integral city 2.0 online conference 2012 harvests: weeks 1-4, days 1-12

7/30/2019 Integral City 2.0 Online Conference 2012 Harvests: Weeks 1-4, Days 1-12

1/32

Integral City 2.0

OnlineConferenceSeptember 4-27, 2012

A Radically

OptimisticInquiry intoOperatingSystem 2.0

Harvests: Weeks 1-4, Days 1-12Appendix A13To Proceedings Report
http://www.scribd.com/doc/120713339/Integral-City-2-0-Online-Conference-2012-A-Radically-Optimistic-Inquiry-into-Operating-System-2-0?secret_password=1yysm4ssfgxqya3vk1mphttp://www.scribd.com/doc/120713339/Integral-City-2-0-Online-Conference-2012-A-Radically-Optimistic-Inquiry-into-Operating-System-2-0?secret_password=1yysm4ssfgxqya3vk1mphttp://www.scribd.com/doc/120713339/Integral-City-2-0-Online-Conference-2012-A-Radically-Optimistic-Inquiry-into-Operating-System-2-0?secret_password=1yysm4ssfgxqya3vk1mp


2/32

Integral City Meshworks Inc. Integral City 2.0 Operating System Inquiry: HARVESTS September, 2012 ii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

TABLE OF CONTENTS .............................................................................................................. iiThe Conference Harvest ............................................................................................................ 3Week 1 Overview: Planet of Cities Mother Earth @ Motherboard ........................................... 4

Ecosphere Intelligence and the Letter 'P' ................................................................................ 5The Island Stances of Emergence Intelligence ....................................................................... 7

Assemble the Citizen Observatory .......................................................................................... 9Week 2 Overview: Gaias Reflective Organ: Integral Intel Inside ...............................................11

Unfolding Integral, Evolutionary Antennae .............................................................................12The Journey of Generations ..................................................................................................14

An Evolutionary Expedition ....................................................................................................16Week 3 Overview: Aligning Strategies to ProsperLogic Processors Connecting the Dots ....18

The Alliteration of Inquiry .......................................................................................................19Meshworks Manifest ..............................................................................................................21Navigating the City Playground..............................................................................................23

Week 4: Amplifying IntelligenceAccessing Our Evolutionary Power Source ........................25Beauty, Truth and Goodness with Practice ............................................................................26Inquiry is Figuring Us Out ......................................................................................................28Mastering the Master Code ...................................................................................................30

Acknowledgements ...................................................................................................................32


3/32

Integral City Meshworks Inc. Integral City 2.0 Operating System Inquiry: HARVESTS September, 2012 3

The Conference Harvest

The Conference was harvested daily with a summary that captured the essence of each daysset of three interviews in a narrative or poem, crafted by Beth Sanders.

The Conference was harvested weekly with a painted image, created by graphic artist ErinStewart.

Read Full Proceedings here. Read Full Interview Appendices here.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/120713339/Integral-City-2-0-Online-Conference-2012-A-Radically-Optimistic-Inquiry-into-Operating-System-2-0?secret_password=1yysm4ssfgxqya3vk1mphttp://www.scribd.com/doc/120713339/Integral-City-2-0-Online-Conference-2012-A-Radically-Optimistic-Inquiry-into-Operating-System-2-0?secret_password=1yysm4ssfgxqya3vk1mphttp://www.scribd.com/doc/120716247/Integral-City-2-0-Online-Conference-2012-Appendices-A-Radically-Optimistic-Inquiry-into-Operating-System-2-0-36-Interviews?secret_password=awnljlwbx9ylut389iahttp://www.scribd.com/doc/120716247/Integral-City-2-0-Online-Conference-2012-Appendices-A-Radically-Optimistic-Inquiry-into-Operating-System-2-0-36-Interviews?secret_password=awnljlwbx9ylut389iahttp://www.scribd.com/doc/120716247/Integral-City-2-0-Online-Conference-2012-Appendices-A-Radically-Optimistic-Inquiry-into-Operating-System-2-0-36-Interviews?secret_password=awnljlwbx9ylut389iahttp://www.scribd.com/doc/120713339/Integral-City-2-0-Online-Conference-2012-A-Radically-Optimistic-Inquiry-into-Operating-System-2-0?secret_password=1yysm4ssfgxqya3vk1mp


4/32


Week 1 Overview: Planet of Cities Mother Earth @Motherboard

Holons, Week 1: Planet of Cities

by Erin Stewart Elliott

Week 1 learning objectives were:Shift your perspective and begin viewing cities as living systemsIdentify ways to amplify our resilience and drive innovationConsider the life cycles of and within the city, its inhabitants, and its eco-regionDetermine ways to shore up our resilience amidst shifting factors.


5/32


Day 1 - September 4: What and where are we implementing ecosphere

intelligence?

Ecosphere Intelligence and the Letter 'P'(Clickherefor detailed information about topics and speakers.)

As I reflect on Marilyn Hamilton and Brett Thomas' opening remarks, and a busy day ofinterviews with Bill Rees, Brian Eddy, Michael Zimmerman, Ina Horlings and Karen O'Brien,these words are front andcenter:planet, patterns, pendulum, pivot, place, powerandpeople.

