Marilyn Hamilton's Blog, page 33

Integral City Stories for Our Times

“People need stories more than food to stay alive.” (Barry Lopez)

That observation has always been one of my favourite insights into the depths of human nature.

When I review the epic voyage to 10 cities (BC Canada: Delta, Vancouver, Mission, Abbotsford; Scotland: Findhorn, Edinburgh; India: Auroville, Chennai, Agra, Delhi) in the last six weeks I am curious to notice what interested people?

At the same time, I am curious to reflect on what interested me? One thing I noticed is that speakers, experts, facilitators and participants who could tell stories captured my imagination (and the attention of the audience).

So, what were the most popular stories I told?

The biomimicry Story of the Honey Bee and the Human Hive wins first place. This reveals the intelligences of nature that we are too often blind to in our own actions, choices, strategies and relationships. And it gives us an image of the whole city that we can relate to.
The related story of the 4 Voices of the City is another winner. People are fascinated to see how the differences in our roles and souls bring strength to the table as a whole system.
The Holistic Maps of the City that can be seen through the Bees and the 4 Voices is another corollary. People are used to geographic maps of the external city but are delighted to see how we can also map the city through bio, psycho, cultural and social lenses.
Audiences are surprised and intrigued by my spin that Cities are Gaia’s Reflective Organs (building on the story of James Lovelock who says Humans are Gaia’s Reflective Organs). We re-story ourselves with the astonishing realization that Gaia has evolved us for a purpose that calls us to a higher appreciation of the value and meaning of our lives.
I was deeply touched in Delhi when I heard an outcome of sharing the story of the Master Code as an Integral Yoga . A young man told me that he had practised it on the way home the night before. Starting with caring for himself by choosing to return home for an early night of recovery and rest (thus Caring for Self); offering kindness to a fellow passenger on the bus (Caring for Others); choosing to take public transport instead of a single person cab (Caring for this Place); reflecting how the whole suite of choices added up to Caring for this Planet. By putting into action, the Master Code, this person realized that if we all made decisions with this “Integral Yoga” we could make significant and rapid change in the world.
A last story I told, always surprises audiences – and it is the story of Russia’s Living Cities – and their intention to change 1000 cities by 2030. Like me they are at first impressed by the ambitious goal – which at first, they discount – but then quickly re-evaluate the possibilities when I tell them of witnessing the change in over 300 monocities that has already taken place. This story is both an example of the Master Code in action, but also designing strategies with the 4 Voices of the City working together.

With just this sample of stories, it is possible to see, we now have many ways to engage the head, heart, hands and wholeness of cities to expand, deepen and mature our ways of serving Gaia’s wellbeing.

Hope from the Heroine’s Journey

From the beginning of October to the middle of November, 2019, I travelled from Findhorn to Vancouver to Auroville India (with brief stops in Findhorn and Edinburgh on the way through) with visits to Chennai, Agra and Delhi before returning to home in Findhorn.

I felt it was an epic journey – the return to Canada, country of my birth and much of my adult life – for the first time in 2 years (since I moved to Findhorn Scotland).

My first visit to India brought a wild mix of experiences from traffic/transportation frenzy,  to cultural celebrations, to spicy foods, a touch of monsoon and Matrimandir amidst jungle and solar kitchen – all exotic and sub-tropical.

I have written in earlier blogs about four of the encounters to which I contributed:

Keynoting at Ecocity World Summit 2019 (EWS) in Vancouver on the story from Vancouver’s Human Hive to Findhorn’s Beehive – how we are evolving as Gaia’s Reflective Organs.
Exploring Beauty Truth and Goodness as roots of an integral professionalism at the Edinburgh International Centre for Sustainability and Peace (EICSP).
Lecturing on biomimicry in the Integral City to the Architecture and City Planning students at Hindustan Institute of Technology & Science.
Presenting a paper on Re-sensitizing Humanity in a Digital World in Delhi for the Indian Society of Applied Behavioural Sciences (ISABS).

Looking back over the journey and its itinerary of engagements I am struck by the contrasting perspectives of West and East, North and South, breadth of topics, interests, audiences and generations. They emerged from the four corners of the world with audiences of multiple and layered points of view.

