I’ve been meaning to do this thread for a while, but never quite get the chance to stop and word it quite right, but over the years with anything #DoughnutEconomics related two things happen, and I thought I’d explain those two things and answer some of the questions people pose.
So, it is really exquisite work, but I hadn’t quite realised that fully until this year, and I think I realise that a bit more now, and wanted to share. Most of my experiences without it were absolutely gut wrenching inspiration, like exploding out my heart type thing when I ..
... heard Kate talk about this idea, it’s so simple, so much common sense, like surely of course we all should have known this, starting back in 2018, when Andy shared the book at the Hub, every talk, every exploration was exactly that so inspiring, so I went back and read ..
.. the book a couple of times more and the 7 ways, I kept getting muddled up because loads of people especially within the climate movement that there isn’t just 1 model Immy and it’s not based on western centric ideas, and I was always like yeah I get that I live and breathe ...
... that in every fibre of who I am and what landed my family here in this country and contradiction anyway. Or, there was the conversations about if you put an outer limit on us then what happens to human ingenuity and so on, I got behind this a little less but understood ..
... the core philosophy, then there was the crowd who were talking about the technicalities of our relationship with nature, and how we needed to decolonise the ideas and everything around that, now I could definitely sit with this, so I went back and read the book for the 3rd ..
... time and recognise none of it was even disagreeing or even putting a firm singular idea for any of that. So, I wondered to myself what pressure am I trying to put on this, why is my intuition and my head fighting each other? I’m both thoroughly inspired and then confused ..
... by everything people are saying, and what is this culture we have of looking for one right answer to a massive long term build up of why we are here, how come I’ve even fallen foul of this idea that I have to find the right perfect thing or discard it entirely, that’s not ..
... even me. Then I took a few steps back and sat with some of the ideas a bit more and went back to the basic idea of the 7 ways, the ways to think, not a precise way to act, ways to think, and they are superb, each with their own tools, methodologies, ways to organise, ..
... examples of people doing that, they intersected so well with so many other pals, who were embodying that way through practise, design, organising, action, and sometimes all the nitty gritty that comes with that rules, codes, governance, finance, with every challenge from ..
.. housing to play and so on, and then I couldn’t see things any other way, and that beautiful blank space created for other ways, that complement or extend or expand the ideas, and I realise them to be these buckets you pile things into, experiment, test, try, legislate, ..
.. at whatever scale you can from the tiniest like your household to the biggest scale and I started to understand much more deeply what is meant by the fact that is a compass to guide us, and then you intersect the accompanying intersection about what also needs to be shifted .. 
... and you start to get this toolbox like a really flipping great foundational toolbox and compass of how to understand what’s next, when you look at some of the contradictions and tensions we will have to figure out from reconfiguring our relationships with so many ideas ..
.. we are jumbled amongst, that now everything I see feel and touch I can tell where it sits on this compass, I feel like I can understand what the right question to ask is, and now someone who had no clue about economics feels like I really can engage with it, and it ..
... took me ages, well 3 years to get here and get my head round what I felt about what it actually meant. Seeing the platform come to life, people respond to all the ways of thinking with pure delight, inspiration and pure and simple oh yeah it’s that straight forward is ..
... purely incredible. I’m trying not to spam Kate’s mentions on a Saturday afternoon, but I’ve realised over these last few months what an exceptionally exquisite piece of work it is to interlay these ideas from the simplest to the deepest layers and synthesise it into ..
... something we can play with, interact with, find ways forward with, and just like everything it’s a set of tools, frameworks, ideas, ways to go forward and I reflected that perhaps it as a book, or all the noise where we can’t understand properly actually that’s all we have ..
.. right now, no perfect answers, but a compass, ways forward to work with, and from there watching the commitment, persistence, depth, playfulness with which it’s being built out is even more motivating. The way the same compass can play out at a household, neighbourhood, ...
... city region, country, continent, global level is mind blowing it allows all us to ask questions, take responsibility, step into action, practice, experiment at every scale and then share back, that’s remarkable, remarkable work, and no idea or culture or way of thinking ..
... about something gets left out, because it’s not prescriptive it just says this a way we have to think about it, and people say yes in other culture we do it like this, and that becomes part of the how we should work, practice together. Then I thought back to how much, ...
... people like Elinor Ostrom or Donella Meadows, and so many others gave us ways to consider, but also highlighted to me their seminal labour hadn’t tipped everything in one go, even 40/50 years later that’s not normal everyday life even though it makes so much sense, so ..
.. it is really all our responsibilities to do everything we can, with every tool we’ve got to honour, and strengthen and practice work like this, I feel really moved by the deep realisations in me about what type of labour, synthesis, commitment and work this took, and ..
... then bringing it to life takes. So, I really want to take any ounce of responsibility we can for one part of bringing this story to life in any way possible, even if we don’t sit under the shade of the shifts or the seeds I hope we get to plant. Feeling extremely blessed to
.. get to do work like this, what an absolute honour. If you want to do one tiny slice of this with us, and are an artist, illustrator, filmmaker, organiser for any age / inter generational, help us tell this story this summer, get in touch, will have paid micro commissions ..
... to find different ways at our scale our work, and share stories and have things we can touch, see, feel to help build that story. Even, if it ain’t with us, there’s a whole global movement go spend sometime with @DoughnutEcon you won’t be disappointed when you do ..
... don’t give up easy, ask questions, tell stories, share ideas, tell someone else, share a video, it’ll spark a journey that I think you won’t regret, because from all schools of thought, ideas, you’ll find ways that our ideas can all hang off together towards a new economy ..
... I want this feeling that is in the pit of my stomach for us all, there’s ways forward, we don’t have to be lost in the complexity and darkness of the idea of economics not at all, and we don’t have to do it all, to be able to understand how to think about it and start.
Maybe just start by having a wander on @DoughnutEcon, sign up, or thinking about 7 Ways, or sign up to our mailing list @CIVIC_SQUARE or following the incredible work of other places, let’s make these ideas not books people look back on and say, you know they were really ..
... on to something, instead build it into being now, so yeah, that’s my journey with it, from inspiration, to confusion, to how can there be one book from a western perspective, that’ll solve this, to deep enlightenment, incredible deep deep respect, and huge motivation ♥️⭕️🍩
I meant with it* here not without.
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