cooperation to arise among the complex interactions between these diverse roles. Other than humans, the best known examples are ants and bees. They each form an incredible collective intelligence through their chemical signaling and dynamic interactions, creating dizzying webs of interdependence. To be eusocial is to cooperatively care for the young, to have overlapping generations of economic exchange among adults, and to achieve a division of labor for specialized behaviors.

Why does this matter? This matters because humans are mammals. We connect with each other through our newborn bonding with their mother. Touch is important to us. It deeply heals us and soothes our traumas if we have any to work through. And also we have something in our brain called the neocortex. Our ability to generate conceptual thought and live into dream worlds of our imaginations is without parallel anywhere in the biosphere of the Earth. Said another way, we can weave ourselves physically through touch and also semantically through story. Thus, our ancestral shamans could shape shift into a jaguar or a tiger. We could imagine being a frog or a snake.

E.O. Wilson reveals that eusociality has arisen many times amongst insects, but only a few other times by other forms of life. For a mammal, such as us, to become eusocial is a special thing indeed. Mammals are known for their milk production to provide for their young. Mothers nurture their offspring while connecting one body to another and recognizing that touch is a pathway for intimacy and care, as well as learning and social exchange. This is the reason why the most popular pets for humans are mammals—with dogs and cats being the most well-known of course.

And so we grow the complexity of our cultural webs in ways that other animals are not capable of. There has been a history of hubris about humans being special—with each presumption of human exceptionalism cast away as false until the next one emerged. Yet one way of describing our specialness has withstood a great deal of scrutiny. Human cultures are cumulative and can grow exponentially. There is no evidence at present that the beautiful richness of non-human social life on Earth can achieve this.

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Thus, we find ourselves living into a planetary collapse caused by human uniqueness. Our abilities to weave the webs of story, technology, politics, and power as eusocial mammals with conceptualizing minds—unleashed during a rare 10,000 year period of warm and stable climate— are what the Earth will lose if humans go extinct as the process draws to a close.

THE ART AND SCIENCE OF BEING THE WEAVE Now we get to the heart of the matter. Humans are weavers. We weave by living into tapestries of life where we are able to devote attention, technical knowledge, mindfulness, and care. This is how we weave baskets and clothing. It is also how we weave stories and communities. A great deal is known about weaving. Yet, Being the Weave is distinctive, for it is the mindful awareness that we are both the weaver and that which is being woven at the same time. This level of consciousness is what humanity requires in order for us to survive planetary collapse in the coming decades. We must become “wise managers of our own evolutionary process” as another helpful biologist, David Sloan Wilson,

powerfully advocates in his work at Prosocial World. It is one thing for human culture to be cumulative and exponential in the perspective that Richard Dawkins calls “the blind watchmaker”. It is another thing entirely to be an artist weaving with love and beauty that are harmonious with the flourishing of life. To be human in this precarious planetary moment is to have a choice. Will you be a weaver of regeneration? Or will you be a weaver of death? Note how you don’t get to choose not to be the weaver—for this is a given as part of the human condition. Each of us is the expression of a story unfolding in the great tapestry of life, yet some of us are more aware than others. Yet all of us are irrevocably strands in the greater whole. As we become aware of the collapse patterns that each of us was born into, it is our choice whether to consciously be a regenerator of the Earth or simply ignore the reality of our present predicament— which itself is still a choice with profound consequences. I made my choice back in 2003. That was when I opened my eyes to the immense suffering of the ecological crisis. My heart had felt the pain before, but only after a full year of intense study could I live

BY JOE BREWER

into the depths of trauma that this journey would entail. I have been a weaver in service to life ever since. When I started writing a book called The Design Pathway for Regenerating Earth in December of 2019, it would have been impossible to imagine the coming together of the many threads that would soon arise around me.

THE DESIGN PATHWAY FOR REGENERATING EARTH JOE BREWER

(CHELSEA GREEN PUBLISHING)

For it was in that moment that I intuitively knew that the book was not my own. It was an artifact of the many years I spent weaving together the knowledge and insights of others with my bodily experiences in the world. The book needed to be given away—and so it was. On December 30th, 2019 I posted on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter that anyone who would like to learn how to regenerate the Earth could participate in a study group called Earth Regenerators. I announced that I would freely share the chapters of my book and hold space for learning exchanges to occur. As the embodiment of weaving, something that seemed miraculous began to occur. Thousands of people all over the planet gathered to talk about the themes covered in the book. A “great weaving” was underway. The book was eventually published with distribution support from Chelsea Green Publishing. It has only sold a few hundred copies. And yet it has catalyzed an emergent web of activities for regenerating entire landscapes on different parts of the Earth.

