Below is a lyrical personal story of what recently happened when I invited some worldshaping women friends to Brussels in January 2012, to co-host an experimental co-creation lab for accelerating global social impact and innovation.
I compiled these images and wrote this story (without twitter handles or links) for a Pecha Kucha evening in Brussels on 25 January, which means I had only 20 seconds to speak about each image - that's 6 min 40 sec total to tell the whole story of what was an extremely transformative experience. It didn't go perfectly, but all in all, a great learning by doing experience I can highly recommend for sharpening your changemaker presentation and storytelling skills.
I would also share that collaging and then turning the story lyrical in the days following these events were both very intense, even catalytic ways, to distill and harvest what really happened for me. I have mindfully told this from a very personal perspective, because I can't say at all that the deep shift which happened for me is representative of what everyone at the #we_b event experienced.
I do know that the whole @ci2iglobal group, however, continues to be deeply moved by what we experienced together with the amazing #we_b participants, and in our debrief and planning session after the event (not to mention dancing together until 4 in the morning in between those!).
Enjoy the story ~ I'd love comments on how it makes you feel.
(You can click on each image to see a larger version, if you need to.)
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Special gratitudes to @appliedwisdom, @bonniekoenig, @christellevh @carolinatocalli @nurturegirl and the #we_b participants for all the amazing inspiration.
Thanks to you as well for reading and commenting if you feel so inspired. Feel free to share.
Follow us collectively at @c2iglobal
I'm at @ChristinasWorld
I compiled these images and wrote this story (without twitter handles or links) for a Pecha Kucha evening in Brussels on 25 January, which means I had only 20 seconds to speak about each image - that's 6 min 40 sec total to tell the whole story of what was an extremely transformative experience. It didn't go perfectly, but all in all, a great learning by doing experience I can highly recommend for sharpening your changemaker presentation and storytelling skills.
I would also share that collaging and then turning the story lyrical in the days following these events were both very intense, even catalytic ways, to distill and harvest what really happened for me. I have mindfully told this from a very personal perspective, because I can't say at all that the deep shift which happened for me is representative of what everyone at the #we_b event experienced.
I do know that the whole @ci2iglobal group, however, continues to be deeply moved by what we experienced together with the amazing #we_b participants, and in our debrief and planning session after the event (not to mention dancing together until 4 in the morning in between those!).
Enjoy the story ~ I'd love comments on how it makes you feel.
(You can click on each image to see a larger version, if you need to.)
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This is a story about a mosaic
of social entrepreneurs, changemakers and worldshapers.
In my belief system, they are the living angels
in which the hope of our planet currently lies.
It’s a her-story.
that’s becoming
a history of WE-stories.
It’s a story about accelerating the work of “changemakers” around the world.
And since I am one of them, it’s also my story.
I first fell in love with the simple word “WE”
when I was using it to catalyze
Webbed Empowerment
in an East African warzone.
I'd been amazed when
an organization “labelled” me
a “leading changemaker”
because of essentially personal passions
I was pursuing.
But I became aware in those days
that there were other people like me,
who were driven to serve the world
by something different inside.
My passion for WE
moved with later me to Brussels,
where I’ve explored & found
work for myself in the emerging
global changemaker scene.
There’s lots of us now!
At the start of this year (2012), I invited five friends
- fellow women changemakers -
to gather from 3 continents at my home.
Each in unique ways they are my angels, and
We see eye to eye on many things.
our plan was to have a conversation
and to host a conversation
about accelerating collective
global changemaker impact and innovation.
We invited a few people we knew
to join us for an experiment in Brussels.
that we called in the invitation "#we_b."
We also committed ourselves
to moving a conversation forward
around the world in the next 2 years.
Worldchanging folks heard the call
and gathered with us for this first ever WE_x co-creation lab.
The inspiring space filled with awe inspiring people
Their uniquely powerful energies
humbled us
as we bumbled through
our group’s first time working together as a team
Round 1 of group introductions confirmed
it would be a very exciting day
We were 20 changemakers
from 9 countries
with work on 5 continents
and unlimited passion in the room
into this pool of empowered people
we unleashed systems thinking content
and co-creative processes
and personal reflection.
With ease the group sparked and taught each other
about how the changemaker space is emerging today,
and explored what that could mean for each of us.
For 12 hours we conversed, we played, we ate, and made plans.
It was exhausting and exhilerating at the same time.
