Dal Fiore, Filippo

Dr. Filippo Dal Fiore holds a PhD in Economics from the Free University of Amsterdam and teaches
at the Master’s and MBA level at the University of Bologna.

After working for 10 years in the field of technological innovation – predominantly running applied research projects and a spin-off venture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology – Filippo realized the need for a deeper exploration of issues of ethical business and mindful leadership. Today these two topics are the subject of his teaching at the University of Bologna and consulting at the Great Place To Work Institute.

Filippo’s major intellectual challenge is related to inter-disciplinarity, specifically on how to de-ideologize social sciences and use common sense for social scientific research. In this respect, Filippo has always tried to beat the path of a polymath, taking on different research topics, balancing research with practice, experimenting new pedagogical approaches

Wuppuluri, Shyam

Shyam Wuppuluri is an independent researcher working in the domain of foundations of sciences and philosophy. He has long standing interest in the interdisciplinary approaches to sciences, deep ecology and sustainability. He is the recipient of prestigious Albert Einstein Fellowship 2021 from the Einstein Forum at Potsdam & Caputh and is an elected fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

​As a primary editor, he has edited various highly interdisciplinary volumes to disseminate and address the issues underlying the foundations of sciences by gathering world’s leading scientists and intellectual leaders including Noam Chomsky, Sir Roger Penrose, Sir Martin Rees, Daniel Dennett, A. C. Grayling, Nicholas Humphrey, Gregory Chaitin, Gerard ‘t Hooft, Ian Stewart, Barry Mazur, Stephen Wolfram, Paul Davies, Tyler Burge, Doron Swade, Julian Barbour, Newton Da Costa, Francisco Antonio Doria, Reuben Hersh, Nicholas Maxwell and many others.

Hafner, Judith

Her context of languages (German, Italian, English, French, Chinese) and professional experiences (business, international cooperation, community building) speaks of her longing to connect spaces through listening.

Her body-felt and mind-opening experience of flow in different trainings (Presencing Institute, Seele und Sein, Thomas Hübl, Art of Hosting) shifted her deeper into inner alignment and availability as basic drivers for growth.

She coordinates, together with four other women, the network future.bz.it in Nortnern Italy around the Agenda 2030, and tries to stay in service of the emerging field, driven by simplicity, curiosity and a sense of connection.

Bulc, Violeta

I’m convinced that a new civilisation is around the corner. More and more of us are feeling it, sensing it, acting upon our inner calling. We know that it is time to live differently. To be more connected to the living world around us. To be in balance with the Planet, the Universe, with ourselves and our fellow humans.

Here I share with you my view of why and how the new civilisation might organise itself, what its new priorities could be, and what could be the essence of it. I am fully aware of my limitations. I humbly hope that it could be good material for a broader global discussion. I would also like to acknowledge all the inspiring people that I have had the privilege to meet, or to read their work, because they have all contributed to what is in front of you.

I feel the new civilisation has a clear mission: firstly, to create Planet Earth as an eco-zone of the Universe with its rich biodiversity at its core. Secondly, to populate the Universe by using technology, curiosity, and greatness to drive it.

The main change in organizing Ecocivilisation is our deep understanding that we are part of a common space that we share within a common consciousness. As a result, structures are based on systems and in the form of networks that nurture a society whose essence is relationships. The concept of competition retreats and gives way to endless collaboration, where the only principle is that collaboration never ends.

Kurt, Hildegard

I am an independent cultural researcher and author, actively engaged in research, teaching and lecturing in Europe, the UK, Korea and the USA. My thematic focus includes art and sustainability, culture and sustainability, aesthetic education, social sculpture and intercultural dialogue.

Infinite Potential – The life and ideas of David Bohm

He was one of the 20th Century’s most brilliant physicists. Albert Einstein called him his spiritual son. The Dalai Lama relied upon him as his “science guru.” So why is it that hardly any of us know the name: David Bohm?

By telling the little-known story of David Bohm and evoking the realms he explored in his research, INFINITE POTENTIAL takes us on a mesmerizing and immersive journey into the mystery of Consciousness––through the use of hypnotic music and rich visual tapestries. The film includes interviews with luminaries such as H.H. the Dalai Lama, esteemed artist Antony Gormley, Oxford philosopher and physicists Sir Roger Penrose, and many more who were influenced by Bohm’s revolutionary work.

Growing up in a poor Pennsylvania coal-mining town during the Great Depression, David Bohm possessed a rare and maverick intelligence that baffled his parents and peers. After earning a scholarship to go to college, Bohm got the attention of the greatest minds in science, including Robert Oppenheimer, the father of the Atomic Bomb, who became his thesis advisor but would eventually turn against him.

Bohm’s explorations led him to intuit a hidden order to reality––the Quantum Potential––that underlies both the microscopic world of subatomic particles and also the macro world of stars and galaxies. Bohm had turned to Eastern thought and the wisdom traditions of India to talk about something that underlies all of creation––a realm that mystics have known about for millennia and modern science is only just beginning to explore. Bohm’s revolutionary ideas were way ahead of their time––a threat to the scientific orthodoxy. And that’s why he was dismissed.

You Matter More Than You Think. Quantum Social Change in Response to a World in Crisis

You Matter More Than You Think is the starting point for an inquiry about quantum social change and its implications for climate change. The book explores how the metaphors and meanings of quantum physics can contribute to new understandings of the relationship between individual change, collective change, and systems change. It considers how paradigms and practices can change the way we relate to each other, the environment, the planet, and the future.

This is a book for those who are interested in social change, and open to the possibility that each of us can contribute to an equitable and thriving world. It is also for those who are concerned about climate change and may be feeling a deep anxiety about the future and if /how they matter. Most of all, it is about why you matter more than you think.

von Meibom, Barbara

Alles Leben ist Bewegung und ein ständiges Ringen, um das rechte Gleichgewicht, um lebensfördernde Balancen und um Synthesen zwischen vermeintlich unvereinbaren Widersprüchen. Dabei haben wir ein feines Gespür dafür, wenn etwas „aus der Spur geraten“ ist und destruktive Entwicklungen für uns selbst, für das Miteinander und für das Leben auf diesem Planeten entstanden sind.

Ich habe in meinem Leben erfahren müssen, was es heißt, sich der Welt zu sehr kognitiv zu nähern. Als Universitätsprofessorin, Politik- und Kommunikationswissenschaftlerin hatte ich gelernt, meine mentalen Fähigkeiten mit aller Kraft in den Dienst der Wissenschaft zu stellen.

Doch ich musste erfahren, dass damit mein Leben in ein destruktives Ungleichgewicht rutschte, und nicht nur dies:  Auch mein Menschen- und Weltbild wurden durch die mentale Perspektive verengt.

Ich begab mich also auf die Suche nach einem neuen inneren und äußeren Gleichgewicht, einem Gleichgewicht, das dem Leben dient.

Dazu entwickelte ich ein zweites Standbein, erschloss mir die Welten der transpersonalen und humanistischen Psychologie und Psychotherapie, vertiefte meinen Zugang zur spirituellen Dimension des Seins durch ausgedehnte Studienreisen nach Asien und erprobte mich seit Mitte der 90er Jahre, zuerst neben der universitären Tätigkeit und dann selbständig mit CommUnio.

Mit diesem reichen Hintergrund, in dem sich Unterschiedliches vereint, bin ich bis heute unterwegs und mit mir die vielen Menschen und Organisationen, die ich im Laufe meiner 20jährigen selbständigen Tätigkeit begleite und begleitet habe. Geholfen hat mir dabei, dass an meiner Wiege „Thron und Altar“ standen, repräsentiert durch zwei übermächtige Großväter, die so unterschiedliche Welten wie Macht und Liebe vertraten und eine Mutter, die sich mit hohem Engagement in den Dienst von Verständigung stellte.

Zugänge, die ich im Laufe meiner langen beruflichen Tätigkeit gewählt habe, sind vielfältig: Einzelarbeit, Lehrgänge, Moderationen, Mediationen, Vorträge, Publikationen. Doch immer geht es mir darum, gemeinsam Wege zu ebnen, in denen sich Stimmigkeit im Innen wie im Außen herstellt, eine Stimmigkeit, die sich aus der produktiven Synthese unterschiedlichster Sichtweisen, Interessen, Anliegen und Weltzugänge herstellt.

taken from https://www.communio-fuehrungskunst.de/ueber-uns

 

Herrmann, Lukas

Lukas investigates the cultivation of generative social fields through long-term whole-school co-creation processes based on a training program in 3 elementary schools with over 1,000 school kids in Berlin, Germany. The training program addresses in particular the schools’ 180 teachers by developing their mindfulness, empathy, and relational competence. Furthermore, Lukas works with Peter Senge and Mette Böll from the center for systems awareness to foster systems change within the education sector in California.

Petranker, Jack

Jack Petranker holds a law degree from Yale and an M.A. in political theory from the University of California, Berkeley.  A former Dean of the Tibetan Nyingma Institute in Berkeley, he has also served as North American Vice President of the World Fellowship of Buddhists (1988-92).  His own academic work is in the fields of consciousness studies and organizational change.  He has been director of Mangalam Research Center since its founding in 2009.

Mangalam Center explores new ways of bringing wisdom to the modern world. We embrace Buddhist, spiritual, secular, and integrated approaches to learning about our mind and ourselves, opening as many doors as possible to the means of healing and transformation.

Our goal is to communicate the heart of traditional teachings in an accessible way, while still maintaining their depth and authenticity. Recognizing the difficulty of translating ideas across time, cultures, and communities, we focus on having conversations and asking questions. We also emphasize bringing meditation or mindfulness practice into ordinary activities, to allow our own embodied experience to guide our understanding.

