admin, Author at Transformations https://transformations.co.za/author/admin/ Re-Authoring the World Tue, 08 Jun 2021 11:13:55 +0000 en-ZA hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=7.0.1 https://transformations.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/cropped-book-cover-32x32.jpg admin, Author at Transformations https://transformations.co.za/author/admin/ 32 32 The Story of an Abundance Challenge https://transformations.co.za/abundance-challenge/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=abundance-challenge Thu, 06 May 2021 12:31:20 +0000 https://transformations.co.za/?p=11975 The post The Story of an Abundance Challenge appeared first on Transformations.

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The Story of an Abundance Challenge

What is abundance? Have you ever experienced abundance in a way that you have noticed it? What would happen if we see the world through the eyes of abundance? Come and join Olivia Saunders and me for our Abundance Challenge! 

In Olivia Saunders’s book, Tomato Economics: Shifting Economies from Scarcity to Abundance, she wrote that she was a pretend gardener because she grew whatever grew naturally in the garden. Since then, she has moved on to become a precarious gardener, producing a variety of plants, including a variety of tomatoes. By her standards, she has been successful although she eventually does something that annoys the plants, and they become uncooperative. But she starts over (again and again). The most important lesson learnt though, is that notwithstanding the thin soil of The Bahamas, the production of an abundance of food is possible even when treated shoddily. She has grown sufficient for her personal use and enough to share with neighbours, friends, and family. The gardening foibles only confirm that we have to work very hard (and be very ignorant) to hinder abundance. The lack and scarcity, especially with respect to hunger and food shortages in the world, result from human-designed economic systems that ensure the few have plenty and most have a little or none. The economic system that leads to the destruction of the earth, to the reduction in crop diversity, and restrictions on seeds’ reproductive capacity guarantees there will not be enough.

Every time we eat a fruit, we should be aware of the potential and possibility of that fruit. In the book, Olivia gives the results of a ‘non-experiment’ she did with cherry tomatoes that pop up every so often in her yard. She counted the seeds from one tomato. Each seed represents the potential of a new tomato plant. If each plant produces a certain number of fruits over its lifetime, the possibility of one tomato is immense. The number of tomatoes per plant depends on its environment, whether it is determinate or indeterminate, and the type of tomato. For example, the soil in South Africa is rich compared to the soil in The Bahamas. Chené can expect a much larger harvest than Olivia. Determinate varieties will produce once, while indeterminate varieties will produce repeatedly. All things being equal, the larger the tomato, the lower the yield. So, more cherry tomatoes can be expected than beefsteak tomatoes on a single plant.

Becoming StoryKeepers of the Announcing of the Coming of the Sun
Abundance Challenge

An Abundance Challenge

The challenge we are putting out to you is to think of the tomato and its potential, its inherent abundance, by doing your own non-scientific non-experiment.

Instructions:

  1. Get a tomato from the store, your neighbour, or your garden.
  2. Cut open the tomato and count the number of seeds. Write this number down. This is the number of potential tomato plants.
  3. Assume each plant produces (conservatively) 20 tomatoes.Or, if you have tomato plants, then approximate a number from your experience. 
  4. Round 1 multiplication. Multiply the number of seeds by the number of tomatoes. Write the number down. E.g., 20 seeds x 20 tomatoes = 400 potential tomato plants.
  5. Round 2 multiplication. Multiply the number of plants (from 4.) by the number 20 (assumed number of tomatoes per plant) by the number of seeds found in 2. Write the number down.
  6. Round 3,4,5, … You can continue until you get tired. For each round, write the numbers down.

Reflection questions:

  1. Reflections: What happened for you as you counted the seeds of the tomato? What caught your imagination as you started entering the multiplication of the seeds? What did the tomato teach you about abundance? What becomes possible when abundance lives closer to our daily lives?

Share your findings and reflections:

  1. On LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter or Instagram by tagging us and using the hashtag  #abundancechallenge.

LinkedIn- @Chené Swart

Facebook- @TransformationsSA

Instagram- @transformations_sa

Twitter- @CheneSwart

Olivia’s reflection.

The underlying assumption of the scarcity of goods, services and resources of the economics profession haunted me for a long while without even realising why it was such an enigma. After all, it was the mantra I recited from my high school years. I repeatedly instruct my students – “Economics is the study of the allocation of scarce resources”.

But, the tomatoes on the tomato plant that arose from ‘nowhere’ in my yard shattered the myth of scarcity for me and, at the same time, the religious fervour I held for economics.

