Edges & Echos
How can organisations centre the Earth and people from within the confines of the systems they are embedded within?
A couple weeks ago Lynne & Kate sat in a park in north London pondering this question.
“It’s edgy. There are so many assumptions wrapped up in the way we work that need unravelling.”
“To become Earth-centred. To become truly holistic as an organisation. It makes a cool acronym - Echo.”
“Can we explore this by writing emails back and forth? Like, public letters?”
And so here we are.
Edges & Echos is our thinking-in-the-open exchange exploring the organisations, edges, humans and Earth systems.
Lynne’s intro
I’m really interested in the role that organisations can play in this Great Turning we find ourselves within. So many of us are feeling in our bones a pull toward the Earth. A force that seems to be willing us to figure out how to live in a way that regenerates this paradise and a deep knowing that, without intending, we have been complicit in the ecocide of the Anthropocene. And we know it is only beginning to unfold.
So many of us know that we find deep solace in the natural world, something more profound than the scientific evidence for ‘forest bathing’. There is a desire for intimacy - to learn to identify plants, tend gardens, to clean rubbish from the river banks and have conversations with birds. A desire to minimise our impact, to shop ethically, buying less, second hand. Local, organic, regenerative, renewable. Cycling when we can. Maybe an electric car. We’re doing our best. We know in our bones this isn’t enough.
And then we go to work. To organisations that perhaps are trying to make the world a better place, perhaps motivated mostly by profit, and most likely a mix of both. ‘We can’t change the world if we don’t look after the bottom line. We can’t change the world if we go bust.’ Even the most ethical of organisations need to tend their revenue streams and their budgets as if their life depends on it. Because it does.
In some professions we sit behind a computer all day knowing that this is not what our bodies were born for. In some professions we witness waste piling to the ceiling and cleared away every day. In most professions we feel stuck, looking to others with more power to unstick the stuckness.
I’m curious how organisations can play a more radical role in this transition to a regenerative culture. To more deeply attune to the systems and cycles of the Earth, the moon, the more-than-human. To centre regeneration in a truly holistic way. What is an Earth-centered Holistic Organisation?
I can think of no one I’d like to unpack this with more than Kate :)
Kate’s Intro
Earth-centred holistic organisations! I’m really interested in thinking about organisations as living systems, comprised of other - human - living systems. How do we, as individual humans - especially ones, as you say, trying to live “good” lives - how do we bring our whole, holistic, selves to our work? And how can organisations genuinely work alongside the whole human beings that populate them? There’s lots of (glib?) talk about encouraging people to “bring their whole selves to work” but this isn’t accessible to many - whether because you don’t feel that your whole self will be accepted, whether because you’re in a position of leadership and feel like you can’t show weakness or vulnerability, or because actually some professional standards are reasonable. We can’t all say exactly what we’re thinking all the time.
And if organisations are living systems, how are they affected by and relate to the cycles of the seasons? We all know that feeling of things being super hard at some times of the year and much easier at others - what could we do to bring more awareness and intentionality to when our organisations are as well as how they work?
So how would an earth centred holistic organisation treat its people? What would it mean to work both alongside the rhythms of the earth and the rhythms of our individual bodies? Are they essentially the same thing (we are of the earth, after all), or do we need two different lenses through which to examine this stuff? I’m hoping to unpick these questions and more! And I am wondering whether if as a society we were more earth centred, then some of these questions in relation to organisations might be moot.
I’m hoping these letters will be wide ranging, fun and thoughtful - and help me be more in tune with the rhythms of the year. I’m also a shy and reluctant aspiring writer and am looking forward to the deliberate practice of writing and exploring more.