The youngest (Millennials) and most intimate “I’s” were the Hindustan University students, along with the young women activists, featured at EWS who are leading the charge for eco-justice change.
The oldest (Boomers) and most reflective “We’s” were the Edinburgh EICSP gathering of (mostly mature) professionals.
A great span of all Integral quadrants, lines and levels (AQAL) ages and worldviews was represented at the Delhi ISABS – with revelations from motorbike-riding social entrepreneurs to technical gamesters and very mature international researchers (spanning interests in the intransigence of economic poverty for artisan women in Gujarat to the effectiveness of city engagement in Pune).
Interestingly at the Vancouver EWS conference great emphasis was placed on the quantifiable city (even weighing in about the weight of cities) and the terrible threats cities face from Climate Change. But few other voices joined mine to call us to a higher evolutionary purpose – to serve as Gaia’s Reflective Organs.

As a result of this “whole Earth” exposure I am both impressed with the daunting challenges that cities face around the world as the search for sustainability is being refocused into resilience. Unavoidable recalibrations to expectations for city wellbeing are arising in every city sector as deep entanglements of cultures,  justice, ecology, infrastructure and organizations both tighten and loosen.

Nevertheless, I am inspired that Integral City can add the values of Evolutionary Consciousness, Culture and Spirituality to the knowledge, wisdom and care that the 4 Voices of many cities seem ready and willing to undertake.

The long journey home has given the radical optimist in me HOPE.

Biomimicry Lessons from the Beehive for Hindustan U Architecture Class

Marilyn Hamilton offered a lecture to the Architecture & City Planning Students at Hindustan Institute of Technology and Science in Chennai, India, on October 30, 2019.

Here are the key images she used to illustrate how the honey bee offers lessons in biomimicry for our Human Hives.

Professing a Spiritual AQtivation

This is a summary of a Plenary/Workshop offered by by Marilyn Hamilton, PhD, Founder Integral City Meshworks to the Edinburgh International Centre for Spirituality and Peace, Day Conference, Spiritualities, True Professionalism and Aligned Action: Discerning the True, Good and Beautiful. It was presented on October 26, 2019

I “professed” the story of my Spiritual AQtivation through the journey to wholeness that my Spirit has guided me in the last 7 decades.

I brought some fresh insights from my October 2019 journey home to Canada (on an Integral and Eco City mission) and back again to Findhorn Ecovillage Scotland. In this journey I realized that the subjective assessment of my wellbeing that I had completed in 2001, using the AQtivating workbook, Journeys to Wellness: A Workbook to Discover Personal Paths to Wholeness, (JTW) (Hamilton, Stevenson, 2005) had changed.

Almost 20 years later I might reassess the highs and lows that I charted about the self-organizing seasons that have alternated with the structuring cycles of my life. The last 2 decades have caused me to recalibrate my sense of self, others, place and planet – and indeed my whole Spiritual trajectory through awakening a Gaian Consciousness with a Master Code of Care (for Self, Others, Place, Planet).

Effectively this has become my discovery process for discerning Beauty, Truth and Goodness in my life. This has happened through AQtion Learning infiltrated by the “perfect timing” of unexpected revelations, strong nudges from the Still Small Voice and inspiring encounters from multiple dimensions.

Drawing on JTW Chapter 1, I led participants in an exploration of Community as defined by these elements:

Community is a journey into wholeness for individuals and groups of people.

Journey:  path, route, way, voyage, trip.

Wholeness:  emerging development to the same level of holarchy in all four quadrants of experience (based on the four quadrant Integral Model).

Individual: the nature and nurture that make up a person; the internal and external life of a person. The essence of who we are.

Group of people:  couple, family, tribe, organization, association, city, nation; the cultural (internal) and social (external) life of a collective.