O’Brien, Karen

Karen O’Brien is an internationally recognized expert on climate change and society, focusing on themes such as climate change impacts, vulnerability, and adaptation including how climate change interacts with globalization processes and the implications for human security. She is interested in how transdisciplinary and integral approaches to global change research can contribute to a better understanding of how societies both create and respond to change, and particularly the role of beliefs, values and worldview in transformations to sustainability. She is passionate about what potential there is in quantum social theory and the implications for climate change responses. She currently leads a Norwegian Research Council Topforsk project called AdaptationCONNECTS (Adaptation: Combining Old and New kNowledge to Enable Conscious Transformation to Sustainability), that aims towards developing new understandings of whether and how transformations can contribute to successful adaptation to climate change. She has been heavily involved in the work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Global Change Programmes and the transition to Future Earth, a 10-year global change research initiative. She is the co-founder and partner in cCHANGE, an Oslo-based company.  cCHANGE is a beacon for individuals and organizations seeking a new perspective, inspiration, knowledge, and tools on climate change and sustainability transformations.

Milton, Mark

Founder and Director of the Swiss-based foundation Education 4 Peace (E4P)

Created in 2002, the Foundation works internationally to promote the incorporation of skills in self-awareness, deep listening, and mastery of emotions into the educational curriculum of youth, including sports education. His earlier experiences first as a volunteer and then as director of an organization that operates hotlines for emotional support and suicide prevention and his successful career as a business consultant specializing in communication, marketing and organizational development have greatly contributed to the work of E4P. From 2001-2010, Mark was chairman of the International Federation of Telephone Emergency Services (IFOTES), with 600 centers in 28 countries. He initiated many activities to promote listening skills, as well as the first international congress on the theme of Emotional Health in 2007, co-sponsored by the World Health Organization (WHO). He has led the E4P’s groundbreaking work with international and national football federations to officially introduce self-awareness, teach listening skills and empathetic communication that pave the way for resilience and relational consciousness. He is the co-author of Master of your Emotions and Football, a Path to Self-Awareness.

Hosang, Maik

MAIK HOSANG researches interdisciplinary relationships between people,
Nature and culture. He has a
Professorship for cultural philosophy, social and cultural change at the Zittau / Görlitz University of Applied Sciences. He
is co-creator of the interactive philosophy-experience world »Sophia im
Spiegel «and author of several books.

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.

Whyte, David

The poet lives and writes at the frontier between deep internal experience and the revelations of the outer world. There is no going back once this frontier has been reached; a new territory is visible and what has been said cannot be unsaid.

Poetry is a break for freedom. In a sense all poems are good; all poems are an emblem of courage and the attempt to say the unsayable; but only a few are able to speak to something universal yet personal and distinct at the same time; to create a door through which others can walk into what previously seemed unobtainable realms, in the passage of a few short lines.

Integrating Personal, Social, and Ecological Transformations toward Ecological Civilization

This invitation-only workshop will convene fifteen leading Chinese environmentalists, international sustainability scientists, grassroots organizers, and spiritual activists to share their knowledge and expertise working on Ecological Civilization. We will employ a highly participatory process of creative inquiry to explore the following question:

“How can we integrate personal, social, and ecological transformations toward Ecological Civilization? What strategic steps can we take to cultivate such an integrated understanding among key stakeholders?”

This workshop will examine how a relational approach to Ecological Civilization may better align its philosophical and political dimensions across sectors, cultures, and contexts. We will invite guests who offer case studies that bridge theory and practice and who are interested in taking a relational approach to their work. The workshop will apply methods that integrate knowledge, experiences, and skills (knowing, being, and doing) in sessions designed to consider case studies from three different orientations: forward, inward, and looping (FIL).

EcoCiv Workshop Agenda

Planetary Ethics and Artificial Intelligence

PETAL: Planetary Ethics and Artificial Intelligence

PETAL: Planetary Ethics and Artificial Intelligence Lab is a humanities laboratory based at the Humanities Research Center at Duke Kunshan University. Co-directed by Daniel Lim and James Miller, the lab promotes research into the future of the humanities in the areas of planetary ethics and artificial intelligence. It hosts events and activities designed to enrich the intellectual life of the DKU campus, and trains students in humanistic research.

The lab’s main research question is: what does it mean to be human in an age of artificial intelligence and planetary civilization? This research question arises out of the conviction that traditional humanistic research must be reconfigured to take proper account of the planetary context from which human life has emerged, and to respond to the challenge of artificial intelligence. In one sense, this is an age-old question in the humanities: what is the difference between nature, people, and machines? But this question takes on new significance because of scientific and technological developments that are overturning ordinary conceptions about the uniqueness of human beings.  Read more about the intellectual context and rationale for the lab’s research.

In addition to conducting research in these areas, the lab also has an exciting student fellowship program. Students receive a stipend, research training, and help design events related to the lab’s themes.

The lab will take place over the 2018-2019 academic year.

Workface

Workface is a network of currently around 1 million entrepreneurs all across China organized in dezentralized learning communities that meet once a week. We cultivate a practice along the three aspects serve – learn – support.

Bornemann, Boris

Ich interessiere mich für Emotionen und Bewusstsein – und welchen Einfluss Meditation und Achtsamkeit darauf haben können. Ich forsche dazu mit Methoden der Psychologie, Neurowissenschaft und Phänomenologie. Ich betreibe Meditation seit vielen Jahren und unterrichte sie in verschiedenen Kontexten. Gerne helfe ich Ihnen oder Ihrem Unternehmen dabei, einen einfachen und hilfreichen Zugang zu Meditation und Achtsamkeit zu finden.

taken from https://www.borisbornemann.de/

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/)

Character strengths and virtues: A handbook and classification

“Can we hold hope that positive psychology will be able to help people evolvetoward their highest potential?” The classification described in this bookbegan with this question, posed by Neal Mayerson to Martin Seligman in 1999.The Mayerson Foundation was concerned that inadequate progress was beingmade from well-worn problem-fixing approaches and that an approach basedon recognizing people’s strengths and aspirations might prove more effective.Mayerson turned to Seligman to explore the intersection of the emerging fieldof positive youth development and Seligman’s new push to articulate a newpositive psychology. It soon became clear that two prior questions needed tobe answered: (1) how can one define the concepts of “strength” and “highestpotential” and (2) how can one tell that a positive youth development programhas succeeded in meeting its goals?”

(from the preface of the book)

Contemplative practices in action: Spirituality, meditation, and health.

“This book seeks to provide a scholarly and multidisciplinary approach on the topic of contemplative practices for the development of well-being, wisdom, healing, and stress management that includes state-of-the-art science, practice, and applications of contemplative practices in the professional workplace, educational settings, pastoral care, and medical, psychological, or other health care interventions. The chapters articulate current findings and practice in contemplative practices from a wide range of religious and spiritual traditions and from experts in the integration of contemplative practices and psychology, nursing, pastoral care, business, and so forth in order to achieve well-being.”

(Source. The book’s preface)

A new psychology for sustainable leadership: the hidden power of ecological worldviews

“During the last decade, the sustainability position in multinational corporations has grown in influence. Much literature has explored how corporations can play an important role in solving the environmental challenges facing the planet. However, until now, there has been little research on sustainability leadership at the individual level. In this book, Schein explores the deeper psychological motivations of sustainability leaders. He shows how these motivations relate to overall effectiveness and capacity to lead transformational change and he explores the ways in which the complexity of sustainability is driving new approaches to leadership.

Drawing on interviews with 75 leaders in more than 40 multinational corporations and NGOs, Schein explores how ecological and post-conventional worldviews are developed and expressed in the context of global sustainability practice. By empirically grounding key theories from developmental psychology, integral ecology, and eco-psychology in sustainability leadership practice, the author encourages us to think about leadership in a different way.

A New Psychology for Sustainability Leadership will be of interest to an interdisciplinary audience of educators, students, corporate executives, social science researchers, and concerned citizens. The insights from this book can be usefully integrated into leadership curriculum and development programs to help the next generation of leaders respond to global challenges.”

(Source: http://steveschein.net/books/a-new-psychology-for-sustainability-leadership/overview/)

Integral Yoga at Work – A Study of Practitioner’s Experiences Working in Four Professional Fields

“Formerly a research psychologist in the USA, the author conducted a qualitative study of sixteen long-term practitioners of the Integral Yoga working in the fields of business management, education, health care, and the arts. Initial chapters frame his research methodology and examine some general findings regarding the participants’ practice of the Yoga in work. Results of the study in each field are based largely on interviews with the participants, and include textual references from the works of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother and the author’s reflections on central themes and common experiences. The final chapter identifies the various principles and insights regarding the application of Integral Yoga in these four professional fields and presents some of the broader implications of the study.”

An Integral Theory of Consciousness

“Abstract: An extensive data search among various types of developmental and evolutionary sequences yielded a `four quadrant’ model of consciousness and its development (the four quadrants being intentional, behavioural, cultural, and social). Each of these dimensions was found to unfold in a sequence of at least a dozen major stages or levels. Combining the four quadrants with the dozen or so major levels in each quadrant yields an integral theory of consciousness that is quite comprehensive in its nature and scope. This model is used to indicate how a general synthesis and integration of twelve of the most influential schools of consciousness studies can be effected, and to highlight some of the most significant areas of future research. The conclusion is that an `all-quadrant, all-level’ approach is the minimum degree of sophistication that we need into order to secure anything resembling a genuinely integral theory of consciousness.”

Restoration of the tropical dry evergreen forest of peninsular India

“Abstract: The Tropical Dry Evergreen Forest (TDEF) ofIndia is only found on the south eastern seaboard of thepeninsular. It has a very limited range, and extends only 60km inland. The TDEF occurs in an area of high populationdensity and consequently it is the rarest type of forestecosystem found in the subcontinent.The establishment of the Auroville International Township in1968 initiated a major work of eco-restoration which has turneda highly eroded lateritic plateau into a re-emerging ecosystemof the TDEF.The work now spreads out beyond the boundaries of theinternational township and involves working with local people,especially women and children. Many lessons have beenlearnt and the work continues to reintegrate the forest in thesocial fabric of a rapidly changing rural environment.”