One little wild cherry tomato, no more than 3cm in diameter, held 65 seeds! Yes, the counting of the seeds was tedious, but at the same time, astounding. 65 possibilities in one tomato for future plants. Each of those plants an opportunity for many more tomatoes, which have further potentials for future plants! In that instant, the mystery was solved. The myth of scarcity was exposed. How I looked at every plant, every fruit, every animal was now different. Each, in their own way, represents potentials and possibilities; each a revelation of abundance, a revelation that there is, in fact, enough. None of them is lesser, and therefore none is more than another in their capacity for expressing abundance.

Because abundance is the natural order of things, so is generosity, so is neighbourliness. So are so many other qualities that were once stultified by an acceptance of scarcity.

You can read more about our story here: https://transformations.co.za/scarcity-abundance/

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]]> Becoming StoryKeepers of the Announcing of the Coming of the Sun https://transformations.co.za/becoming-storykeepers-of-the-announcing-of-the-coming-of-the-sun/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=becoming-storykeepers-of-the-announcing-of-the-coming-of-the-sun Sat, 17 Oct 2020 11:16:29 +0000 https://transformations.co.za/?p=10429 The post Becoming StoryKeepers of the Announcing of the Coming of the Sun appeared first on Transformations.

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Becoming StoryKeepers of the Announcing

of the Coming of the Sun

Dear StoryKeeper

WELCOME TO MY GARDEN
It was 5h30, the magical hour, just before the break of dawn, and on this cold and cloudy Spring morning, I was sitting next to the fire who has been my companion in keeping the flame of many stories that matter to me dearly. And this time was no exception, the fire kept me warm as I explored the theme, Announcing of the Coming of the Sun, in a talk for this year’s story gathering. Come and join me in my garden next to the fire, and also in my 6-month old vegetable garden, where you will see the beautiful unfolding of an alternative story. You can watch this 12-minute talk here.

INTRODUCTION
The question I held in preparation for this talk, was:
What is our work to do as the ones closely living and working with narratives and all the possibility it holds in the night and in the dawn so that it will announce the coming of the sun?

This exploration brought me to our role as StoryKeepers who have the capacity to make meaning and to make story and to the invitation to listen, ask questions, re-tell and weave stories as StoryWhisperers and StoryWeavers in ways that invite others to move through this extraordinary night so that we become co-authors of an alternative world.

When it is night, what can we do, how can we hold the dawn as we go through the night, and what will announce the coming of the sun? What is our work to do in these extraordinary times?

In the night, StoryKeepers ask careful curious questions about all the stories that seem to be told as “the way things are.” The dawn belongs to the StoryWhisperers, who live alternative stories to the night and open our imagination to the breaking of the dawn of an alternative. The rising of the sun comes when we retell, connect and become StoryWeavers as we weave into this world, these alternative or counter narratives that can collectively spark our imagination for a different world.
In this blogpost I will elaborate on my talk and provide Secrets, Magical Doors, Roles, Curiosities and Examples we can consider as we move through the night, into the dawn and announce the coming of the sun.

Becoming StoryKeepers of the Announcing of the Coming of the Sun
The role of the StoryKeepers

THE NIGHT
Why do StoryKeepers have to announce the coming of the sun?

A Secret
The stories of the night, represent for me the stories that we so often hear tagged with lines like, “this is just the way things are” or “this will never change” or “this is how it has always been” in the world. These kinds of stories can overwhelm us, because of their certainty and also because they do not have an address where we can go to lay our complaint or offer an alternative.
The stories of the night, come from long histories, traditional powers and the markets and support many problem stories that make the person the problem as it hides its role and its origins.

A Role
The role of the StoryKeepers is to dare to ask careful curious questions to these night stories. These explorations remind me of the irreverence so well known to the tradition of the Carnival because it makes visible and exotic what we take for granted as the way things go and what is normal in our world today.

A Magical Door
In these conversations with the stories of the night, our questions are asked with careful curiosity in ways that we do not know the answer and as we do, a world that seems fixed and certain can open up and make visible the crack in everything.
• How is it that we have come to accept these beliefs and understandings?
• Who benefits if we continue this way of thinking and doing?
• How is this way of life influencing us?
• Where do this way of thinking and doing come from?
• Who benefits if these beliefs and understanding continue to be sustained?
• How does the way things are influence our lives?
• Are there also emerging alternative stories that tell of something different, about a new dawn?

An Example
Everyone Deserves a Holiday is a holiday participation centre in Tourism Flanders that facilitates holidays for people in Flanders that would never otherwise be able to have this experience. In 2016 I first met the team and together we deconstructed and unpacked the world of their work (stories of the night) and the context in which they were providing holidays for people in poverty and with disabilities. In this article (page 11-13) I share the story and a process where we dared to ask questions to the story of the night with its fixed world of ideas and beliefs when it comes to travel and leisure and who is allowed to benefit and enjoy these things.