Then we shared an attunement to four domains (relating to the AQ = All quadrants) of an Integral reality/realization (JTW p.21-22):

Self and Consciousness (which includes the inner life of emotional, mental and spiritual development — the very source of the Knowledge revolution);
Brain and Organism (which includes all the bio-physical factors that make up our lives. Medical and scientific discoveries are continuously showing us the multitude of the bio-physical impacts arising from the infinite complexity of our bodies.)
Cultural and Worldview (which includes everything to do with our inner lives as collectives – our beliefs, worldviews and the stories we tell ourselves.)
Social System and Environment (which includes everything that defines our ways of organizing ourselves as a population, from tribal taboos, to systems of government, to traffic rules, to energy consumption, to waste management).

I concluded with my most recent learning and insight from James Lovelock, author of the Gaia Hypothesis – that humans are Gaia’s Reflective Organs. Thus, the Master Code has become for me an “Integral Yoga” that I practise at the end of each day – seeking to notice my contribution to Beauty, Goodness and Truth as I AQtivate Gaia’s Reflective Organ in/as me. I invite others to do the same.

I attach below pdfs of Chapters 1 and 7 from the Journeys to Wellness Workbook – so others can explore this experience of professing self and community through the 4 domains, using the worksheet summaries set out in Chapter 7. If anyone would like to obtain a copy of the whole workbook, drop me an email through Contacts on this website.

JtoWWorkbook Ch 1 Intro

JtoWWorkbook Ch 7 – Community as Whole

Refocusing Human Sensitivity in a Digital World

Through Caring, Contexting, Capacity Building

“How are our systems supporting us in the fullness of our humanity?”

Answering this research question moved my career from the study of leadership patterns to the connections amongst teams, organizations, communities and now cities – in both face-to-face and digital worlds. I have written three books that explore how to redesign the city as a living system that makes us feel fully alive as individuals and collectives.

In the Integral City books, I explore human systems that integrate development in person, people, place and planet. I consider three themes that are critical factors for designing generative relationships for a collective life that works for all life; namely, Caring, Contexting and Capacity Building. This trio is fundamental to the qualities of survival, adaptation and regeneration that define all living systems and can be traced through the expansion of moral influence, spatial influence and evolutionary time horizons. Refocusing human sensitivity in a digital world requires the integration of the inner journey of Care with the outer journey of Contexting through the integration of Capacity Building. The combination of the overview effect and the integration effect enable a holarchy of complexity to emerge in all scales of human life in the city that is made coherent through decisions that are aligned around the Master Code of Care: to care for Self, Others, Place and Planet.  This will enable sensitivity to have a trajectory to the 7th generation in the future, a time span that many indigenous people consider relevant to making wise and caring decisions that support our living planet, Gaia in the fulness of her systems.

This Paper was presented by Marilyn Hamilton, Founder of Integral City Meshworks, at the Indian Society of Applied Behavioural Sciences Summit 2019.

It focused on the theme: Resensitizing Humanness in a Digital World.

Click Here to download the full Paper. Paper on Caring Contexting Revised Sept 6, 2019

From Findhorn Beehive to Vancouver Human Hive: How Evo & Eco Evolve Gaia’s Reflective Organ

Keynote Address Ecocity World Summit, October 8, 2019

by

Marilyn Hamilton PhD, Integral City Meshworks Founder

Introduction

Think Global, Act Local – who in this room has heard this expression before? Most of us. Can you even remember the first time you heard this and where you were? It’s not quite a moonshot but it is fundamental to the worldview that embraces the whole earth as one ecology and care for the relationship that human actions have on the local environment.

For sure, when I first heard it, I was somewhere in the vicinity of Vancouver. And it is a pleasure to be back in Vancouver – a city that was part of my “home” region for more than 30 years. In the last 2 years I have taken a (road less travelled) back to the “home” of my ancestors. Scotland.

Scotland is a fascinating place. Land of many philosophers, pioneers and poets. Scotland has spawned many Canadian explorers and has been a founding nation of international entrepreneurs and enterprises without whom Canada would not have emerged in all its dignities and disasters.

Scotland is also the birthplace of the man who coined that phrase, Think Global, Act Local – in 1890 – Patrick Geddes, the inspirator of City Planning, Sociology, community engagement, city revitalization +++

Geddes lived in Edinburgh. I visit there often, because it is close to where I live now – the ecovillage of Findhorn.

How many of you know of Findhorn Ecovillage Scotland? How many of you have been there? How many of you have it on your bucket list??

