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COMPANIONS IN LIFE-CENTRED TRANSFORMATION.
Guided by George Simons and Julian Ellerby.

POSTS STORIES REELS TAGGED

“Your attention is not broken. It’s being corralled — culverted away from everything that sustains life.”

We treat distraction as a personal failing. Julian Ellerby offers something better: attention isn’t just focus, it’s an ecology — shaped by place, memory, and the more-than-human world. Like any living system, it thrives on diversity. Feed it only feeds, and it narrows.

In Vol 3, he shares five rituals for wilding the way we notice — small, deliberate practices for being here again.

“I am an antenna. We all are.”

Read Wilding Attention by Julian Ellerby — full piece in this week’s Meanderings. Link in bio 🌿
#wildness #attention #rewilding #presence by @wyrdfutures

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4 months ago

Meander Magazine Vol 3: Wildness is out now.
What does it mean to be a wild human? Not wild as in elsewhere — wild as in what remains when we stop overriding instinct and outsourcing our attention.

A rich, plural, embodied enquiry across 172 pages. We're glad and grateful our futures guide Julian has two pieces inside: An English Edgeland Chorus gives voice to a hedgerow @lopemede_farm in south Oxfordshire, and Wilding Attention, five rituals for re-encountering the world.

In good company with @bayo.akomolafe @r_u__ta and many more.

Wildness isn't somewhere else.

@meander_magazine.

#meandermagazine #wildness #wyrdfutures #morethanhuman #regenerativeculture by @wyrdfutures

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4 months ago

Register by 9th March @ https://actionnetwork.org/forms/growing-2040-workshop-expression-of-interest-form

Please share with anyone that you think would be interested and you can ask the team question here info@growmoregrowers.org #agroecology #collectiveimagination #growing #participatoryresearch #basicincomeforfarmers taken in Thame, Oxfordshire by @wyrdfutures

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7 months ago

Join us on the 16th April to imagine a food system where growers, communities and the living landscape thrive in Bucks and Oxon.

Share a meal of local produce, hear short talks, and help creatively shape a shared story for people and land.

Location in Thame, Oxfordshire.
Bursaries/honoraria available based on need.
Expression of interest by 9th March. Link in bio.

Grow More Growers demonstration pilot aims to support new entrant growers to strengthen local food systems and improve food security toward an inclusive, climate‑resilient future. A partnership between Real Farming Trust, Bucksum, Bath University, Basic Income for Farmers, Autonomy Institute and wyrd futures. taken in Thame, Oxfordshire by @wyrdfutures

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8 months ago

What if skylarks shaped policy? Or rivers had a say in the future of land use?

🎥 In this short film, we meet four people who stepped into the voices of red grouse, wheat field, skylark, and yellow rattle — and discover what it means to make policy not just with humans in mind, but informed by the living world.

🗨️ Earlier this year, artists, ecologists, activists and policy thinkers came together in London for an Interspecies Council, to represent the voices of the more-than-human world and to create a collective response to the UK Government’s Land Use Consultation.

💞 The Interspecies Council, part of the Moral Imaginations methodology, invited participants to listen beyond the human, to imagine policy rooted in care, and to shape systems that serve life in all its forms.

Rather than speaking about nature, participants are invited to speak as nature, and bridge this into real-world decision making.

⚖️ How do we balance food security with nature recovery? What governance structures truly serve the land? How can we meet both biodiversity and net zero targets while honouring all life?

You can read the full response, convened and submitted by @wearefoodrise, @moral_imagining and @wyrdfutures futures via our link in bio.

🦋 Can you imagine representing your favorite species in a decision? Tell us in the comments below! And if you are interested in learning how to host an Interspecies Council, get in touch via Moral Imaginations’ website. by @wyrdfutures

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a year ago

What if policy processes were designed not only with humans in mind, but through the lens of multispecies flourishing?

