The Elephant at the Front Door: A Designers Approach to Shadow Work

Permaculture Womens Guild

By Jennifer English Morgan Crash, clatter, smash, tink, tink. A careless boy’s ball shatters the front window pane. A scorned lover flings a picture frame into the brick fireplace. A glass slipping through nervous fingers falls to the floor. All adrenaline rushes of fear, anger, and surprise. Moments of exhilaration turned sour if left to ferment. When trauma goes unresolved, fragments of the soul get imprisoned. The glass is a broken mirror. The shards and cracks remind us of suffering. Painful memories lodge into our psyche. Eckhart Tolle named this tenant, the pain body. It’s that little voice in our…

Decolonizing Permaculture: Bridging the gap between privilege and oppression

Permaculture Womens Guild

by Heather Jo Flores As Published in issue #98 of Permaculture Design Magazine, November 2015 First of all, I want to say that I do not represent anyone but myself, and though I have vetted this article with several peers and mentors, I do not presume to know the needs and desires of anyone else. However, it seems to me that there are ripples of injustice coursing through the permaculture community, manifesting as a pattern of landowners and/or self-proclaimed leaders doing things that hurt, offend, oppress, and devalue others. These behaviors discredit the permaculture movement at large, and unless we…

Permaculture on the edge

Permaculture Womens Guild

Building an anti/beyond/despite capitalist movement By Becky Ellis Permaculture is a philosophy and set of practices aimed at creating regenerative human spaces that mimic natural eco-systems. The concept was developed in the 1970s based on observations of the ecological systems created by Indigenous and “traditional” communities around the world. The philosophy of permaculture offers a counter-hegemonic worldview especially regarding the place of human societies within nature. While permaculture can be thought of as a movement, some of its proponents insist it stay de-politicized and professionalized as a system of ecological design. Indeed, some of the practices of permaculture limit its…