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This is because we focused on cultural scaffolding, or, in other words, how to socially support each other in leaving the extractive economy and helping to birth a regenerative replacement. Specific emphasis was given to the formation of “prosocial” groups who manage themselves as commons while cultivating the emotional and social capacities of group members to govern themselves. It was one thing to join the weave. A whole new level of capabilities arose when more of us learned to consciously be the weaving into, from, and for each other as regenerators of the Earth. What does the science of prosocial teach us about how to be good weavers? The foundation of it all are two basic psychological capacities—the regulation of emotion and the flexibility to hold different perspectives. Together they form the basis of empathy. Cultivate these capacities in members of a group and collective intelligence is able to emerge. But this only works if we take to heart what the political economist Elinor Ostrom

uncovered in a lifetime of cross-cultural studies. There are 8 core design principles for managing any commons which need to be in place for a group to function well. You can search them out on the internet. I will name a few of them to give you a sense of how they work. Shared identity and purpose establish the commons of any effective group. Fair and inclusive decision making must be expressed. Rapid and fair conflict resolution must be possible. Equitable distribution of contributions and benefits need to be felt among the participants. While there are more, you can hopefully already feel how it begins to work. Cultivate human capacities to creatively express love and care. Organize them into shared purposes that are able to govern themselves. Earth Regenerators was born as an experiment in applied cultural evolution. If it is the accumulation of cultural change that threatens all life on Earth, perhaps it is the accumulation of regenerative cultural change that may be able to protect what still remains. And so we learned how to awaken our inner weavers in small, supportive groups. Then we mapped them to landscapes that imitate indigenous ways of living.

BY JOE BREWER

A LIVING EXPRESSION OF BEING THE WEAVE As you might have already surmised, Being the Weave is a living process that is felt and expressed within a larger context. The living expression of a weaver in service to life is to surrender to the tapestry and feel into what is needed at any given time. I would like to describe this with a real-world context. It starts making sense when we realize what it feels like to become part of a tapestry embedded in localized ecology and culture. The story I share is a personal one—because this way of being dissolves any false separation between professional and personal. I want to talk about what it is like to be a human who speaks for the land. The stories I am about to tell are transformational because they are real. In August of 2020, I was invited to visit two pieces of land. The first was heavily eroded and felt like stumbling upon the unconscious body of a rape victim—with all her intimacy and pain on full display. The second was

being invaded by a pillager who sought to carve it into pieces and sell them for personal gain. Note how the feeling of weaving among these two places was initially unpleasant. Finding the Origen del Agua was a journey of many steps. It began when I was invited by a friend to visit a place that looks like a giant scar when viewed by satellites in space. The violation is visible for all to see. The topsoils were long since gone. Denuded of trees decades ago. The ground was like hard-packed cement with the red clay lay exposed to the tropical sunlight. I walked onto the land and felt an irresistible need to touch the scars. As my hand felt the baked earth, a message trembled loudly through the core of my being—that this land needs to be liberated from colonialism and that the native forest needs to be restored. I took a few photos with my smartphone, then posted them to my Facebook profile saying that I wanted to liberate a piece of land that had touched my heart. I didn’t ask for money. A message arrived in my inbox saying that, if I wanted to buy this land, they would give me the first thousand dollars. The next morning I went back and posted again on Facebook, this time asking if anyone would pledge money to help liberate the land. Within 24 hours, I had ten thousand dollars from people living all over the world.

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This initiated a process of setting up a working group for the regeneration of Barichara. In the next few months, we raised $50,000 and were able to purchase the land. Thus began a protracted negotiation process with the family that was selling it to prosocially engage them in common purpose. When the purchase was complete in April of the next year, I named the land Origen del Agua because it is the origin of three essential hydrological processes. One on the surface as the top of a drainage into the large Barichara River that flows through the valley below. Another as the top of a ridge with an aquifer system that carries groundwater to the village of Barichara. And a third for the land-to-air connection that brings fog and rain when clouds pass over the ridge from the deeper canyon on the other side. The water weaves ecology into land and air. The humans weave resources into a pattern of regeneration. Together we dance with tapestries that are scarcely visible to us. And so the process goes onward today—we are now a year and a half into the restoration of the land. On to Las Albercas—which translates as the place with many pools of water. Within a few days of stepping onto the Origen del Agua, my friend Joep reached out to say that someone was cutting

down the native forest on the 10-hectare plot that sits adjacent to his land. It was being divided into parcels for the construction of twenty or more houses; even though all the water dried up about fifty years ago and the only way to service these houses would be to steal water from the eighty homes downhill. Again I sprung into action. This time my role was to play the part of a potential buyer and let the owners know that we would like to create a community project on the land. All we needed to do was stop the current development plan and raise the money to secure the purchase. At the time of writing these words two years later, the purchase is now within reach and the money is secured. What was the weaving process like this time? I quietly walked alone into Las Albercas with an open heart and an open mind. I whispered to the land, “If there is anything you would like to tell me, please let me know.” And it was in this meditation that an auditory hallucination came into my mind. I heard the voice of an indigenous man calling out to me from a distance. I could not make out what he said but the tone was clearly an acknowledgement—as if to say that he saw me and I was welcome there.

