The Communities of Practice Playbook

Working through communities of practice has never been more encouraged in organisations than it is now. Better gathering, sharing and using of data, information and knowledge in public organisations such as the European Commission are essential to deliver integrated policy work and overcome silo mentalities. This is highlighted explicitly in European Commission President von der Leyen’s work guidelines stipulating transparency and the ambition to become a digitally transformed, user-focused and data-driven administration. Communities of practice are an excellent instrument for fostering collaboration among internal and external stakeholders: they can bring groups with different knowledge perspectives together and can strengthen their capacity to work and learn creatively together. Thus, communities of practice harness the collective intelligence in organisations and help improve performance.

Voggenreiter, Valerie

Sustainability – Self – Silence
Silence Spaces is a collective of four people, which resulted out of sustainable higher education at the Eberswalde University for sustainable development. During the M.Sc. program we realised, that the inner dimension is under represented when sustainability efforts come into action. Hence, we created a space for the self to empower sustainable behavior in silence and finally helping to transform mindsets and societies. Silence Spaces are physical as well as symbolic spaces. They are free of cyber activities, talking, reading, writing or any kind of input as long as there is not a a conceptualized learning journey taking place. In Silence we learn how to drop into ourselves, observe, reflect, relax – deep learning can take place and this environment can help us to deal more sustainable with ourselves instead of exploiting our own resources. Finally, Silence Spaces want to empower each single individual to invite inner change in order to initiate and shape sustainable outer change – and Silence is the container where this processes can origin from. Silence allows to LISTEN to our inner needs, become more empathic and caring towards oneself as well as the surroundings.

Silence Space

What is sustainability? Often, environmental aspects are in the foreground, while the social dimension is neglected. A transformation towards a more sustainable society, though, needs to consider the social and individual dimension as inner change causes outer change – and vice versa. We see the inner dimension underrepresented in public spheres.
We raise the awareness, that we need more than a technological understanding of sustainability, which cares primarily about the ecological consequences of our actions. We call for a shift in consciousness, too, which influences our thinking and action.
To think critically and acting according to it, is asked from each one of us. We believe that these capacities can be found in Silence. It offers a container for subjective transformation processes – by pausing consciously and taking part at learning journeys on (self)transformation. Deep inner change towards sustainability can’t happen in times of overwhelming stress and acceleration.
Silence Spaces in public places allow a transformation on both levels with the emphasis on internal spaces. The potential to become a part of the solution of grievances lies in every one of us and is able to unfold here. Silence Spaces are physical as well as symbolic spaces. They are free of cyber activities, talking, eating or any kind of input as long as there is not a learning journey taking place. In Silence we can drop into ourselves, observe, relax and reflect. We can gather strength and become observers when we exploit ourselves or witness exploitation of others and the environment. We need an economic and political shift and therefore promote spaces where critical thinking can happen, which is needed to bring along system change. The time for cool headed action is now.

Awareness Through the Body: A Way to Enhance Concentration, Relaxation and Self-Knowledge in Children and Adults.

“ATB started in July 1992 in the schools of Auroville as a programme to help children increase their capacity for attention, concentration and  relaxation, and to enhance their ability for self awareness and their sense of responsibility. Nowadays, it is offered to adults as well as to children.

Through a wide variety of exercises and games, ATB offers individuals opportunities to come to know themselves better, to explore the complexity of their being, and find ways to integrate and harmonise this complexity around the inmost centre of their being.”

(source: https://awarenessthroughthebody.wordpress.com/)

Auroville Film Festival

“The aim of the Auroville Film Festival is to connect with people and cultures within and beyond Auroville and to further the aspiration of human unity by showcasing films that develop the theme of human unity. We feature films that are created in and around Auroville, as well as international films that explore the theme of human unity.

The Auroville Film Festival wants to turn film-viewing in Auroville, a relatively passive activity, into a creative expression using digital media and, in the process, to foster a deeper understanding and exploration of the aspirations of Auroville. Through the film festival, the community is engaged in an interactive expression through digital films.”

(source: http://filmfestival.auroville.org/about-the-festival/)

Films for the Earth

“Films for the Earth: sharing knowledge and raising awareness with the most moving films about sustainability.

Films for the Earth is an educational initiative awarded by the UNESCO which creates settings, in which important films are showed to move gathered people and to develop visions and aims for a more sustainable society. You are on the most comprehensive website about films and sustainability, ecology and environment.

