coevolution

Woven Essence

Sometimes sound and light is better at conveying the essence of things than words ...

Council Of Hosts - video powered by Metacafe
(This video was made at a Council of Hosts gathering in Bowen Island, by Ashley Cooper and Thomas Arthur of Woven Essence)

Talking it Through

Born on the northeast coast of England, of Viking and Welsh ancestry, I grew up as a granddaughter of the Empire and daughter of the Commonwealth. As a young girl in the years following the First World War, I puzzled and then grieved that the men came back so hurt—legs lost, difficulty breathing––and so many dead. How could we have done this? I wondered. Why couldn’t we have talked it through? This was a question that really mattered to me.

Later, studying the armistice conditions ending the war, it became very clear that the lack of ongoing and authentic dialogue among nations created conditions for future conflict. I determined that, when I grew up, I would study ways in which these mistakes would not be repeated.

Compelling Conversations

The following is a story in response to a question Juanita posed:

How did you become aware of conversation as a co-evolutionary force and why do you think that is an important insight for engaging with the critical challenges of our time?

It was 1970 and I was 16, a ‘run-away’ living in a hippie commune in the back woods of Vermont.

The Day I "Got It"

My original awareness of conversation as a fundamental and generative force  in our collective lives came from a source and a setting that I could never have anticipated. It was the innocent curiosity of two corporate leaders... 

The year was 1993 and World Café had not yet appeared in our lives. I was sitting in the living room of our home in Mill Valley, California, with John Browning and Frank Gonzalez, leaders of a regional Sales organization within a major U.S. corporation. They wanted to build their organization as a community. How did you do it in the farm workers’ movement, they asked? What really is at the heart of community development, anyway?