I learned so much.
One framework that cut naturally across
many of our conversations was
the @Thrivable action spectrum,
proposed by Jean who was there to share from Chicago
Seeing our actions as changemakers
through the lens of
what we can control
what we can guide
and what we can nurture
was so grounding.
a collective sigh of relief
seemed to ripple through
this group of often
over-committed over-achievers
as we got this.
Christelle from Paris
provoked us to think about impact
in terms of social risk and opportunity
How might we invite
new conversations with old system institutions and corporations,
that re-frame the story of why social inclusion matters?
What if
creating social impact
was valued in terms of
reducing social risk?
led discussions about scaling impact which left us wondering:
Must we all scale our impact?
Or can we find ways to work together
to achieve the impacts we seek at scale?
There is only so much each of us can do,
to control, guide, & nurture
the world’s current transformation.
But collectively
We are a new landscape
that’s daring to emerge
and through modeling with clay we learned:
We each define the impact we seek to create in this lifetime,
We each bring our own dynamic to the landscape,
and We each determine the direction we face
as we keep moving forward to serve
Our group included changemakers
at every stage of the European talent pipeline.
we were students and start-ups,
consultants and thought leaders and
directors from globally operating organizations
We’re still developing the basic language
to talk about what we do,
and why we do what we do.
Our simplest shared truth is that
we exist as a real community of human beings
who feel called to live our lives in service to the earth’s
transformation today.
It might sound to some of you
like our heads are in the clouds.
But as an angel who joined us reminded me,
each of us sees something different in the clouds.
and learning from what we all see
is the essence of the magic
that tapping into our collective wisdom offers.
The perspective we gain when we gather
helps all of us to see how to reach higher
another nugget from her, and this frilly doodle
that floated in from one of the many flipcharts
have given me a new appreciation for ginger lately
Did you know that ginger is a rhizome?
I’m told it’s a unique biological concept,
that needs no beginning or end to grow
the nodes grow where they are called to grow
without any perceptible effort
like the conversation that #we_b became
So people left us inspired,
some embarked on new paths of commitment and collaboration
The conversation moved online
with #we_b angels like @ladyniasan and others
organizing themselves to connect and
to share all their many thoughts.
But although this first #we_x lab was done
we knew,
the real harvest was yet to come.
In the afterglow
a warmth of women’s wisdom infused my Brussels home,
where we debriefed and distilled,
seeking meaning in it all
for another 12 hours.
With a renewed sense of common purpose,
but still without clarity on what we’d actually done,
we pondered ci2i logo options and
discussed and discussed and
asked ourselves,
again and again
Where does the #we_b conversation lead us?
For me personally, clarity came
once everyone else had finally gone.
In the house all empty and reflective
The silence started rumbling
as an organized unjumbling
of the many thoughts in my head
began to crystalize
and spill itself
onto the screen.
It was our ci2i group’s mosaic
of content and tools and process and future plans.
It that thing that drives me on this path.
Forming a clear picture
where there hadn’t been one before
where there hadn’t been one before
of an approach - our collective approach -
to nurturing the changemaker’s call
to learn and become
who we are and what we can do
in this emerging new landscape
we're co-creating.
Working together to guide this discovery
in ourselves and in others,
is a natural way forward
my angels see eye to eye on
and I love it
since there is nothing else we can control.
For each changemaker carries our own cross for change
and follows our own integrated personal and professional development path,
that leads us toward the kind of impact on this transformation that
we are each here to make.
And every day,
more and more brilliant and
driven people
are picking their up their own crosses for change
and pursuing journeys in service to the earth's renewal,
toward humanity's higher good.
Look around and see us everywhere,
gathering in places like Brussels every day.
Are you one of us?
I’m glad they like ginger in Thailand,
since Chiang Mai is the next step in my own unique journey
Now preparing for new projects in the orient
I feel oriented.
#we_b was a powerful affirmation for me
of the the thriving existence of a global tribe
to which I know I belong.
I can only wonder
at what we’ll see
at #we_c !!
===== end =======
Special gratitudes to @appliedwisdom, @bonniekoenig, @christellevh @carolinatocalli @nurturegirl and the #we_b participants for all the amazing inspiration.
Thanks to you as well for reading and commenting if you feel so inspired. Feel free to share.
Follow us collectively at @c2iglobal
I'm at @ChristinasWorld
