The Regenerative Movement & Relational Being
An Embodied Transformational Path and Process for humans and the multispecies ecological communities we're a part of
You might have noticed of late a growing movement—one that seeks to heal the scars of an exploitative past and rejuvenate the planet we call home in more holistic ways. It’s called the Regenerative Movement and it consists of a multitude of ways to help shift humanity's central detrimental narratives. The regenerative movement confronts these narratives and is working to provide ideas, stories, language, and actions that can help illuminate a different pathway for us to travel. Going beyond sustainable practices and moving towards emergent, complex, systems based ways to be of service to a better future for all beings of this living world.
The regenerative movement, and regeneration are more than just buzzwords, though they are already being co-opted and utilized to sell more stuff and make certain people and organizations appear to be not servicing the business-as-usual train. Besides these unsavory actors who are part of the regen-washing machine, there are thankfully a rising tide of regenerators out there who are of service to supporting this transformative movement.
A movement that is exploring ways to move beyond modern industrial practices and our human centered, short sighted processes. Sending the default dominant story for how things get done into the compost heap. And presenting alternative stories that are truly good for the planet as a whole.
In agriculture for example, regeneration is about nurturing soil health, revitalizing ecosystems, and ensuring food security for future generations of humans as well as the local eco/bioregion at large. In economics, it's a shift from linear and exponential growth models towards circular and regenerative energy (i.e. monetary) systems that value the well-being of this whole living world.
Regenerative practices breathe life back into depleted landscapes, while also helping in rebuilding, and transforming local economies. A key goal of the greater movement is to develop practices and processes, both economical and agricultural, that are holistic and dynamic.
Regeneration isn’t here though to merely support a slightly more renewable business-as-usual. Sustaining our anthropocentric current trajectory, so we can keep doing what we’re doing, by providing civilization with more efficient, but similar lifestyles, by figuring out how to cut down on our carbon emissions.
We have far too many challenges to confront and embrace for this to be possible.
And that’s not a sustainable (or realistic) future anyways.
Having breached at least 6 of the 9 planetary boundaries, which are essentially global, systemic tipping points. This means there are already baked in dire compounding consequences for all members of this living planet that will play out in the coming days, weeks, months and years ahead. A great deal of these consequences are a result of our path forward since the industrial revolution. But it also began further back to around the time of the ‘enlightenment’ and those mechanistic thinkers who declared humans and nature are separate things, and that all other beings are essentially organic robots.
And yes, these current troubles and crises are tied to climate change, but it goes so far beyond this as we also recognize that we are in the midst of a 6th mass extinction event. This comes largely down to how we humans have collectively lived (and due to colonialism, capitalism, cheap and abundant fuel sources, exponential/perpetual growth value systems, to name but a few) and now we have some deep reckoning to do. Great thinkers of our age are calling this a polycrisis, or the metacrisis.
Thankfully, enough of us humans recognize that things have got to change post haste.
There is nuance and by no means are all humans equally contributing to, or responsible for this situation we collectively as a species, and living world, face. The key players are primarily from the global north and are part of Western Civilization and modernity. Especially the entities who’ve attained personhood like corporations and multinational conglomerates, they are the ‘people’ who need the most course correcting.
Given all this context, the regenerative movement aims to be of service to changing the story line, or the wavy, swirling, multi-directional and dimensional threads of this yarn of reality. In addition to this general theme and concept that is the regenerative movement, a crucial element still is needed for us to more holistically proceed. What is also imperative is for us humans to be aware and mindful of the rest of nature and all the more-than-human, multispecies ecological communities we’re a part of. Then our species will be better able to navigate a regenerative movement in more relational and ecocentric ways.
This is where the Institute of Relational Being (IRB) comes into the picture.
The Institute of Relational Being has been birthed through these multispecies relationships and collaborations. Co-created and co-founded by humans and more-than-human companions.
IRB is here to be of service to multispecies relationality and emergence. Relational Being beckons us to acknowledge our interconnectedness with the rest of this living world. It's an invitation welcoming in the realization that humans are not separate from nature, and the cosmos beyond, but rather we are woven into its tapestry.
Relational Being lives in fertile soil, filled with composting elements swirling between life and death. Currently bubbling forth from the space between humans of modernity - who see themselves as greater than the rest of the world, separate from nature, and at the center of it all - and those who embrace that this world is alive, that we humans are nature too, and that we are always and in all ways dancing in relationships as part of shared ecologies and bioregions.
So, how does Relational Being fit into the Regenerative Movement?
Imagine a world where direct participation with our more-than-human, multispecies companions is the norm. Where every regenerative act is informed by integrative, sensorial, embodied practices. Where it becomes commonplace for processes of co-becoming and collaboration to emerge from a space of reciprocal care.
IRB is engaging in this greater process of linking Relational Being together with the Regenerative Movement in part through utilizing the relational potential that technology can offer. One of the ways we are doing this is through an app that’s in development called ReBe. It is part of a new project process that is being called a ‘provotype’ (from “provocation” and “prototype”), which you can learn more about from this great paper called: Codesign with more-than-humans: toward a meta co-design tool for human-non-human collaborations.