THE DAWN
As StoryKeepers of the announcing of the coming of the sun, what can invite the breaking of the dawn of an alternative in the night of this extraordinary time?

A Secret
The best kept secret is that the stories that are “other” or “alternative” to the “way things are” are often sold as the exception and therefore, nothing special. But the moment we have an exception, the dawn breaks for the possibility of a counter or competing narrative. There is a crack in everything like Leonard Cohen says.
I call those who are practicing these alternative stories, StoryWhisperers, as their work whispers to us of the possibility of the dawn beyond the night.

A Magical Door
As StoryKeepers our work is to listen for these cracks, these exceptions and listen to the StoryWhisperers in ways that do not judge, assume, give advice, but rather hold an openness where you are willing to be transformed by what you hear.
• What kind of stories have you heard recently that have filled you with hope?
• To which of the stories of the night is this story an alternative?
• What would happen if this alternative story would be nourished and cared for?

A Role
As StoryKeepers we listen always for the crack in everything, and when we hear the stories of the StoryWhisperers, we put them in our treasure chest and tell and retell these stories whenever we hear the night around this topic/theme as a gift to spark the imagination.

A Story
On the 12th of March, my colleague, Griet Bouwen and I were standing on the station in Lier, Belgium, just after we completed a Storyweavers training workshop. The new language of lockdowns and the cancelling of work entered my life. As I rushed back to South Africa as soon as possible, all the stories of the night came rushing in, and the anxiety and fear lived close to me. When our own lockdown was announced, a thought re-appeared. I want to finally take the time to plant a vegetable and herb garden. It was my good friend, Griet Bouwen, who was the StoryWhisperer, who sparked my imagination for the possibility of living in a different relationship to the earth and to food. And it was Ron Finley who was the StoryWhisperer, reminding me that “this is no damn hobby, this is life and death. This is our revolution”. These StoryWhisperers show us the crack in everything, and bring us the dawn of alternative possibilities.

Curiosity
• Who is your StoryWhisperers and which stories are calling you to be told and re-told?
• What are you a StoryWhisperer of?

An example
In June 2018 I had the privilege to come alongside a gathering of 130 people living in Nova Scotia, a small province on the east coast of Canada and the ancestral land of the Indigenous Mi’kmaq people. This was a grassroots gathering called How We Thrive, that had come together to build relationships and skills, and to imagine how they could re-author the future of their province. In this article (page 13-14), I share the group process of this gathering that invites communities to whisper the stories that give us glimpses of an alternative world.
This year, the How We Thrive community started with an initiative called, The Narrative Project, that is an example of a community who creates the space to make meaning together as they listen to the StoryWhisperers sharing alternative stories to shine through the cracks—stories that inspire, nourish, challenge and provoke.

THE RISING OF THE SUN

A Secret
When all the alternative stories come together, and are woven into a rich tapestry of otherness it might become unstoppable.

A Magical Door
When we hear the alternative stories in our world, they call on us to weave these competing stories into our conversations, to connect StoryWhisperers with one another and to also ask, what is mine to do?
• What is the story that is calling me to whisper?
• Who do I need to connect around this story?
• What would the gift be in our world when this story has more of a say?

A Role
StoryWeavers weave these stories back into the world in some form of documentation or re-telling, and make visible how it is an alternative to the night, connect the story with other alternatives that becomes a movement beyond the way things are.

Origins of the word, practice and training
Storyweaving was created by three women who found each other in their shared love of stories. Marianne Schapmans, director of Everyone Deserves A Holiday – Chené Swart, narrative expert and author of Re-authoring the world – Griet Bouwen, initiator of Nieuwmakers. In this video Co-authoring the future of travel and tourism you can discover more about the journey we have travelled together. Or read this article with the same title.
Storyweaving was developed in 2017 at Everyone Deserves a Holiday and we did our first projects outside this network at KrisKras and Jint, where young people start narrating their international travel, learning and volunteering experiences. In 2019 Storyweavers went in search of Travel to Tomorrow stories for Tourism Flanders.

Storyweaving is the skill to invite, appreciate, listen to and document stories with dignity. Storyweaving is also about discovering meanings, threads, lessons and possibilities throughout the growing collection of stories and can be used as a way of action-oriented research: where learning and change already go together.