(source: Blanchflower, P. (2005). Restoration of the tropical dry evergreen forest of peninsular India. Biodiversity, 6(1), 17-24.)

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/)

Sadhana Forest

“Sadhana Forest started its ecological revival and sustainable living work on December 19th 2003.

The vision of its founders, Yorit and Aviram Rozin, is to transform 70 acres of severely eroded, arid land on the outskirts of Auroville. In a spirit of human unity, their aim is to introduce a growing number of people to sustainable living, food security through ecological transformation, wasteland reclamation, and veganism. Our energy and resources are focused on the creation of a vibrant, indigenous Tropical Dry Evergreen Forest (TDEF).

Sadhana Forest won the third place in the Humanitarian Water and Food Award (WAF) 2010. The ceremony took place in the Marble Hall of the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, on November 25th, 2010. Shri Ashok Kumar Attri the Ambassador of India to Denmark honored Sadhana Forest by attending the ceremony.
This award is an international recognition of the quality of the ecological and humanitarian work done by Sadhana Forest in India and Haiti.”

(source: https://sadhanaforest.org/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)

Evolution at work

Evolution at Work offers over a decade of experience in guiding personal and organizational journeys into self-organization

The shift to self-organization is a transformational and multi-dimensional journey. No two journeys are the same, and this work requires differentiated approaches to learning and development. Everything Evolution at Work offers includes the following three approaches:

Teaching: Presenting a unique combination of theoretical background and practical stories drawn from real-life experience, we help you gain a deep understanding of the Whats, Whys, and Hows of your experience.

Facilitation: Taking a holistic approach to learning, we guide you through exercises that cultivate an embodied confidence with the processes, exercises, and practices that support sustainable self-organization.

Holding Space: We commit to being fully present with what is needed now, without judgment. Love, care, and compassion are at the heart of our work.

taken from https://www.evolutionatwork.org/about


Emerge

Emerge is an independent, non-profit media platform highlighting the initiatives, individuals and ways of thinking that are sowing the seeds of a new civilisation.

We are exploring how to act wisely in a world that seems out of control. We aim to explore the emerging cultural narratives of our time by collecting useful content from across the web, profiling change makers and thinkers, publishing thought-provoking commentary and producing original videos and podcasts.

We are living in times of profound transition where our ways of working, communicating and governing are quickly transforming. Many of our received wisdoms, habits and perspectives are becoming obsolete. What will emerge in the vacuum created by this disruption is not yet clear, but some critical questions hang in the balance:

Will we manage to avert ecological crisis? Will our new technologies enable powerful collaboration, or create intense polarisation? What does it mean to live a meaningful life in relationship with ourselves and others?

Nobody knows what the world will look like in 20 years time. At Emerge we believe that we all have a part to play in weaving a new story for humanity and our planet.

In fact, we are already doing it.

By combining live events with the power of the internet, Emerge is a hub for people and initiatives searching for solutions to pressing global challenges, asking the question: What new patterns of living, working and existing together are currently emerging?

We are a network and a movement that celebrates people and projects, and we offer an invitation to each of us to discover our role in this new story.

What We Believe

 The challenges facing our world today are more complex and species-threatening than ever before in human history. The global threat of climate change and the social impacts of digitalisation and globalisation are currently far more complex than our collective capacity to comprehend. In order for us to move forward, our thinking about global problems has to evolve to match their complexity.

Our personal psychology is of huge consequence to the outside world. If we are going to transform as a society then the personal development of individuals must be taken seriously as a societal, as well as an individual, concern.

There is no one ‘true’ way of seeing the world. In order to move forward we need to transcend binary thinking.This means moving beyond left and right political divides, thinking in terms of individual and collective responsibility, national and global identity, honoring individual identities and recognising the need to focus on a greater “we”.

Our world is socially constructed in more ways than we habitually tend to think. Human beings are dependent on and connected to the natural world, but when it comes to human society we are the creators. This means that we have more power than we realise to change it.

The emerging future will be co-created by all of us. The world is learning to come together in new ways and each of us has a vital role to play. Emerge is a place where all are called forth to bring our gifts to the greater circle.

Across the world, there are hundreds of initiatives, projects and persons who are already tackling real world problems from this place of deeper awareness. Our aim is to bring awareness to this growing movement and connect the dots between the people and projects contributing to this emergence.

This is a time of profound collaboration and we see you as a vital part of this mission. We’d love to weave your voice and vision into all that is being created and keep you updated on the launch of new projects, events and initiatives around the world.
Text from http://www.whatisemerging.com/about

Spirituality and Practice

This multifaith and interspiritual website, founded by Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, is devoted to resources for spiritual journeys. The site’s name reflects a basic understanding: spirituality and practice are the two places where all the world’s religions and spiritual paths come together. While respecting the differences among traditions, we celebrate what they share in common.

Launched in 2006, Spirituality & Practice consolidates nearly 50 years of the work of co-directors Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat and their various publications and projects, including Cultural Information Service, Living Room Learning, Values & Visions, and the Spiritual Literacy Project. A small but devoted staff has joined the Brussats to add new types of content and voices to the website.

CIStems, Inc., the nonprofit organization behind Spirituality & Practice, was originally organized in 1972 with the purpose of increasing positive uses of the arts/media by religious and community groups. Publications included reviews of books, films, and TV programs, providing insights on their deeper meanings and ways to use them for lifelong learning by teachers, preachers, and community leaders. Special projects included Viewer’s Guides to TV programs and Values & Visions Discussion Guides to movies and books.

Berkana Institute

The Berkana Institute and our partners share the clarity that whatever the problem, community is the answer. We prepare for an unknown future by creating strong & sustainable relationships, by wisely stewarding the earth’s resources and by building resilient communities. We rely on our experience that most human beings are caring, generous and want to be together. We have learned that people can get through anything as long as we’re together. Berkana was founded in 1991 to create communities of support and inquiry for those working to create a future of promise and possibility that benefits all people. We are based in the U.S. and operate as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.

We work from an evolving, coherent theory of change. Since 1991, we have been learning from life (living systems) about how to create systems that are interdependent, adaptive and resilient. Everything we do is a conscious experiment to better understand two of life’s robust capacities: self-organization–life’s process for creating order (effectiveness) without control, and emergence–life’s means for creating system-wide change, taking things to scale. Read Lifecycle of Emergence: Using Emergence to Take Social Innovation to Scale by Margaret Wheatley and Deborah Frieze.

We work at the level of community. The Berkana Institute works in partnership with a rich diversity of people around the world who strengthen their communities by working with the wisdom and wealth already present in their people, traditions and environments. Berkana and our partners share the clarity that whatever the problem, community is the answer. We prepare for an unknown future by creating strong and sustainable relationships, by wisely stewarding the earth’s resources and by building resilient communities. We rely on our experience that most human beings are caring, generous and want to be together. We have learned that human beings can get through anything as long as we’re together.

We focus on four key activities. In many ways, Berkana’s work is quite straightforward. We name trailblazing leaders and communities, connect them to one another, nourish them with relationships, learning, resources, and support, and illuminate their stories as important examples of the future taking place right now

Center for Ecozoic Studies

From its beginning in 2000, the Center for Ecozoic Studies (from 2011 to 2017, known as the Center for Ecozoic Societies) has been concerned with the integration of the human world in the natural world. “Integrate,” as used here, means to make whole by bringing all the components of Earth’s community of life together in a coherent and mutually enhancing manner. This is first and foremost an ecological challenge, but it cannot occur without cultural changes and changes in human relations.

Our work has been inspired and guided by Thomas Berry’s vision and insight. Berry taught that the primary flaw in human development is the radical discontinuity between humans and other modes of being. He also taught that human activity has disrupted major life patterns and systems such that we are bringing to an end the Cenozoic era in Earth’s history. For there to be a hopeful future, we need to bring into being an “Ecozoic era.” Bringing this into being, he called “the Great Work” of our time, one surpassed by no other great work given to humans in history. To accomplish the Great Work will mean re-inventing the human and establishing a new intimacy with the natural world.

Our work involves teaching, translating, further developing and applying these ideas. We see the movement into the Ecozoic era as involving a transition from economic-industrial societies (including the visions, understandings and ways of relating in these societies) to ecological-cultural (ecozoic) societies. Thus, our mission is to offer new ideas and new ways of living for an ecological-cultural age.

We divide our work into four main areas described elsewhere in this website:

  • Publications
  • Education
  • Events, and
  • Action

This is our expanded mission statement:

The mission of CES is to advance new ideas and new ways of living for an ecological-cultural (ecozoic) age, through publications, education, arts, and action. CES emphasizes critical reflection, story and shared dream experience as ways of enabling the creative advance needed to bring into being a new mode of human civilizational presence, and also of discerning the practical steps leading to the Ecozoic. CES understands the universe as meaningful, continuously evolving, and relational. In such a universe, the Ecozoic is not something to be arrived at, but something ever to be created. Its hallmarks are inclusiveness, interdependence, and appreciation; communion, differentiation, and subjectivity; and sensitivity, adaptability, and responsibility. It involves more just and cooperative relationships among humans, as well as transformed relationships of humans with the larger community of life.

Initiative Psychologie im Umweltschutz e.V.

Die Initiative Psychologie im Umweltschutz e.V. (IPU) ist ein bundesweiter Verein von Studierenden und Berufstätigen, die das Ziel der Förderung des Umweltschutzes mit den Mitteln der Psychologie verfolgen.

Freemasonry

Freemasonry is the oldest, largest and most widely recognized fraternal organization in the world. Founded in London, England in 1717, its current worldwide membership totals 3.6 million members, 1.6 million of which are in North America. With 120,000 Masons and 530 local Lodges, Ohio has one of the largest Masonic memberships of any state in the country.