Marilyn Hamilton, conference producer, named our challenge: to build a new operating systemfor cities. Bill Rees, co-developer of ecological footprint analysis, puts it this way: it's time for anew cultural narrative. Both are articulating a world where we contemplate the well-being of ourplanet, notice the patterns in our behaviour that add value to the planet, sense the time to swingthe pendulum from a focus on the hot Memes of I/me/mine to the cold Memes of we/us/our, andchoose to pivot to a new way of being. We have the power to shift from a rogue race to one thatexercises its power to take care of self, others and our place. A people of and for people.

The theme of this first week of The City 2.0 Conference is "Planetof Cities". Today's interviews

brought that home. Urban inhabitants consist of more than half of the planet's humanpopulation. The reach of our cities is well beyond what appears to be what are now very blurryboundaries of urban areas. We are now drawing down our planet's natural capital to the pointwhere we are risking our survival. But this is not a pessimistic view, for crisis is necessary fortransformation. This is the source of radical optimism.

There arepatternsin the chaos of the hive mind. There are patterns now visible to us that areseeds for a new operating system for cities, a new cultural narrative. Here is what emergedtoday, on day 1:

1. A city's well-being depends on its relationship with its ecological context

2. A city has blurry boundaries3. A city self-organizes4. City systems are interwoven, interconnected and non-linear5. Knowledge in the city is multi-scalar, from the individual to the species6. Knowledge in the city comes from multiple perspectives

The new cultural narrative is a higher order of complexity. Thinking of the wordpendulum, weheard today about the need for a swing from a focus on structures, evidence, expertise and the
http://www.integralcitycollective.com/posts/day-1-september-4%C2%A0what-and-where-are-we-implementing%C2%A0ecosphere-intelligencehttp://www.integralcitycollective.com/posts/day-1-september-4%C2%A0what-and-where-are-we-implementing%C2%A0ecosphere-intelligencehttp://www.integralcitycollective.com/posts/day-1-september-4%C2%A0what-and-where-are-we-implementing%C2%A0ecosphere-intelligencehttp://www.integralcitycollective.com/posts/day-1-september-4%C2%A0what-and-where-are-we-implementing%C2%A0ecosphere-intelligence


6/32


individual, to a stronger emphasis on culture, emotion, local knowledge and the collective. A

swing from the short term to longer term views. A swing from the scientific to the arts. A swingfrom the cognitive to the heart. A swing from the exterior to the interior.

The pendulum serves as a contrast, articulating what we wish to put our attention to in responseto today's life conditions. It articulates what we are missing in our world today: a culture wherewe work on both 'sides' of the pendulum. Where we make room for both and integrate all thatwe know. This is where the wordpivotcomes in.

We build our cities (both the exterior and interior). They are made by no-one else but us. Theyare also ours to change. The are ours to create and recreate. They are ours to co-create and

co-re-create. We can choose to turn and face the hard truth of the challenges we face. We canchoose to ask and explore hard questions.

To pivot is also to place a fulcrum. We do not have to choose either end of the pendulum, butwhere to put the fulcrum to meet the life conditions for each city in itsplace. For it is inacknowledging each place, at each scale, where integration comes in. And the source, andpurpose, of such integration rests withpeopleand the qualities that make us human. Rees andHamilton put this clearly. The source of our radical optimism lies in our distinct ability to uselogic, to seek evidence and analyze our world. It also lies in our ability to think into the future,discerning patterns and trends. We also exercise moral intelligence, recognizing right andwrong. Last, we have compassion; we endeavor to take care of self, other and place, the

Integral City master code. We use thesepowersto make places, our cities, that work for us.

Cities are places of confluence. Many are settled at the confluence of transportation routes.Today, our cities are where we find the confluence of hard-to-resolve issues and opportunities.Our hive minds bring us together, in ever increasing quantities, to create problems and resolvethem. We naturally do this as part of Earth's natural systems. This is a piece of the new culturalnarrative.

We are growing our capacity to self-evolve at the scales of self and species, and to do so fully inrelationship with Mother Earth and her operating system. This is the ultimate ecosphere

intelligence.

The new cultural narrative is an unfolding journey, an integral journey, inside and out.

by Beth Sanders


7/32


Day 2 - September 5: What and where are we implementing emergence,

complexity & resilience intelligence?

The Island Stances of Emergence Intelligence(Clickherefor detailed information about topics and speakers.)

Day 2 of Integral City 2.0 was a quest to find the language to describe what is emerging on ourplanet of cities. Buzz Holling, Emeritus Eminent Scholar at the University of Florida, evoked thespirit of experiments and islands. Jan de Dood and Harrie Vollaard of Rabobank, planted seedsfor self-organizing to face the 5 big crises that face our planet, and Will Varey, a consultantspecializing in social generativity, and Ian Wight, professor of city planning at the University ofManitoba, teased out the notion of thearchipelago, a series of interconnected islands.