To know more, contact Griet Bouwen griet@zinspeling.be or Chené Swart chene@transformations.co.za

Much gratitude
Thanks again to Harris III Underwood for the invitation speak at #STORY2020 with its beautiful theme, Announcing the Coming of the Sun, that sparked my imagination and thinking around our roles as StoryKeepers, Story Whisperers and StoryWeavers moving through the night and the dawn towards the sun. With much gratitude also to Alan Roberts from Five Star Media for a wonderful morning of filming that birthed this beautiful documentation of my thoughts and stories and to Ilene Sawka for your coaching so that these ideas could become words.

Enjoy the journey and please let me know how it goes in your adventures as StoryKeepers of the announcing of the coming of the sun.

Warmly
Chené Swart
Your co-adventurer

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]]> Re-authoring ideas and practices for Leadership https://transformations.co.za/re-authoring-ideas-and-practices-for-leadership/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=re-authoring-ideas-and-practices-for-leadership Mon, 18 May 2020 05:29:30 +0000 https://transformations.co.za/?p=10010 The post Re-authoring ideas and practices for Leadership appeared first on Transformations.

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| Re-authoring ideas and practices for Leadership |

For the past 8 years I had the privilege to share Re-authoring ideas and practices with leaders at the University of Stellenbosch’s Business School in their Postgraduate Diploma in Leadership Development (https://www.usb.ac.za/course/leadership-development/ ).

Because of the lockdown here in South Africa, the session with 40 students were facilitated online for the first time. It was a magical morning with the students as they reflected on a moment as a leader that they would want more of in their lives.  We also employed practices that enrich and thicken these stories. This is what participants said:

“I fascinated about everyone’s ability to tell their story without a lot of time to prepare. It shows how we are able to re-live those moments we are passionate about and are able to bring others into those moments and derive meaning and become co-authors in the narrative.” 

The moments that were shared “were all so different, yet inspiring, indicating leadership is evident in every context, aspect and situations in life.”

“My imagination was inspired by the surprise of the story moment the two people in my group shared. It’s not that I had a different story in mind for them, it was more the joy and excitement I experienced as they shared their wonderful moments. Both are so much more than I previously knew and thought of them. Inspirational people filled with courage, dedication, and hearts filled with love. “

“I was fascinated by the details in the stories, sights, sounds, smells described. Also, how the leader is a role model, making hard decisions or acting differently from the norm. What really resonated with me is the incredible examples fellow participants set as leaders in their own environments.”

“Fascinated about what members are doing in their communities, bringing hope, education, development. Positive impacts, I am hopeful. Good work, good stories happening in our country.”

“We are really “poorer” because we do not make enough time to listen to one another’s stories.”

I always had so many doubts about co-creating human connectedness, knowledges and sometimes even transformation through online learning, but these reflections and our time together showed me that it is possible, it was such a joy to learn with this community of leaders!  

If you are interested to read more about Re-authoring Leadership Narratives you can read this article,  https://transformations.co.za/re-authoring-leadership-narratives-with-and-within-organizations/   or watch this interview with David Hutchens: https://youtu.be/M_ksxA6IvcM

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]]> Moments are portals to stories https://transformations.co.za/moments-are-portals-to-stories/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=moments-are-portals-to-stories Wed, 08 Apr 2020 09:43:37 +0000 https://transformations.co.za/?p=9939 The post Moments are portals to stories appeared first on Transformations.

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| Moments are portals to stories |

When I started translating Narrative Therapy ideas for organisational and communal work as a consultant and coach, the question in group work first sounded like: Tell me a story about your leadership (for example). I soon saw how people were terrified by the question. Many thought they did not have a story or that their story was not worth telling or they judged the potential story as not good enough even before it was told. Although we as human beings are meaning-makers and story-makers, it seems that we are not always aware of these amazing human capacities.

When I met Jeff Zimmerman in 2012, his neuro-narrative therapy ideas evolved my question in group work from “Tell me a story about…” to, “Tell me about a moment…” The smallest unit of a story is a moment.  But later Jeff pointed out, that this question could still invite a telling without the experience really being felt. In one of my workshops he attended he then suggested that we ask: “Tell me about a heartfelt moment” which brought the body back as part of the answer.

Thanks to Griet Bouwen, the question, “Tell me about a moment…” evolved even further when she suggested that the invitation should rather be: “Take me to a moment”. Moments are portals to stories but it is important that we not only tell about the moment, but take people with us in the telling to the moment with all our senses and imagination. It is like watching a movie and being transported with the teller.

These questions will help you to take people with you to the moment:

Who was there? What happened? When did it happen? How long did the moment last? Was there any art present? Was nature present? Was beauty there? What did you taste or smell or touch? What was the sounds like? What happened in your body?

