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Our drive to Jeremy’s house up in the Moor. Our last night together...

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We’ve had the privilege of listening to stories, ancient indigenous tales, from the grand storyteller Martin Shaw. Here he briefly talks about the fine line between living a soulful life and going mad.

#madness #story #tale #ancient #indigenous

Best moments at Schumacher College (Part I)

As the world faces recession, climate change, inequity and more, Tim Jackson delivers a piercing challenge to established economic principles, explaining how we might stop feeding the crises and start investing in our future.

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I asked Satish Kumar (originator and cofounder of Schumacher College) how to create a sense of community in huge cities, such as São Paulo. Here is his passionate answer...

A systemic challenge

"All of the crises we currently face (of climate, finite resource, human well-being and the economy) are driven by the way we have chosen to organize the economy, which has de facto become the way that we organize and understand society.

The dominant mode of organisation rests upon an ideological position that underpins neo-liberal economics and much of modern science and industry: that isolated individuals make decisions in their own interest (that humanity can be understood as ‘homo-economicus’), competition is a ‘natural’ condition, markets should be left to self-regulate and resources are infinitely exploitable."

Excerpt from Ruth Potts's "Being me and also us" (Economics for Transition Assessment)

Is Money at the root of our big economic and social problems?

"The financial crisis is as much a crisis of economics as of the financial system. Inherent flaws in the modern monetary system overlay and magnify conceptual flaws in prevailing neo-liberal economic policy that rely on frameworks ill-suited to the current context of ecological and social problems. Our response therefore needs to address both the reform of the financial system and a fundamental reframing of economic policy away from an obsession with growth in GDP towards a focus on achieving high human well-being and social justice in harmony with ecological systems."

- from Rethinking the Role of the Economy and Financial Markets by Tony Greenham & Josh Ryan-Collins

How is money really created by banks? http://youtu.be/KvpbQlQwl0A

#de-growth #financial crises #ecological economics #monetary reform

This is us! The two current MASTERS programs at Schumacher College. What a lovely bunch :) In January the third MASTERS program - Ecological Design - begins. New people, new stories, new moments! You should enroll www.schumachercollege.org.uk

So much fun designing our chalk board menu :) #typography

#chalk #design #typography #art

To explain a bit more what our focus is here.

#video #neweconomy #money

About the loss of our sense of community:

"We don't really need each other."...What better description could there be of the loss of community in today's world? [...] We don't need to know the person who grows, ships, and processes our food, makes our clothing, builds our house, creates our music, makes or fixes our car, we don't even need to know the person who takes care of our babies while we are at work. We are dependent on the role, but only incidentally on the person fulfilling that role. Whatever it is we can just pay someone to do it as long as we have money. And how do we get money? By performing some other specialized role that, more likely than not, amounts to someone paying us to do something for them ...

The necessities of life have been given over to specialists, leaving us with nothing meaningful to do (outside our own area of expertise) but to entertain ourselves. Meanwhile whatever function of daily living that remain to us are mostly solitary functions: driving places, buying things, paying bills, cooking convenience foods, doing housework. None of these demand the help of neighbors, relatives or friends. We wish we were closer to our neighbors; we think of ourselves as friendly people who would gladly help them. But there is little to help them with. [...] we are self-sufficient in relation to the people we know but dependent as never before on total strangers living thousands of miles away.

The commoditization of social relationships leaves us with nothing to do together but to consume. Joint consumption dos nothing to build community because it requires no gifts. Community and intimacy cannot come from joint consumption, but only from giving and cocreativity."

excerpt from book 'Sacred Economics: Money, Gift and Society in the Age of Transition' by Charles Einstein

#book #community #money

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Jamming out by the fire is my favorite! Our group is very musical and I am so grateful for each beautiful talented soul I am meeting here :)

#music #fire #jam

Why am I here?

Like many of us, I'm in pursuit of my true purpose and in need of moving beyond the "lone wolf hero" narrative, so deeply rooted in me after living my whole life in huge metropolitan centers and spending the last four years in New York, USA. Choosing the Economics for Transition Masters Program at Schumacher College was both an intentional and rational choice to keep growing and expanding perception but also an involuntary guidance from the universe, a natural and obvious outcome of my path.

The decision happened in a moment of deep concern with our planet, the future of humanity and all other beautiful species that are as important as us. It was as well, a moment of intense questioning about all that surrounded me, from bizarre social differences, the concept of money, status, illusion of eternal economic growth and pointless jobs that don't fulfill us and don't bring well-being, while our souls die out, our colors fade, years pass and we are stuck in the empty and horrific consumerism habits we've been conditioned to as we distance ourselves from truth, happiness and each other.

Heavy... I know. Take a breath and stay with me.

After feeling so lost and disconnected from "reality" I finally came home. This is my journey to find purpose. To find hope in alternatives, to be understood, to understand how to move from the so called "growth" of the economy, or the suicidal growth, to an intelligent growth, to get out of my head and be useful to the community around me, to practice empathy, respect, connection and mindfulness, to connect to nature in a deep level so I can fix the disconnect I have (we all have) between myself and other beings (humans, animals, plants, rivers, oceans, rocks, etc.). We are all one. Living comfortably in a nice apartment, with nice clothes, a "cool" social status, an acceptable job, a car in the garage, a husband in auto-pilot and with kids learning how to compete since day 1 at school is not my ideal of a wholesome life.

In order to accept and embrace this new path I am having to let go and deconstruct many beliefs from the past. It is a heartbreaking process, letting go of my ego's dreams to focus on what I believe is my spirit's calling. I know this time here will lead to a new me full of purpose. I truly hope my learnings and transformation process can spark something in you.

Wholeheartedly,

A New kind of Classroom for a New Economy

This is our cozy classroom. Here we face each other, we don't use shoes, we truly listen when someone is speaking, we respect the different opinions, we start and finish with three minutes of silence, we leave the class to connect with nature, we use the space to get to know one another, we have sharing circles to talk about how we are feeling, we have learning groups (4 people group) to extend the conversation and give support to each other, here we practice mindfulness and we don't use the expression "google it" when someone has a question - it is extremely disrespectful and shows a lack of willingness to help - instead we actually help each other find answers.

I wish all classrooms all over the world could be like this one. It helps shape the individual as collaborative as opposed to competitive.

#class #mindful

Going for a swim at the River Dart is my favorite thing to do on a sunny afternoon.

#river #nature

A meaningful connection with our Food

To begin with, the culinary at the College is 100% vegetarian. We eat so well here you could come visit me just for the food! Our Head of Food is Julia Ponsonby, a master in community veggie recipes, a sweetheart, humble, hard working author of three books and married to Stephan Harding (they met at the College over 20 years ago, got married and have a son).

Here we plant, harvest, cook, serve and eat our food together. It is OUR local food. How amazing is that? I had never before seen where the apples I eat come from, neither the celery, tomatoes, kale and so on. I appreciate the food so much more and am so so so happy my food didn't need to travel by ship or plane with an absurd carbon emission from California, New Zealand or another far away land.

Here we plant using a regenerative and self-maintained agricultural system called Permaculture. It is a philosophy of working with, rather than against nature. It's an amazing resilient (you will see this word a lot here, it means to recover quickly when facing a crisis, shock or problem) technique that uses almost 100% human power (energy). Its three main principles are: Earth Care, People Care & Fair Share.

#food #veggie #permaculture

First visit to the beautiful grand being, River Dart. It was freezing but amazing to swim in him (yes, I refer to the river as him). This afternoon brought many of us (Economics for Transition and Holistic Science Masters students) closer and I consider this moment the beginning of new friendships and of me feeling at home.

#river #nature #friends

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