At the heart of Emergence Intelligence is resilience. At the heart of resilience is creativity, andthe artist's determination to make impossible possible as s/he plays with ideas and explores.This experimentation is about noticing what is happening, not about what is working or notworking. Emergence comes to pass when we create the conditions to explore, for exploringleads to more exploring. Experiments lead to more experiments. Emergence leads to moreemergence.

Our relationships create the social habitat that dictates the quality of our experimentation, andour reaction to experimentation. We have choices to make about the feedback we receive:reject or integrate. These choices accumulate as our culture. Individually and collectively wehave the power, in our relationships, to create a habitat where adaptability and regenerationthrive or stagnate. The choice is ours.

Experimentation is not easy, and from time to time it is useful to sequester ourselves withpeople who share a common goal, or purpose, on an 'island'. For Holling, it is important to sharea goal with people you actually want to spend time with. This is a crucial feature ofexperimentation: creating a habitat for the possibility of the impossible coming to pass. A

'snively whiplash', intent on destroying opportunity, won't do. Be with people who believe inexperimentation.

But is a city an island? For Varey, only if the metaphor of the island is expanded to thearchipelago, where islands are interconnected by land, water currents, reefs, swirls, and theartifacts that come ashore. Connecting islands is like connecting communities of thought. ForWight, an island can be a base to take off from. But if islands are closed systems, as a memberof the audience asked, is this a useful metaphor? Let me experiment.
https://drive.google.com/?tab=wo&authuser=0#folders/0B0bFpb8fqza_YU1aX3FrUW1Zcmchttps://drive.google.com/?tab=wo&authuser=0#folders/0B0bFpb8fqza_YU1aX3FrUW1Zcmchttps://drive.google.com/?tab=wo&authuser=0#folders/0B0bFpb8fqza_YU1aX3FrUW1Zcmchttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archipelagohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archipelagohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archipelagohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archipelagohttps://drive.google.com/?tab=wo&authuser=0#folders/0B0bFpb8fqza_YU1aX3FrUW1Zcmc


8/32


Our planet is an island, alive with whole, interrelated systems, such as cities, that make up ourplanet island. (And our planet island is a whole with other, larger wholes.) Perhaps each ofthose wholes are islands themselves. We can see them both open and closed, for both arepartially true. Both truths lend a different perspective to the situation.

At times it makes sense to squirrel up away from the world. This is where we can create theconditions for experimentation and gently move back into the open world when ready. Othertimes, when we wish to tackle de Dood's five big crises that face the world (water, food, energy,finance, climate change), we must take in the open and interconnectedness of the living systemof which we are a part. Our choice, then is about choosing an island stance appropriate to

context and complexity at a given time.

This understanding of open and closed poles of island stance have a critical relationship withthe role of experimentation in emergence. We need closed system islands to create theconditions for experimentation and we need open system islands to foster wider connectionsand nodes of understanding.

We need to reach both in and out.

Our cities reach both in and out.

by Beth Sanders


9/32


Day 3 - September 6: What and where are we implementing living systems

intelligence?

Assemble the Citizen Observatory(Clickherefor detailed information about topics and speakers.)

Assemble the citizens

awakening the city

with open invitations

for feedback, for dialogue, for seeding

a journey

from contamination to pollination

proving the impossible possible

is possibility

pleasantly transparent

for all to see

imagine citizens

sensing city systems

sensing potential enthusiasm

with momentum mobilizing

collaboration and transformation

with transparency and trust

life unfolds and grows

intelligence for resilience

as we learn

and cities learn

to realize the full potential

for planetary survival

is in inquiry

as cultural intelligence

moves the edge

of collective

orchestrating synchronicities

in learning commons

where the conversations that matter

reveal all

of us

exposed

as whole (s)

our power lies

in our collective

vulnerable strength

in opening

unto ourselves

our parts, perspectives

co-creating, co-awakening

everyone

in this momentness
https://drive.google.com/?tab=wo&authuser=0#folders/0B0bFpb8fqza_YU1aX3FrUW1Zcmchttps://drive.google.com/?tab=wo&authuser=0#folders/0B0bFpb8fqza_YU1aX3FrUW1Zcmchttps://drive.google.com/?tab=wo&authuser=0#folders/0B0bFpb8fqza_YU1aX3FrUW1Zcmchttps://drive.google.com/?tab=wo&authuser=0#folders/0B0bFpb8fqza_YU1aX3FrUW1Zcmc


10/32


of interconnectedness

a new operating system

for a planet of cities

is alive to cycles

of radical optimism

in a living, conscious universe

that replenishes every second

profoundly conservative with what workswell

profoundly experimental with what worksnot

cheering adolescent excellence

cheering new narratives of passage

and transition

that build the story

of inner life

that build the story

the city weaves

about ourselves

celebrating

the power of

diverse voices

diverse questions

connecting and articulating

leading and linking

vulnerable voices

assemble the citizens

awakening the city

with open invitations

by Beth Sanders


11/32


Week 2 Overview: Gaias Reflective Organ: Integral

Intel Inside

Integral Theory, Week 2: Gaias Reflective Organ


Week 2 learning objectives were:Explore the value of individual leadership, cultural storytelling, and developmental infrastructureDevelop your capacities for integrity and integral leadershipDiscover why relationships are the prime currency for the Integral CityIdentify ways you can support and sustain the well-being of your city.


