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Resonant World #78
In early January, I shared a list of 33 questions I was walking into 2024.
It was the most-opened post of any I’ve published on Resonant World this year.
It’s since occurred to me to offer a brief report on the progress I’ve made (or not) in answering them — and to invite resonance in return.
Since some of these questions touch on deeper personal material, I’m offering the start of the report publicly, but paywalling the rest for members of the Resonance Council (paid subscribers).
I love hearing from readers, so please don’t hesitate to comment below.
Here’s my update so far:
How to create an “emotional resilience for climate leaders” course, based on the kinds of principles I’ve been studying in the Timeless Wisdom Training, to use this work to support allies in the climate movement?
I’m working on a proposal for an offering on this topic with a colleague from a fantastic climate nonprofit organisation. We’re due to meet later in April to pull our draft proposal into sharper focus, before taking it to funders.
We are at a tipping point in the global trauma healing movement — which I believe will soon become far more visible and influential in mainstream culture. How could I write a book that could help galvanize this process, say in an analogous way to Silent Spring’s role in raising environmental consciousness?
This task is my dream contribution. It also can feel impossibly, even painfully, out of reach — at least from where I’m sitting right now. In February, I was glad to take a micro-step in this direction by writing about the seminal article ‘Healing Systems’ by Laura Caldéron de la Barca, John Kania and Katherine Milligan of the Collective Change Lab, which I think they should turn into a book. (Resonant World#69:Forward This When Words Fail).
In conversation last week with coach Jordan Bates, it occurred to me that I could downscale the arguably inflated level of ambition contained in the question, and write a short e-book breaking down why I think applying the lens of collective and inter-generational trauma can be so helpful for individuals, and also at a collective level. That feels more manageable, and could draw on a lot of the work I’ve done for Resonant World to get this off the ground. Further reflection needed.
How best to deploy my networking skills to serve and integrate my core constituencies — the climate movement and the trauma healing movement — more powerfully and effectively?
I’ve been doing this by sharing my writing on inter-generational and collective trauma with climate-focused colleagues, and bringing this lens to climate coverage on Resonant World, such as this story on Havas CEO Yannick Bolloré, and this story on COP28 President Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber. (Resonant World#62: Yannick Bolloré: A Case Study in Corporate Climate Disavowal. Resonant World#68: Why Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber Needs A Men’s Circle).
What practices can best help me dissolve more of my default level of resistance to the circumstances of my life? (My hunch: Lots and lots of meditation).
My meditation practice is not bad — if somewhat sporadic. Something new has come into my awareness in recent weeks, however: the magnificent system known as the ‘Gene Keys’, which has helped me make more sense of several long-standing shadow patterns which, at least on the surface, make no rational sense.
The business world has the Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal. Where does the global trauma healing movement go for its news? What kind of new media platform is needed to support the global healing movement? How could it be funded?
I developed this idea further in Resonant World#73: Building a Media System to Heal Collective Trauma. Who’s in? And I’m taking the plunge by speaking about these ideas in public at Kairos in London on April 11.
What principles should inform much-needed initiatives to bring trauma-informed perspective to the news? For example, to what extent is it appropriate to analyse the character of key global power-brokers, such as COP28 President Sultan Ahmed al-Jaber, through a trauma-informed lens?
In the end, I wrote about Yannick Bolloré and Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, and I don’t think I crossed any ethical lines. In fact, it’s arguably the other way round — by not bringing individual, inter-generational and collective trauma into the picture, we’re only telling a fraction of the story.
Where to focus Resonant World? Interviews? Podcasts? Reported stories? My process? Something else?
I have published a mixture; continuing to walk the question.
How to exponentially grow Resonant World’s subscriber base?
When I published my 33 questions, Resonant World had 939 subscribers. Now it has 1,095. That’s solid, if not exponential, growth. I notice people tend to sign up for the newsletter when I do live events (such as this webinar for the Global Investigative Journalism Network), and I’m hoping to spread the word further by teaming up for more events with organisations such as the Pocket Project, Acer, and others.
How to find ways to write about healing work that cuts through to a more mainstream audience?
Does this really matter? What does “mainstream” even mean? I’m not sure this is the right question. That said, I’d like to write more about this work for big publications I’ve worked for in the past.
How to spread the word about our monthly men’s group more effectively?
The men’s work I’ve been offering with Daniel Simpson is morphing into the Resonant Man Project, with Jacob Kishere. More details soon.
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