Objective

Today I want to share some discoveries that I have taken from Findhorn’s Beehives back to Vancouver’s Human Hive to reframe and reflect on the new paradigm of the city that I have been flirting with for 2 decades. I want to talk about how the journey from Vancouver to Findhorn and back again has called on 2 major intelligences of the Human Hive – namely Evolutionary Intelligence and Ecological Intelligence – and how these are informing and reflecting my belief that cities are critical to Thinking Globally and Acting Locally – in fact I have come to believe cities have been evolved by Gaia herself as her Reflective Organs with the capacity to think and act both globally and locally.

To download and read the Full Keynote click here: Integral City Evo to Eco EWS Keynote Oct 8, 2019

The Power of the Pebble

What happens when we turn up in our organizations and discover the presence of a “pebble”?

Our human systems are living through a time when a small act can cause an enormous result—like the power of a pebble to precipitate a land slide or an avalanche.

When I look at a city and see all the human systems embedded within its boundaries—individuals, families, work places, sectors, and communities—the power of the pebble becomes a metaphor for transformational change on a multi-scalar level that is truly daunting.

The pebble is a metaphor with particular sensitivity because it reminds us all too easily of the irritation of a small rock caught in our shoe—or grit between our teeth—or even the biblical “mote in the eye”. We can even think of other ways to notice the impact of a pebble not only in body, but also in mind, heart, culture, and system.

It might be impossible to interact with the organizations in our lives without encountering the presence of a “pebble”.

To read the full article click here.

The original article was published in Enlivening Edge’s E-Zine.

Featured Image by Pexels from Pixabay

Integral City Reflective Organ – September Equinox 2019: Strike the City vs City on Strike

This newsletter is published quarterly using a cycle of perspectives on the Integral City viewed from: Planet, People, Place and Power. The theme of this issue is Place.

… we ground the cycle of Place Caring and Place Making with an evaluation process that is itself a fractal of the cycle. In order to be coherent with our many propositions that an Integral City is a meta-system, our approach to evaluation is based on a systems view of life. This view (Capra, 1996) considers that a system is alive when it can survive, adapt to its environment, and reproduce or regenerate. Research indicates those life processes are only possible because the system utilizes feedback to inform it of its success in surviving, adapting, and regenerating. This feedback is the most basic form of evaluation – on the life-giving level.

Hamilton, M. (2017). Integral City Inquiry & Action: Designing Impact for the Human Hive. Tucson, AZ: Integral Publishers, p. 283

~

Scroll to end of newsletter to access Free Resources.

Strike the City I want to get on!!
Strike the City I want to get off!!

Strike the City – it’s Burning Man time again. This annual phenomenon proves that cities can arise from a real desert. With a seeming stroke of magic the surveyors strike a city plotted on the desert sands that houses 70,000 people for a week.

This has become a true clan gathering that attracts tribes from around the world to gather, celebrate, entertain, experiment with chaos, invent a sharing economy and take complete responsibility for people, place and planet.

Burning Man is a lesson in what is possible when intention stays clear, energy is high and VUCA is not avoided but invited in. Volatility? They burn their most cherished creation the iconic Man. Uncertainty? Who can control the weather or the combination of people who turn up? Who will be your neighbor, your friend, your provocateur? Complexity? What happens when your urban apparition challenges the surrounding environments, townships and is always on the edge of health, safety and all three levels of government? Ambiguity? This is practically the star attraction – because who wants to turn up to the predictable, planned or pretention that arrived last year?

So we will scramble the unexpected, the uncertain and the unattractive with beauty, truth and goodness for regenerative madness that will be contagious enough to attract people to return next year.

Striking the Burning Man City is like striking up the energy vortex of the Nevada desert – everyone wants on to this playing field.

By contrast a parallel movement is going on with Extinction Rebellion and 350.org – it might well be called Strike the City I want to get off!!

Out beyond the boundaries of the state of Nevada, a global movement is emerging to take the City out on Strike from Sept. 20-27, 2019. Organizers from 350.org have not left events to the vagaries of spontaneity, but have rather planned, designed and unfolded from 350.org Central an impressive global-spanning, unfolding, inspired by the teenage strike leader, Greta Thunberg. What happens when you put youthful Urgency together with middle-aged Devotion? We will see even as this newsletter is released.

