Wed, July 3, 2013: Creative Dreaming: Take Control of Your Sleeping World

This coming Wednesday, join us at the Living Centre form 7pm-9pm for a workshop: Creative Dreaming: Take Control of Your Sleeping World, presented by myself, Rob Read, as part of the Inner Transition group.

This workshop, based strongly on the work of Patricia Garfield, will be a practical session that teaches you basic techniques to:

1. Remember your dreams

Everyone has them (4-5 per night), and remembering them is a learned technique that can be practiced until achieved.

2. Control the content of your dreams

Guide what you'll dream about, control nightmares, get creative insights.

3. Become lucid in your dreams

Advanced control in realtime as you realize you are dreaming, but instead of waking, influence what's happening in your dream. 

Through group exercises, we'll then bring together these insights to address how our dreams can assist us during this time of transition from 'business as usual' to a future lower on petroleum resources, but higher on working together in communities to enrich local economies and lifestyles, and working with and protecting our ecosystems.

I read Patricia Garfield's book Creative Dreaming about 15 years ago, and it's one of those rare books that has stuck with me in a very clear way over the years. This workshop won't be about interpreting dreams (which, I believe, is best done by the person dreaming the dream), but will give an overview of Garfield's research on creative dreaming, and the techniques she suggests. With audience participation, we'll tie this into the Transition model, and leave the workshop with ideas for  'homework' dreams to work towards.

EcoFest 2013

The Great Canadian EcoFest, in Komoka, on June 23rd, 2013 was a really cool event. I didn't count, but I 'm guessing there were over 40 vendors, as well as native dances, live music, and a raptor show. 

We met lots of people at the Transition Middlesex booth, at which we had a raffle for John Seymour's The Self-Sufficient Life, and How to Live It, and a silent auction for a Pineapple Guava plant. The night before, Julie and I scrambled to put together the content for the display board that someone was nice enough to give us for free at a yard sale, and Robin and Wendy graciously talked to people and shared info about what Transition is at the booth. Did I mention there were free buttons that Jeremiah made? 

My son's favourite part, by far, was these steam-powered trains that you could ride behind - tucked in behind the railway museum (by the Komoka Community Centre). They'll be giving rides on them on Canada Day too...don't miss it!

The Power of Just Doing Stuff...

Rob Hopkins, co-founder of the Transition Movement, has just released a new book called The Power of Just Doing Stuff.   Here is a link to a short inspirational video that contains some ideas rooted in Transition on how some communities are just doing stuff...
THE POWER OF JUST DOING STUFF

Companion Planting Guide

Our best way to transition is to sustain ourselves...

Lorenna and Shantree of The Living Centre with Sophy Banks

I was inspired to share the notes I took at the talk given by Sophy Banks from the Inner Transition group of Transition Totnes.  I had the pleasure of attending her talk last night at The Living Centre for a wonderfully inspiring dialogue.  Here are some of the most salient points, according to me:
There are four stories of how our future will unfold.
1. We will continue on with 'Business as usual'
2. We will experience a collapse of our culture as we know it
3. We will achieve some sort of 'green stability' where we rise to the challenge of inventing technologies to maintain things similarly to how we currently live
4. Transition will occur, and we will design our way down.

Some of these options are not viable...business cannot carry on as usual when oil reserves are dwindling.  Green sustainability is also not viable due to existing inequalities within our society.  We live in a psychologically confusing time, where we experience aspects of each of these stories at the same time within ourselves.  Inner Transition is all about how to sustain ourselves during this tumultuous time in history.

Sophy also discussed the how process of change that happens.  Although the following are numbered, they can occur in a different order or simultaneously:
1. Wake up call
2. Emotional Meltdown
3. Learning more and making meaning of it all
4. Identity shift
5. Renegotiating relationships
6. Be with others who have made the shift to Transition
7. Learn new skills and plan for change.

Transition is about VISIONING our future.  How do we see our future in 20 years time?  With that in mind, Transition gives us a framework to build something together, right now without having to wait for anyone else!  Transition is about looking for solutions rather than wallowing in the problems.   There is a lot of power at the community level of scale.

We operate best when we are open to give and receive information.  So how do we achieve and maintain this openness?  Sophy summed it up in 5 main categories:
1. Being connected
2. Having a sense of empowerment
3. Safety
4. Being valued
5. Being well resourced (eg. books, people, healthy diet)

She spoke about burnout...something which doesn't often get discussed in public forums.  Transition  is about seeing parallel proxesses across all levels of scale...and she sees what happens to individuals who burn out as a reflection of what is happening 'out there' on a global scale.  The world's problems find a way to 'come right in' so that we can learn about it.  The goal is to have the awareness to both notice ourselves being caught in a belief system and creating space around it in order to make positive changes.