As a fraternal organization, Freemasonry unites men of good character who, though of different religious, ethnic, or social backgrounds, share a belief in the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of mankind.

The traditions of Freemasonry are founded upon the building of King Solomon’s Temple, and its fraternal ceremonies use the working tools of the stonemasons to symbolize moral lessons and truths. For example, Masons are reminded at Lodge to “meet upon the level of equality, act by the plumb of uprightness, and part upon the square of virtue.”

Like most organizations, one will get out of Freemasonry what he is able to put into it. However, membership in Freemasonry is not meant in any way to interfere with an individual’s commitment to his faith, family, or occupation. Freemasonry is not and never can be a replacement for these important institutions, but rather it is a positive environment that reminds every Mason of his duty to God, his community, his family and himself.

Freemasonry provides opportunities for sincere, honest, forthright men who believe in God and desire to contribute to the improvement of their communities and themselves. Through our Masonic Fraternalism, we reaffirm our dedication and unity to become involved citizens who have a strong desire to preserve the values that have made and continue to make America great.

UniverCity of Compassion

The UniverCity of Compassion (UCC) is a space for discovering and nourishing ideas for compassionate action, within the setting of a self-organized community of learning. The UCC is an initiative of Sadhana Forest, a reforestation project and conscious living community which offers the framework for collective learning. The term UniverCity comes from the understanding that living is learning.

As She Is

For years there was this deep sense of insecurity inside…or rather a wrongness about my existence that I did not know how to describe. I tried to live the values of the culture, follow the roadmap to success imparted to me through community, family and school. I was determined to be an “acceptable” kind of woman, even though I was obviously not. So I got educated, went into business, wore suits, thought rationally, competed against others and was successful for a time, but then my life fell apart.

I had been looking outside— in what I did, what I had, who I knew—for who I was, but it didn’t work. The best way to say it was the outside was not connected to the inside so I was living someone else’s idea of me (who I wonder?) I was not free and did not know how to live what I valued. I had no idea if there was a more natural way for me to be.

It became clear that the only way I could understand was to explore from the inside…to renounce what the culture valued and reconnect to my inner knowing. I now know this unknown inner dimension of myself as the feminine…. so I started with a simple question that guided my journey. What is the feminine?

I ask some remarkable people who embody these traits to find out how they would describe the feminine, to get a sense of how being connected to this part of themselves informs their lives and how it is lived in balance with their masculine aspect.

This is my personal inquiry, but I have a sense that this film is also about our collective journey towards wholeness because I am simply a microcosm of the macrocosm…and so are you.

Bhumi Project

The Bhumi Project is an international Hindu response to the environmental challenges facing our planet. It is facilitated by the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies in partnership with the GreenFaith.

The Bhumi Project stands for respect, compassion and service for our environment.

Our aims are:

  • To educate, inspire, inform, and connect Hindus interested in service to Mother Earth.
  • To develop long term sustainable plans for environmental care.
  • To build a base of global partners and friends who encourage best environmental practice.

Manitou Institute & Conservancy

the Manitou Institute & Conservancy’s greater mission is to: preserve and protect biodiversity in ecologically sensitive areas, conserve greenspace, protect watersheds, preserve and protect prehistoric and historic sites “sacred sites”, and land which has special recreational, scenic, agricultural, wildlife habitat, spiritual and/or environmental value, promote ecologically sound development and land use, by methods including but not limited to Covenants & Restrictions, Conservation Easements, an active Environmental & Architectural Team and Guidelines, work with local, county, state and federal agencies and other nonprofit organizations to protect and preserve the unique and important natural resources in this locale; to provide education and training opportunities to youth and adults to: promote Earth stewardship, community service, sustainable lifestyles, and appropriate technologies, and assist in preservation and promotion of indigenous culture and arts, ancient medicinal practices and the world’s religious and spiritual traditions; to study, research, preserve, protect, grow out, distribute, and provide education and networking about endangered, non-hybrid seed genes vital to the future food supply, and natural, medicinal plant species, which optimize human health and wellbeing; to network and maintain outreach systems, linking this organization with related projects, organizations, agencies and individuals; and to implement sustainable community housing models.

Balanced Rock

Yoga and Backpacking Trips in Yosemite. Yosemite journeys for mind, body and spirit. Our retreats and backpack trips harness the transformational power of nature to inspire deep connection with your own inner wisdom.

Refugia Retreats

Refugia acts as a catalyst for societal and personal change through retreats, workshops, spiritual direction, and community facilitation.

Spiral Ecology

Welcome to the website of SpiralEcology, a cultural transformation collaborative. We invite you to explore ‘deep ecology’, walking, and other workshops, where we invite you to connect more deeply with self, world, and Earth.

Reclaiming Our Lives, Reclaiming Our Earth – A WORKSHOP FOR WOMEN WORKING TOWARDS CONSCIOUSNESS

In these deeply polarized times, we feel the wounds on the body politic, the body of the earth, and our own bodies, all at once.  It is ever more important that we come together as women, allow all these wounds to breathe, and, finding their beauty as well as their pain, let them germinate into something entirely new, born to us and to our communities.

Every year we work with a myth or fairy tale, because tapping into archetypal wisdom deepens our understanding of ourselves and our world.  This year we will be examining the Norwegian tale Prince Lindworm, the tale of a queen who gives birth to boy twins, one human and one a serpent.  She conveniently puts the birth of the serpent twin out of her mind, and when he comes of age he challenges her entire kingdom to examine its “forgetfulness.”  The results are dramatic, and transformative.

Please join us at Menla Retreat Center (http://menla.us), Phoenicia, New York, April 3-8, 2018 where, through body work, dreamwork, meditation and the expressive arts, we will investigate what remains hidden in our unconscious and bring it to light, in the warm embrace of our women’s circle.  Please register at www.reclaimingourlives.com.  Scholarships are available for first-time attendees.

April 3-8, 2018

Active Hope: How to face the mess we’re in without going crazy

The book guides the reader through a transformational process informed by mythic journeys, modern psychology, spirituality and holistic science. This process equips us with tools to face the mess we’re in and play our role in the collective transition, or Great Turning, towards a life-sustaining society.

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.

Go Wild Institute

Go Wild Institute weaves science, myth  and spirit to awaken our Nature and find wonder and balance within the great web of life. We rekindle an innate sense of belonging to the natural world. We specialize in fun experiential programs that delve into Earth Wisdom, Ethnobotany and Deep Ecology for people of all ages and walks of life.

Myzel, Jen

Jen Myzel sings of personal and planetary healing. Medicinal music is a message from the heart of the world; it is a dance of the soul, a grieving love song for a world in crisis, and a celebration of the immense beauty that surrounds us right now.

Jen Myzel is both songstress and facilitator of The Work that Reconnects, whose themes are woven throughout the music. Her deepest prayer is to help heal self and world through song, live a simple life in harmony with nature, and inspire others to do the same.

 

 

Animas Valley Institute

The nature-based journey of soul initiation is the way
to personal revelation, visionary leadership,
and cultural regeneration.

The primary goal and method of all Animas programs is the encounter with soul. Founded in 1980 by wilderness guide and depth psychologist Bill Plotkin, the Institute is one of North America’s longest-standing organizations offering contemporary wilderness rites. “Animas” is plural for “souls” in Spanish. In Jungian psychology, the Anima is the Inner Woman in a man; the Animus, the Inner Man in a woman. The Anima and Animus refer to the mysterious energies within our psyches that guide us on the journey of descent to soul. Animas Valley Institute is located in southwest Colorado in the valley of El Rio de las Animas Perdidas — The River of Lost Souls.

Global Center for Indigneous Leadership and Lifeways

The Global Center for Indigenous Leadership and Lifeways (GCILL) is an informal umbrella created to support short-term and long-term projects that educate and inform people about indigenous ways of knowing and wisdom for modern times—spirituality that raises human consciousness and harmonious relationship with Mother Earth.

Parliament of the World’s Religions

We live in a world of difference. Yet, we are interdependent. Nowhere is learning to live with difference more important than religion.

Too often, religion is misused as an instrument for division and injustice, betraying the very ideals and teachings that lie at the heart of each of the world’s great traditions. At the same time, religious and spiritual traditions shape the lives of billions in wise and wonderful ways. They gather people in communities of shared beliefs and practices. When these diverse communities work in harmony for the common good, there is hope that the world can be transformed.

Over the years, the Council has initiated dialogues and nurtured relationships among people of difference. In doing so the Parliament has provided a framework for expressing many visions of a just, peaceful and sustainable future. In the process, religious and spiritual communities have discovered a shared commitment to ethical principles.

This shared commitment has opened the way for a new era of cooperative action among the world’s religious and spiritual communities as well as civil and political societies. The well-being of the Earth and all life depends on this collaboration.

Fox Institute for Creation Spirituality

Honoring all of creation as Original Blessing, Creation Spirituality integrates the wisdom of Eastern and Western spirituality and global indigenous cultures with the emerging scientific understanding of the universe and the passion of creativity. It is both a tradition and a movement, celebrated by mystics and agents of social change from every age and culture.

Edinburgh Institute for Advanced Learning

EIAL offers education and sponsorship for learning opportunities in applied spirituality, that is, the application of spiritual practice and experience to everyday life: peace studies, ecology and psychology.

 

For further information see abwoon network.

 

 

Ecological Citizen

Rather than dominating and parasitizing the biosphere, with non-human life harmed and ever-increasingly hemmed in by humans’ industrial development, an ecological civilization would thrive within a preserved and restored expanse of unfragmented wild nature.

