Leadership as Developmental Friendship Transformations

A coLAB supporting individual and collective action in response to Eco-Social Crisis.

AR+ Members co-stewarding

Starts April 18th. 75-90 mins. Meeting each month on third Thursdays at 16.00 Universal time (i.e., 8AM Los Angeles; 17.00 Paris)

Spring Magnolia

Our Inquiry: How to be the transformation we need for the world. In particular, we ask: how are we to move from the extractive ways of living with one another and with nature? If we have inherited these extractive practices over millennia how might we learn and practice relating in ways that promote partnering and co-creativity? As well-meaning as we may be personally, we are also part of a social escalation of extractive (supremacist) dynamics worldwide that has many ugly manifestations, e.g., ecocidal tendency, religious and ethnic persecution, anti-refugee dynamics, racism, misogyny, anti-LGBTQIA+ laws and ... the list goes on. Amidst these troubling events, how do we each ground ourselves and move toward transformation  - personal, relational, ecological - anyway? 

Our practice: We will practice nurturing capacity, our own and one another’s, in sharing power and increasing inquiry at this time of eco-social crises. We’ll elevate our insights and practice on how to integrate power and love on our journey as ARTists. This practice is needed for our times. We’ll inquire into transforming supremacy dynamics (examining gender, race, class and other salient social groups) through personal insight and community resourcing as we join a larger global momentum to shift from industrial era exploitative relations toward ecological mutuality. Importantly, we seek this transformation through an ethos of developmental friendship, where our relationships become the source and space for our own and others transformation.

Our Style:  In this coLAB we’ll build a community of learning and practice to apply personal development insights to our own real-life contexts, mindful of working with our stakeholders. We draw from a number of "developmentally edgy" practices. In the spirit of a “flipped classroom,” monthly plenary is devoted primarily to practice with a concept introduced as pre-reading / video clips. In each session, expect emphasis on experimenting within a consciously “brave” protainer. Between sessions all participants are asked to join at least one practice group, led by a facilitator. This is intended to answer questions and deepen insights as we each apply our work with our own clients and students.  We strongly encourage brief but regular journaling on line also! Expect some light preparation before each session in the form of video and/or reading.

Participants: Those who play a leadership role in their world - educators, change-leaders - and are concerned with our eco-social crises. The group will be limited to around 15 participants. 

Where/When: A monthly plenary is 90 minutes.  Each month there will be an additional informal intersession small group meeting. We hope each participant will attend at least one as a way to deepen practice and connection with rotating others.

Relational Meditation. Learning to contain natural anxieties and bring forward our “better self” despite stress or when under challenge requires individual never ending daily practice. If you do not have a regualr mindfulness practice (and even if you do!) all participants registered in this coLAB are invited to join the AR+ community's weekly eco-relational meditation at no additional cost. Please register separately for that at the dedicated page.

Organizing (Sustainable) Futures - Action Research

DETAILS FROM THE 2023 coLAB GIVE A TASTE - but expect the details to be entirely refreshed!

May  - Settle with one another within a protainer that invites you to step to your developmental edge! As preparation all registered will have received and completed a developmental self assessment. Facilitators will introduce ourselves and invite you to do likewise as we unpack our habits with power, feedback and collaboration. We'll organize a first set of small group meetings for the intersession and start a group journalling habit! 

June - Máille leads with practices of culture sharing and (re)claiming multiple identities. She ends with invitation to reflect on when we have treated someone else as “less than.”

July - Hilary leads with ART theatre (“Math and Circus”) in which we’re invited to get more deeply acquainted with our signature practices/personae regarding our use and abuse of power, feedback and collaboration. Ends with an invitation to go deeper in journaling and small group intersession.

Aug - Louie leads with 'presence in action' to help us unpack what we are noticing in our signature practices when we look through the lens of facts, feelings and fictions.

Sep - Luea leads us into a system-sensing practice to explore hidden dynamics, available resources and untapped potentials in our respective work fields. We listen to meaningful next steps for shifting our ways of showing up from extractive to partnering practice in the issues at stake and their embeddedness in the broader culture. She ends with an invitation to journaling and a collective-sense-making round highlighting collective patterns of our larger culture.

Oct  - Bringing it all together! What experiments are we each working on?

Key Themes:
How do we transform our relationship to hope and despair in light of mounting eco-social crises?
How do we become more effective bridges between diverse perspectives?
How do we acknowledge and transcend the anxiety we may have about interacting with others who have opposing views?
How do we reconcile our love and concern for the world and our ability to act wisely?

Key Focus: 
This coLAB is for those who are engaged and or wish to deepen their engagement in transformative action, i.e., action that is the fruit of reflexive awareness of self and context. This likely means locating ourselves more fully in the sweet (sour?) spot between our inner landscape - where we may find a mix of uncertainty and compelling insight - and the outer landscape that demands wise action together with others. We’ll discover more about ourselves and the eco-social systems we are a part of as we imagine more regenerative roles we can play. The coLAB can be viewed as a
developmental scaffolding that builds our capacity to engage with our whole self: body, heart, mind, and soul, so that we become more effective at engaging collaboratively with others.

Expectations:
We will work within the 
ART framework that calls Action oriented Researchers for Transformations with an emphasis on developmental reflexivity and collaborative action with stakeholders. Throughout we endeavor to become more aware of our untapped genius. For this, we will create together a robust “protainer.

JOIN US for a refreshed coLAB in spring 2024

AR+ is a non profit 501.c3 donations supported organization. Donations are tax deductible in the USA. 

If you are seeking a partial scholarship, please submit a request here: