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 [...]
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 [...]
One of the tensions most cities face is how to create the conditions for multiple generations to speak together. In an Ecovillage which is at a smaller scale of “human hive” than a city, the generational tensions can seem even more intense, because people are closer together in time and space on an everyday [...]
Be moved. Be still. Repeat. Last year (2017) I was moved to write a series of blogs on the journey of grief I was experiencing on the death of my husband, Peter. I was moved, by his last wishes, to return to Scotland (north of Inverness) to Royal Dornoch Golf Course and scatter [...]
The 12 Intelligences of the Integral City can be directly connected to the Principles of Living Systems. This may not be surprising given the core influences of their creators. In the case of the 12 Intelligences, I was considering the evolution of the holarchy of human systems from individual, to family/collectives, to organizations, to [...]
Cohering the Integral We-Space: Engaging Collective Emergence, Wisdom & Healing in Groups is a new resource with potential to catalyze the emergence of Integral Cities. The book is an edited volume (by editors Olen Gunnlaugson and Michael Brabant) that reveals the leading edges of We-Space through the lenses of integrally informed practitioners located in [...]
Integral City sat down in June, 2017, with Lev Gordon on his recent visit to North America. We got the "inside scoop" from Lev on how he and his colleagues had transformed the Urbanfest 2014, featuring Integral City with other urban experts, into a Living Cities Association that stretches from Vladivostok to St. Petersburg. [...]
After reading Scale by Geoffrey West, I am deeply impressed by his research, even though it appears that I have some fundamental disagreement with some of his conclusions. West argues for a framework of scaling cities (and other complex adaptive systems) that includes four core properties. His treatise is to my sensibilities so [...]
Imagine Durant has drafted a working Vision. They are at a stage where that Vision will continue to be refined and wordsmithed. But it captures enough of the intentions of the last 3 years of Dialogue that three strategic themes have emerged. 1.Learning & Growing Citizens through: Growing (participation) Educating (to world-class level) [...]