Ecosystemic Ancestry and Imagin-action in the Now and Future

This workshop will offer an experiential exploration of inner and outer landscapes, inviting participants to journey on a re-discovery of ecosystemic roots and ancestry, foregrounding narrative, cross-cultural and anti-oppressive thinking and practice. It will explore the landscapes of ecosystemic ideas and places as an ecosystem of stories from our personal and professional lives towards Imagin-Action i.e. how to be and engage in the world as therapists/activists. 

The workshop will include: 

Systemic Ancestry - a short presentation, to warm the context and map the landscape of our systemic ancestry i.e. early roots in Bateson, and to include wider systemic thinking and the inner landscape of our ecology of selves (Nora Bateson, 2019) within an ecological ecosystemic framework (Santin,2024). 

An Ecology of Selves - stepping-out and being in relationship with nature and nature as our co-therapist. We can walk to the sea, sharing stories about the landscapes, the places or environments that have had an influence on us, personally and professionally, in the past and in the present. After collecting objects from the beach, there is an invitation to gather, make a representation, step back, talk to this ecology of selves and stay with the emerging stories through writing, drawing or taking a photograph. 

We can explore how we might see these lands and places reflected in the landscape we are walking through - in the here and now. 

Nature/the environment as a metaphor to connect to capture these landscapes and places, thoughts and feelings. What is it about these found objects, words or images that resonate or connect us to past landscapes - how have these past landscapes or environments impacted and influenced us as people and in what ways might this show up in our systemic practice? 

These 2 paragraphs are useful and detailed for when we deliver the workshop but I suggest we delete them from the proposal as it’s beyond the word limit at the moment. 

Ancestry Circle – Group sharing and story-telling about Future through Imagin-action Inviting stories and reflections about being with nature, 

Feeling/seeing/touching/smelling through an object, image or word. 

Considering how inner and outer landscapes, past and present, might suggest what we may wish to attend to in the future for ourselves in our personhoods; and selves as therapists/activists; and for the future of systemic therapy and practice. Imagining new landscapes of action and practice in our work contexts and geography of places.