These kinds of questions will transport us with you to have a full experience of the moment!

 

 

Online Workshop: Re-authoring listening, questions and documentation

 

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]]> The world of problems https://transformations.co.za/the-world-of-problems-5/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-world-of-problems-5 Mon, 30 Mar 2020 12:46:38 +0000 https://transformations.co.za/?p=9915 The post The world of problems appeared first on Transformations.

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| The world of problems |

We live in a society where problems and people are so often seen as one thing, they are not separate. Therefore, we hear about the “oversensitive woman” or the “weak leader” because so often the descriptions of people are married in language one to the other.

In the world of problems that we are faced with today:

  • Problems are often situated inside of people
  • Problems are part of a person’s identity

When we are working with problem stories in re-authoring ideas and practices, we are in a certain sense challenging these ideas of the problematization of people or the situation of problems inside of people.

At a time in my life when I was told that I am the problem and that the problem was somewhere inside of me, a surprising question came that changed my life. The question situated me in relationship to the problem by asking me: “What are you teaching the problem?” Up until that point I had no imagination that I could be teaching the problem anything.

In Narrative Therapy we say: “The person is not the problem. The problem is the problem.” We also say that the person is in relationship to the problem and the problem is in relationship to the person. We are curious about how that relationship with the problem started, what is strengthening it and what is also helping the problem to sometimes take a holiday?

Re-authoring ideas and practices invite you to consider your relationship to problem moments, problem stories and stories you want less of. You are not the problem!

This has been the most liberating experience for me, to know that in this relationship with problem moments in my life, I have a say and I can choose. I am a participant in the writing of my own life!

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]]> Moving Through 2019 https://transformations.co.za/moving-through-2019/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=moving-through-2019 Fri, 20 Dec 2019 09:14:14 +0000 https://transformations.co.za/?p=5923 The post Moving Through 2019 appeared first on Transformations.

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| Moving Through 2019 |

For the last week I have been greeting the day with this view and a heart filled with gratitude that I can move through as the ocean, the sand, the wind, the birds, the rocks, the sun and the moon all holds me.

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]]> Beyond Storytelling https://transformations.co.za/beyond-storytelling/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=beyond-storytelling Thu, 19 Dec 2019 05:00:40 +0000 http://transformations.co.za/?p=5157 The post Beyond Storytelling appeared first on Transformations.

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| Beyond Storytelling |

In 2016 I contributed an article called Re-authoring Leadership with and within Organizations for the OD Practitioner, Volume 48, Number 2: Co-constructing organizational and Leadership Narratives. 

A version of this chapter was also published in the book Beyond Storytelling.

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]]> Transforming Organizations https://transformations.co.za/transforming-organizations/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=transforming-organizations Thu, 19 Dec 2019 04:06:05 +0000 http://transformations.co.za/?p=5152 The post Transforming Organizations appeared first on Transformations.

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| Transforming Organizations |

In 2019 I contributed a chapter in Transforming Organizations called: Transforming Organizations through the Re-authoring Lens and Practices. An earlier version of this chapter was published called Re-authoring the World: Unfolding Ideas and Practices. I also co-authored a chapter with Marianne Schapmans and Griet Bouwen called: Re-authoring the Future of Travel and Hospitality: An Unfolding Practice in Tourism Flanders. In the beginning of 2019, the same article was translated into Dutch and Afrikaans and can be found under the title: Co-authoring the Future of Travel and Hospitality

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]]> Re-authoring the world: unfolding ideas and practices https://transformations.co.za/re-authoring-the-world-unfolding-ideas-and-practices/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=re-authoring-the-world-unfolding-ideas-and-practices Thu, 19 Dec 2019 03:42:30 +0000 http://transformations.co.za/?p=5111 The post Re-authoring the world: unfolding ideas and practices appeared first on Transformations.

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| Re-authoring the world: unfolding ideas and practices |

In this article you will be invited into the transformational nature of the re-authoring lens and practices for organisational and communal work. Re-authoring work facilitates ways of seeing and doing that invites individuals, communities and organisations to take back the pen in the authoring and co-authoring of their lives and their worlds as it builds on the human capacity to weave meaning into narratives…

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]]> Re-authoring the world https://transformations.co.za/re-authoring-the-world-2/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=re-authoring-the-world-2 Thu, 19 Dec 2019 03:04:21 +0000 http://transformations.co.za/?p=5147 The post Re-authoring the world appeared first on Transformations.

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| Re-authoring the world |

In 2013 my learnings on the journey of consulting, coaching and leadership development work became the book, Re-authoring the World, which is a translation of the narrative ideas for those interested in organisational and communal work.

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