Profound changes are called for. Indeed an entirely new historical course is needed. Changes to be explored in depth include the following:

● achieving large-scale protection, restoration and rewilding of air, land and water;

● rejecting the anthropocentric construction of nature as resources;

● designing and implementing steady-state economies;

● reassessing the connections between cultures and bioregions;

● superseding the paradigm of consumerism;

● stabilizing and then lowering our global population;

● increasing the sustainability of urban living;

● rethinking food production.

We also consider necessary changes in ways of thinking and consciousness. In particular we welcome new natural and cultural narratives and cosmological stories that awaken us to Earth’s sacredness, celebrate its abundant and diverse life, and rekindle humanity as a plain citizen of the ecosphere.

Mother Pelican – A Journal of Solidarity and Sustainability

INTEGRAL HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

Integral human development includes all dimensions in the life of each person, including the physical, intellectual, pyschological, ethical, and spiritual dimensions. In particular, the spiritual development of each and every human person is crucial for sustainable development. It is recognized that spiritual growth is impossible for people living in misery. However, the extreme poverty of many is mostly a consequence of the spiritual underdevelopment of people living in abundance. Therefore, the mission of Mother Pelican encompasses the full range of social and ecological justice issues, but is specifically focused on how they relate to spirituality and the practices of various religious traditions. Gender inequalities that emerge from religious patriarchy are explored as major obstacles to integral human development, solidarity, and sustainability.

Ökologie und Humanität im Anthropozän

ÖKOLOGIE UND HUMANITÄT IM MENSCHENZEITALTER
Der Mensch und seine Aktivitäten werden zunehmend zu einem bestimmenden Faktor in der geo-biologischen Entwicklung der Erde. In existenziellen Aspekten übersteigen die menschliche Eingriffstiefe und deren Folgen erkennbar die natürliche, von der Evolution bedingte Dynamik. In der Fachwelt wird deshalb derzeit der von Paul Crutzen eingebrachte Vorschlag diskutiert, ob das Erdzeitalter des Holozän durch das Zeitalter des Anthropozän abzulösen ist. In der Öffentlichkeit findet dieser Vorschlag zunehmend Aufmerksamkeit.
Zugleich bleiben die Menschen unauflöslich Teil der äußeren Natur und in die Naturzusammenhänge eingebunden. Sie unterliegen unaufhebbar den Naturgesetzen. Sind die modernen Ansprüche von Freiheit und Humanität dauerhaft mit den Gesetzmäßigkeiten der Evolution vereinbar? Ist der Mensch überhaupt fähig, das Erdsystem verantwortlich zu erhalten und zu steuern?
Damit ergibt sich die Notwendigkeit, das Verhältnis von Humanität und Ökologie neu zu bestimmen: Was bedeutet das Anthropozän für die Zukunft humanistischer Werte und Gesellschaftsformen?
Vielfältige Fragen zum gesellschaftlichen Naturverhältnis stellen sich, die die Entgegensetzung von Humanität und Natur hinter sich lassen: Was ist eine Ökologie des Menschen? Was bedeutet Menschlichkeit, das uns Menschen Gemäße, bezogen auf die Ko-Evolution von Pflanze, Tier und Mensch? Wieviel spontan sich entwickelnde und wirkende Natur braucht, wünscht oder duldet der Mensch? Wie abhängig ist er vom Boden?
Welche Herausforderungen bringt das Anthropozän für die jetzt beginnende Große Transformation zu einer postfossilen nachhaltigen Entwicklung mit sich? Welche Arten von Techniken können dabei eine Rolle spielen? Wie weit müssen wir ihnen vertrauen oder sie fürchten?
Alle an diesen Fragen Interessierten sind herzlich nach Tutzing eingeladen; Fachleute der unterschiedlichen Disziplinen ebenso wie Multiplikatorinnen, Engagierte und Neugierige. Kommen Sie zum Austausch und zum Feiern in die Akademie!
Menschenzeitalter, gestalten wir es in human-ökologischer Perspektive.
http://www.ev-akademie-tutzing.de/veranstaltung/oekologie-und-humanitaet-im-anthropozaen/

Buddha-Stiftung für säkularen Buddhismus

Die Buddha-Stiftung möchte Menschen die zentralen und ursprünglichen Einsichten des Buddhismus und deren praktische Anwendung im Leben in einer verständlichen Form zugänglich machen.

Das Fundament bildet dabei die Idee des „säkularen Buddhismus“, d.h. einem Verständnis des Buddhismus als Möglichkeit einer Lebenspraxis , die ohne kulturhistorisch entstandene Dogmen oder Glaubensinhalte auskommt.

Die Buddha-Stiftung fördert Angebote buddhistischer Meditation als Alltagspraxis, insbesondere als Methode zur Entwicklung von Einsicht, Achtsamkeit, Offenheit und zur Bewältigung von Stress im Alltag.

Die Buddha-Stiftung fördert den Dialog zwischen Buddhismus, Philosophie, Wissenschaft, Kunst und Religionen sowie den Dialog zwischen den verschiedenen buddhistischen Traditionen.

Die Buddha-Stiftung fördert wissenschaftliche Forschung zur Wirkungsweise von Meditation in der medizinischen Therapie.

Die Buddha-Stiftung fördert humanitäre Projekte im In- und Ausland.

Gegründet von Dr. Jochen Weber und Dr. Regina Tröscher-Weber 2002.

FORUM “DAS WIR-POTENZIAL. INNOVATION DURCH EMPATHIE”

ICH oder WIR? Unsere Fähigkeit zur Empathie spielt auf dem Weg zu einem anderen, humaneren Kapitalismus eine Schlüsselrolle. Der Homo oeconomicus, eingespannt in die Pole von Selbstsucht und Mitleid, kann an sich arbeiten und sein Mitgefühl gezielt trainieren – zum Wohle der Gemeinschaft und zum Wohle der Gesamtwirtschaft. HEED, das von der Karl Schlecht Stiftung geförderte Institute for Human Engineering & Empathic Design der Hochschule Pforzheim, nimmt diese Thematik auf: In dem öffentlichen Forum „Das Wir-Potenzial. Innovation durch Empathie“ am 12. und 13. April 2018 beleuchten führende Vertreter aus Wissenschaft, Wirtschaft und Kultur das Thema Empathie facettenreich.

Mit:
Matthias Bolz, Psychologe und Labor Manager für soziale Neurowissenschaft am Max-Planck-Institut für Kognitions- und Neurowissenschaften in Leipzig

Robert Eikmeyer, Wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter für Kunst- und Designtheorie an der Hochschule Pforzheim

Uwe Jean Heuser, Leiter des Wirtschaftsressorts der ZEIT und Autor von “Humanics”

Wolfgang Henseler, Professor für intermediales Design an der Hochschule Pforzheim und Managing Creative Director von SENSORY-MINDS

Robert Besta, Schauspieler, verkörpert in Serien wie Tatort und Polizeiruf 110 häufig das Böse

Eva Köppen, Beraterin für ko-kreative und mensch-zentrierte Innovationsprozesse und Autorin von “Empathy by Design”

Fritz Breithaupt, Professor an der Indiana University Bloomington und Autor von “Kulturen der Empathie” und “Die dunklen Seiten der Empathie”

Das Forum findet in der Aula der Fakultät für Gestaltung, Holzgartenstraße 36, 75175 Pforzheim statt. Für externe Gäste fällt eine Tagungsgebühr in Höhe von 250,- € an. Studierende und Angehörige von Hochschulen sind frei. Um Anmeldung bis 2. April 2018 wird gebeten. Details zum Programm und zur Anmeldung unter HEED.

 

https://www.hs-pforzheim.de/forschung/institute/heed/aktuelles/detailansicht/news/forum_das_wir_potenzial_innovation_durch_empathie/

Education is the kindling of a flame: How to reinvent the 21st-century university

“Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.” This quote from Plutarch is as true today as it was two thousand years ago. Still, the misconception of education as a vessel-filling activity remains. In this column, I outline an idea that could reshape our universities while also prototyping new ways of addressing urgent societal challenges. The kindling of the flame that Plutarch talked about has never been more relevant than now.

Let’s start with 2017

Last week my column focused on 2017:

  • The year 2017 mirrored the epochal year 1917 by putting a new challenge in front of us: the challenge of vertical development.
  • By “vertical development” I mean the capacity to deal with disruptive change, which requires us to let go of the past and to let come the future, to shift our awareness from one state to another. In the language of tech: vertical development is about suspending your habit of installing yet another app and instead upgrading your entire operating system.
  • From that perspective we can interpret the current global surge of terrorism, fundamentalism, xenophobia, Trumpism, and autocracy as expressions of the same underlying phenomenon: the missing capacity as a society to respond to challenges in generative ways, by evolving ourselves “vertically,” by upgrading the way we listen and attend, the way we converse and think, and the way we organize and coordinate in the context of larger systems.

Last week I suggested that such an upgrade of our societal operating system (OS) should include advancing and transforming our economies, our democracies, and our education systems. It is the latter that I focus on in this column: how to how to reinvent our institutions of higher education through their transformation from an ivory-towered into a distributed eco-system for societal renewal.

Vertical Literacy: Addressing the Knowing-Doing Gap

The difficulties we have in meeting today’s global challenges, such as implementing the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) worldwide, are not caused by a knowledge gap. We have all the knowledge we need. The problem is a knowing-doing gap: a disconnect between our collective consciousness and our collective actions. In most societal systems we collectively create results that (almost) nobody wants. Examples: the ecological divide (the self-nature disconnect), the social divide (the self-other disconnect), and the spiritual divide (the self-self disconnect—that is, the disconnect between my current and my emerging future self).

These gaps and divides are amplified by the silo structure of our key institutions and the mindset of the decision makers that operate inside them. To address these issues at their root requires two things: new platforms for cross-sector co-creation and an upgrade in the operating system that people use to collaborate—practices that facilitate a shift from ego-system to eco-system awareness.