BY JOE BREWER

So we must learn to dance with the chaos and feel joy in the confusion. So I began seeking funds for the land. A dream for planting the seeds of a bioregional learning center began to take form. Conversations began to weave among people in the community (and on the global platform of Earth Regenerators) that this land could be the future home of the Barichara Ecoversity. All I needed to do was let the land speak at each uncertain step while surrendering to a process that would last for two years. Being the weave is about having deep empathy. It is about doing what is needed even if it feels crazy. I had never raised money like this before, yet the planet seemed ready at each step to bring me what was needed to carry on. All I had to do was listen deeply to the needs of the land itself and trust that everything would work itself out. There have been many dark nights between then and now, but the land has remained open to me at both locations. I am now a steward for the Origen del Agua and Las Albercas.

GATHERING THE THREADS OF A POSSIBLE FUTURE It is time to bring this article to a close. I feel that more words will only muddy the waters—when what is needed now is to practice seeing clearly. So I close with a comment about emergence. Complex systems are full of surprises. They carry within them a web of relationships that can never fully be observed. So we must learn to dance with the chaos and feel joy in the confusion. For it is this dance that enables threads to gather around possible emerging futures. I did not know that Origen del Agua would become a real future. Las Albercas remains elusive even to this day while confidence continues to grow. Being the weave of possible futures is to hold a clarity of intent about what is needed together with a looseness about how it will all unfold. Each step remains a mystery. Yet the picture appears with each piece that slides into place. May these humble words open you up to the mystery. For there is much weaving still to come for the dreamers inside all of us. ●

Onward, fellow humans.

JOE BREWER

CELEBRATE by Bartjan De Brujin

WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT ABOUT GAIANET’S VISION OF A NEW EARTH

GROWING THE ROOTS OF A NEW EARTH One World. One Team. One Love.

LIVE GATHERING IN BELGIUM, OCT 2021

CELEBRATE by Bartjan De Brujin

ur shared dream has become a reality. The systems of power and control have shifted towards decentralized, fully-transparent governance—empowering each individual to express their authentic nature. The power is with the people, and decisions are aimed at optimizing the well-being of humans, plants, animals, and Mother Earth. Influential corporations have shifted their priorities from shareholder profits to stakeholder well-being and the regeneration of resources. We have awakened to the understanding that we are all One. People are aware of their multidimensional aspects, and self-actualization is commonly accepted as the purpose of life. Knowledge and wisdom are transparently available for all human beings. The awakened are in service to fully healing themselves, others, communities and nature. The basic human needs of energy, clean water, housing, healthcare and education are available in abundance. Healthcare is high-tech and holistic at the same time. A new decentralized value system helps humans live in abundance and rewards individuals based on the sustainable value of their contributions. Co-creation is the new standard. Every project and initiative is fully self-organized based on the laws of nature. Competition is long gone, leading us as a collective to focus on best-bred initiatives and technology that is open-source with decentralized ownership.

As individuals, we learn to surrender completely, align ourselves continuously, and receive the effortless synchronicities in a divine ecstasy of cocreation. Gaianet envisions and embodies a heart-driven New Earth, where: • Love is the driving force; • All of Humanity lives their purpose in perfect harmony with nature and each other; • Resources are shared in abundance for all.

WHAT HAVE WE DONE IN THE WORLD? Gaianet is a widely used platform where NewEarth professionals, project leaders, experts, elders and investors connect and unite around specific projects and solutions that make our shared dream a reality. We have co-created processes through which any New Earth co-creator can connect with the right people, knowledge and tools to advance on their individual soul mission. Inside Gaianet, members find their new family. It is a safe “soul space” where like-hearted brothers and sisters come together to share their superpowers, give and ask for what they need and experiment with New-Earth methods and technologies.