More-than-human governance makes space for a multitude of interests to be considered, and voices to be heard. The Interspecies Council is a more-than-human governance process that builds arts, imagination and role-play into community deliberative democracy to bring alive a conversation between more-than-human actors in an ecosystem or bio-region.

The journey of attending an Interspecies Council involves a profound shift in worldview and perspective, decentering our human selves and interests for the greater purpose of empathy, connection and care with the living world around us. It balances empathy with analysis, bringing both emotional and intellectual presence to the questions being deliberated.

For our project with @wearefoodrise and @wyrdfutures, the Interspecies Council was chosen as a way to break through human-centred approaches to land use and to open space for deeper listening.

Rather than speaking about nature, participants were invited to speak with and as nature, and bridge this into real world decision-making.

What emerged was a chorus of compassion, grief, distress, wisdom, interspecies solidarity, resistance, anger, disarray, humility and invitations to be acknowledged, respected, and cared for. The team listened to all of these responses, and translated them into a written response to Defra’s Land Use team.

The experience brought critical questions to the surface, namely the absence of other-than-human voices in formal decision-making, and the need for new tools and processes.

Many participants spoke of how stepping into a more-than-human perspective shifted their understanding, not only of the beings they represented, but of time, land, responsibility and power.

The Interspecies Council on the themes of land use in England, was an invitation to listen beyond the human, to imagine policy rooted in care, and to shape systems that serve life in all its forms.

Would you like to find out more? Take a look at our Case Study via the link in bio! by @wyrdfutures

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a year ago

🌿 After the release of our Case Study, we're diving deeper into the insights that emerged from our Interspecies Council. These weren't abstract policy recommendations, but truths spoken directly by those representing living beings in the room. These insights formed the heart of our response to Defra’s Land Use consultation.

🤝 Land As Relationship, Not Resource—Land is often treated as an asset to be owned, used, managed. But to many beings, land is kin. Home. Life itself. To plan for land, we must listen to it. To govern land, we must remember our interdependence with all life it holds. The Council called for a radical shift in mindset: from extraction to belonging.

⏰ Time As a Site for Change—Regeneration works on timescales far longer than human policy cycles. As Hawthorn reminded us: "I predate Defra and will likely outlive it." Rivers shape landscapes over centuries. Soils build slowly, patiently. Meaningful change cannot be rushed. Even listening takes time—slowing down enough to notice what usually goes unnoticed.

🌍 Life Overflows Rules—Mycelium crosses countries underground. Birds migrate across borders without passports. Human boundaries often create chaos for the relationships and balances that keep ecosystems healthy. The beings asked us to reimagine planning systems that respect ecological realities rather than administrative convenience.

✨ Protect Life For Its Own Sake—Policy is built around usefulness: what meets human needs for food, housing, energy, and entertainment. Many beings asked to be valued without utility. To exist, flourish, and go undisturbed in their own right. To be seen as worthy of protection even when they offer us nothing tangible in return.

🎧 What Goes Unheard Goes Uncared For—More-than-human beings are excluded from decision-making because our governance systems were never built to hear them. The language, structures, and very premise of consultations like Defra’s Land Use Framework remain narrowly human.

💭 The Council revealed how much wisdom emerges when space is made and permission is given. Listening is foundational: without it, we neither understand nor care.

Curious to find out more? Visit our link in bio! by @wyrdfutures

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a year ago

🌱 Back in April, 34 participants gathered at the Paper Gardens in London for something extraordinary: an Interspecies Council. Convened by @wearefoodrise, @moral_imagining and @wyrdfutures, this wasn't your typical policy meeting.

🐦 The Interspecies Council is our participatory methodology that brings the voices of more-than-human life into decision-making. Instead of humans speaking for nature, we create space for species and ecosystems to have their say. This time, we were collectively drafting a response to DEFRA's Land Use Framework consultation.

🌳 Conservationists, ecologists, artists, designers, activists and policy thinkers came together. But here's what made it powerful: through story, embodiment and expanding their imagination, they spoke as their chosen beings during Council. A river. A hedgerow. A barn owl. Each voice bringing a different perspective to land use.

