Composting
Power-Over Culture

Grapplings at the Threshold
of Inner and Outer Change

South Devon, 2024

At the threshold of inner and outer change, the crossroads of the present and our unknown future, we now stand longing for a way forward. In times like these, of collapse and mass extinction, we can feel desperate to know “what to do”. Often, we reach outwards to other humans to see what we might do together in resistance and/or to create alternatives. Or, we reach upward, towards spirit and the light, looking for help, for guidance. While both of these ways can be helpful, there is another, vital yet oft forgotten way; the downward path, into the wild unknown, the dark of the dreaming seed, the fruitful fecund Earth, the depths of the forest and the magic of the mythic Moorlands. 

In our consumerist capitalist fast paced hurry up and do something culture, we are always trying to get shit done, even our inner work has to happen quickly. The path that leads down and in, to ourselves and to Earth, is the very ground we need to return to. When we let the old way die, we can receive the nourishment of its goodness, like compost spread on the garden. In order to grow a new life, we must let the seeds of vision and beauty that we each carry within us, gestate in that fecund nutrient rich humus. Then, when we are ripe and ready, Earth will show us where we are needed and what we must do with our “one wild and precious life”. It is the unhero’s journey, the relinquishing of adventure and answers and triumph. It is the surrender to gravity and to the ending of the old power-over way. Resting like leaf litter, rotting, dreaming, being shaped and transformed by powers far greater than you. What a relief to become intimate with the Earth, to grow roots into the fertile darkness and drink the waters of soul to sprout into a beautiful future from a present that, no matter how challenging, is worth living.

This journey into the depths requires bravery and humbleness, softness and surrender, not-knowing and careful listening, feeling deeply, expansive grieving, exquisite intimacy and risking being shaped by giving yourself to the revelation of wonder.

Whilst these testing times require outer practices of challenging systemic injustice, the transformative impact of our outer actions depends on us engaging in inner practices that support us to expand our consciousness beyond power-over culture and drama triangle consciousness this polarising paradigm perpetuates. Burnout, destructive conflict, unhealthy group and power dynamics and dysfunctional and disempowering decision-making are all symptoms of power-over culture.

We invite you to join us in learning how to compost the power-over culture within you, and the groups you are part of, by tracking the ways in which its shadow and wound are part of you.

What we'll get up to...

Together we will surrender to Earth’s intelligence and decenter the human story of individual separate lives through dream, deep imagination, council practice and speaking across the species boundary. Somatic practices of deep feeling, free movement, sounding, expressive art practices and poetry will crack open the shell of modernity so that we might come alive again in conversation with the wild ones. We will live together at the threshold of the wild world, the liminal places, the places of in-between, both/and more. Do you dare join us at this threshold of transformation?

Who is this for?

This core program is specifically designed for change-makers, activists, therapists, mentors, coaches, spiritual practitioners, artists and visionaries who long to participate in crossroads consciousness at the threshold of the inner and outer, in surrender to the journey of deep cultural transformation that are these times. Those who are tracking the inner and long to compost power-over culture within themselves and to cultivate the ground of a co-evolutionary consciousness with the whole of Earth community.

This 5 day program will run in south Devon, England during the first half of 2024. To register your interest and be kept informed of the dates and how to book please complete the form below.