I love the people! The feeling of coming home. Wow. I guess a lot of people deserve to come home.” — Tribe member David Smith after experiencing a live Gaianet gathering

LIVE GATHERING IN BELGIUM, OCT 2021

CELEBRATE by Bartjan De Brujin

HOLACRACY ORGANIZATIONAL SYSTEM

LIVE GATHERING IN BELGIUM, OCT 2021

Together, we master the skills of heart-to-heart collaboration and self-organization. Through the interactions members have on Gaianet, they gain hope—by understanding the immense beauty and power of love in action. Gaianet provides value in numerous ways. Members gain “all the things money can’t buy”, for example:

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meeting individuals in the process of self-actualization, connecting with a new tribe and finding a dream project to share their superpowers with. interacting with project leaders to acquire knowledge, partners, a workforce, funding and other resources throughout every stage in/of their development—to accelerate their manifestation and to minimize the incubation time between idea and implementation.

CELEBRATE by Bartjan De Brujin

Gaianet can offer a wide variety of structures to serve your needs. This ranges from single events up to 1-year periods with regular meetings. Know that we can always customize our services depending on your requirements. Download our SUPPORT MENU for more details.

LIVE GATHERING IN BELGIUM, OCT 2021

WATCH THE VIDEO OF GAIANET’S LIVE GATHERING IN BELGIUM (2021)

CELEBRATE by Bartjan De Brujin

LIVE GATHERING IN BELGIUM, OCT 2021

Gaianet’s main driver is the liberation of the human spirit. The individuals involved in the projects are deeply fulfilled because they act in alignment and receive continuous support on their journey to selfactualization and self-transcendence.

WE ENABLE SHARED OWNERSHIP OF SUSTAINABLE PROJECTS Gaianet is best known for enabling the Light Cities project, which will co-create a network of 144 Cities of Light. Gaianet operates as the “nervous system” or “connective tissue” between New-Earth initiatives, forming a portal into the new paradigm and connecting both worlds. The Gaianet organization operates nonhierarchically and consists of fully self-organized circles. Pioneering what the ultimate purposedriven organization looks like, Gaianet’s blueprints are used by numerous organizations worldwide in their efforts to become more aligned and effective.

Our network has evolved into a global conglomerate of cooperatives (“the UN of the new world”). As the home of humanity’s “Urgenda”, Gaianet gathers experts worldwide to design solutions for humanity’s top challenges (environmental, health, societal, economic, educational, etc). We have become a global source of harmony, unity, strength, hope, equality, resources and transparency—constantly informing, guiding and servicing the new world. ●

Send us an email to start the conversation and discover more on our website.

connect@gaianet.earth gaianet.earth

regenerate

cultivate

recreate

Her back A concrete cage Encapsulated her vulnerability Suffocated it Reaching for air She saw them gather around her Slowly entering the circle They were thousands in one Their arms Elongating grace Blessed her in unison She felt the earth tremble beneath her fortress Walls tired of carrying goodbyes Unwritten words Unreclaimed power Oh, the silence of her fear How it protected her from denying her strength

READY TO BE CROWN

She sat in the middle of the pine tree clearing Her legs grounded in butterfly form

She thought she knew how to be tree But without inner roots Her self-condemnation forced her to remain Seed. Their hands dragged out her concrete capsule Shattering relief echoed through the green stillness She sighed Nothing moved You have to tell them what to create, Do you understand? Waves in swirling length Escaped the tips of her fingers Extending for faraway distances To unspoken lands Counting herself amongst the few Her heart A sharp-edged diamond Seedling ready to be crown Fell softly in her chest Silently sprouting from within.

-suddenlyskyclad

REGENERATE

SAYING YES TO THE CALLING FROM THE EARTH Lessons in Discovery as an Evolutionary Organisation

s global heating grips the planet, multitrillion-dollar agribusiness corporations degenerate the land—and modern society remains driven by industrial growth, addicted to fossil fuels, entranced by materialism, and fueled by an extractive financial system inflaming gross social and economic inequality, it’s no surprise that it’s a fine mess we’ve gotten ourselves into! Every aspect of our modern lives has become increasingly unstable—from the climate to our environment, from the food on our plates to the cash in our pockets. Call it a complex systemic crisis or a veritable clusterf*ck—the race is on for transformation. A crisis of challenges at this scale can’t be resolved by short-term band-aids of piecemeal reforms applied to symptoms in isolation. Generations of erosion to Earth’s supremely intelligent and interdependent life-support systems require a

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more holistic whole-system approach: a regenerative redesign firmly rooted in living-system principles of harmony with nature and aligned with life’s own evolutionary patterns to rebalance, revitalise and renourish our ailing ecosystems. You may already be called to a regenerative purpose—whether in food or farming, designing circular economic models, renewable energy solutions, or building community land projects, to name a few. But changing the game requires radical shifts across all areas. Not just our practical actions, but a fundamental redesign of how we think and how we do business, adopting seven-generation thinking beyond just the short-term, holding reverence for nature in our hearts, and setting a clear and coherent vision as our guiding North Star. Nothing less than full personal and system overhaul in service to healing and planetary regeneration.