🏞️ Throughout the day, they grappled with profound questions:
How do we balance food security with nature recovery?
What governance structures truly serve the land?
How can we meet both biodiversity and net zero targets while honoring all life?

📝 From this process, a formal response emerged—written entirely from the words spoken in Council. Every paragraph came from the voices of beings and creatures who rarely get heard in policy rooms.

✨ Our joint organisations are releasing this Case Study that tells the full story of what was spoken, heard, and what will be carried forward. You can access 'A More-Than-Human Response To Defra's Land Use Consultation For England' via our link in bio!

🦋 We hope this provides a clear example of how to integrate more-than-human perspectives into decision-making.

Through imagination, we can (and must) make space for nature and living beings to be heard in the rooms where decisions about their futures are made.

What would the river in your area say about land use decisions?

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#morethanhuman #governance #policy #decisionmaking #landuse #agriculture #naturerecovery #biodiversity #netzero #ecocentric #imagination #rewilding #nature #resilience #climatechange #interspeciescouncil #moralimagination #imaginationactivism by @wyrdfutures

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a year ago

This guide belongs in your rucksack, your pocket, your top drawer.

It’s designed to be used — on walks, in team meetings, with partners, or in quiet reflection.

Use it to open conversations, ground a design process, or bring more-than-human voices into your next workshop.

Every page invites slowing down, deep noticing, and design in service of life.

If you’ve ever felt the need for something soft, clear, and brave to hold onto while doing complex change work — this is for you.

DM us to request the PDF or you can buy a printed copy.

@lopemede_farm @arteri_studio_
#RootsAndRhythms #PocketGuide #WyrdFutures #LifeCentredDesign #NatureConnection #CollectiveImagination by @wyrdfutures

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a year ago

The Pocket Guide emerged from the process, not just alongside it.

As Roots & Rhythms unfolded — through muddy walks, design sprints, multi-species workshops and community visioning — we documented key practices that shaped how we thought, felt and worked.

We then worked with @arteri_studio_ to transform those reflections into a beautifully designed guide: tactile, shareable, and grounded in rhythm and relationship.
It was printed by Oxford Green Print with vegetable inks on recycled stock, using a soft palette and textured motifs to honour the embodied, seasonal nature of the work.

It doesn’t tell you what to do. It offers ways to begin again — with more attention, more connection, and more courage.

#RootsAndRhythms #PocketGuide #WyrdFutures #LifeCentredDesign #NatureConnection #CollectiveImagination by @wyrdfutures

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a year ago

The Roots & Rhythms Pocket Guide is a field companion for anyone exploring life-centred practice.
Designed as a portable, practical takeaway from our six-month journey at Lopemede Farm, it holds the questions, rituals, provocations and insights we found most helpful along the way.

It’s not a workbook or manual. It’s a soft invitation — to notice more, design with care, and move in rhythm with land and life.

Created in collaboration with the brilliant @arteri_studio_ , the guide carries the spirit of the project into other fields, farms, forests, and futures.

Available in print and PDF. DM us if you’d like a copy.

#RootsAndRhythms #PocketGuide #WyrdFutures #LifeCentredDesign #NatureConnection #CollectiveImagination by @wyrdfutures

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a year ago

Roots & Rhythms: What we learned?
Food is a catalyst for systemic change.

We entered the project with a broad view of what diversification at Lopemede Farm might look like. We left knowing that place-based food production links ecology, health and economy in one living system. When farms feed their neighbours, including the wider web of life, they unlock transformation.

#RootsAndRhythms #LifeCentredDesign #MoreThanHuman

We are grateful for support from @weareinnovateuk, part of UK Research and Innovation. The project was successfully awarded funding as part of ‘Design Foundations Round 2: Net Zero Environments’ to support projects that use people-centred and planet-centred design methods. by @wyrdfutures

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a year ago