Films for the Earth means: hundreds of volunteers and contributing companies, active members and thousands of fans!

Find film screenings, free environmental movies for passing on, nature movies or watch right now films on the website!

Films for the Earth is an international centre of excellence for environmental documentaries and a network of environmental country sections. We want to reach as many people as possible with selected films, pass on knowledge about sustainability and inspire them to act.  

We know the best films about sustainability and how they can be used. We make this expertise available in an advisory capacity but also online, on our most comprehensive film and sustainability directory in the world. In three countries we reach over 100,000 people a year with our international festival, school events and member network. Films for Earth inspires, amazes, creates awareness and moves!”

(source: https://filmsfortheearth.org/en/about-us)

InnSaei – the Power of Intuition

“The ancient Icelandic word for intuition is “innsæi,” but in Iceland it has multiple meanings. It can mean “the sea within” which is the borderless nature of our inner world, a constantly moving world of vision, feelings and imagination beyond words. It can mean “to see within” which means to know yourself, and to know yourself well enough to be able to put yourself in other people’s shoes. And it can mean “to see from the inside out” which is to have a strong inner compass to navigate your way in our ever-changing world.

In the inspiring and thought-provoking InnSæi – the Power of Intuition, Hrund Gunnsteinsdottir and Kristín Ólafsdóttir go on a soul-searching, global journey to uncover the art of connecting within in today’s world of distraction, disconnection and stress. They meet with world-renowned scientists like Marti Spiegelman, an expert in neuroscience and indigenous consciousness who believes that we are only using a fraction of our capacity as human beings, with devastating consequences for the planet; artists like Marina Abramovic, the “grandmother of performance art” who teaches that “in order to create something new human beings need to go into the unknown”; and spiritual leaders like the captivating Malidoma Patrice Somé, a West African elder and author who reasons that “intuition binds us together. Without it we lose our sense of purpose and belonging.”  They also meet an extraordinary group of British schoolchildren who are learning how to better cope in today’s world by unlocking the power of nature and mindfulness.

Illustrated with gorgeous animation and stunning imagery, InnSæi is a film like no other, and one that offers radical insights into how we think and sense the world today.”

The Bridge

RESEARCH EXCHANGES IN AUROVILLE

Auroville is the largest and longest-standing intentional community in the world, practically researching into the evolutionary potential of humankind, developing award-winning transformational practices across fields of culture, economics, governance, education, environment, and health, recognized by UNESCO, the Indian Government, and major industries such as Tata. Visiting researchers can bridge this future-facing body of experimentation with developments in their fields worldwide, for the benefit of humanity as a whole.

WHO WE ARE

The Bridge promotes exchange between Auroville and visiting researchers similarly dedicated to the progress of human society.
We curate presentations and forums that facilitate exchange and the intiation of collaborative projects between Aurovilian and visiting experts.

WHO ARE YOU?

Are you an Aurovilian or visiting expert – in any field? We invite you to offer a presentation of your work.
Contact: thebridge@auroville.org.in
Are you an Auroville community member, volunteer, or visitor? You are welcome to attend our public events series!

Wasteless

Waste is a serious and growing global problem. The way we use and discard it is quickly destroying the earth and damaging our health faster than most people realise. Our planet can’t handle it, and neither can we.

Presently, when we think of waste we follow a linear model. A product is created, we purchase it and, when we’ve used it, we throw away whatever’s left. However, this approach generates an amazing amount of ‘unseen’ waste long before consumers touch it. Conservative experts claim that each kilo of garbage we dispose of in our bins produces 40 kilos of waste upstream (extraction, production and distribution).

After waste is generated, it is typically transported from our lives without much thought. For us, it’s ‘out of sight, out of mind’. For our public systems, it’s a nuisance to be dealt with cheaply and quickly. For future generations, it’s one of the biggest mistakes we are making.

We urgently need to raise awareness, change behaviour and inspire an estimated 7 billion+ people to generate less waste.

(Source: wastelessindia.org)

Great Transition Initiative

The Great Transition Initiative is an online forum of ideas and an international network for the critical exploration of concepts, strategies, and visions for a transition to a future of enriched lives, human solidarity, and a resilient biosphere. By enhancing scholarly discourse and public awareness of possibilities arising from converging social, economic, and environmental crises, and by fostering a broad network of thinkers and doers, it aims to contribute to a new praxis for global transformation.