BY YASMIN C.

by Open World Alliance (Reproduction)

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Doing the inner work is paramount—for, in true holofractal fashion, one’s level of conscious alignment and inner connection with source ripples outwards through all our actions and relations, as energy moves into form through the web of life. By its very definition, this bold approach is challenging for conventional systems. However, at the edge of chaos and collapse comes evolutionary opportunity! This critical crossroad on humanity’s evolutionary path heralds a fertile time for world-bridgers—those nimble edgewalkers with a foot in both worlds, who straddle the lines between disciplines, weave adroitly between, across and back again, and comfortably embrace the ambiguity of ‘not knowing’. Through connecting more dots from multiple vantage points outside the status-quo with an experimental mindset, one can more fluently harness the exponential quantum potential within uncertainty. Steel-toe boots with added wings are a bonus! Here at Open World Alliance—an impact-driven, action-catalyser with a deep sense of purpose— we are working holistically across a number of integrated tools to support Earth regeneration during this most urgent decade of planetary emergency. This includes a:

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FUNDING ENGINE: to support eco-projects and communities, due to launch this year;

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CIRCULAR FINANCIAL ECOSYSTEM: to encourage healthy resource circulation and redistribute wealth to benefit ecological resilience;

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TOKENOMICS MODEL: designed to create new layers of value flow;

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SOCIAL ARCHITECTURE TOOLS: to facilitate transdisciplinary collaboration between changemakers;

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REGENERATIVE DATA SYSTEM: also underway in a co-creative project with multiple partners.

BY YASMIN C.

All tools in development have been designed to identify, understand and address key leverage points for planetary regeneration to induce maximum impact at scale. One of the obstacles to effective regenerative efforts is that, whilst swimming in a sea of data, it can be difficult, costly and time-consuming to access reliable and high-quality information from the thousands of fragmented and disconnected data silos worldwide. Advancements in AI and machine learning have yielded a whole new world of digital tools, yet this unparalleled technological expansion is typically utilised to convince consumers to buy more stuff, promote addiction to social media, and maximise shareholder profit. How about deploying this intelligent technology less competitively and more wisely, in service to life and protecting the Earth? In this Aquarian age of information, data plays an indispensable role in supporting efforts to regenerate the Earth. For example, it helps us to detect trends and patterns of climate impact, assess activities that conserve biodiversity, enable projects to mobilise faster, implement more sustainable supply chains, locate potential funders, and align capital flow to restoration projects more effectively. The Regenerative Engine incorporates a next-gen search engine, information resources, a mapping tool and a marketplace embedded within a project-building application. It is intended to share specialist information on regenerative practices, projects, resources and case studies—to assist

organisations in developing effective solutions to planet-critical problems. Satellite geo-data will also be included for accurate real-time bioregional mapping. It is, in effect, a dynamic living manual providing open-access content within a DAO-governed system to empower the global regenerative community. Time is short and actions can be costly, so we need to be focused, strategic and coordinated in our efforts. Decision-making based on reliable, accurate information and credible evidence is likely to amplify success, whether regenerating degraded land, building more resilient ecocommunities, inciting behaviour and lifestyle change, or shaping environmental policy. The complexity of today’s global issues in a rapidly-moving playing field requires an interdisciplinary approach. Radical cooperation, accelerated knowledge-sharing and reciprocity across diverse sectors generate new insights, activate new synergies and catalyse exponentially positive win-win regenerative solutions. The co-creative road less travelled holds vital keys to our regenerative future, but is also fraught with new challenges and bumps along the way. Many a good intention is let down through inadvertent misunderstandings that take us beyond our professional comfort zones into unfamiliar thorny areas. How do you collectively steward multi-stakeholder technologies? How do you balance expectations around accountability, renumeration or monetisation? How can we sensemake our way to coherence between multiple scattered perspectives?

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Learning from our own trial and errors over the years as a start-up in securing funding, finding collaborators, joining forces and the upheavals of building a growing evolutionary organisation from the ground up has helped exercise and build the muscle required to execute disruptive ideas. When the rules are still being written after the game has already started—in a world in increasing flux— new levels of agility and flexibility are required. Injecting these experiential learnings into our infrastructure as operational blueprints for inter-organisational weaving is forming the viable and healthy connective tissue required to mesh and sew projects together and cultivate a nourishing collaborative culture internally within OWA. As we begin to reach out into forging new alliances in solidarity with our wider community, drawing on these practices provides solid foundations from which to navigate the nuances inherent in emergent new partnerships with increased coherence, minimal friction and greater trust. Through doing so, we can collectively marshal our forces, collaborate more productively, and activate our full potential in service to systemic planetary regeneration.

