Hello friends 

 

It’s been a little while – we hope this finds you well and enjoying the emerging spring. 

 

We recently passed the vernal equinox (from the Latin aequus: equal, and nox: night), when day and night are in equilibrium. From here, in our hemisphere, light defeats dark as we turn ever more towards the life-giving sun. The days are lengthening, the air warming… it’s a time to throw off the constraints of winter, make plans and help new possibilities germinate. This time is also known as Ostara, named after the Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring and fertility (and an etymological route of Easter, which many will celebrate this weekend).

 

Like seeds lying quiet but busy in the wintry earth, we have been taking some time for germination and planning over the last few months (and Iris has been in hibernation with her baby daughter, born at the turn of the year). Much is beginning, like the spring flowers, to emerge now – and we’re pleased to share some of it, some new audio encounters and some glimmers of hope with you below.

 

As ever we love to hear from you if you have questions or ideas for us, and we will be in touch again some time in the summer (as mentioned in December, these newsletters will be a little less frequent this year while Iris is on maternity leave). Happy Easter/Ostara, Ramadan Mubarak, and may Spring bring new possibilities.

 

With love and hope,

Gemma, Iris, Jo, Lily

New Constellations

 

We will be opening an application process very soon to find people to take part in this journey. If you are based in York, or know brilliant people or organisations who are, please reply to this email so we can make sure you receive information when the process goes live (and/or keep an eye on our Twitter feed). We’d be so grateful for help spreading the word.

We have some new audio encounters for you to enjoy: with life-long activist, former monk and nature lover Satish Kumar, Bradford Council Chief Executive and local government champion Kersten England, and with Director General of the British Chambers of Commerce and eternal optimist Shevaun Haviland.

 

You can explore all our encounters on our website (on a new, simpler page) or by searching ‘New Constellations’ wherever you listen to podcasts. We always appreciate your feedback and reviews, and would love to hear your ideas for people we should record with this year.

As New Constellations evolves we are growing our constellation of collaborators, and are delighted to be working with a growing group of amazing people across some exciting projects. We look forward to telling you more about the work we’re developing as it happens, including looking at how we can build community with the growing group of people who have been through the New Constellations journey, scoping a possible journey around new patterns of wealth and investment, a new project looking at how ecological systems of distribution can inspire new forms of resource flows, and of course the York journey mentioned above. It’s a privilege to be working with Emma Shaw, Jo Sparber, Kim Willis, Megan Lucero, Rithika Rajamohan, Yasmin El Dabi on this and more over the coming months.

As spring arrives we’ve relished the chance to spend longer stretches outside, and the feelings of nourishment and hope this brings. If you too are looking (or perhaps inspired by Satish’s encounter) to deepen your connection with non-human nature we love these Wild Cards, and are excited to read Prof. Miles Richardson’s new book Reconnection, out this month (see also his excellent blog and Nature Connection Handbook exploring the science and powerful personal and social benefits of nature connectedness).

 

The stark terms of the recent IPCC synthesis report were hard to read and impossible to ignore, yet we’ve seen glimmers of hope around climate action too – from this piece suggesting emissions could peak within two years to Denmark's biggest bank declaring an end to fossil fuel financing and top lawyers vowing they won't prosecute peaceful climate protesters. We also enjoyed this piece by Rebecca Solnit on climate action as abundance and can’t wait for Mikaela Loach's book also out this month. If you know other visionaries pioneering solutions for our planet can you help Ashoka find them?

 

As tech leaders urge caution on AI development we were struck and (somewhat!) heartened by the 'new emotion’ created by GPT-4, and know the tech is having some positive impacts. But we will no doubt be having many more conversations about AI’s unforeseeable consequences and the questions it begs around the nature of authentic human experience. 

 

If you want a space to get into such questions, The Digital Age online course starts next week (use code ‘advayalife15’ for a 15% discount), and is one of many upcoming offerings that might help navigate these complex times; International Futures Forum’s popular Competence in Complexity programme is starting again later this month, the remix is a guided adventure exploring story as technology starting in May, and Becoming Resilient is a course on embodied knowing (next cohort starts April 19). We have often referred to the useful Three Horizons model in our journeys (one of our first audio encounters was with its creator Bill Sharpe), and Leaders’ Quest have a Three Horizons Facilitator Training in May. If you’re interested in how we create healthy relational culture Sophy Banks has a series of learning journeys coming up (don’t miss her powerful encounter too). Meanwhile Perspectiva has an ongoing series of Conversations on Remaking the World with Iain McGilchrist, and looking a little further ahead, Next Frontiers will take place in London on 11 July.

 

Some things to listen to… We loved this piece on healing with the wonderful Abdi Hassan (who was part of our Bold Dreams leaders’ journey last year), have been enjoying The Sacred, a podcast about what we hold sacred and how to meet across difference (don’t miss the beautiful episode with Nick Cave and Seán O’Hagan, whose book is remarkable), and REWORLDING is a new podcast from The Serpentine on how we might begin reshaping our future.

Finally, no words can describe the powerlessness and devastation felt after the shocking earthquakes in Syria and Turkey, but we are ever-inspired by the White Helmets, whose volunteers saved almost 3000 people from the destruction. They are now working tirelessly on recovery and rehabilitation; if you'd like to support their critical work please do.