Figure 1 maps the landscape of options for such an operating system. In our research we have identified four different operating systems—in other words, four fields of attention that social systems can operate from: habitual, ego-systemic, empathic, eco-systemic.

Figure 1: Matrix of Vertical Social Evolution (Source: O. Scharmer, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.amazon.com/Essentials
BY KELVY BIRD
Figure 1: Matrix of Vertical Social Evolution (Source: O. Scharmer, The Essentials of Theory U)

Since I have presented the Matrix of Social Evolution in much more detail elsewhere, allow me here to stick to its essence: the matrix shows that we are stuck with our collective knowing-doing gap because we try to solve level 4 problems with an operating system that runs on OS 1.0, 2.0, or OS 3.0. But, as we learned from Einstein, you cannot solve problems at the same level of thinking and consciousness that created them.

The result of that mismatch is on display every single day: more problems lead to more felt pressure and frustrations, which lead to more destruction and “absencing” (to use the language of last week’s column), which in turn lead to more problems, felt pressure, frustrations, and so forth. That in a nutshell is our vertical development challenge: how to move from the vicious cycle of reacting to disruption powered by OS 1.0, 2.0, or 3.0 to a generative response that is powered by 4.0—that is, by a process of co-creating the future.

The lack of vertical literacy is the main problem in our universities and schools today. Talk to experienced CEOs and CPOs (chief people officers) of major companies and ask them what they need. They commonly say: people, teams, and leaders that can make our organization thrive in a world of VUCA (volatility, uncertainty, complexity, ambiguity). By that, I believe they mean people and capacities that can take their organization into the 4.0 world in which they respond to disruption by co-sensing and co-shaping the future. Then go to universities and talk to faculty and deans of management and engineering schools. Many, maybe most, are rather illiterate when it comes to vertical development. They think mostly in terms of horizontal development—for example, about adding another skill here or another app or course there. They do not think in terms of upgrading the entire educational OS—of our students, our learners, and our societal systems.

But if you think about it, if we follow Plutarch, I believe that the only reason universities exist in the first place is to provide vertical developmental literacy. Especially now. If you want the app, you just go to an online learning store like edx.org and get your free knowledge download. Done! You don’t need a physical university for that. The primary reason we have universities and other institutions of higher education today is to support the development of vertical literacy. That means creating a learning environment in which the learner can step into his or her highest future potential in the context of hands-on societal challenges. In our experience, this requires us, as learners, to upgrade the way we pay attention and listen, to upgrade the way we converse, dialogue, and think, to upgrade the way we organize and coordinate in the context of VUCA shaped environments. Everything else is secondary. Vertical literacy gives us the vocabulary and capacities to:

  • become a blackbelt in listening with our minds and hearts wide open
  • turn a conversation from debate to generative dialogue
  • shift organizational fields from competing silos to generative eco-systems
  • invent new coordination mechanisms that operate from shared awareness.

Ten Principles of the New University

How do we build vertical literacy at scale? Well, not by placing learners inside lecture halls. And also not by separating out humanities, social sciences, and STEM into separate universes. That much we know. What it will take is nothing less than a complete reinvention of schooling and higher ed based on a new set of principles. Here is a first cut at a list of core ideas:

(1) Co-initiate: Put the learner into the driver’s seat of profound societal change. The learner is not a consumer. She or he is a partner in making the world a better place.

(2) Co-sense: Move the outer place of learning from the lecture hall to the real world. This isn’t just about action learning but also includes immersion journeys to the global hotspots of societal renewal across cultures.

(3) Embodiment: Move the inner place of learning from the head to the heart, and from the heart to the hand. The essence of learning in this century revolves around activating the intelligence of the heart and then putting it to use in serving the needs of others and the whole.

(4) Science 2.0: Bend the beam of scientific observation back onto the observing self. At the intersection between the old, dying civilization and the one that is being born is the transformation of science. Science 2.0 must integrate first-, second-, and third-person data by bending the beam of observation back onto the observing self.

(5) Systems Thinking: Make the system see itself. Systems thinking is a core capacity of vertical literacy. Students must learn methods to make the system see itself.

(6) Systems Sensing: Make the system sense itself. This is the core capacity to unlock collective creativity. Learners must become literate in “aesthetics” in its original meaning (aistesis means to sense): the cultivation of all our senses.

(7) Systems Inversion: Transform the system through eco-system activation. All societal sectors go through similar institutional changes: from perpetuating systemic silos to cultivating generative social field in the context of their eco-systems. Learners need to be literate in facilitating this shift.

(8) Know Thyself: To create vertical developmental literacy, we need to integrate science, social change, and self. Deepening our self knowledge requires us to access not only the intelligence of the open mind (curiosity), but also the intelligences of the open heart (compassion), and open will (courage).

(9) Tend the Fire: To patiently elicit and draw out the unique qualities and expression of each person with perseverance and in support of his or her highest possible future.

(10) The Fourth Teacher: Use nature and social fields as gateways. The Reggio Emilia approach is known for seeing the environment as the third teacher. Building on that we see the cultivation of profound learning relationships to nature and to social fields as gateways to the deeper sources of knowing (”the fourth teacher”).

Five Building Blocks

How can we build a 21st-century university that embodies these principles of vertical literacy, i.e., of awareness-based systems change? The answer will vary across contexts, cultures, and geographies. But in our experiments we have found the following five building blocks to be critical (Figure 2).

Figure 2: The 21st-Century University: Five Building Blocks
BY KELVY BIRD
Figure 2: The 21st-Century University: Five Building Blocks

(1) Cross-Sector Innovation Labs

Create cross-sector Innovation Labs that bring together key stakeholders and innovators who need each other in order to evolve the system they operate within. With our colleagues and partners, we have refined a lab process that generates remarkable results.

(2) Cross-Intelligence Capacity Building

Create massive online-to-offline mechanisms for complementing the labs and building the deeper capacities at scale (that means at marginal costs close to zero). With the u.lab MOOC we have prototyped a mechanism that combines the democratization of access to knowledge with the activation of the deep learning cycle. Some of the early key learnings from u.lab, which has attracted more than 100,000 registered participants from 185 countries since its launch in 2015, can be found here.

(3) Awareness-Based Action Research: Deep Data Imaging

Although “big data” has been useful in many parts of our daily lives, the algorithms that increasingly shape our reality have also became a liability that undermines some of society’s foundations (as discussed in last week’s column). We need to progress from big data to deep data. By deep data I mean data that advance vertical literacy by making us look at ourselves in a mirror, individually and collectively, by making us aware of our own patterns and blind spots, by making us see ourselves through the eyes of another or of the whole. An example of big data is your Facebook feed: Facebook filters out all news that it thinks does not match your world view (i.e., it keeps us stuck in our own echo chambers). Examples of deep data mirroring are the case clinics and global mindfulness practices described in the u.lab link above.

This New World
The current capitalist system is broken. Get updates on our progress toward building a fairer world.

Another mechanism for generating deep data (i.e., data that help us to see ourselves and to deepen our awareness) that we have developed over the past decade is Social Presencing Theater (SPT). SPT practices help complex stakeholder groups to see themselves and their evolutionary patterns through the mirror of the whole, thereby shifting their individual consciousness from ego-system to eco-system awareness. We are now working to develop SPT as a research methodology that allows people to visualize and understand the deep (and mostly invisible) structures of social change. We see the potential for SPT “scans” to do for social field research over the next decade what MRI scans did for mindfulness and neuroscience over the past decade.

(4) A Community of Eco-System Catalysts

The fourth building block deals with people. The best concept is worth nothing if the faculty do not embody these new forms and the principles of student-centered learning. The requirements of today’s tenure-track system put faculty on pathways that keep them far from the experiences that are most relevant to reinventing the type of education described here. We need a new faculty track for reflective practitioners who are more deeply involved in major projects of societal transformation and who can share their knowledge-in-action with students while also helping learners deepen their own capacities for embodied knowing.

(5) Places, Platforms, and Practices for Making the System Sense Itself

The fifth building block concerns places, platforms, and core practices. The piece most needed here is places: high-quality spaces that are designed and structured to build vertical literacy.

Figure 2 summarizes these five building blocks that, if put into place, could prototype and accelerate the journey of higher ed institutions toward 4.0 worldwide—a journey that in many microcosms of higher ed has already begun to take shape.

Five Bold Initiatives to Actualize the New University

While I have been holding the vision of such a new university for some years, it is only now that I feel it is completely doable. To advance the journey toward realizing it, we—the core team of the u.lab and Presencing Institute community—will launch five major initiatives throughout 2018.

(1) 4.0 Labs: Co-shaping the Future by Activating Generative Fields

We will convene 4.0 Labs at both the country and the regional level. We are currently working with the government of the Netherlands and Scotland on prototyping a country-level lab. We intend to launch the European 4.0 Lab in June 2018. Each of these 4.0 Labs will co-define its own focus at the outset. With the United Nations Development Group (UNDG) we are discussing how to use 4.0 Labs to accelerate the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) on a country level.

The key idea of all these labs is very simple: the next wave of innovation in food, farming, finance, health, learning, and leadership will be highly interrelated and sourced from a shared co-creative 4.0 territory (see Figure 3 below). Since no one can do this alone, we need to create cross-sectional infrastructures that support these initiatives on that journey.

Figure 3: Four Evolutionary Stages: From 1.0 to 4.0 (Source: O. Scharmer, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.amazon.com/Esse
BY KELVY BIRD
Figure 3: Four Evolutionary Stages: From 1.0 to 4.0 (Source: O. Scharmer, The Essentials of Theory U)

(2) u.lab 2x: Transforming Our Economy

Our second initiative will be launched in March 2018. A joint eco-system of sites and platforms among HuffPost and PI will capture and share the new economic narrative that is shifting the economy from ego to eco. Starting in April, each month our online platform will present inspiring, interactive, 60-minute live-broadcasts. Between the monthly live sessions we will hold global community cafés where change makers from across sectors, systems, and cultures can join the conversation. These will incorporate video-based discussions in small breakout groups and help us to move from traditional media and social media to more interactive and engaging forms of conversation, and from there to globally distributed ways of co-generating future media that change the world for the better.

(3) Social Field Research Summer School

The third initiative focuses on launching a research project that blends SPT practices, , and data-driven third-person research to investigate the deep structures of social fields. The focus in 2018 will be on establishing the research group and integrating these methodologies. Starting in 2019 an annual Berlin Summer School for Social Field Research will invite 50 leading awareness-based action researchers from around the world to work with each other and with senior thought leaders and investigators in their fields. The intention is to run the Berlin Summer School for 10 years in order to do for awareness-based field research what the Mind and Life Institute did for mindfulness and neuroscience: establish a new domain of research and replicate it worldwide.

(4) Eco-system Catalyst Masterclass

The fourth initiative, the masterclass for eco-system catalysts, will target the most advanced practitioners and activators of social eco-systems of innovation in order to help them advance their skills, mirror and support each other on their journey of Self, and interweave their respective innovation ecologies across regions, sectors, and cultures. This masterclass will be a year-long journey limited to 50 participants. The first cohort will start its journey in Boston in October 2018. As a group they will activate and cultivate a globally distributed innovation ecology. From that group we expect a new breed of young faculty to emerge who are literate across all of the intelligences discussed above.

(5) u.school

The fifth initiative focuses on upgrading our place- and web-based infrastructures to better serve the evolving needs of our rapidly growing global community. One key focus is on finding physical campus areas for all of the above (which together will constitute the “u.school”). The first conversations for such a campus are happening in Berlin. The longer term intention is to establish campus areas in all major cultures and geographies. These u.school campuses will partner with multiple universities to co-deliver a curriculum in vertical societal literacy across all system levels (Figure 1 matrix) and then create open source resources that allow for the replication of this curriculum in universities worldwide.

Figure 4: Actualizing the New University: Five Initiatives
BY KELVY BIRD
Figure 4: Actualizing the New University: Five Initiatives

Reinventing the Idea of the University

The classical university was based on the unity of research and teaching. The modern university has been based on the unity of research, teaching, and application. The emerging 21st-century university, I believe, will be based on the unity of research, teaching, and civilizational renewal. To transform higher education into its most advanced evolutionary state requires nothing less than a full inversion of its traditional discipline structure toward 4.0 ways of innovating and learning.

The purpose of education is not to fill vessels. It’s also not to spurn people who diligently rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic. The purpose of the 21st-century education and university is to help us develop what matters most: vertical literacy—the capacity to sense and actualize our highest future possibility in the face of disruption.

All the elements for making this happen at scale already exist. By connecting them we can activate a vibrant global eco-system of 4.0 Labs, place-based hubs, change maker communities, research initiatives, distributed media producers, and eco-system catalysts—in short, a living ecology that can protect the flame that Plutarch was talking about and that we need to pass on from one generation to the next. For it is this flame—the flame of the creative human spirit—that at no point in the history of our planet has been so at risk, so attainable, and so necessary for addressing our ecological, social, and spiritual divides. We need intentional places to kindle, cultivate and evolve that flame.

At the entrance to the Academy of Athens there was an inscription that said: Let no one enter here who does not know math and geometry. What should the inscription be at the entrance to the new university that we aspire to create today, 2,400 years later? Maybe it could read: Let no one enter here who does not know that the issues outside are a mirror of the issues inside; i.e., let no one enter here who is vertically illiterate. The new university comes into being—the flame is kindling—wherever and whenever we bend the beam of collective attention back onto ourselves, whenever we shift our awareness from ego to eco in order to regenerate our economic, democratic, and educational systems from that awareness and source.

Wisdom Together

We deeply believe that consciousness and ethical leadership are fundamental for global transformation. Conscious leaders have high levels of awareness, and act with compassion to share their knowledge, network and experience with others.They lead from an inner source of wisdom and authentic power, and can be found in any position in our societies.

Wilderness Torah

Wilderness Torah awakens and celebrates the earth-based traditions of Judaism to nourish the connections between self, community, earth, and Spirit.

We create pluralistic, multi-generational community celebrations to reconnect us to the earth-based traditions of Judaism.

Alliance for Sustainability and Prosperity

The world faces crises ranging from economic instability and growing inequality; energy, water and food shortages; global warming and loss of ecological integrity. These are all symptoms of a system that is unsustainable.

A global movement has formed to present the world with a new way of organizing ourselves, doing business, and rising to meet the crises. In July 2011, the United Nations issued a Resolution titled “Happiness: Towards a holistic approach to development” (65/309). Introduced by the Kingdom of Bhutan, co-sponsored by 68 countries and adopted by consensus, this resolution called on the nations of the world to shift from a development path of increasing GNP to one that ensures a path to wellbeing and happiness for all life.

Center for Whole Communities

Our work began on a hillside in Vermont in 2003, stewarded by the vision and hard work of founders Peter Forbes and Helen Whybrow. The manifestation of the retreat center and Whole Thinking program was made possible with the help of many people, specifically CWC’s founding board: Gil Livingston, John Elder, Danyelle O’Hara, Torri Estrada, Diana Wright and Scott Chaskey.

Based at Knoll Farm for over a decade, we hosted hundreds of people in our Whole Thinking retreats and workshops. Over time, we saw a need to evolve our mission and scope to serve people in diverse communities where they live, and to move beyond our bucolic space. We set out to explore doing our work in other parts of the country and began a conscious leadership transition that would allow the work to evolve with integrity to serve a more diverse constituency. Our 2006 statement on Land, Race, Power, and Privilege documents our aspirations to be a diverse, multicultural organization that served people across sectors, differences, and geographies.

In 2010 we developed our Breakthrough Vision which set in motion a transition of leadership and methodology to further diversify our organization and to better serve change-makers in working in urban, suburban and rural communities across the country.

Fueled by our new vision, Center for Whole Communities rapidly expanded our work from the hillside in Vermont to leading retreats and workshops in Washington D.C., New Mexico, Ontario, Colorado, Maine, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, California, Michigan, British Columbia and New Jersey, New Hampshire, Maryland, and New York City.  We have successfully evolved our work to engage more collaboratively with organizations and communities in the places where they live and work.

In the winter of 2015 we moved to our current office in Burlington, Vermont in the ecotone of the Burlington city-scape and the waters of Lake Champlain.

EcoDharma

The Eco-Dharma Centre is situated in a beautiful and wild part of the Catalan Pyrenees. We offer courses, events and retreats which support the realisation of our human potential and the development of an ecological consciousness honouring our mutual belonging within the web of life – drawing on the Buddhist Dharma and the emerging ecological paradigms of our time.

Our courses and retreats take place in a context of sustainable low-impact living, closely woven within the web of elemental nature. These meditation retreats, study seminars and training camps are intended to help people to empower themselves to make changes in themselves and the world consistent with a life-affirming vision.

We seek to develop practices which honour the inseparability of the transformation of the self and the world; to support the shift from a destructive industrial growth society to a life-affirming future; to contribute to the creation of a movement of renewal and resistance; to evolve spiritual practice where courageous compassion and a deepening realisation of our radical interconnectedness helps us to live in solidarity with life.

Naropa University

Trained as a Buddhist scholar and educated at Oxford University, Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche wanted to create a place where students could study Eastern and Western religions, writing, psychology, science, and the arts while also receiving contemplative and meditation training.

Hunecke, Marcel

Prof. Dr. Marcel Hunecke ist Umweltpsychologe. Interessengebiet unter anderem die Erforschung kontemplativer Praxis für Nachhaltigkeit.

Changes in materialism, changes in psychological well-being: Evidence from three longitudinal studies and an intervention experiment

Few studies have examined how changes in materialism relate to changes in well-being; fewer have experimentally manipulated materialism to change well- being. Studies 1, 2, and 3 examined how changes in materialistic aspirations related to changes in well-being, using varying time frames (12 years, 2 years, and 6 months), samples (US young adults and Icelandic adults), and measures of materialism and well-being. Across all three studies, results supported the hypothesis that people’s well-being improves as they place relatively less impor- tance on materialistic goals and values, whereas orienting toward materialistic goals relatively more is associated with decreases in well-being over time. Study 2 addition- ally demonstrated that this association was mediated by changes in psychological need satisfaction. A fourth, experimental study showed that highly materialistic US adolescents who received an intervention that decreased materialism also experienced increases in self-esteem over the next several months, relative to a control group. Thus, well-being changes as people change their relative focus on materialistic goals.

Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology

The Forum on Religion and Ecology is the largest international multireligious project of its kind. With its conferences, publications, and website it is engaged in exploring religious worldviews, texts, ethics, and practices in order to broaden understanding of the complex nature of current environmental concerns. The Forum recognizes that religions need to be in dialogue with other disciplines (e.g., science, economics, education, public policy) in seeking comprehensive solutions to both global and local environmental problems.

The objective of the Forum on Religion and Ecology at Yale University is to create a new academic field of study that has implications for environmental policy and environmental humanities.

From presence to consciousness through virtual reality

Immersive virtual environments can break the deep everyday connection between where our senses tell us that we are and where we actually are located and whom we are with. ‘Presence research’ studi es the phenomenon of acting and feeling that we are in the world created by computer displays. We argue that presence is a phenomenon worthy of study by neuroscientists and may help towards the study of consci ousness, since it may be regarded as consciousness within a restricted domain.

Psychology and consumer culture: The struggle for a good life in a materialistic world

Psychology and Consumer Culture provides an in-depth psychological analysis of consumerism that draws from a wide range of theoretical, clinical, and methodological approaches. The contributors to this edited volume demonstrate that consumerism and the culture that surrounds it exert profound and often undesirable effects on both people’s individual lives and on society as a whole. Far from being distant influences, advertising, consumption, materialism, and the capitalistic economic system affect personal, social, and ecological well being on many levels.

