 I first heard about the Transition Network when I watched the film “Tomorrow” by Mélanie Laurent and Cyril Dion in December 2016. At that time, I was searching for an internship to complete my bachelor of applied foreign languages in France and what was important to me then (and now), was to invest my time and energy into something that would help create a viable future for our planet - which is such a major issue today. The Transition concept struck me as a very interesting approach to resolving today's problems of climate change and ruthless globalisation and when I received Transition Black Isle's approval to my request for an internship, I was glad to have the opportunity to experience how a Transition Initiative works in real life. The internship started in early June 2017 and for three months, I was kindly hosted by two TBI members and supported by Martin Sherring, TBI's convenor at that time. As the directors of TBI were well prepared to host an intern and had already thought about the different activities that could be given to a potential intern, I had the chance to work on a beautiful project which resulted in the creation of a very nice and useful website, featuring local produce on the Black Isle (www.blackislelarder.org). My work included detailed research about local enterprises, a lot of communication work, the arranging and filming of interviews with local farmers and also some photography for the website. It was three intense months where I learned amongst many other things:
To work with a voluntary organisation certainly requires a lot of enthusiasm and independence as supervision might be limited, but it is also very rewarding and leaves you with a valuable experience. This is why I would recommend an internship within the Transition Network without any hesitation. Lara Feldman 
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In May, Eva Schonveld and I had the opportunity to attend the international Transition Hubs gathering in Santorso, Italy (not far from Venice). It was preceded by an Inner Transition training organised by Transition Network’s Inner Transition coordinator Claire Milne, together with Madelanne Rust-d’Eye, a body-based psychotherapist, and Peter Cow, specialising in social permaculture and the 8 Shields work.  The beautiful gardens of Villa Rossi, our venue The theme for the training was how we create regenerative group cultures. Much of it was learning by doing, and we spent a large part of our first day identifying and creating “the container” which would help us feel safe and comfortable enough to be able to be honest, understand each other, express empathy, and ultimately feel the self-sustaining creativity that can emerge in such an environment. So we introduced ourselves, played a couple of games, agreed on group rules, stated expectations and made agreements with the group, but also with ourselves, about what behaviour we would like to see. Peter introduced the acorn model of group leadership of the 8 shields, where people take on qualities and actions of the eight directions of the compass to help spread out and share the support needed for a well-functioning group:  As more people stepped in to take on these different roles and tasks, the pressure on our three facilitators obviously decreased, but it also created a shared sense of responsibility, and things did seem to just happen of themselves at times. Madelanne brought a very interesting piece on how our nervous system works, and influences our behaviour in a group. The part of the nervous system we want to be in, the Social Engagement System, regulates our digestion etc. – it makes us feel relaxed, safe, and able to interact with others. However, our nervous systems haven’t changed since the Stone Age, which means that our everyday reality of traffic, big workloads, noise, verbal or online disputes, deadlines (etc. etc.) often trigger our fight or flight response, without us having the opportunity to act on it. So we can find ourselves with a lot of energy built up inside coming from our nervous system wanting to respond to its perceived danger by attacking back, or running really fast and far. But we very seldom do that, leading to conditions of anxiety, stress or burnout. So if we can give ourselves the opportunity when working together to move, shake things off, make noises, breathe, and practice simple things that automatically push us back towards the Social Engagement System, such as eye contact, physical touch, etc., we will probably see much more productive meetings. We also spent some time looking at empathy – our ability to feel and deeply understand others. As such, it is a quality of presence that can help people’s nervous systems to feel safe and relaxed, leading to creativity naturally arising in the group. My experience was that when somebody listened to me and repeated what I said in their own words, trying to understand without making suggestions, I could take my ideas further and together we arrived at ideas that were much more exciting and fun than if I had just kept my thoughts to myself. The suggestions was that if this empathetic environment can be created in a group, there are no limits to its creativity and regenerative capacity. Connected to this is how we give and receive feedback. How do we communicate with each other, and how do we become aware of how our responses affect the other person? The statistic of the day was 5:1 - we need five positive feedbacks to one negative to feel good, appreciated, and constructively develop. We discussed practices to create a safe and supportive way of giving feedback, such as agreeing on formats for feedback beforehand, discussing emotions and related needs, opening meetings with regular gratitude rounds, creating structures to give the group regular permission to express feedback so it doesn’t come at an inopportune moment.  We spent an afternoon experimenting with a version of the theatre of oppressed, which we called theatre of cooperation. We played out a scenario I think many of us can relate to, where members of a Transition group have too much to do, there aren’t enough people, and they struggle to recruit more members. Trying to intervene and set the destructive dynamics of the group right, it became clear to us that the best intervention would have been to have spent time and efforts creating a healthy group culture in the first place, rather than trying to save already stressed out group members or replace them by new.