When I became aware of the design for the planned global strike(s). I felt an eerie sense of deja-vu.

This impending series of real events reminds me of 2 other apocalyptic conditions that impacted my life – the first arose out of fiction – when I read the book “Atlas Shrugged” at age 15. The worldview and ideas in Atlas Shrugged, framed my understanding of the world for the next 15-20 years. In recent years I have come to recognize this phase of my life was what Spiral Dynamics integral labels as “Orange”.

The second frisson of deja-vu from striking the city, arose from my participation in what was the world’s first global learning experience – Y2K. In the late 1990’s I helped communities prepare for that impending expected massive failure of global technology, by co-creating a learning game: Y2K Connections.

The game’s design was founded on two more worldviews more complex than Orange – namely the communitarian/environmental values of Green worldviews and the ecological, systemic views of life called Yellow in the SDi system (Teal in the Integral world). My game co-creator (Jan Nickerson) and I had learned these values from engaging with the writings, practices and communities connected to (amongst others) M. Scott Peck, Parker Palmer and from studying complexity sciences with Meg Wheatley.

Ironically the context for both those deja-vu’s has been changed by the emergence of the technology we take for granted today. The systems view of the world along with the Orange capacity for enterprise and manufacturing has enabled the hardware and software that has produced the global internet and social media.

Neither of these Striking-City Phenomena could succeed today without the technological systems that act as the virtual Town Criers calling the 4 Voices of the City to participate, express their desires and co-create new realities.

Striking the Burning Man City in Nevada is a potent model for what can emerge when we want to get on the bandwagon of Acting Local. Striking the City to a full economic stop in September is an equally potent model for what can emerge when we want to get off the consensus-trap that is blind to Thinking Globally.

If we are going to find a negotiated middle between the Local Act and Global Thought we may have to take our Strikes to another level altogether – the Cosmic level. Jude Currivan (see below) proposes we Think Cosmically FEEL Globally and Act Locally.

And Charles Eisenstein has suggested if we knew Gaia could FEEL – we would stop the pain we are causing the global super-system that all our lives, cities and Strikes depend on.

Whether we are Striking the City to get on or off, we are compelled to gain an overview effect from the Cosmic View. With that view, we can gain the perspective that both Strikes must move us toward Striking the Sweet Spot of living the Master Code of Care . We are called to care for our Selves, so we can Care for Each Other, So we can Care for our Cities/Places so we can care for our Planet.

350.org Coaches Climate Strikes

As I bring this issue to press 350.org offered online trainings on: Going Big, Escalation, and Goals and Strategy. Their website said:

These trainings are helping new and experienced activists and teams all over the globe to scale up local participation in the climate strike.  Register for your place in these online trainings now!   In … two weeks in September, 350.org and … coalition partners [offered] free online trainings on the following topics:

Climate Parents are Rising! (10 September)Our Kids’ Climate, alongside organd the Climate Reality Project, will discuss how parents, grandparents and caregivers can support and join young people taking action.
Safety & Risk Planning (11 September) This basic safety and risk training will ensure you’re ready to deal with any risks that arise at your event, and will outline what support is available to you.
Climate Storytelling (14 September) More details soon!
Live Coverage Skills (17 September) We’ll share the best tips and advice for covering your action or event using just your mobile phone, to ensure that your climate strike is part of the global story.
Countdown to the Climate Strike! Q&A Call (18 September) A few days before the Global Climate Strike, you’re invited to join orgfor a ‘last minute prep’ webinar on Facebook Live. A live panel will be on hand to answer your questions.
Media Training (dates TBC) Tips and tricks to get your climate strike in the media. Go through the essentials of messaging, writing press releases and giving … For full details on all these topics, including the exact webinar times and how to register,  head to the Global Climate Strike online trainings page now!




The Wisdom of Place – from Nest City’s Beth Sanders

Teaching from Me in Community

I’ve been exploring a vital question for years, in anticipation of publication of my book, Nest City: how do I share my thinking and my work while being in community with my audience, especially when we are face-to-face?

