politics – Seeding Our Future

Right-wing chaos: control through fear

Naomi Klein’s 2018 book, No is not enough: defeating the new shock politics, is the most lucid, convincing, and alarming account I’ve seen yet of what Donald Trump is really about, and much of it is relevant to the numerous other right-wing leaders gaining power in these chaotic times. She’s clearly right that Trump excels … Read more

Book blog:Perfidious Albion by Sam Byers

If this is our future, we should be worried… You may not be surprised to know that there’s been an upsurge of dystopian fiction recently. It’s not usually a genre I go for, but I saw good reviews of Perfidious Albion, and it is indeed perceptive and witty – but also pretty depressing. This book depicts Britain in a … Read more

Emerging from emergency

Hopes, joys, skills, support for life beyond lockdown Saturday July 17: 2-5pm, BridportWith Alan Heeks and John Harley In recent weeks, we’ve had a big loosening of lockdown, with hopefully more to come soon : so how will we use our new freedom? This workshop offers a hopeful, supportive space for us to explore: harvesting what we’ve learned, and forming a vision of the life we’d like now, as individuals and in our community. Our afternoon will include processes for exploration, sharing time, skills tips, and a simple ritual to help each of us step into the future. The covid pandemic has probably brought some blessings as well as setbacks for all of us. The outlook ahead is uncertain in many ways, but is also full of opportunity. Right now is a unique chance to learn from lockdown, and grow from it. Leaders Alan Heeks has been helping individuals and communities with resilience and wellbeing for many years. In Bridport, he started the cohousing project, and the Bridport Food Matters initiative on food security. John Harley is a facilitator, drama therapist and Unitarian minister who is passionate about creative and holistic ways to engage with the climate crisis and the current pandemic. Venue: The Yellow Room, Chapel in the Garden, East Street, Bridport. This is a large room which we’ll keep well ventilated. We’ll discuss any other covid-related guidelines at the start of the group. Cost: £10, concessions £8. Bookings and enquiries: Contact Alan on data@workingvision.com or 07976 602787.
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Woodland Resilience Immersion Retreat For Doctors

Nature-based ways to resource yourself and your practice Tuesday 20th July at 5pm until Thursday 22nd July at 5pmSingle accommodation. Vegetarian food locally sourced where possible. Total £275 The impact of prolonged overload, COVID working and the stress of facing ever-rising demands with shrinking resources, is calling us to respond creatively. This Woodland Resilience Immersion will offer you some insights and skills, and different ways for raising resilience and nourishing wellbeing. In 2018, Westminster Centre for Resilience recognised that health professionals need something more than the typical half-day resilience session in an urban training room. Hazel Hill Wood is an off-grid conference centre set in a 70-acre wood near Salisbury. Hazel Hill Trust and Westminster Centre for Resilience have jointly developed a woodland retreat programme. We have many years’ experience of delivering nature-based resilience programmes for front-line services. The next two-night, 48-hour residential Woodland Immersion will offer a unique combination of our teams’ expertise. There is growing evidence for the benefits of Nature contact in offsetting high levels of stress, ‘Directed Attention Fatigue’, information overload, and excessive ‘screen time’. The pilot programmes at Hazel Hill – evaluated by Westminster Centre for Resilience – showed statistically significant impacts. There is a brief summary below. Find peace in a beautiful 70-acre woodland – healing/nourishing in its own rightTry a range of ‘forest bathing’ and mindfulness techniquesExplore what nature’s cycles can teach us about our resilience as human ecosystemsTime to experience some movement, including some brief practical conservation workTo feel nourished by being part of a transitory community of shared experienceApplying the neurophysiology of the recovery responseCampfire circles: personal/professional stories of living in turbulent timesTime for resting and to share good food FACILITATORS David Peters worked for many years as a GP, and since 2000 in a range of professional and research roles in the NHS . He co founded and directed the Westminster Centre for Resilience (WCR), where he is now Emeritus Professor. https://www.londonfirst.co.uk/newspublications/blog/what-a-university-can-do-resilience-and-leadership-in-challenging-timeshttps://www.westminster.ac.uk/news/westminster-centre-for-resilience-in-conversation-with-michel-van-der-bel-of-microsoft Marcos Frangos has many years’ experience as a person-centred counsellor, and in groups working with ecosystems as a model for human resilience: http://www.wellspringchange.com For information please email David Peters. Link to Nourishing the Frontline Resilience: Intensive Preliminary Evaluation
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Grow your own Happiness

