REGENERATION
Visual Whakapapa of Ōtepoti for the development of a new BEntre at Otago
Sensing, Thinking, Regenerating Systems
My passion is to facilitate states of being, both physically and mentally, which enables deep connection to place and potential, so as to affect positive change for all.
This is where Regenerative Practice has been invaluable as a set of tools, frameworks and procesess, to create more clarity and direction for a project to enact these transformations of thinking and action. My training with Regenesis Group (USA), and ongoing practice of Regenerative thinking and design has lead me to understand that my role in the evolution of our communities is to help to develop individual and organisational capacities to sense and respond regeneratively to the living systems that they relate to.
In practice, this means that my facilitation of projects, meetings, hui, workshops, or any other activity that needs a helping hand, is done in a way that invites people to physically and imaginatively connect with the world that supports their existence.
Key Skills
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Regenerative practice and design thinking
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Project development, organisation and delivery
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Workshop, wānanga and Hui organisation and facilitation
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Communication and graphic design
Project Examples
The University of Otago:
Development of a 'Compass' for the new Bachelor of Entrepreneurship within the Business School
Working with Akasadaka Robison as co-facilitators of a project to design the groundwork for the course to be based from, we offered a process of discovery and evolutionary thinking. The final product of this mahi was a document containing the compass, the research, and the process we undertook. Comments from this process described the shift in energy and perspective from one of resistance to potential. (Image above is from this process).
CODE - Centre of Digital Excellence, Dunedin:
Creating the foundations of Kaupapa CODE, the Māori-centred part of the larger funding pool
This project aimed to understand the needs and visions of gamers and digital creatives in Ōtepoti, and in Aotearoa, with which to inform the values and decision-making guidelines that Kaupapa CODE will operate from. It also aimed to develop relationships with Māori creatives and local Hapū, who will be both supporting the organisation, and benefitting from the funding available through this resource. Working between Māori Creatives, local Whānau, DCC, and CODE itself during Lockdown 2020, was both challenging and rewarding. People felt the process to be energising and transformative of their thinking with regards to how they were thinking about CODE, Kaupapa CODE, and the potential for Kāi Tahu Whānau and Māori Creatives ki Ōtepoti to positively affect the wider organisation through this mahi.
Quarter Kai Hui - Gatherings for Regenerative Practitioners
Following my training with Regenesis in 2017, I was able to convert some of the momentum and enthusiasm for this new practice into supporting the community of practitioners based in and around Tāmaki Makaurau. The first gathering was an afternoon of connecting and conversing, as well as offering spaces for thinking through the potential of Rengerative Practice in Aotearoa, and what we need as practitioners.
The second hui was centred around ME Family services in Mangere East, and acted as a practical regenerative workshop to help the organisation understand it's current state, and potential actions to enable it to evolve to new levels. As a part of this day, I was able to imbue some of the movement and somatic practices I offer, to enable an embodied experience of the whenua as a being in relation to our own bodies. This was felt through a group 'enactment' of building rua kumara - kumara pits with our own bodies. Volunteers became the volcanic rock, with which the rua were built, and others were tasked with moving the rocks into a circle. Through this 'performance' of historic actions, we are able to come into closer relations with both the people who originally created the gardens in the area, as well as the rocks themselves.
haerenga kōrerorero - choreographing sensing relations, Thesis for Masters of Art and Design, Spatial Design, AUT, 2012
I include my Masters Thesis in this space of Regeneration, in terms of how I have come to designing spaces, experiences and events in a way that develops regenerative capacities to sense into the systems we are a part of. The research that is encompassed by this thesis often draws upon practical experiments and my own embodied knowledge of my subject matter, and as such is the story of an emerging practice that engages storytelling through listening, and facilitates intimacy by slowing down action.
You can get free and full access to this through the AUT Online Repository.
A visual Whakapapa of Ōtepoti for the new University of Otago BEntre