Coda: art of meta broadcasting (Process Reponse #1)
Hypocrisies, observations, celebrations and improvements.
I feel very tired.
I turned on the creative tap and the handle fell off.
I imagine I have a lot of energy stored up for discussing these topics, and now that I have an outlet, my bedtime routine is suffering.
It has also been very hot here, and I am moving around to various places and fitting in layers of work-play and connections and systems. D-Y-N-A-M-I-C.
I have learned a lot from reading this book, and the sheer amount of insight has generated a lot of labour to love. If this was (already?) my vocation, or part of a study programme, I could afford to go into more depth, editing and cleaning up each piece of this text. That would be så fint.
However, I am doing this in my spare time, while trying to finish reading the next book, and digestion cannot be hurried. So, maybe this is going to be a bigger challenge than I expected, but at the same time, I’m rising to it.
I can now appreciate how useful it is to refrain from putting a ‘due date’ on a piece of creative work.
While it’s helpful to have a motivating force so that something happens (yes, I’m guilty of contributing to server farms with all these electronic notes and forgotten drafts scattered across an overabundance of mediums); I can really appreciate, more than ever before, the value of setting smaller goals.
Just enough work each day to feel satisfied with making progress.
Reflecting on social permaculture through the context of a ‘cousin model’ has already been a great tool for deeper awareness around what it means to be applying this work in society. I never thought Permaculture was Peacemaking, and didn’t even appreciate True Peace til now.
I have found pleasure in articulating my A-Has, and despite the rough quality, I hope these pieces open some very generative dialogue.
There is a theme I notice surfacing; around the psychological desire for predictability (this is also discussed in the next book, ‘Ends’) and how culture design doesn’t offer neat deliverables.
A way of thinking about it, as I’m learning with my project development work, is that an organization doesn’t need to become a permanent fixture. Commitments can be time-bound, and when they are, there is such a vibrant shift in energy. Managing expectations doesn’t require foolproof prophecy.
It connects to the observation that open spaces can become TOO open, and that this closes space.
While the future is anxiously unknowable, this doesn’t mean it’s time to throw commitment and stability out the window, only that our way of handling these factors as designers can benefit from being more explicit.
Addressing limitations is a simple acknowledgement of what exists on the physical, emotional or psychic site.
I can forecast better by practicing tuning into the moment with all levels of my being, and learning to notice subtle differences.
This reiterates my principle that questions are more valuable than answers. Notice the answers changing. Notice the conditions which repeat the same or similar answers. This is the heart of the scientific method. Yoga.
I guess it requires some practice in non-attachment to be comfortable with things dying and being reborn in every moment, developing fearlessness about things breaking, because this is the prerequisite for breakthrough.
This might come with feelings like fear that we are wrong, guilt that we hurt others, shame that our authentic style is not widely appealing.
And yet what else forms authentic connection?
Belonging occurs when you’re ready to belong to yourself, which means not belonging everywhere at once (because that place is nowhere).
Growing into our full space and touching against boundaries, because whoever shows up then are definitely the right people.
When I start writing, I face these fears of being wrong, being shamed or condemned, and also of being put on a pedestal and used as a decoy to shield others from their own path of self discovery. It’s demanding, after all.
I am afraid of my words being ungrounded, causing confusion and spreading damaging half-truths. I am afraid of creating waste, over-saturating the attention economy with rambles.
And despite all this, I have this voice within me, incessant, calling to be practiced. It is the result of my own personal emergence, an artifact of my rich and wild experiences and an offering to the collective spirit of humanity, in a time where we are re-learning how to live in harmony with other beings.
So, I feel tired, and yet I feel profoundly satisfied, like lying in the sauna after a very intense workout. I can only trust that these stories will fall on fertile soil, as I broadcast them across the virtual landscape of my digital neighbourhood.
All that I can be is all that I am. Enough.
Going forward in my work, I have found these questions:
According to what do I/we measure effective social permaculture design?
Where does pleasure fit in?
How can my writing be in itself a living practice of the theory?
Thanks for joining me on the journey, and if you’d like to engage or share this work, I’d be happy to attract more bright minds of ecosocial design into this ongoing summer project.
Happy midsummer!
Naomi Joy Smith (they/them/their or she/her) is a New Zealand-born semi-nomad on an old journey of experiencing complex living systems, presently through the lens of social permaculture.
Sustain the flow: https://liberapay.com/naomijoy/
About my garden:
I write, speak, design, engage, host, weave, dance and facilitate.
I sensemake through improv singing and channeling poems.
My collaborators appreciate me for my playfulness and integrity.
Reach out to collaborate in the name of regenerative cultural design!
Twitter/Instagram: phoresced
Email: hmu@nextstepnaomi.com