12/32


Day 4 - September 11: What is an Integral Map and where are we implementing

Integral Maps for individual leadership?

Unfolding Integral, Evolutionary Antennae(Clickhere for detailed information about topics and speakers).

Change is changing us. Our hive mind is evolving into a hive being, where the mind, heart andspirit are all engaged and intertwined. Day 4 of Integral City 2.0 articulates the first wee, tinysteps of an emerging conscious collective: Gaias reflective organ.

Graham Boyd, Managing Partner of TetraLD, advised us that we each hold smaller and smallerpieces of knowledge of the worlds complexity. He estimates that knowledge workers (managersand leaders) now only have 1% of what they need to know in their head. No one person is ableto have enough knowledge to get a job done s/he must work with others to gain a more fullpicture of the world.

It is evident that any one perspective holds only a partial truth. Ken Wilber, the world's leadingintegral philosopher, reminded us that each integral voice of the city citizens, city managers,city developers/builders and civil society is full of additional lines of development, each withtheir own levels and stages of values and understanding.

This is a world full of diversity and complexity. It is a world that is full of increasing uncertaintyand our antennae know what we need to do in response. Our antennae are inviting new ways ofcollaborating to ensure that our collective work is relevant and helpful as we face known andunknown challenges. Yene Assegid assured us that these challenges and crises we face arepurposeful: in the face of crisis, as human beings we become what we need to become toovercome the crisis.

So what are our antennae telling us about what we are becoming, our evolutionary unfolding?

The crisis we face, in its simplest explanation, is a separation between our interior and exteriorworlds. Integral City thinking and doing can help. The four integral maps offer ways for us toexplore and create habitats that will allow for the prosperity of all in the human hive. (ForIntegral Map 1, go to Appendix F.) They remind us to think and be whole at all scales, from selfto city and beyond.

Reuniting interior and exterior, energy and matter, consciousness and culture, takes place by


13/32


putting attention to our emotions and feelings. For Graham Boyd, this is where we can turn the

hive mind into the hive being, fully integrating everything this metaphor has to offer cities byjoining the hive mind with heart and spirit. David Fabers conversation with Jan Inglis, a publicdeliberation specialist, and Graham Boyd revealed that this means we need to create habitatswhere we support each other and struggle with each other. This means growing our capacities,at the scales of self, city and beyond to:

Welcome and explore vulnerability Dialogue with presence and authenticity Connect with feelings of self and other Lead as practice, rather than position Distribute and share leadership Recognize our work as spiritual practice Follow our niggles

To pull this off, we are learning to fully access our passions, our intuitive insights, and the deep,emerging purposes for our work. Barrett Brown, a specialist in leadership and sustainability,describes our emerging abilities to manage our personal energy, where we thoughtfully placeour attention, and the role of our intentions. For Brown, this is transpersonal work, connectingthe rational mind with deep intuitive insights. These are a whole range of inner antennae thatallow us to, in Browns words, grow up, wake up, hone up and clean up.

At the heart of this work, both inner and outer, is our ability to lead from purpose. YeneAssegid, a Transformative Leadership Coach, confirmed this with her interviews of Africanleaders. In circumstances seemingly impossible to exercise leadership, leaders thrive with abelief in purpose, or deep intention. Knowing why we do something is what compels us to step

into leadership roles as required.

Our unfolding antennae are the beginning of a new story in human consciousness, where weare exploring the depths of the inner purpose of Self, the City and a Planet of Cities. We aresensing a new "why" in our very being in the universeour inner work scales up to Gaias innerwork as we grow our antennae to be her reflective organ.

We are growing antennae, and corresponding behaviors and structures in response, that serveour own, and Gaia's, evolutionary unfolding.

by Beth Sanders


14/32


Day 5 - September 12: What and where are we implementing cultural / storytelling

intelligence?

The Journey of Generations(Clickherefor detailed information about topics and speakers) .

The ring of fire

is cooking a new species

is looking for stories

of the second generation

of the human race

merging marriages

mingling muchness

in the world mind

evolution is evocation

catalyzing cultures

tantalizing tongues

traveling

activating

the spirit of cities

an architecture of meaning

and form at the beginning

a cycle in time

celebrating

radical renewal

in story

the infinite genius of

city culture co-creating

response to co-creation

crossing the divide of otherness

to see the city

we havent seen

a city of stories

growing themselves

dream vividly

archaeologists of the mind

lets take a walk with our self

lets talk with our self

lets be the superpower of people

telling the story of the universe

a world child

a kosmic renaissance

we are the universe in miniature

waking

to voices

to messages

to stories
http://www.integralcitycollective.com/posts/day-5-september-12%C2%A0what-and-where-are-we-implementing-cultural-storytelling-intelligencehttp://www.integralcitycollective.com/posts/day-5-september-12%C2%A0what-and-where-are-we-implementing-cultural-storytelling-intelligencehttp://www.integralcitycollective.com/posts/day-5-september-12%C2%A0what-and-where-are-we-implementing-cultural-storytelling-intelligencehttp://www.integralcitycollective.com/posts/day-5-september-12%C2%A0what-and-where-are-we-implementing-cultural-storytelling-intelligence