IRB is creating ReBe, and bringing forth all of its emerging projects (including its Fellowship, Consulting, Collaborations, workshops, writings, etc) with the spirit and goal of Building in Public. The inspiration and clarity of this process comes from Building in Public Hub and they describe this method as “an intentional practice of creating content and sharing your company’s story as it unfolds — with transparency, openness and vulnerability.”
This is what is happening as you read this presently.
With all of this noted, the invitation is for you and IRB to slowly proceed on this relational journey as we shift our behaviors and our human-centric perspectives. This may happen at an unfamiliar tempo, moving more at plant pace. We see there is an immense sense of urgency, yet we wish to proceed with care, in a relational, seasonal, cyclical way, doing our best not to let our actions be driven by anxiety and fear.
IRB is also embracing that messiness and failure are natural parts of this unfolding process.
We are inspired to help institute relational being into our day-to-day lives, through accessible processes and practices. The goal being that this can ideally lead to our personal, and collective perspectives becoming more eco-centric. From this position our decisions and actions can be better informed and guided by all of our senses, intuition, and the information coming through from beyond the human realm.
And through this way of living and being, we can better normalize a reality in which all forms of life are seen, honored, and celebrated for the agency and aliveness they have.
It is also crucially important to remember that we humans are not giving this agency to these more-than-human companions and the rest of the multispecies ecological communities of this living world, they already have been vitally alive, active, agency filled beings the whole time.
Through relational being it is we humans who arrive back into that humble state of remembrance. From there our appreciation and awareness of being but one small part of an intricate web of life can become our starting point. Then we can collectively live with awe and reverence as we see every breath rippling through this living tapestry and shared cosmic reality.
Relational Being offers us simple pathways back to this missing holistic context and framework for what it means to be alive, as a part of nature and this living world. Helping to provide and guide us towards an ecologically inclusive fertile soil for holistic, complex, emergent regeneration to grow.
Relational Being encourages us to approach regenerative agriculture as more than a set of farming practices. To literally and figuratively see it as a dance of co-creation with the land. Calling us to consider not just the economic benefits of circular economies but also the well-being of ecosystems as communities. Manifesting together with our multispecies partners with respect, reverence, and a sense of joy for simply being a part of this rich and diverse living world.
In the Regenerative Movement, Relational Being can be of service in navigating the sometimes unfamiliar territories of ecocentric living. Allowing for mindful, caring ways of co-creating with our fellow ecological community members, so that eventually it becomes embedded not just within the regenerative movement’s culture, but woven into business-as-usual’s, too.
Re-orienting us all back into nature's embrace.
Through sensorial, embodied engagement with the world (and beyond) we can remember our way back to a life-way where we see and acknowledge that we are not conquerors of nature but engaged co-collaborators in a grand symphony of life. And as relational being’s we are better able to listen to the whispers of the wind, the songs of the birds, and the wisdom of the soil.
And feel a better sense of belonging, too.
As we nurture our relationality with the rest of nature, and the cosmos beyond, we become better attuned to the collective needs, rhythms, and wisdom that are being shared with us. And in this synergy of the Regenerative Movement and Relational Being, we can find a path, non-linear in shape, that weaves together our past, present, and future, all aspects of the ever-present-moment, and arrive together in the space where the regenerative is also relational.
There's a fair amount of repeating themes here and this is present for you to really allow for this to all slide deeper into your being. Your Relational Being.
The Regenerative Movement does not just require a shift in perspectives, it also needs a shift in practices. An on-going opportunity to recognize our place within the web of life and to act as caring creatures who are part of multispecies ecological communities. Relational Being empowers us with the awareness, practices, processes, and behaviors needed to embody this shift. Where ecological health and human well-being are intertwined.
A holistic journey where we regenerate soils, waterways, and the quality of the air all of us beings breathe, while also stimulating better relationships between humans and the rest of nature and this exquisite living world.
May we bring many into this voyage of ecocentric wandering and wondering together.
What would it look like for you to embrace Relational Being and welcome this as an integral part of the Regenerative Movement?
Where you, and we, along with our multispecies communities will consciously collaborate, bringing healing and restoration into a shared relational context. Then with our ecological companions help, we can have their support to co-create a world where humans thrive in unity with all of life.
IRB welcomes you to join in this journey of relational being. Let us activate our personal and ecological imaginations together, one breath at a time.
As a parting note, we at the Institute of Relational Being are really looking forward to being a part of this year's Gathering of Tribes event in Portugal from 11-15 September 2024. Gathering of Tribes is just such an event that is looking to amplify the greater Regenerative Movement. Bringing people, projects, and organizations together to catalyze and advance this greater work.
And of course, IRB feels it is paramount that the framework for who the ‘people’ we are referring to expands and includes the many living beings of the land, air, and water. So during Gathering of Tribes we’ll be exploring creative, artistic, and collaborative ways for the land and the multispecies communities that will be present there to be illuminated, celebrated, and respected through an ecology of care.
This will be Relational Being and the Regenerative Movement together in action.
We would love to see you there.
