Working towards a regenerative future? Deny Entropy.
The Wave: Entropy vs. Regeneration
Caveat: Every issue of The Wave should have a big IMHO tag splashed across it. The newsletter helps me digest, understand, and communicate issues I’m learning about that will, I hope, accelerate our passage to a regenerative society. Given that, please read with skepticism and send your improvements, and insights.

This issue is inspired by author and management guru Tom Peters. He wrote the hugely successful business book “In Search of Excellence” in 1982 and has just released a new book. I was struck by his recent tweet:
Entropy
The notion of societal entropy is a well established paradigm -- a widely accepted metaphor pretending to be physics. It suggests society struggles to slow and can’t prevent decay. It is used to justify extraction and collateral damage as necessary prices to pay in the battle against inevitable decline. 

This framework puts a cap on what is possible. It limits vision and ambition. If you assume decline as a given, than the concept of regeneration - an economy that makes the world better - isn’t possible. In environmentalism, you can see the result of this thinking with interventions that, at their best, help us "lose more slowly.”

The metaphor of inevitable decay and necessary damage is an example of a  narrative we are trying to replace with a new, regenerative, vision. Living systems tend to create more complexity, not less. Think of coral reefs or modern cities as examples of entropy in reverse.

James Lovelock, the ‘discoverer’ of Gaia, explains “Inanimate things tend to end up in equilibrium sooner or later, and that is a state of very high entropy, or low order – whereas something alive, which is infinitely more complex, will have a very low entropy indeed.”

Decline and disorder might be our future, but, we shouldn’t assume them to be! Instead, we can turn our energy <note the little entropy joke there> to creating a regenerative world instead.


We’ve discussed the role of storytelling in accelerating a movement to a regenerative future. Next issue will explore a distinction between storytelling and narrative. I think “entropy” represents a narrative we want to replace with one of “regeneration”.  What say you?
How do you transform coastal waters from a marine desert into a thriving ecosystem? A village in Mexico may hold the answer (2')
Designers of Paradise
Check-out the new podcast series Designers of Paradise. Each episode is a story intended to demonstrate the reality of regeneration in the world. Listen, subscribe and please tell others.
Host, Erik van Lennep, explores the concept of food sovereignty with Simone Senogles of the Ojibwe nation and the Indigenous Environmental Network.

This episode features co-founder and Chairman of Iroquois Valley Farms, Stephen Rivard. He talks about how he got interested in organic food and how Iroquois Valley Farms helps young farmers get access to land.

Join host Erik van Lennep for podcast series, Designers of Paradise. He will bring you into conversations with people changing how we produce our food, care for our soil and water, and protect our climate. New episodes (almost) every week.

Let's Get Together
Check out the sessions planned for the inaugural Regenerative Economics conference. We can also plot our own sessions for the unconference day (Thursday). Use this link to get 30% off your ticket price.

A full day of mindful interaction and discussion into the roles business plays in transforming the workplace into a life-space of restoration to culture and planet.

Formulate strategy and collaboration across food and fashion industries for impact on agriculture. Our intention is to influence and accelerate systemic change in land to market systems that consider the regeneration of soil, air, water and life.

Intending to gauge interest in forming a 12-state Regeneration Midwest Alliance in the heart of America’s “breadbasket", our team showed up expecting some interest. Only to be met by an enthusiastic crowd ready for a regeneration revolution!

Communications & Media Co-promotion
A group of people interested in promoting regenerative agriculture is convening to explore opportunities for co-creation and cross-promotion of communications and media. 

Interested in joining such an effort?  Let me know.
An Obligatory Hippo (and rhino) Video
When Charlie the baby hippo lost his mom, he was rescued by a rhino orphanage and became best friends with a little rhino. (3.5')

In Closing
We are very early in the process of defining what it means to build a regenerative society. While the terminology will continue to evolve, we're convinced the ideas are directionally correct. We are studying, testing, plotting, and building interest, support, and resources.

Thus this newsletter, which will come out every few weeks with information about RASA - narrating our work - along with brief observations and links to related materials exploring innovation and the regenerative economy.

With effort, and a bit of luck, we hope support for these concepts becomes a wave sweeping the world! Check out the archive to see if this newsletter is right for you (or a friend).

If you find this email valuable, please share with a friend. If you don't, please unsubscribe (link at the bottom.) We also much appreciate comments, advice, and suggestions for links to highlight.

Thanks.

      Dave 





PS's:
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4. Please send questions or suggestions to David Witzel
David Witzel · The Window · Oakland CA 94606 · USA
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