Grounding the regenerative movement is proving a frontier experience. We find ourselves in a living laboratory, attentively applying our best efforts, whilst simultaneously trusting and surrendering to flow; acting decisively with no time to waste, yet trusting patiently in divine timing; staying authentically in one’s own truth, when embracing radical co-creation with others; boldly stepping forward with confidence, whilst remaining observant to humility at core; fiercely serious in our mission and joyously light-hearted in our souls. Doing the inner work is paramount—for, in true holofractal fashion, one’s level of conscious alignment and inner connection with source ripples outwards through all our actions and relations, as energy moves into form through the web of life. Multi-dimensional much?! We are excited by the timely launch of initiatives like The Weave that seek to re-imagine a new cultural narrative for planetary change and we are thrilled to be contributing our voice in alignment. And as the regenerative movement weaves together in deeper synergy, we trust that our paths are synchronously drawing us to one another at the right time, right place and in right relation—to liberate a healthier, more resilient and enlightened future that enables all of life to thrive. ●

YASMIN C.

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BY YASMIN C.

ABOUT OPEN WORLD ALLIANCE OWA is an evolving holistic ecosystem of individuals and organisations drawn together in aligned vision and a shared desire to accelerate greater systemic well-being. We invite regenerative data-holders, tech developers, funders, investors and other solution-oriented agents who would like to contribute to this global regenerative resource and wish to explore synergies to get in touch via mark.kane@openworldalliance.org

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BY SYCAMORE

SOIL AS SACRAMENT Cultivating The More Beautiful World

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Eating is an agricultural act,” says the author, poet, and farmer Wendell Berry. Where do the minerals and morsels that nourish our minds and bodies originate? Furthermore, do we recognize that every meal begins somewhere in the dirt, then is passed through countless hands—and often many machines—all in order to arrive at our holy bodies? And in this recognition, do we find our power and our capacity to choose a More Beautiful World through the act of journeying from the “soil to the table”? First, we begin in the soil, even though our food may not even begin in the soil itself. The trend toward hydroponics and synthetic lab-grown foodlike substances offers an important question: does our food truly travel from the “soil” to the table? Looking at urban agriculture operations and centralized vertical farming may give us our answer. They purport to create systems based on improved “efficiency,” using largely artificial growing systems. These acclaimed corporations utilize fluorescent lighting, air filtration, and often chemically-enhanced, aqueous growing mediums. If we are to place the entire critique regarding hydroponics and the acclaimed synthetic “Future of Food” conversation aside for a moment, we

can instead look into a ReGenerative future based on a direct lineage between the Earth-body and our physical bodies—through the elemental relationships of Fire, Water, Air, and Earth. While “dirt” could be akin to a pejorative for a lifeless medium merely holding the often-fertilized plants, the word “soil” on the other hand elicits the feeling of an alive ecosystem. Crawling with earthworms, micro-arthropods, bacteria, viruses, protozoa, and fungi numbering in the hundreds of thousands if not millions of distinct species, each tablespoon of soil can contain as many microorganisms as there are stars in our galaxy. Let’s pause to recognize the vastness of this “Hidden Half of Nature,” as author David Montgomery coins it. The soil begs for a degree of humility that few will offer it. Soil chemistry, soil biology, and even soil physics continues to expand our knowledge beyond the imagination of even the wisest university scientists. Even with the most modern laboratory instruments, only 5% of the micro-organisms within the soil universe have been identified and mapped onto the emerging “Soil Food Web.”

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The journey from the soil to the table and from the Earth-body to the human body is a sacred transmutation of elemental forces. Similar to the antiquity of the conventional dietary pyramid, the concept of the previously conceptualized “Soil Food Chain” has long been disposed of by those who are aware of the interconnectedness and infinitely complex nature of subterranean relationships. Leading researcher Dr. Elaine Ingham has become a sub-cultural elder via her decades of in-depth dedication to learning and teaching through her “Soil Food Web School,” with a focus on elucidating the potentiality of working with the intricate dance of the universe beneath our feet. While this so-called “soil food web” could seem to be a niche obsession of a few organic farmers, this science-based revolution reveals, in fact, a web of connection that has not only been ignored, but vigorously attacked for at least a century in the Western world through chemical warfare and mechanical disturbance.

