Circle of Regeneration — Cultivating wellbeing in a VUCA world
Regen Collective is a community of practice for the regeneration of education and learning. Each month, educators gather in a circle of regeneration to explore the evolution of education and learning towards holistic and humanitarian practices. We follow the PAUSE practice, a micro-version of Theory U, to take us on a deep dive journey. Our shared experiences cultivate synergy through deep listening and generative conversation, and inspires us to cultivate practical applications of social regeneration.
In an increasingly unstable and rapidly changing world, there can be no higher value or greater measure of success than the cultivation of wellbeing within disruption. With the worldwide decline in social, spiritual, and ecological wellbeing it is imperative that we learn how to counter volatility with vision, meet uncertainty with understanding, react to complexity with clarity, and remedy ambiguity with agility.
In our September 2020 Regen Circle, we explored how we can collectively remedy VUCA disruption with our personal and collective practices. We asked: How have you been able to cultivate wellbeing in your personal and professional life? What are ways we can cultivate this in the social field through greater learning experiences? Through individual introspection and generative conversation, a palatable understanding emerged about the importance of our micro-practices for impacting the greater good.
Through our discussion, we surfaced that cultivating highly intentional and purposeful living is accomplished through rituals, rather than routines. Our micro-practices — such as mindfulness and embodiment, meditation and breathing, and PAUSE — fortify us for times of major disruption, allowing us to preserve a connection to deeper sources of knowing. When VUCA situations arise, it is our cultivated awareness that allows us to not react or overreact, but to clearly express needs in the midst of new situations and attend to individual and collective wellbeing rather than perpetuate the problems.
An intentional, mindful interruption is then a remedy in the midst of a volatile disruption. Take a deep breath before you react. Pause and tap into deeper sources of knowing.
As we recognize the increasingly unstable and rapidly changing world, we also recognize that the old structure of the collective is crumbling away and something new is emerging. Within the generative space of our circle, it was very clear to us that by focusing our attention on that which is emerging, rather than patching up what is decomposing, our attention is put in service to the cultivation of the new collective. Through this practice, a new sense and system of accountability is also emerging. An accountability based on new levels of awareness — of how I impact the collective and how the collective is influencing me.
This moves beyond collective intelligence to cultivating individual and collective wisdom. Attending to that which ripples along the mobius loop between the individual and the collective allows us to validate and further cultivate practices of presencing and regeneration. We move beyond the polarity of right and wrong, and shift our focus to that which cultivates wellbeing. Shared in the circle were: How I attend to my interior condition and presence, impacts the wellbeing of others. How I attend to and prepare my environment, creates safe space for others. My attention on wellbeing, cultivates the wellbeing of the whole. And perhaps most significantly — that our micro-practices are building the language of the social field, a language that is expressed through symbols and metaphors, and woven together through our gestures, through how we treat one another.
The practices of cultivating individual and collective wisdom have the potential to change the very foundations of the current education system — by shifting our routines away from rote learning and towards the cultivation and regeneration of the rituals of awareness practices that lead to wellbeing. We can create an intentional interruption in how we have been educated to be distant from one another and to be distracted from our sense of the collective.
You can join in this learning journey with us.
We can begin a learning journey now by asking ourselves and each other: What practices build my awareness of the mobius loop between myself and the collective? How do I attend to the impact that I am having on the collective — and am I contributing to the collective wellbeing? How is the collective influencing me and my wellbeing? What practices can I participate in, what social language of symbols and metaphors and gestures can I contribute, to cultivate individual and collective wisdom?
Through journaling, drawing, crafting, or movement, explore this within yourself. Share your thoughts and artistic response in the comments below and with those around you through words, symbols, gestures and metaphors. What inspires you will also support others, a circle of regeneration.
Three days after our September Regen Circle — “Cultivating wellbeing in a VUCA world” — I am surrounded by a wildfire crisis which is burning down half the valley and contributing to the noxious smoke covering the entire west coast of the United States. I have never seen VUCA behavior more clearly displayed. Volatile weather patterns and wildfire alerts, uncertain evacuation priorities, complex social needs, all while we sit in thick smoke and even thicker ambiguity, struggling to find purpose in the waiting — which loops back around to a volatile and uncertain future.
As we take in the displaced and comfort the shock of loss, I recognize the fortification of my micro-practices and those of others. A deep breath, a well cooked meal, a moment of PAUSE to tap into deeper sources of knowing, evening meditations, deep listening and responding to conversations with coaching language. Each of these helps me to be more present and intentional in each interaction I have. Each brings a moment, a glimmer, an offering and an invitation of vision, understanding, clarity, and agility, rather than continuing the spiral of violent disruption.
As my neighbor plays the wooden flute on his porch in the evening, creating peaceful tones that cut through the mounting chaos, I watch the ripple of gentle smiles and deep breathes across the neighborhood — perhaps across the entire valley. Our micro-practices are at least subduing the fires on one level. Perhaps the most important level of all.
Thank you to everyone who participated in this Community Regen Circle and the co-creation of collective wisdom and regeneration.
You are invited to join us for a creative exploration and generative conversation with Community Regen Circles HERE. We gather on the first Friday of each month, connecting with members worldwide via Zoom video call. All you need is a quiet space, journaling or arts tools, a warm heart and an open mind.
You can learn more about the PAUSE practice and Regen Circles HERE Please consider supporting the work of Regen Collective with a financial contribution HERE
Regen Collective was created within the Societal Transformation Lab of The Presencing Institute in order to co-create awareness practices for social regeneration and cultivate the conditions needed for the evolution of education and learning towards holistic and humanitarian practices. We look forward to cultivating this with you!