The question comes from long-standing ‘antibodies’ in my citizen-system (me) to the dominant learning pattern of the expert on the stage, separate from the audience. (There’s a time and a place for this, but we are not good at discerning when it is right or right circumstances for the sage on the stage; it is our default shape when we gather in groups.)

I get itchy when we seem to think that when one or a few people talk to a crowd about community that we are learning about community. We are not. 

Read Beth’s Full Blog here.

Gaia is ALIVE

When I first wrote Book 1 of the Integral City Series, I knew of only 2 scientists who considered the Earth as a living system: physicist, James Lovelock, author of the Gaia Hypothesis and Evolution Biologist, Elisabet Sahtouris. The list is now growing as a transdisciplinary constellation of experts who believe, speak and write about the aliveness of the Earth now includes:

James Lovelock
Elisabet Sahtouris
Paul van Schaik
Daniel Christian Wahl
Charles Eisenstein
Polly Higgins
Jude Currivan

I am so delighted to be writing, speaking and working in such company and to share the voices below of: Jude Currivan, Paul van Schaik and Elisabet Sahtouris.

Urban Hub 15: Dancing with the Future

Paul Van Schaik’s most recent addition to the Thriveable City Series shows the slides from a dynamic deck that accompany a presentation on Visions & WorldViews and Thriveable Cities. The history of the co-evolution of cities, evolving WorldViews, Visions & Mindsets in urban Habitats and technology is presented in an integral framework. Integral theory is simply explained as it relates to these themes. This volume is part of an ongoing series of guides for integrally informed practitioners, to which Integral City has contributed. The book is available at Amazon here. The PDF version is available gratis at this link: https://issuu.com/paulvanschaik/docs/urbanhub15

Enjoy the Integral City Dance in 3 Acts – posted in a Blog series here .

Spirited Business, People and Brands:​ For now and the future   

Join Jude Currivan , 12 October, 2pm –15 October, 12.30pm,  at Findhorn Foundation, Scotland

A Spirited Business supports the evolution of human consciousness with a purpose defined by the unified field that connects all existence. When business leaders attune to the spirit of their business, expressed in the DNA of its brand and work in harmony with it, they inevitably are called to contribute to and align with this evolutionary impulse. They develop a sense of planetary purpose and stewardship, far beyond the limits of shareholder returns. One that adds value and enhances the lives of others. Their wholistic world-view and approach naturally aligns with and co-creatively synergises systemic intelligence, to optimise human and planetary well-being and empower local and global stewardship and regeneration.

Elisabet Sahtouris Updates Principles of Healthy Living Systems

Elisabet let me know in a personal communication about an update to her Principles of Healthy Living Systems. She tucked in an extra principle related to resilience between 13 and 14 on the list. With humour and humility she confessed it as “an important omission”, so we are happy to support her and republish the whole list below.

Elisabet explains: “Our industrial culture became so obsessed with efficiency that we almost entirely missed the critical importance of Nature’s resilience…of the flexibility always needed and increasingly whenever change is called for…

Nature is conservative with what works and radically changes what does not!  If we got that those two approaches must function in partnership, we might get democracy to work!  Seeing them as adversaries and voting in one or the other every few years is preventing our maturation as a globalised species”.

Main Features or Principles of Healthy Living Systems

(from cells to cities, ecosystems to Earth, bodies to businesses)

Self-creation (autopoiesis)
Complexity (diversity of parts)
Embeddedness in larger holons and dependence on them (holarchy)
Self-reflexivity (autognosis/self-knowledge)
Self-regulation/maintenance (autonomics)
Response ability to internal and external stress or other change
Input/output exchange of matter/energy/information with other holons
Transformation of matter/energy/information
Empowerment/employment of all component parts
Communications among all parts
Coordination of parts and functions
Balance of Interests negotiated among parts, whole, and embedding holarchy
Reciprocity of parts in mutual contribution and assistance
Efficiency balanced by Resilience
Conservation of what works well
Creative change of what does not work well