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We are quickly learning the degree of annihilation that our land has suffered under the assault of tillage-based, chemically-obsessed monoculture farming operations. Barren and exposed soil, full of fertilizers and herbicides, then erodes into rivers. This poisons and clogs the aquatic ecosystems, including famously creating the dead-zone in the Gulf of Mexico. While the question of why farmers have chosen this heavily mechanical and chemically-dependent methodology deserves its own consideration, this commentary here is meant as a reckoning call for those who are ready to relate more deeply with the journey that their nourishment takes, from the soil to the table. Have you ever asked, not only, where does your food come from—but also, how is your food grown? What is the condition of the soil where your food begins its life? How do the seeds start, which seed varieties are even grown, what are they fertilized with, and how do they survive the pests, drought, and seasonal forces that all plants must encounter during their months or years of life?

BY SYCAMORE

Agriculture is an elemental alchemy process, not a mere manifestation of Costco and WalMart magic. All plants and animals begin somewhere. There are seeds, and there are people who grow them. There are lands, and there are waters that nourish them. All food is cultivated somewhere. I invite you to generate a relationship of connection, between you and the lands that give you life. From what you eat and where it grows, to who grows it and how it is grown, to even asking yourself what your body and ancestry are meant to digest, there are many considerations that affect your relationship with food. Furthermore, what is your local bioregional ecosystem, and do you have a good relationship with it? Our modern Western journey from soil to table often involves a hyper-interconnected network of transnational food corporations that ship hundreds of substances through countless addresses to arrive at a local supermarket. Even the apples at my local “organic co-op” grocery in California still come from New Zealand, and the squash comes from Mexico, in August, despite my garden containing both of these in abundance. Thus, the invitation for connection to our seasonal cycles must begin with the knowledge of our personal and bioregional dietary habits. The potential for relating to the lands and waters that offer us nourishment is beyond that of nostalgia or new-age trends—for this is a mineralogical and energetic impetus. Soils are increasingly depleted of vital minerals in an agricultural climate that

rewards short-term production in spite of longterm health. Modern-day vegetables can be a mere 10% of the nutritive quality compared to 50 years ago. Therefore, the lands and waters that feed us must be regenerated, for the sake of the environment and all life, but also so that we may have highly nourishing foods for our bodies’ wellbeing. In essence, we must first season the soil. The journey from soil to table and from the Earthbody to the human body is a sacred transmutation of elemental forces. We must reclaim these primary and universal linkages, not only as a fundamental health imperative but also as a cosmological origin point of connection with the planetary body that permits our incarnation. The Earth—and the human species—is in the midst of an indisputably prophetic and paradigmatic turning point. While the intellectual and political climates often remain polarized and obfuscated, it is the Earth to which we can authentically return. Through regenerating our relationship with the elemental forces, we can cultivate a new culture that honors the alchemy of photosynthesis—of turning light, air, water, and Earth into nourishment that fuels our life journey. May you be a humble steward of this possibility, and a joyous recipient of its abundance. ●

SYCAMORE

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by BIOTONOMY (Reproduction)

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BY MOEIN NODEHI

BUILDINGS AS LIVING ORGANISMS Why Architecture Must Have an Ecological Role in Ecosystems

e, humans, have exploited the land and the oceans to such an extent that we have convinced ourselves that the only way to expand is to exploit the natural resources of this planet. This is a mindset that has led to ecological disaster. Today, more than 75% of the Earth’s land areas are substantially degraded. If this trend continues, it is estimated that 95% of the land on Earth will be degraded by 2050 (IPBES). These statistics could have dire outcomes, as just the top one meter of soil is home to almost 85% of life on this planet, including us. Land degradation is the leading cause of losses to ecosystem functions and is mainly created by agriculture, urbanization, and the development of infrastructure. While development projects do contribute to the economic upturn, they also cause major economic downturns due to land degradation as well. Recent estimates of the global loss of biodiversity due to land degradation and desertification are between US$ 6.3 and 10.6 trillion annually (IUCN). History tells us that our negligence could have major consequences that threaten our very existence.

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RECREATE

Historically, the fall and decline of many ancient civilizations has been related to their failure to maintain fertile soil and biodiverse ecosystems. In order to keep the soil’s richness and manage the biodiversity that exists in it, you must constantly add organic material to it. Currently, many humans try to manage their crops by adding fertilizers, but without having a substantial amount of animal waste and green litter from the trees, there is no way to revive the soil and protect our ecosystems from collapsing.

For the past decade, Biotonomy has focused on innovating by using nature to develop holistic solutions that allow buildings to operate as living organisms. Today, we offer Nature-Based Solutions for architecture and construction that are affordable and can be applied to both new and existing buildings. Nature-Based Solutions can help reduce the operating cost of buildings and transform them from harming the environment to daily nurturing and restoring ecosystems.