15/32


to the margin

on the edge

of seeing, smelling

feeling, hearing

a human system

living the city sacred

embodied, congregated

fun-damentally listening

for seeds

of social discourse

universally and specifically

more than imagined

cities full of decathlete athletes

energy bursting forth

fairness, justice

for we all make the soup

for we all make the codes

in story

in stories with lives

of their own

we choose what will ricochet

in the journey of generations

we choose what to whisper

of our olympic possibilities

we choose what will ricochet

in the journey of generations

by Beth Sanders


16/32


Day 6 - September 13: What and where are we implementing structural /

infrastructural intelligence?

An Evolutionary Expedition(Clickherefor detailed information about topics and speakers.)

Imagine an expedition.

It always starts with a purpose: to get somewhere, to solve a problem, to see new territory, toreach a dream. The journey is not easy, so having a clear purpose, believed in deeply, isessential. Day 6 of The Integral City 2.0 Conference leaves us with a wonderful conclusion to aweek contemplating our expedition: to be Gaias reflective organ.

We are not heading out on an expedition for traditional scientific or military purposes, but forevolutionary purposes. We are building structures, infrastructures and systems to support thisexpedition. This is an intelligence that supports our journey. As Mark DeKay of the College ofArchitecture and Design at the University of Tennessee put it, we are designing for flow.

There is always structure around flow: our thinking patterns, our buildings, our rivers, our

banking systems. Structure is both naturally occurring in our environment (the habitat we aregiven) as well as the naturally occurring structures we construct (the habitat we make). At theheart of our exploration of Structural Intelligence is the search for a blend of our structures andnatures structures. For DeKay, what we build tells part of the citys story; our structures bothconceal and reveal our relationships with nature.

Marleen Kaptein, catalyst for EVA Lanxmeer, and Alex Von Oost, co-developer of the AlmerePrinciples, are on wonderful city expeditions as they live structural intelligence for an IntegralCity. They see whole new futures for how we organize and design our cities in ways that DeKaywould describe as regenerative: ways that produce greater ecological health and well-being.

Kaptein and Von Oost are living the spirit of expedition by heading out into new territory andnote that they always head out with a crew that shares the dream. Their respective crews arediverse and transdisciplinary, flexible and adaptable, travel with open hearts and minds andspirits, and share principles to guide them on their journey. They, and their crews, are masterdesigners that find ways to balance the necessary structure to support their expeditions as wellas create the conditions for self-organizing.


17/32


What compels us to embark on expeditions? Brian Robertson, known for his work developing

Holacracy, would say tension. We desire to resolve the tension between where we are andwhere we see we could be. This tension is full of energy, and we can design how to organizeour social structures to take advantage of this energy by having a clear purpose (a necessarycondition for expedition!), integrating knowledge and distributing authority and leadership.Integrating all we know, as it pertains to a specific purpose, is imminently practical andachievable, even with diverse values and worldviews. Especially on an expedition.

On our evolutionary expedition we will encounter a variety of perspectives, each with their owninterpretation of where we are and where we could be. Brett Thomas, co-founder of Stagen, aconsulting firm that specializes in Integral Leadership, describes four worldviews, each of whichdefine the purpose and progress of a given expedition differently. Each of which will offer

different forms of leadership for our expedition. The purpose of the Integral City Collective hintsat the Latin root of the word expedition, which means to get ready, to prepare. This aptlyunderscores our work in these times. Understanding the four world views described by Thomasand how they show up is critical, social structural preparation for becoming Gaias reflectiveorgan.

As our planet of cities begins to contemplate the purpose of cities, our expedition is taking placeat every scale. We are paying attention to life-sustaining energy patterns in our personalpractices, organizations, cities and the Kosmos. We are also paying attention to the expeditionout in the world as well as our inner expeditions, our personal journeys along the way.

Thank you to all crew as you share stories of all the complexities in your journeys. Thank youfor the evolutionary trail markers.

by Beth Sanders


18/32


Week 3 Overview: Aligning Strategies to Prosper

Logic Processors Connecting the Dots

Centralized Coordination, Week 3: Aligning Strategies to Prosper


Week 3 learning objectives were:

Explore the interplay between individual inquiry, meta-wisdom, and hierarchical systemsCarve a path through the barriers and co-create a natural flow of resourcesExperience how meshworking aligns various partners to achieve a common purposeDiscover ways to monitor the health of our cities -- and how to make them even more effective.


19/32


Day 7 - September 18: What and where are we implementing inquiry intelligence?

The Alliteration of Inquiry(Clickherefor more detailed information about topics and speakers.)

Ill start and end this harvest with three words that form the formula to create a habitat for InquiryIntelligence: kindness, humor and joy. These qualities are at the heart of this intelligence thatallows us access to our in-tuition, as individuals and as collectives, a key strategy to prosper. Akey strategy to prosper in cities.