Upcoming Events for Integral City


Beyond Smart Online: Integral City Practices, Tools & Maps
For Practitioners. (2 Days Online: 3 Dates – Nov. 29-30, 2019, Feb. 7-8, 2020 , April 4-5, 2020)

This 2-day course online introduces “practitioners” to just the basics of the Integral City model. You will learn the framework of practices, tools and maps that reveal the common patterns that impact the lives of individuals, organizations and communities within your city. This short course explores three powerful images animating Integral City systems – the integral map, the meshwork and the human hive. You will learn from your own situations and each other how the toolkit guides you beyond models for Urban Ecovillages and Traditional, Smart and Resilient Cities.  MORE INFO

Beyond Resilient: Integral City Inquiry Action & Impact
For Catalysts. (4 Days, Findhorn, Scotland, Oct. 10-14, 2020)

This 4-day course is for “catalysts” to explore inquiry and action that inspires productive impact for reinventing today’s cities for the future. You will interact with the 4+1 Voices of the Integral City (Business, Local Government, Civil Society and Citizens, plus actors from other regional cities) to identify strategic possibilities. Integral City introduces you to new ways to think about, act in, relate to and reinvent the city as a Human Hive. Through placecaring and placemaking, we invite you to discover the unique contributions you make to its aliveness. We believe the future of cities will emerge not just from the bottom up through Smart City Technology or the top down through Resilient approaches – but from the integrated actions of the 4+1 Voices in all the cities in your eco-region, as you reinvent your Human Hives.   MORE INFO

Beyond Complexity: Integral City Care Context & Capacity

For Meshworkers. (4 Days, Findhorn, Scotland, Aug. 29 – Sept. 2, 2020)

This 4-day course is for “meshworkers” to imagine how to reframe simplicity on the other side of complexity in the Integral City – or Human Hive. You will join graduates of prior training to build on the Integral City practitioner and catalyst competencies to apply new skills to a live case study. You will look at the city through the lenses of Care, Contexting and Capacity Building. You will view the city as a complex, adaptive living innovation eco-system, where the internal and external connections amongst the 4+1 voices of the city (Citizens, Civil Society, City/Institutional Managers, Business/Innovators (and other cities) enable conditions for thriving today. You will seek to align intra-city and inter-regional collaborations through caring for people, contexting for place and capacity building for purpose. This course introduces the practices of “meshworking”, so that practitioners who work with individual organizations and catalysts who build bridges between organizations can engage with the city as a whole.  MORE INFO

 Upcoming Integral City & Constellation Events with Place Focus

August 28 – December 11 2019,  Nest City Circle Training, Calgary Alberta.

September 18, 2019  Integral City training “Beyond Complexity Co-Lab” in partnership with Findhorn College

October 7-11, 2019  will see us in Vancouver Canada for the 10th Ecocity World Summit to deliver a plenary and two workshops

October 26, 2019, join us at Edinburgh, International Center for Spirituality and Peace Spiritualities, True Professionalism and Aligned Action: Discerning the True, Good and Beautiful in 21st Century Profesionalism

November 8-9 Integral City in Delhi, India to dialogue with the Indian Society Applied Behavioral Psychology Conference on the topic of Placecaring and Placemaking in a Digital World.

Celebrating Place in the Planet-of-Cities in the Coming Quarter of 2019

 September 21 marks the start of what Integral City calls the Place Quarter (from September 21 to December 20). What strikes you about the Feeling of Change in your City? How do you relate to radical actions like striking and radical expressions like Burning Man? Do you care deeply for places that are indigenous to you? How do you share that care with others in the same place?  Visit us on our Integral City Website and Blog or post a comment about places that are evolving, changing, and becoming more sustainable on our Facebook page.

Meshful Blessings for our Planet of Cities from
Marilyn Hamilton and the Integral City Constellation Corps Team

PS Here are some FREE resources for Growing Gaia’s Reflective Organ:
Podcasts, Videos Blogs and More

 Graphic Book – Paul van Schaik – Urban Hub 15 Dancing With the Future

Podcasts & Videos

Dr. Tom Henfrey Interviews Dr. Marilyn Hamilton for UrbanA Research
Dr. Sheeba Chander Interviews Dr. Marilyn Hamilton re Ecocity World Summit plans
Tamarack Community Change Festival Vancouver Sept. 30 -Oct. 3, 2019
Watch 2 Green Manifestos delivered by Oleg Lega and Marilyn Hamilton at Amsterdam’s 2019 WeMakethe.City Festival

Password for all video’s: WeMakeTheCity1!