Now is the time to redesign buildings and cities to actively help restore biodiversity, soil fertility, and increase air and water quality. The potential in applying nature-based solutions to buildings and cities is much greater than just expanding green spaces. By making nature and ecosystem services a fundamental part of how buildings operate, we can transform our buildings and cities into having an ecological role in ecosystems. By acknowledging and integrating the intelligence of the natural world, we can find all kinds of solutions that we never before imagined were possible.

We are intimately interconnected with nature, whether we like it or not. If we don’t take care of it, we are risking the well-being and existence of our future generations. As we move towards a population of 10 billion people on this planet, one thing is for sure—we need to go into the future armed with nature as our strongest ally. ●

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MOEIN NODEHI

BY MOEIN NODEHI

ABOUT BIOTONOMY Biotonomy is a global company that develops autonomous buildings, communities and cities with Nature-Based Solutions (NBS). We provide innovative and groundbreaking solutions through a holistic combination of ancient and modern techniques, while using nature’s design principles to specialize in ecological, economical and social projects that address our climate emergency and biodiversity crisis. Together with interdisciplinary collaboration and educational programs, Biotonomy works to advance the development, uptake, and upscaling of NBS for autonomous buildings and cities. Our vision is for NBS to become an integral part of the way we design and build a future in which buildings and cities are conceived to actively restore ecosystems.

DOWNLOAD OUR PRESENTATION HERE

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CO - CREATION (noun) - a form of collaborative innovation: ideas are shared and improved together, rather than kept to oneself. It is closely connected to—and mentioned alongside—two other buzz-words: ‘open source’ and ‘mass-customisation’ (fronteer). In the regenerative movement, co-creation is embedded with purpose, collaboration, self-organisation, New Earth governance and a vision that goes beyond our personal benefit.

GIFT ECONOMY (noun/variably called Gifting Economy) - a gift economy or gift culture is a system of exchange where valuables are not sold, but rather given without an explicit agreement for immediate or future rewards. - Wikipedia

GLOCAL (adj.) - a portmanteau word (or blend) resulting from the truncation of the words ‘global’ and ‘local’ reflecting or being characterised by both local and global considerations. - Oxford Languages

NUMAN (noun) - as the second generation shifted from Anthropocene to the Naturacene geological era, the term Human (understood as separate from Nature) also shifted to Numan. The term was popularized by a cartoon heroine of that time whose catchphrase was always “I am nature”. - Dictionary for a (re)Evolution MASTERMIND (noun) - term that normally refers to an individual with outstanding intellect (Oxford Languages). In the regenerative movement space— and here in The Weave, this term describes a space-time (or session) in which participants intellectually distill a topic in the form of dialogical questioning and brainstorming.

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REGENAISSANCE (noun) - a portmanteau word (also called blend) designating the Regenerative Renaissance: a period of transition in which many decades of subtractive and unequal ecosystems have produced an emergence of new approaches, ideas, solutions and connections, leading to a new cultural explosion of art, science, and literature. This can only be compared to huge cultural and social shifts that happened in the past, like the Renaissance or the golden era of classical Greece. This new movement is advocating for a world that works for 100% of life. - Design Science Studio

REWILD (noun) - to restore (an area of land) to its natural uncultivated state (used especially with reference to the reintroduction of species of wild animal that have been driven out or exterminated. The Weave uses this term holistically to refer to the rewilding of human beings, which is characterised by our return to and reconnection with Nature and our intrinsic indigeneity and sovereignty— our original state of being.

SENSEMAKE (verb) - sensemaking or sense-making is the process by which people give meaning to their collective experiences. It has been defined as “the ongoing retrospective development of plausible images that rationalize what people are doing” (Weick, Sutcliffe, & Obstfeld, 2005, p. 409). - Wikipedia

ABOUT THE WEAVE

About The Weave Our multimedia publication blooms with the mission to reflect the vastness and the colours of the glocal regenerative movement by amplifying inspiring, pioneering voices of regenerative visionaries and communities. Through authentic and heart-driven sharing of ideas, experiences, perspectives, best practices, and other New-Earth intelligences and technologies, The Weave cradles the vision to inspire readers to live regeneratively by becoming a worldwide pillar publication for the leading voices, the weavers, and the deep listeners of the Regenaissance. We are a values-based, purpose-driven and communitypowered, co-creative magazine. Our editorial choices are made independently and in service of a new world that is collectively woven for the thriving of all life. In the spirit of regeneration, we accept gifts, grants and sponsorship from individuals and organizations who would like to support our mission through principles of Gift Economy. We welcome aligned sponsors who embody regenerative solutions on the level of the individual, the community and/or the planet. In exchange, we offer full-page spaces in which we want to challenge the traditional concept of advertisement and explore a regenerative, conscious and integrative language that blends with the narrative and values of our magazine.

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