60-90-minute online workshop Cultivate your wellbeing with gardening skills! Available for group bookingsWith Alan Heeks In these stormy times, we need new skills to stay happy. A cultivated ecosystem, like a garden, is a role model for human nature: this workshop shows how gardening methods can help you grow your own happiness and deepen the roots of your resilience. For example: Mulching and pruning to nourish your rootsComposting stress as a source of energyUse gardening skills like observation and creativityFind new ways to adapt to the climate crisisDraw inspiration from Nature to guide you in uncertainty Alan Heeks has over 25 years of experience exploring Natural Happiness with groups. It grows from creating a 130-acre organic farm and education centre at Magdalen Farm in West Dorset, and from gardening with his wife at home. In this online workshop, Alan will describe the Seven Seeds of Natural Happiness, and participants will have a chance to try some of them out. Alan is happy to take bookings for this event from environmental, community and other groups, at a time of their choosing for a moderate fee by negotiation. CONTACT LINK
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NATURAL HAPPINESS:

Deepen your roots, nourish your fruits with the Gardener’s Way July 9-11 2021: at Hazel Hill Wood, near Salisbury With Alan Heeks, Jane Sanders and Marcos Frangos As restrictions ease, we’re facing new freedom and possibilities. How do we stay steady and make fruitful choices, serving ourselves and the bigger picture? This weekend is a wonderful chance to explore these questions, in a magical wood and a supportive group, using Alan’s unique Natural Happiness approach to learning from ecosystems. This workshop is designed to help us all find clarity, stay centred, and see how we can grow and contribute in these exciting and worrying times. Let’s remember the hopes of shaping a better future after the pandemic! Our methods will include: nourishing our roots; composting challenges; using co-creative skills to handle uncertainties; cultivating our inspiration; and ecosystem insights about community. Along with workshop sessions, there will be solo times in the wood, plus good food, campfires and songs to nourish us. We will explore how to cultivate wellbeing and resilience for ourselves and our communities, especially in response to the climate crisis and the related pandemic. If you are interested in using this model in your professional work with individuals or groups, Alan will be happy to offer you advice and support: the content of this workshop relates to his fourth book, which is planned for publication in 2022. See more at www.naturalhappiness.net/books. Alan Heeks has been exploring resilience with people and nature for many years, and has led many groups on this theme, drawing on experience of resilient natural systems from creating an organic farm and setting up Hazel Hill. Jane Sanders has over 25 years’ experience in working with a mindfulness-based approach to wellbeing with groups and individuals, and has also incorporated deep ecology, ecopsychology and the wisdom of natural systems into her work in many different settings, including numerous groups at Hazel Hill Wood. Marcos Frangos is widely experienced in group facilitation, coaching, counselling and constellations work. He was General Manager of Hazel Hill Wood for 5 years, and has co-led many groups there with Jane and Alan. Cost: including food and accommodation: £240 per person, concessions £190: this includes a single bedroom. If two friends or family members share a bedroom, the cost is £220 per person. We will share cooking and other community tasks. To secure a place, we will need a deposit of £40, £30 for concessions: in the unlikely event that covid rules prevent us running the group, you will receive a full refund. Timings: from 4pm on Friday afternoon, finishing by 2pm, after lunch on Sunday. Covid precautions: although all Covid restrictions will hopefully be lifted by July, we are planning a number of precautionary measures for this group. These include: option of single bedrooms for everyone; sessions run outdoors where possible, and with plenty of ventilation when indoors; scope to maintain 1-metre distancing if desired. We will agree together at the start of the group guidelines we’re all easy with. Hazel Hill: is a magical 70-acre conservation woodland and retreat centre, 7 miles from Salisbury. It has simple, yet beautifully crafted off-grid wooden buildings with lovely indoor and outdoor group spaces, basic accommodation in bedrooms and sleeping lofts (or camping), good hot showers and compost loos. Please note there are deer ticks at the wood which can carry Lyme disease: we will brief you on precautions in the joining instructions. See more about the wood at www.hazelhill.org.uk. For bookings and enquiries: Please contact Carol Nourse via email on naturalhappinessoffice@gmail.com
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RESILIENZ (German) and RESILIENCE (English) – where´s the difference?