After movie: https://vimeo.com/344647596

Oleg: https://vimeo.com/344652468

Marilyn: https://vimeo.com/344653330

Discussion: https://vimeo.com/344653036

5. Watch Marilyn Hamilton’s Webinar Are Cities Evolving as Gaia’s Reflective Organs? Delivered with 3 Horizons University (H3Uni)   https://vimeo.com/330821261   Password: H3UniHamilton

6. Bees in a Cello

7. Bees – See the invention of the flow hive

8. Blogs

4 Voices of City Visit Amsterdam, Moscow, London
Integral City in Amsterdam: WeMakethe.City Better for All of Us
Living Cities Russia Discovers “Habits for Changing Cities”
City, Psychology and Place Summit Generates Rich Inquiry
Co-Creating Europe: What Have Cities Got to do With It?
New Sincerity Manifesto – an Update
Citizen & Civil Society Organizations Evolve with Lessons from the Honey Bee
Global Ecovillage Network (GEN)

Global Ecovillage Network EU 2019 Conference in 4 Graphics
Integral City Prepares for Ecology Panel at GEN EU 2019 Conference
Global Ecovillage Network Europe 2019 Ecology Panel


Gaia’s Reflective Organ: Marilyn’s Spiritual AQtivism Journey
Urban Hub 15: Dancing With the Future – Integral City Dance

Imagine Waking Up the Human Hive: A Dance in 3 Acts
Imagine Waking Up the Human Hive: Dance Prelude
Imagine Waking Up the Human Hive: Act 1 Deep Inner Listening
Waking Up the Human Hive: Act 2 Work is Love in Action
Waking Up the Human Hive: Act 3 Choreographing With Nature





Newsletters Past Issues 2019-18

Integral City Reflective Organ – June 2019: Imagine the Human Hive
Integral City Reflective Organ – March 2019: Are Cities Evolving as Gaia’s Reflective Organs?
Integral City MetaBlog 2018  – A synthesis and index of all Integral City Blogs from 2018.
Integral Cities of the Year 2018 – 6 AIKA  – for the collaborative city spirit amongst 6 cities in Finland.
Meshworker of the Year Award 2018 – Diana Claire Douglas for Systemic Constellation Work for the Collective.
Integral City Reflective Organ – December Solstice 2018: Reframing Complex Challenges with the Power to Change

Citizen & Civil Society Organizations Evolve with Lessons from the Honey Bee

Integral City identifies 4 Voices of the City: Citizens, Civil Society, Civic Managers and Business/Innovators. Each of these Voices has organizational forms, but some are more developed than others.

The organizational voices of Civic Managers and Business/Innovators are commonly expressed through their public and private institutions both of which have decades of practices and multitudes of consultants with methodologies to grow organizational capacity.

However, Citizen and Civil Society organizations are often less sophisticated with fewer resources available to help improve performance. Often these not-for-profits and/or associations have little experience or guidance to aid development or performance.

But surprisingly, Citizen and Civil Society Associations (CCSA) can learn valuable habits from the honey bee.

A beehive must produce 40 pounds of honey per year in order to survive. The survival strategy that the beehive has evolved depends on the performance of five roles: conformity enforcer, diversity generator, inner judge, resource shifter and intergroup tournament player.

Read the full story of how Citizen and Civil Society Associations can learn from the honey bee capacities for sustainability, resilience and evolution in Enlivening Edge here.

Waking Up the Human Hive: Act 3 Choreographing With Nature

This series of blogs forms Integral City’s contributions to Paul van Schaik’s Urban Hub Volume 15 – Thrivable Cities Graphic Book.

We imagined a Dance in 3 Acts based on the Findhorn Foundation’s 3 Principles:

Prelude+
Deep Inner Listening
Work is Love in Action
Co-Creating with the Intelligences of Nature