My conclusion from the training is that Inner Transition is not only the touchy feely emotional heart stuff that some feel very comfortable discussing, and others feel shy or nervous about, and is often left on the shelf of “nice things we’ll do when we have time”. What I realised is that Inner Transition is the backbone of creating a healthy, creative group culture, which in turn is vital for sustaining our Transition Initiatives and their role in local communities. So often, our groups rely on the efforts, stamina, and courage of individual volunteers. Without that backbone, no wonder we can suffer from stress and burnout, conflict, miscommunications, mission drift, stagnation… And the right time to do something about all these things is not when they occur, but create practices that reduce the likelihood of them in the first place. So, ending on a practical note – how can we do this? Claire has some plans to develop a year long investigative journey into what Inner Transition can look like across the world, so keep your eyes open for that. We resolved during the course of the Hubs gathering to create an Inner Transition community of practice, where there will be an online meeting once a month to connect with others thinking about Inner Transition, and share what we are doing. And perhaps, if we have enough energy and time and motivation, we could look into having an Inner Transition training and sharing event in Scotland soon. What do you think? Members of Transition Scotland will be at the forthcoming SCCAN gathering (see below) and we'll be running one of the afternoon workshops on the health of your organisation. We are also having our own Transition Scotland mini gathering after the main event. Transition Scotland gathering Feb 4th, Edinburgh These are exciting times in Transition Scotland!
We plan to meet, celebrate all these things, and discuss many more after the Scottish Communities Climate Action Network gathering on February 4th in Edinburgh. We will gather outside the venue at 5pm and head to a nearby pub. Do come along if you can!  SCCAN Gathering - Feb 4th 2017, EdinburghThe Scottish Communities Climate Action Network (SCCAN) are having their Annual Gathering 9.30-4.30 on Saturday 4 February 2017, David Hume Tower*, George Sq, Edinburgh EH8 9JX. Book at https://sccan4feb.eventbrite.co.uk A day packed with inspirational talks and workshops with lots of space for you to share as well!
Highlights of the day include:
Social evening 6-9pm Friday 3 February, David Hume Tower. For those of you nearby – or coming the day before to stay over – we invite you for an informal Social with food and drink on the Friday evening. This is a chance to get to know each other more. Paul Allen will join us for this – to share his experience of moving ideas into action. Register at https://sccan3feb.eventbrite.co.uk Draft Programme9.30 Registration opens. - refreshments
10.00 Welcome and warm up session 10.30 Plenary Session Suzy Goodsir of Greener Kirkcaldy, on Lessons from Fife CCAN’s pilot regional network Paul Allen of Centre for Alternative Technology, on Zero Carbon Britain 2: Making It Happen 11.15 Workshops 1
13.25 Workshops 2
14.40 Open Space: topics generated by participants
A Special Guest gives feedback from Open Space discussions: sharing the next steps 16.30pm Close then.... 17:00 Transition Scotland folks head to the pub to discuss TS stuff. * Location map at https://goo.gl/lb1Q92 |
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