Hello, it's been a while… Today is Imbolc: an ancient Celtic festival celebrated at the midpoint between winter solstice and spring equinox. It marks the promise and first stirrings of life after winter, celebrating the slow re-awakening of our natural world as we move towards spring in our hemisphere. It's a time to look ahead, set intentions and make space for new beginnings; a time in which to remember the promise of light and renewal, even as the cold and dark persists. In this spirit we want to reconnect and share a few things with you below, as well as our intention to be in touch with you more often this year (if this isn’t what you want, don't hesitate to let us know and we'll take you off our list). We also have one request: please help us find some brilliant people for our upcoming journey. We’ll be back in your inbox at spring equinox. Til then, thank you for reading and listening and to everyone who worked with us, helped us and inspired us last year – and a very warm welcome to those new to this list. We always love hearing your thoughts – receiving a voice note through our website makes our day! With love and hope, Gemma, Iris, Jo and Lily New Constellations |
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We are very excited to open applications for our next journey: a unique opportunity for up to 15 emerging and established leaders working in service of communities across the UK. We are looking for courageous individuals ready to embolden and renew themselves and their work to help meet the challenges of our time. If this sounds like you or someone you know, please consider applying – participation is fully funded for those selected, all the details are here and applications are open until midnight on Monday 28 February. Please forward this newsletter to anyone you think might be interested and help us spread the word. |
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For the past six months, we have had the privilege of working with an amazing group of people in Sheffield, creating a journey for a diverse ‘crew’ from all across the city to explore a new vision for their collective future. We worked together to look at what the city should turn away from, what to preserve and cherish, and what to turn towards. We hope to share more from the Sheffield crew very soon. With support from The National Lottery Community Fund we have the opportunity to host a journey for another town, city or place-based community in the UK later this year. If you live in or know a place that could be interested in exploring a better future and what it will take to transform, we would love to hear from you (just reply to this email). |
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We’re pleased to share two more audio encounters with you from Candy Chang and Panthea Lee, completing our first ‘constellation'. We've been delighted (and a bit surprised) to see over 40,000 downloads of the encounters so far in at least 64 countries, and would love to hear what you thought if you've had a chance to listen. Inspired by a growing body of work on emergent strategy and the importance of looking at patterns (and especially the encounters with adrienne maree brown, Anna Murray and Bill Sharpe), Gemma has written this blog and recorded this audio exploration of the patterns emerging from our initial research and these first encounters. The audio also gives a taste of what’s to come in the next series we’re just embarking on. In developing that we experimented with this new format with Dan Hill: a slow-conversation recorded over a year which you can learn more about here. Let us know what you think, and who else you’d like to hear from. You can learn more about how and why we're working with audio in Jo's new blog. As he says “When we listen to something, our minds fill in the gaps and build a picture of what our other senses are not picking up. We fill these 'gaps' with our individual understanding of the world, our hopes, our fears…” We hope you enjoy listening and making each encounter uniquely yours. |
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Some of the many things inspiring us recently include The Murmuration Project’s Synthesis Report which got us excited about the growing field of organisations “developing the ‘inner work’ needed to meet the complexity of our times” and this excellent blog which got us thinking (even more) about the kinds of transformative innovation needed to birth and finance new systems. We are cheering on the mighty Rekindle School as it opens its doors this year, Out in the Field as they continue their powerful work, and BEEN London’s collaboration with Terra Neutra – who can help you track and offset your carbon footprint too. We also loved The Long Time Academy: podcasts and practices to help us become better ancestors, seeing our first frEGGs, and Kae Tempest’s More Pressure, More Relief which is Iris’s anthem for 2022 (More grounded, more rooted, less convoluted / More stillness, more movement / More existence, less improvement… More intuition, more connection / More nature, more protection / More abundance, more reflection…). And we can't wait to see Our Body Is A Planet. |
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Thank you for reading, we wish you a grounding and renewing Imbolc. What intentions are you setting – in relation to yourself, your community, the collective? |
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New Constellations exists to help people imagine and create better futures; futures in which humanity and the planet flourish together. If you like what we’re doing, you can help us by: - sharing this email or our website with a friend
- following us on Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn
- subscribing to New Constellations wherever you find your podcasts (and consider rating and writing us a review)
- letting us know what you think: we want your feedback and to listen and learn with you. Just reply to this email or leave us a voice note
- you can also support our work through PayPal.
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