Authors address consumerism’s effect on everything from culture, ethnicity, and childhood development to consciousness, gender roles, identity, work stress, and psychopathology. Contributors provide a variety of potential interventions for counteracting the negative influence of consumerism on individuals and on society. The book makes a strong case that, despite psychology’s past reticence to investigate issues related to consumerism, such topics are crucial to understanding human life in the contemporary age.

The Center for Spirituality in Nature

The Center for Spirituality in Nature offers relaxed and engaging experiences in nature, which provide the time and space for those who want spiritual connection to be a more regular part of their lives.  We also offer a variety of resources and practices that help individuals and communities regularly explore, and respond compassionately to, our deep theological, spiritual and ecological connections with the earth, all its creatures and the Divine.

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.

Spiritual Ecology: New principles for addressing the ecological crisis

The calling for us to reconcile our relationship with the Earth, our common home which is in deep crisis, could not be more urgent. Moving beyond mainstream approaches, spiritual values can provide the foundation from which to respond and rebuild, and create real and lasting change. Join us for this special two day workshop!

Feb 24th 2018 ~ Feb 25th 2018

St. Ethelburga’s Centre

St. Ethelburga’s Centre for Reconciliation and Peace

St Ethelburga’s is a ‘maker of peacemakers’.

We inspire and equip individuals and communities to contribute, in their own particular contexts, to activating a global culture of peace.

They have a project called Spiritual Ecology:

“The ecological crisis also reflects something deeper and more intimate: a spiritual crisis — one of perspective, meaning, solidarity, and practice.  And therein, perhaps, lies not only our indictment, but our hope.” – Andrew Zolli

In a time of ecological unravelling and conflict, spiritual values have the potential to provide the foundation from which to respond, rebuild and reconcile our relationship with the earth, our common home.

Spiritual Ecology is an emerging field that joins ecology and environmentalism with a deeper awareness of the spirit, sacredness or divinity within all creation. It calls for responses to the environmental crisis that go beyond technological, political or economic solutions, but that create a deeper shift in our underlying beliefs, attitude and relationship with the earth. The five core values include: interconnectedness, reverence for nature, compassion, service and stewardship.

The Mindfulness Initiative

WEBSITE: The Mindfulness Initiative is a policy institute that grew out of a programme of mindfulness teaching in the UK Parliament. We now work with politicians around the world who practice mindfulness and help them to make capacities of heart and mind serious considerations of public policy.

The Mindfulness Initiative helped the Mindfulness All Party Parliamentary Group (MAAPG) carry out an inquiry into how mindfulness could be incorporated into UK services and institutions.

Bringing scientists, practitioners, commissioners of services and policymakers together in a series of Parliamentary events, the Mindful Nation inquiry held eight hearings on topics including the workplace, mental health, education, criminal justice and pain management. Working papers from these discussions served as the foundation for the Mindful Nation UK report, which summarises evidence-based recommendations.

KfW Stiftung

WEBSITE: Die KfW Stiftung ist eine operativ tätige Stiftung. Sie setzt sich mit den großen gesellschaftlichen Herausforderungen auseinander – Globalisierung, Umwelt- und Klimaschutz und demografischer Wandel.

Wir fördern Initiativen, die bestehende Muster aufbrechen, entwickeln Konzepte für alternatives Handeln und bieten Plattformen für grenzüberschreitenden Austausch. So schaffen wir Raum für anderes Denken, gestalten Vielfalt in Ökonomie, Ökologie, Gesellschaft und Kultur und übernehmen Verantwortung.

Nachhaltigkeit durch Achtsamkeit?

Nachhaltigkeit durch Achtsamkeit?, Vienna, Dienstag, 20. Juni 2017

WU Matters. WU Talks. Nachhaltigkeit durch Achtsamkeit? Über Mindfulness, Megatrends und Managementmoden
Infos & Anmeldung:

„Mindfulness“ ist in aller Munde. Weisen die vielen Diskussionen und Events zum Thema Achtsamkeit auf einen Megatrend hin? Oder haben wir es mit einer Modeerscheinung zu tun? Und warum ist das Thema für die Nachhaltigkeit relevant? Bei der 14. WU-NachhaltigkeitsKontroverse beleuchten hochkarätige Expertinnen und Experten diese und andere Fragen aus unterschiedlichen Perspektiven. Es geht um die Rolle von Achtsamkeit in Management, Personalführung und Nachhaltigkeit und gesellschaftstheoretische Perspektiven auf das Thema. Eine Übung und Interventionen werden einen direkten Einblick davon vermitteln, was Achtsamkeit praktisch bedeuten kann.

Diese NachhaltigkeitsKontroverse ist eine Kooperation des Kompetenzzentrums für Nachhaltigkeit mit der Executive Academy.

Vortragende:
– Karin Bauer, Der Standard
. Dr. Ingolfur Blühdorn, Institut für Gesellschaftswandel und Nachhaltigkeit, WU
– – Thomas Klien, Achtsamkeitstrainer
– . Michael Müller-Camen, PhD, Institut für Personalmanagement, WU
– Helga Pattart-Drexler, M.A., WU Executive Academy

Stiftung Weltethos für interkulturelle und interreligiöse Forschung, Bildung und Begegnung

WEBSITE: “Damit ein gutes und konstruktives Zusammenleben möglich ist, benötigen alle menschlichen Gemeinschaften eine Basis an Grundwerten, die sie teilen. Das gilt für die Familie, die Schule oder das Wirtschaftsunternehmen genauso wie für die Gesellschaft im Allgemeinen. Heute, in Zeiten des Internets, einer global agierenden Politik und Wirtschaft und zunehmend multikultureller Gesellschaften, braucht es einen Grundkonsens über Werte und Normen, der unabhängig von Kultur, Religion oder Nationalität gilt.

Die Idee eines Weltethos geht zurück auf den katholischen Theologen Hans Küng. Bei seinen empirischen Forschungen rund um den Globus stellte er fest, dass allen Weltreligionen und philosophisch-humanistischen Ansätzen bereits grundlegende Werte- und Moralvorstellungen gemeinsam sind. Die Goldene Regel beispielsweise, nach der man sich seinen Mitmenschen gegenüber so verhalten soll, wie man selbst behandelt werden möchte, findet sich in allen Traditionen wieder. Ebenso die Forderung, dass alle Menschen menschlich behandelt werden müssen und Werte wie Gewaltlosigkeit, Gerechtigkeit, Wahrhaftigkeit sowie Partnerschaft von Mann und Frau. Für unsere globale Gesellschaft muss ein solcher gemeinsamer Wertekanon also nicht erst entwickelt werden, denn er existiert bereits: Wir nennen ihn „Weltethos“. Jedoch muss dieser Wertekanon immer wieder neu bewusst gemacht, gelebt und weitergegeben werden.”

Netzwerk Achtsame Wirtschaft

WEBSITE: “Das Netzwerk Achtsame Wirtschaft e.V. (NAW) vermittelt und entwickelt das Potenzial buddhistischer Lehren für die verschiedensten Bereiche unserer Wirtschaft. Ausgangspunkt ist hierbei das Verständnis und die Schulung des eigenen Geistes. Zu diesem Zweck werden Seminare und Retreats durchgeführt, Publikationen verfasst und Initiativen ergriffen.

Im Netzwerk treffen sich Menschen, die nach sinnvollen Alternativen zum heutigen Wirtschaftssystem suchen, sich für Themen wie Achtsamkeit in der Arbeit, beim Konsum und im Umgang mit Geld interessieren und in ökonomische Zusammenhänge wirken.”

Icewisdom – Angaangaq der Schamane aus Grönland

WEBSITE: “Angaangaq ist ein Ältester der Eskimo-Kalaallit aus Westgrönland, der von seinem Volk in den höchsten Rang des Schamanen berufen wurde. Er ist seit vielen Jahren als traditioneller Heiler tätig. Sein Einsatz für Umwelt und indigene Themen führte ihn in über 60 Länder der Welt.”

Institute for Studies in Happiness, Economy and Society

WEBSITE: “As long as the current structures of society and economy depend on “growth,” however, some people fear that a slowdown of economic growth could lead to social instability. Thus, at present almost all governments base their national policies on “economic growth” and “GDP growth.”

We are now at a point where humanity cannot avoid facing the“dilemma of economic growth.” If we do not continue to pursue economic growth in our current economic and social systems, we will have instability of employment and livelihoods. On the other hand if we consider the real limits to the Earth’s energy and other resources, ability to absorb carbon, and so on, we know that we cannot continue forever with economic growth. In recent years, researchers, politicians, and others are taking up these topics in a big way.”

Mind & Life Institute

WEBSITE: Since the first Dialogue with the Dalai Lama, Mind & Life has held 32 others that bring together scientists and contemplatives on a wide range of critical subjects: addiction, ecology, ethics, attention, neuroplasticity, destructive emotions, altruism, economics, and more. Additionally, over the past 26 years, Mind & Life’s work has extended beyond the Dialogues. The Institute has become a direct funder of individual research via its grant and scholarship programs. It convenes an annual Summer Research Institute, as well as the field’s marquee biennial conference: the International Symposium for Contemplative Studies. In the process, Mind & Life has become more than just a leader in the field of contemplative science; it has become an incubator for discovery in all of the fields this new science touches.

Travers, Melody

My mission is to promote human flourishing. The last several years my research in philosophy and sustainability has focused on how our inner lives affect our actions, and how contemplative practices can help to positively influence how we interact with and transform our human systems. I am fascinated by that mysterious interplay between the individual and the larger social and institutional structures. The ecological crisis reveals fundamental flaws in the way we relate to one another and our environment. It is also by definition a turning point, an opportunity for us to develop a symbiotic relationship with the earth and each other.