Notices by Dr. Elizabeth Sawin✨ (bethsawin@spore.social)

Can building community change the world? Can it support us as shocks shake the systems we depend on? Does multisolving building community? Or does community building enable multisolving? If questions like these interest you please join us in reflection and conversation. https://bit.ly/ClimateWeek25Multisolving

It's not a pushover either. It holds it's ground once it gets going.

And it is never stingy. Like my neglected gardens, there's a lot of needy spaces in the world, gaps vacated by systems that are faltering or being deconstructed intentionally. May we be scrappy, a little bit assertive, and brilliantly generous, as we explore what is possible there.

I think now is a time we could learn from goldenrod. If it's not a plant you know here are a few things about it: It finds its way into marginal spaces at the edges of a mowed area, the un-mulched spot in the flower garden, the gravely side of the road.

It puts down tough roots that hold it in place (you'll know if you ever tried to to remove some from a garden!). Then it does its thing - its bright, brilliant cheerful flowering. And it offers generously of nectar and pollen, to bumble bees, honey bees, wasps, little solitary bees.

I live now in an old house with gardens having weathered some years of neglect and the goldenrod is everywhere. Even as I negotiate with it - you have this spot, but not here, this is for the lily, the peony, the poppy - I admire it. Nothing shy or retiring. No hiding this light under a bushel.

Do you notice how, while some people spend their days breaking things, others, more of us than them I believe, just keep mending. Humble, patient, skilled, never done, usually messy, the handwork that holds the world together.

@dalias def not promoting accelerationism - more recognizing that I have likely been too timid in the past in saying how deep I think change needs to be.

Could it be that one thing these times are showing us is that the way to a flourishing future refuses to come through slight course corrections of systems that are founded on extraction, othering, and domination?

Some solid ground in chaotic times:
Conserving energy and water is almost always wise.
Prevention is almost always cheaper than coping.
Diversity in communities and ecosystems is almost always source of strength.
It remains one indivisible planet no matter what those in power

And I (still) believe that my vision - perhaps yours is similar - is more practical, more achievable, and more coherent with how our miracle of a planet operates than the self-serving prognostications of capitalism and its beneficiaries.

I (still) imagine a future where the water runs clear, children are safe, the oceans are full of life, we stabilize and draw down greenhouse gases, peace is common, conflict is generative, and the many and fluid ways of living/being human all have the space to flourish, on and on into the future

@band try it without the "#" I might have messed up... (and thanks for your interest!)

It is really interesting to write a book and then learn how people are using it. Here's some things I've been learning lately about how my book Multisolving seems to be helping people: https://islandpress.org/books/multisolving#desc

A facilitator of groups (including many with people in deep uncertainty regarding job security, grant funding, projects & more) closes every meeting by reading this poem which opens the last chapter of the book. If it gives even a temporary boost of courage or clarity that makes me so happy! ❤️

A book group in the UK is meeting chapter by chapter and applying what they are reading to their own lives and work - I get to join them at the end of the journey and I'm so curious!

Someone who is handing out gift copies of the book to friends and colleagues tells people if the are too pressed for time to read the book from cover to cover to just open it every day to a random spot and read a paragraph. "I tell them it will definitely have relevance to their day..."

Definitely not a vision I had, but I can see it. Since we are afloat in complexity all the time a little droplet of a story or a concept about well ...being afloat in complexity... could offer a moment to reflect or re-find one's center, or look at a situation or a problem in a new way.

If you are using the book, please let me know how - here or in a DM or whatever is easy. I am so curious!! And the book is on your "someday" list my publisher Island Press offers a generous 20% off with the code #MULTI

...uncertain step by uncertain step because what else are you going to do. And you'll discover that bodies are miracles and also messy and that love is strong and that suffering and meanness are everywhere but so is kindness and that almost everything is fragile even when it doesn't look like it