She also brought brainstorming done by Inner Transition groups across the globe about what Inner Transition is all about.  The following is the condensed list from her surveys:
-Personal resilience
-Effective groups
-Difference (diversity and inclusion)
-Reconnecting to nature
-Happiness
-Supporting each other
-Celebrations
-Peace and conflict
-Change
-Psychology and the unconscious
-Spirituality

Her advice: Stay present, stay grounded in the changes...uncertainty is going to intensify.  When people shine a light in the face of change, others will flock to it.

OLLAS: More on Passive Irrigation

Here is a video that has more information on clay pot irrigation or Ollas:

Great Canadian EcoFest on June 23 in Komoka

EcoFest on June 23

Mark your calendars - the Great Canadian EcoFest is Sunday, June 23 from 10am-5pm, at the Komoka Community Centre and it sounds like a great event. Numerous vendors of eco-friendly products, and local groups concerned with ecological issues.

Stop by the Transition Middlesex table to enter your name for a copy of John Seymour's classic book on Self Sufficiency, and/or put down a bid in a silent auction for a Pineapple Guava tree (donated by Artemisia's Forest Garden Nursery).

Meeting next week

In other news, we have a meeting next week, Wed June 19, at the Coldstream Community Centre at 7pm. Val will be leading the group through a needs and yields assessment, which sounds really fun.

 

Burdock stem.

  Weed-eater tip of the day

In other other news, in our neck of the woods (southwestern Ontario), it is presently the perfect time to hack the stem off that huge burdock you missed eating the root of last year. In their second year of life, burdock (aka 'Turkey Rhubarb' - that very large leafed weed that produces the famously velcro-y burrs of the fall season), push up a long flower stalk. Catch it before it flowers, hack it off at the bottom, hack off all the side leaves and stems, and you're ready to do something with it.

This is my first season trying the stems (the roots are delicious), and I'm planning to use a recipe from Fergus the Forager, which is burdock and potato cakes. He also talks about making syrup and candied burdock stems, but that's getting a bit much for me at the moment. I've already gathered three stalks, and the sap smells amazing (though warning, it does brown the hands a bit).

Behavioural Science Takes on Climate Change...

Great TED talk about how to use behavioural science to reduce energy consumption.  Worth the 8 minutes to watch:

Heart & Soul - Inner Transition with Sophy Banks

A special guest from England, and one of the founders of the first Heart and Soul or Inner Transition groups as part of Transition Town Totness, Sophy Banks will be presenting at the Living Centre (just south of London) at 7pm on Monday, June 17th. The cost to participate is $15. 

This is a great opportunity, especially if you can't make Sophy's two day workshop in Guelph on June 19 and 20th, which if you can make it - do it.

Her talk will be about Inner Transition - why it's a key piece of the puzzle, how it links what happens inside us, or in our groups or relationships with the patterns of the bigger systems.

There will be time for interactive sessions - with lots of times for questions and shared discussion.

Sophy Banks 

In 2006 as Transition Town Totnes was coming into being Sophy co-founded the “Heart and Soul” group, addressing the psychological, spiritual and consciousness aspects of Transition. As the Totnes project grew she was involved in many areas of developing and running the organization. In 2007 she and Naresh set up Transition Training and started to offer the two day “Introduction to Transition”. A year later they took this workshop around the world travelling in 6 countries across 3 continents and visiting many Transition and other community projects along the way. Sophy’s current interest is in supporting, networking and resourcing Inner Transition groups around the movement.

Originally trained in science and engineering, Sophy worked in London for over 20 years as a computer trainer and systems consultant mainly in the voluntary sector. She retrained in inner work – psychotherapy, healing and family constellations – and set up a private practice as a therapist. In 2005 she realized she was too old to carry on slide tackling on the muddy football pitches of Hackney Marshes and moved to Devon, where she now roams the lanes, beaches and moors on foot or bike as often as Transition and the vegetable patch allow. 

Date: Monday June 17th.
Time: 7pm. 

Location: The Living Centre (5871 Bells Rd.)
Cost: $15.

Habits for Change - Workshop this Wednesday!

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Join us on Wednesday, June 5 at 7pm for our Inner Transition workshop called:

Mindful Living: From Habits that Drain to Habits that Sustain

How do we create space in our busy lives for the things that bring us happiness?  With so many ways to occupy our time, we have become good at multitasking.  The trouble is that the busier we are, the less we are actually living our lives.  Cultivating mindfulness can help us achieve our goals and enjoy life more fully.  This interactive workshop will focus on taking stock of how we spend our time, reflecting on what makes us happy, and how to set the foundation to form pretty much any habit, and live a more mindful life. 

This workshop will be facilitated by Julie Walter.  As the mom of two young children and an elementary school teacher, her passion lies in the journey of learning.