Inquiry intelligence allows us to connect the dots of Appreciative Inquiry, articulated by AnnPerodeau, faculty at Royal Roads University in Canada, as discover, dream, design and deliver.It is essential to settle into our stories and values before we dream. It is essential to dreambefore we design, and it is important to design before delivering. Within all these dots, weinquire endlessly about the future we are co-creating together.

JoAnne de Vries story of the Building SustainAble Communities Conferences, hosted by herorganization, the Fresh Outlook Foundation, offers another collection of words. While sheworks, her mantra is educate and engage and inspire. But those are not the only words thatdescribe how she works. She aims to involve everyone, even the people she hasnt thought of

yet. She aims to include all topics. She aims to connect anything and everything that needsconnecting. She aims to bring the best out of everyone, and as she evaluates her work, shesees results. Her results are because of her passion to inquire with self and others.

There is a bit more to de Vries mantra, educate and engage to inspire. Ian Wight, of theUniversity of Manitobas school of city planning, would throw the word enact into the mix.Addingde Vries purposeful evaluation, the mantra evolves to these words that frame thestructure of Inquiry Intelligence: educate, engage, enact and evaluate.

The approach we take to inquiry is changing. For Ann Dale, Canada Research Chair in

Sustainable Community Development, Inquiry Intelligence means working beyond amultidisciplinary approach. She also moves beyond the integration of interdisciplinary teams totransdisciplinary teams. This involves working with diverse people, even in conflict, to inquiretogether and create research questions before research takes place. Through inquiry, bigquestions are asked and explored, and the results are much more than what any person orperspective could accomplish alone.

The habitat in which Inquiry Intelligence thrives is not easy to create and infinitely worth the


20/32


21/32


Day 8 - September 19: What and where are we implementing meshworking

intelligence?

Meshworks Manifest(Clickherefor detailed information about topics and speakers.)

Hard truths are hard

to call out

in fragmentation

so lets connect

what matters

to design what works

with memetic competence

with memetic competence

we connect what matters

to design what works

with organizing principles

that align function with people

with tools, maps, intelligences

designing city organisms

memetically full

of diversity

we are looking

for invisible

natural patterns

we are releasing

natural structures

aligned

with what we need

with landing lights

for leaders held

by one sky

wild and woolly

learning on the ground

with open hearts

supporting structures

catalyzing connectionswith heartful

energetic architecture

genetic architecture

inviting deep space

mesh weavers

affirming

I we itsscaffolds

structure gives life

replicating what works

with hierarchy of intent


22/32


quickening fortuitous connections

quickening synchronicity

good things happening

with powerful joy

contributing to

the superordinate

doing what I, we

do best

measurement is the metabolism

of human life in nature

the city sends signals to itself

for speed, agility, vitality

using any channel

to connectcivilization to nature

making sense together

using all means

to manifest

connectivity

pause

sense into circle

of Selves

settling

inviting

space

for the planet as a whole

a pulse

full of gratitude

encircling fertility

stepping into longing

sharing love

for life

by Beth Sanders


23/32


Day 9 - September 20: What and where are we implementing navigating

intelligence?

Navigating the City Playground(Clickherefor detailed information about topics and speakers.)

A city is like a big playground. It is full of fun, smiles, and laughter. It has snacks on hand. Italso has some form of basic structure on which, and around, the fun takes place. Sometimesthe play turns to conflict and feelings get hurt. Sometimes bodies get hurt, too.

It can be a big decision for a neighborhood to decide what a playground should be and whetherit meets expectations. Navigating intelligence monitors and discloses the wellbeing or generalcondition of the playground, the city, telling us if it is a healthy or unhealthy place. Navigatingintelligence also tells us if we are moving in the direction of our vision.

The best way to ensure a playground serves people well is if the playgrounds users determinewhat matters. Day 9 of the Integral City 2.0 Conference revealed that cities are no different; thebest way to ensure a city figures out and reaches its desired sustainability outcomes is ifcitizens have a hand in creating both the citys vision (what they want) and how to get there(what matters). A playground is a success if what is built aligns with what matters to the public.

Hazel Henderson, founder of Ethical Markets Media, LLC and numerous quality of lifeindicators, started learning the ropes as a mom at a playground. She learned to think laterally,connect organizations and create the conditions new relationships. In playground language,Henderson introduced kids who normally played separately and helped them find a whole newgame together. In the playground of the city, she spent years gaining experience, learning howto navigate the relationships and networks, helping them connect to serve community interests.

Henderson reminds us that in the city playground, what is important is not what we think it is.

The value of a playground is not the price tag on the equipment, for we mistake money forvalue. The value is in the quality of life generated by/within/around the playground. There iseven value in the avoided costs of a happy playground, such as drops in violent crime.

As we make efforts to track quality of life indicators, we are able to connect the dots and seewhat makes our city playgrounds fun and healthy. In fact, having fun while creating cityscorecards is important. Gaetan Royer, with Metro Vancouver Regional Parks, and JohnPurkis, with The Natural Step Canada, have figured this out. They enjoy their work, in their work


24/32


"playgrounds".

