Regenerative Leadership — A Meaning Fringe event
By: Garry Turner
Tags: Leadership, Meaning, Regeneration, Dinner, Inspiration

What an incredibly poignant, inspiring and educational start to my Meaning Conference 2019 experience.

After meeting the awesome Ollie Martin in real life for the first time doing a ‘recky’ of our home for the main conference tomorrow and then catching up with the energetic and awesome Lizzie Boyd for the first in real life (just love all these human connections :-)), I made my way to Jenny Andersson’s Regenerative Leadership workshop which was one of many #MeaningFringe events this week.

Regenerative Leadership

Now full disclosure; this is a term that would have washed over me unconsciously as recently as two years ago.

I, like so many others I am sure, were nd still are living a fully unconscious, consumerist, ‘all about me’ life without thought as to the externalities of our choices.

I feel that I am much more open and conscious of my choices — they are not always the best ones for the planet, society, and even my own body, but I am much more conscious when I make those choices.

I have followed Jenny’s with real interest over the past two years and I fully recommend if you are reading this blog, that you follow her work.

She is vocal, passionate, engaging, driven and balanced in her mission to help show us the way to more regenerative and restorative practices for the benefit of all.

Checking in and connecting

The group of around 15 people stood in a circle and offered a short intro to themselves and their areas of interest for being present today.

Some worked in leadership development, some worked in social enterprises, some were deeply spiritual in their coaching practice, and some were just curious about the subject matter.

Jenny then took us on the most interesting and engaging journey as to the methodology of the feminine psychology of development. At first, I was deeply intrigued and within minutes totally engrossed in Jenny’s story-telling and her ‘informal PHD’ which has involved her going deep into a range of ancient stories and systemic shifts that will make up her new book that comes out in 2020.

Pairs Excercise

Jenny asked us to carry out an exercise in pairs, to answer one or more of the following questions:

My talking partner and I looked across the top two, with my summary resulting in the following:

What the above represented for me was the need for us to move from the current ‘competition’ between masculine and feminine and the lack of youthful curiosity, all of which feel like mutually exclusive conversations currently, toward a more holistic, present and collaborative conversation with all three of these elements at the centre, grounded in courage, vulnerability and rest.

People are tired today. Exhausted, from the perpetual noise, fear and disconnection that is pumped into every ether of our 2019 life and to come together on the above basis, role-modeled individually and collectively, I feel has transformative potential.

There was also a rich conversation around the importance of language.

I would love to learn what comes up for you on reading these questions?

Laura Storm, founder of Regenerators

Jenny had arranged for Laura to join us virtually to share her personal experience of separation and to offer clarity as to the importance of regenerative leadership and the wider world.

Laura is a passionate speaker, vulnerable in sharing her origin story which included an accident that left her completely immobilised for a period of time.

Laura has written a book called regenerative leadership where she outlines some steps that we can all take to move the current state of disconnection and separation to a reconnected state.

My personal learning and impact from today’s session

Summary takeaways for me from today's awesome session include:

We talk about the ‘mechanistic’ shift of work as if it is a recent thing il.e the past 100–150 years, however, the ‘separation’ to ourselves and from the blend of feminine and masculine energies started 4000 years ago! #mindblown!

In ancient story-telling, there were early, and many, examples as to how important and impactful utilise feminine energy was, but in many early teachings including te bible, feminine stories were erased in favour of masculine ones! — This offers a beautiful opportunity to get away fro the ‘recent’ short termist stories and get back to a ‘root cause/review’ of our humanity

For me, I took away such clarity that vulnerability and love/care are two of the most powerful gateways back to our innate connection with self and others (I appreciate spiritually there is not a ‘self,’ but I do see it is important that we offer a bridge for people to see back home)

and are two of the most powerful gateways back to our innate connection with self and others (I appreciate spiritually there is not a ‘self,’ but I do see it is important that we offer a bridge for people to see back home) We all have choices, not always easy, but we always have them and to take that accountability to engage fully in the conversation around regenerative leadership, in all aspects of our life, is of critical importance

What a wrap-up

To wrap up an already amazing day, a number of us Meaning-goers got together for dinner which created some of the richest, diverse and inspiring conversations that anyone could ask for at a dinner gathering!

This was not your run of the meal, boring chat, and meal with peers. This was a meaningful, impactful and deeply growth-fuelled conversation.

Just so awesome to meet Jo, Lara, Nuria, Perry, Broch, Emily, Anna, Anna, Catalina, Christine, Miranda and more — Just the best night with open-hearted peers and I recommend if you are not already connected, get connecting to all of these awesome, progressive humans.

Just so excited for today with the cup of optimism and opportunity well and truly filled.

Weare ready for you Nilofer. :-)