Guest Blog by Daniel Körner of Wisdom Tree Recently, my attention was drawn to the topic of resilience and how this concept has been taken up differently in the two cultures where I live, the UK and Germany/Austria. Typing ‘resilience’ into google UK, many initial results lead to news from the banking sector, official governmental websites concerned with risks and emergencies on a national or global level, and luckily also some sites concerned with mental health and other personal aspects of resilience. The word itself seems to me, even if not frequently used, to be more understood in English than in German: people have at least an idea of its meaning (I doubt that many people in Austria or Germany would be able to explain the term ‘Resilienz’). Starting the same way, by just typing the word ‘Resilienz’ into German google, I found to my surprise that the word is indeed in use: In academia and business and more with a personal health focus, no mention of banks, water crisis or global challenges. I was even more surprised to find out that in fact the first research institution in Europe dedicated to resilience is in Germany. The German word ‘Resilienz’ (pronounce [ʀeziˈli̯ɛnʦ]) derives from the same latin origin (resilire or resilio– to bounce or spring back) but compared to the English word, it is much less used in day to day language. A synonym that is more widely known and in more common use would be ‘Wiederstandsfähigkeit’, yet this word describes much more the ability to withstand or to resist rather than the ability to bounce back. In this way it describes more the quality of a rock in breakwater, rather than of a solidly rooted tree that bends in a storm. One might say that this subtle semantic difference is not of importance, but I think it points to an unhealthy misconception and direction that the idea of resilience is taken in the German language. Alan pointed out in his last blog on ‘super-resilience’ (you can read the whole blog here) that resilience is often misused and mistaken as endurance, putting up with more and more pressure. The image of the strong ego-driven, successful individual that can cope with more stress, less sleep and can do more things at the same time is an expression of the unhealthy working culture of our time. But more on that later, back to the RESILIENZ… The German Resilience Centre (Deutsches Resilienz Zentrum, DRZ website available in English) in Mainz is an interdisciplinary and integrated centre for the research and promotion of resilience, supported by the Johannes Gutenberg University (JGU) and the University Medical Center of the JGU, and funded by the German federal government. The centre tries to combine basic neuroscience, clinical neuroscience and social science to address, as it says on their website, ‘one of the most important public health challenges of modern, knowledge-based societies.’ So there is an acknowledgment of the importance of this topic and of its implications on individual and social life, confirmed by its federal funding, not only for research but to provide a variety of services at their Resilience Health Care Centre as well. Furthermore, workshops, lectures and a list of resilience self-help books are provided and students have the possibility to attend the different formats for free. Wow,… imagine resilience centres connected to hospitals or community spaces. Where people find support and information… Then, I found several ‘resilience centres’, mainly in West Germany but also one each in Austria and Switzerland. Taking a closer look, they turn out to be coaching and consulting groups, focused on personal coaching, supervision, training and consulting for companies. Generally a positive tendency, as it shows a changing ‘Zeitgeist’ and the recognition of the importance of this theme in our working world. What disappointed me a bit though was the way in which resilience is presented and talked about. Almost everywhere it is directly linked with performance and productivity, the language in use fits perfectly into corporate settings, yet feels sterile. The focus seems to be on professional intervention in clinical settings. Considering the fact that the institutions who make use of the terms exist and arose from a corporate context this is not surprising and in itself also not reprehensible, yet it leaves me with some discomfort. Firstly because I think resilience needs to be understood not (only) in an ‘in order to … [be more productive]’ way, but for its own sake. I´m reminded of a famous quote by Howard Thurman, ‘…what the world needs is people who have come alive’ I´m convinced that people who are truly resilient and alive also are more productive, have less absence from work and are more creative and context-responsive in their work. Yet, to put the emphasis on productivity to begin with (and approaching resilience work just as a means) holds the danger of losing this idea of resilience to the corporate world and it being transformed into a fancy but empty concept (as it has happened with the broad philosophical idea of ‘sustainability’ before). The second thing I´ve been missing whilst exploring the different German institutions and offerings is ‘nature experience’. There has been a lot of scientific research in recent years on the health benefits of interacting in and with nature (see e.g. the research of Berman M. G., et al., University of Chicago ) and it is one of the key elements of the resilience work that I´m involved in through my activities at Hazel Hill Wood and through Wisdom Tree. So I was surprised not to find the words ‘nature’, ‘environment’, ‘the outdoors’. I guess this is what I mean by sterile. There seems to be a stronger recognition in the UK of the relation between nature experience and physical/mental health and further physical/mental health and resilience. In the German speaking area there is a lot of talk about mindfulness, acceptance, optimism, focus on the future, creativity or self-responsibility, some of which might implicitly include nature, yet there is certainly no […]
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