Royer and Purkis have also figured out that when establishing the vision for a city, itsinhabitants must see their role in the vision if they are going to make the vision a reality. No oneplays in a park if its design and amenities are not suitable. Involving the citizens in thediscussion and decision making about the city ensures that the city will be relevant. The peoplewho play in the playground must have a hand in its creation or it isnt a satisfying place to be.

Our work together in cities involves figuring out what we want (vision), how to implement it andhow to recognize, or measure success. This means crawling into the playground together. Tolook at the indicators themselves, Christa Rust, with the Canadian Sustainability Indicator

Network, advocates that the community choose the indicators. In her work in Winnipeg,Canada, the community built the indicator framework. The community chose to monitor anddisclose what mattered.

Gil Friend, CEO of Natural Logic Inc., supports the strong role of community. For him, peoplehave to find their own way. It is essential that the community explore patterns themselves, figureout what matters themselves, measure what matters. That way, collectively, we are navigatingto what matters to us.

Friend conjured the difference between a press release or a dashboard. Imagine these in the

playground where a multi-stakeholder group is sorting out how well we are doing in relation toits vision. The press release is ignored, for there is nothing to play with. The dashboard is whatdraws your attention because you decided what to put there. It also matters because itsinformation keeps changing, allowing you to adjust your course along the way. For Friend, agood dashboard is also additive and multiplicative.

Navigating intelligence gets to the numbers and the stories in our cities. And when effective, it isplayground equipment that will be used. And to get the result we want, we have to play together.

by Beth Sanders


25/32


Week 4: Amplifying Intelligence Accessing Our

Evolutionary Power Source

Emerging Systems, Week 4:Amplifying Intelligence


Week 4 learning objectives were:

Work with the MasterCode of creating a more sustainable, thriving futureFind ways to monitor and manage your personal energy and well-beingExplore learning systems that promote individual, cultural, and holistic contributionIdentify ways to more skillfully care for self, others, and place.


26/32


Day 10 - September 25: What and where are we implementing evolutionary

intelligence for outer wellbeing?

Beauty, Truth and Goodness with Practice(Clickherefor detailed information about topics and speakers.)

It takes practice for the biological outer intelligence where the body acts, behaves andevolves to embody the intention of our inner intelligence. It takes practice because what weview as beauty, truth and goodness is always changing.

For Steve McIntosh, a leader in the integral philosophy movement, the meaning of beauty, truthand goodness comes from our notion of what improvement means. What we declareimprovement, of course, depends on our worldview, our values. The result we are endlesslypulled into evolutionary achievements. We recognize these as stages of development, or levelsof consciousness, or unfolding value systems.

So, how we see beauty, truth and goodness to be depends upon our view. What we see asimprovement depends on our view. McIntosh conjures the voice of Clare Graves: higher stagesare better, and perhaps the way to go is for higher stages to better include the lower, particularlythe healthy aspects of lower stages.

For Leo Burke, Director of Integral Leadership at the Mendoza College of Business at theUniversity of Notre Dame, the challenge for todays leaders is in the polarization of private andpublic paradigms. He proposes a third view, that of the commons (air, ocean, forest, opensource software, languages). When looking at the commons, we see issues that areinterdependent, with no clear path. For todays leaders, the time frames to create the lifeconditions we want are a challenge. They are long, and as a result, we need to reframe how welook at our context and how we insert ourselves into our context.

Outer intelligence means embodiment of right action. Peter Merry, founder and chair of the

Center for Human Emergence, Netherlands, and Deirdre Goudriaan, an organizational,leadership and community development consultant, remind us that aligning behavior with innerintention takes practice. Life practices, where our inner and outer work meet, are essential toensure we live intention. This means recognizing the energy patterns in our bodies. It meansexploring our shadow and light. It means living from heart space, forever curious.

Both Merry and Goudriaan notice that people are yearning for face-to-face connections within


27/32


and between our communities. We recognize that we yearn for collectives that embody right

action that feeds our hearts. Merry leaves us with this thought: Anyone can be an evolutionaryactivist. The life process is flowing through you. Help people see who they are, where they areat, who they are for now. Help them find their place in the collective context, to find their

peace/piece. The evolutionary spirit will flow through them.

Right action is in both individual and collective. It means creating collective habitats conduciveto people living their highest potential, allowing them to take their next natural step. It alsomeans alignment of personal inner intention with action. The more coherent the self, the morecoherent I can take in the world and create appropriate conditions for others. Our individualpractices are key. For Goudriaan, the value of personal practices is that when engrained, weshow up differently in the world, better able to serve the world.

The ultimate practice: discerning and valuing the various forms of beauty, truth and goodness.

by Beth Sanders


28/32


Day 11 - September 26: What and where are we implementing evolutionary

intelligence for activating city spirit?

Inquiry is Figuring Us Out(Clickherefor detailed information about topics and speaker.)

1.

Inquiry always asks for more

aliveness weve never been before

something new is always

coming into being

patterns carry forward

creativity, novelty

notice, trust, deepen

choose

show up

explicitly

uncomfortable

in silence

simple and complex

amplifying

evolutionary power

raw, whole

honor

well

2.