On Being

The On Being Project is an independent non-profit public life and media initiative. We pursue deep thinking and social courage, moral imagination and joy, to renew inner life, outer life, and life together.

We make audio, digital, live event and other offerings towards the generative possibilities of a tender, tumultuous global moment. We look behind and beyond the news cycle, attending to the human change that makes social transformation possible across generational time.

On Being has its origins in a public radio show called Speaking of Faith, which was created by Krista Tippett and launched nationally at American Public Media. A journalist and former diplomat who had studied theology, Krista saw a black hole in media where intelligent conversation about religion, meaning, and moral imagination might be.

In 2010, On Being was born. In 2013, Krista and a founding production team of three spun out of APM. In 2017, Krista and a growing team of comrade-leaders opened the new chapter of mission-driven innovation that is The On Being Project. We’re based in a studio/work/public event space on Loring Park in Minneapolis, with community, colleagues, and partners around the world.

On Being with Krista Tippett, now heard on over 400 public radio stations and a successful podcast, is produced by On Being Studios, together with the On Being Blog, initiatives like the Poetry Radio Project and Public Theology Reimagined, and an expanding portfolio of new podcasts including Becoming Wise and This Movie Changed Me.

The Civil Conversations Project (CCP), which began in 2011 and has become a front edge of our evolution, is an emergent approach to conversation and relationship across the differences of our age. It is an offering towards renewing common life through grounding virtues and spiritual technologies like generous listening, adventurous civility, and hospitable questions. Civil Conversations are increasingly happening in live public events on the road while On Being’s Better Conversations Guide is finding its way into far-flung settings.

CCP was also at the heart of the inaugural On Being Gathering at the 1440 Multiversity in California in 2018.

Our newest adventure, the On Being Impact Lab, is the home of our Fellows Program, the future Spiritual Innovation Laboratory, extensions of the Civil Conversations Project into communities, classrooms and neighborhoods — and more to come.

We believe that collaborative discovery will be a key to living into the generative possibilities of this moment — not just in the halls of the academy or scientific laboratories, but in the everyday living laboratories of our communities, our friendships, and our minds.

Michael Meade Mosaic Voices

Mosaic is a network of artists, activists, community builders, healers, and spiritual teachers working in innovative ways to develop cross-cultural alliances, mentoring relationships, and forms of community healing.

Amid the rattling of cultural institutions and radical changes in nature, it may be time to turn again to valuable traditional methods of cultural healing and individual mentoring. Shaping new forms from separate, estranged, or even broken pieces is a dynamic remedy for the personal isolation and spiritual dislocation that increasingly characterize modern life. The creative act of finding and fitting together the divergent yet necessary elements of a diverse culture can produce “moments of wholeness” in times of great uncertainty.

 

Walking the talk: Faith, spirituality and the next generation

‘Walking the talk’ is a collection of interviews and stories from young adults on how the younger generation are engaging with faith, spirituality and social action amid the challenges of our times.

Spirituality in a time of global crisis
Young people are growing up under the influences of globalisation, consumerism, social media and new technology. They face a future beset with multiple challenges to our planetary stability, such as global ecocide, the rise of religious extremism and the refugee crisis.  The millennial generation are reported to be the least religious that our world has ever known. And yet some surveys show they are simply rejecting organised religion in favour of self-organised spirituality that draws on many different sources.

This edited collection of stories asks: How are young people engaging with faith, religion and spirituality at this time of crisis and transition?

Generation Y are doing faith differently!
For a start, young people have a more global interconnected outlook. They also have more flexible religious identities. They draw on the wisdom of the different religious practices that are available around them and they relate to each other’s traditions more openly.  Many have a deep concern for the Earth, economic justice and a values-based way of life. They are co-creating their own non-hierarchical spaces – either within traditional religious institutions or completely outside them. They build community together and share what nourishes their souls. Most importantly, they cannot separate faith from the need to respond to what they see around them. Spirituality belongs to the inner life but is also the driving force for social action, for building a just and sustainable future.

Facing challenges 
Young people face many, many challenges – often including a lack of understanding from their elders.  Today’s faith leaders also face a major challenge in meeting the needs of this generation and staying in relationship.  There is a great need for the talents and unique perspective of the younger generation to be better supported and better understood.

This book will explore these themes through stories, lively interviews and case-studies of new emerging youth-led communities.  The book also asks what all this tells us about the evolution of faith in the future and humanity’s changing relationship with the sacred.