Inquiry is figuring us out

radically optimistic

unifying and making whole

the scale of the city

of peace

fully sacred

evolutionary impulse

itself

suffering

provocations to new intelligence

what happens is in our hands,

is flesh and blood

awakening, expanding

citizensidentity

whole

city

deeply optimistic

that we can handle anything

3.

The way we connect will bring

intelligence

spiritual weightlifting


29/32


discerning practices

welcome

the golden shadow

welcome

the light of Self

step in

to the gift of suffering

as an optimist

by choice

by Beth Sanders


30/32


Day 12 - September 27: What & where are we living the master evolutionary code?

Mastering the Master Code(Clickherefor detailed information about topics and speakers.)

As many stories do, this one started many decades ago with a small voice inside someoneshead. This small voice lead to a series of questions, research projects and the metaphor of thehoney bees hive as a stand-in to understand human systems and the human hive: the city.

Bees generate 40 pounds of honey a year, exactly what they need to survive, and contribute tothe health of their habitat. Marilyn Hamilton asked herself this: what is the human equivalent of40 pounds of honey and what could we do to add value to our cities eco -regions? Eventually abook emerged and here we are, at the end of the Integral City 2.0 Online Conference, havingexplored:

Earth as a planet of cities, growing our understanding of our biosphere, living systems andemergence, complexity and resilience.

Humans and cities as Gaias reflective organ, full of storytelling/cultural intelligence and theintelligence to build the structures we need to survive and thrive. All with integral intelligence.

Strategies to align our efforts to prosper, drawing on our inquiry, meshworking and navigatingintelligences.

Amplification of our intelligence through our outer and inner intelligences, embodying right

action aligned with intention, and the master code (look after self, look after other, look afterthis place).

Brett Thomas, co-founder of Stagan, a consulting firm that specializes in Integral Leadership,supports Hamilton in this endeavor because he believes that in todays world there are manydifferent ideas of improvement. Subsequently, many types of leadership are also required. Thisconference is about beginning to create the interrelationships that are necessary to facehumanitys challenges. For Hamilton and Thomas, it is time to bring the wholeness of humanitytogether to expand our consciousness.

Hamiltons invitation to us is to create a new operatingsystem for the city. This will involve fourkinds of awareness. We are learning to be clear about ourtransactionwith the planet. Ourecological footprint, for example. And the understanding that life is adaptive and fully within us.Second, we are learning totranslateeffectively from, between and into different cultures,values, levels of world view. Third, our citiestransformalong with us. What we build changesus, and our consciousness changes what we choose to build over time as well. Last, our ego-and ethnic-centered view of the world is beingtransducedto a planet-centric view. Ourcollective consciousness is connecting us.


31/32


Day 12 of the conference brought several voices together to reflect on the conference: CherieBeck, George Por, Alia Aurami, and Amy Oliver. Four people embodied four different voices ofthe city, four different generations, four different integral quadrants and 4 different cities.Together, they see that the new operating system for the city is in each of us and between eachof us. Working at the scale of the city is where we will have the ability to meet the challengesthat face humanity. It is time for a new narrative for the city.

The 12 intelligences explored over the conference give us a frame with which to look at thestories of our cities. And the stories themselves are acts of citizenship. Even more citizenshipsurfaces when we ask ourselves, endlessly, how we work in, of and as the city.

This is the conundrum I see in cities: they have a hand in creating us and they are created byus. We are our own creators. We are on an evolutionary trajectory of our own creation. This iswhere the master code plays its crucial role: look after self, look after other, look after thisplace.

We dont know where we are going, but we have realized that we need to prepare. We aregetting a number of base camps ready as we see uncharted territory ahead. We areconnecting with each other like never before. We are searching for learning experiences,creating learning laboratories. We are exploring the very design process we need to createhabitats that serve us well. We are cultivating relationships between generations to draw on

their motivations and gifts.

The four voices you heard regularly throughout the conference (host Eric Troth and interviewersMarilyn Hamilton, Beth Sanders and David Faber), gathered at the end of the conference toreflect on how the master code revealed itself. We noticed that the three principles of the mastercode are alive and well:

Expect the unexpected. We practiced the radical humility of not knowing what eachinterview would bring, let alone the whole conference.

Pay attention to the rules. We noticed that the new currency is relationships, particularlywithin and between different worldviews or levels of consciousness.

Enable emergence and resilience.We noticed the narrative of the citys emerging story. Anew depth to our understanding of the city is emerging. It is our story to stretch up.

The master code is simple and complex, as is the future of the Integral City 2.0 OnlineConference community. We dont know yet what it will bring. We trust that by inviting inquirywe are inviting our minds, bodies and spirits to stretch up to new possibilities. In that we trust.Fully.

by Beth Sanders


32/32

Acknowledgements

Report Production Team:

Marilyn Hamilton

Beth Sanders

Harvest Author: Beth Sanders

Harvest Graphics: Erin Stewart Elliott

integral city 2.0 online conference 2012 harvests: weeks 1-4, days 1-12

Documents