Each choice we make is a vote for the kind of world we want to live in. The mission of ‘Adapt – A Permaculture Game’ is to educate individuals and groups how to design in the ethics and principles of Permaculture to each aspect of our lives. We will play through the creating of a world to thrive in by applying principles, patterns, and collective knowledge pools to cultivate caring choices for our communities and our own self-care needs.  This playshop will provide you with the inside scoop on the evolutionary teaching tool – ‘Adapt’ – while participating in a few rounds of game play. Explore with us the many ways in which this game and its pieces can be used through out a multitude of educational environments and community development.

Presented By: Bridget O’Brien

Sunday September 18th | 12:30 – 1:30 PM | Bioregional Hub

Afia Walking Tree, M.Ed. is recognized for her restorative facilitation of African Diasporic courses, processes, and performances, internationally. She uses drumming, rhythm, song, movement, storytelling, earth stewardship, ritual, and affirmative communication as vibrational vehicles for co-creating with nature a hearth for our bio-dynamic renewal, where we revitalize our indigeneity with mama earth.

2016 Convergence Workshops:  Here We Grow … DRUM!

Alegra was born in the Arizona southwest desert and has always had a deep love of nature, art, and passion for learning. Her grandfather was a green thumb and a cherry farmer in Oregon.  She loves to grow and propagate things everywhere she goes, from Native Reforestation to Permaculture food forests, to backyard gardens, CSA’s and farmers markets. She has been working in the magical soils from California, Hawaii to Brazil and Mexico. Exploring sustainable ways of living and being that we may be in harmony with the biosphere. She loves helping people discover and nurture the artist in nature and in themselves. She also has studies in World dance, Sports Thai massage and Yoga. Dedicated to sharing, Knowledge, Skills, Creativity  to birth a healthier world. She is  a visual , performance artist, movement alchemist, painter, maskmaker, dancer trained in various cultural styles  Haitian, Brazilian, Congolese, Afro- Cuban, Modern, & Fire. She has deep studies in Expressive healing arts, Dance therapy, N.m.t. Sports/Thai massage, Organic Gardening/ Permaculture and Somatic Psychology. She has worked with multicultural drum and dance ensemble, ‘ Cuero a Cuero.” danced  as fire artist with International circus troop in Playa del Carmen  -”Atomic Weight.”   As well she has assisted in production/performance of –  Next Level Theaters’ Black light Burlesque and Body painting shows. Her passion is to release the  universal rhythm through her, and to use art as a shamanic tool to inspire, heal and reveal creations tale.

To her Dance  is a play and a prayer of mystery and hidden treasures and can create transformation bridging inner and outer worlds.

2016 Convergence Workshop: Dancing Freedom: Regenerate Zone Zero- Vision, Movement, Action

An experiential workshop using meditation, Theater of the Oppressed, Nonviolent Communication, and Qi Gong to understand allyship as deepening our organic interconnectedness with the conscious intention to heal.

This workshop is an exploration of the ways that allyship can be understood as deepening our organic interconnectedness with the conscious intention to heal. Jihan will facilitate meditation, somatic exercises, and interpersonal practices to build skill in deconditioning ourselves from manifesting oppressive patterns in our interpersonal relationships and interrupting oppressive patterns with discernment and compassion.

Allies for Life workshops are experiential explorations of our internalized identities and how they shape our relationship to acting for a just and equitable shared reality. Our definition of allyship begins with redefining oneself as primarily an Earth-being, all others being subject to this one that calls for our alliance with forms of Life. Participants will gain clarity on their internalized notions of identity, skill in interrupting oppressive patterns of behavior in themselves and others, and tools for self-care to make engaging the hard work of allyship sustainable. We will be drawing from meditation, Family Constellations, Theater of the Oppressed, The Work That Reconnects, Qi Gong, and Nonviolent Communication. The structures of oppression, of humans as well as all other living things, are perpetrated by people, quite often unconsciously, and people primed in their healing capacities are needed to transition these structures into uplifting ones; human beings cooked them up, it will take humane beings to compost them.

Friday, Oct 6| 5pm| Mediteranean

Presented by Jihan McDonald

Chinese Galactic Cosmonaut

Alpha Lo is co-editor and co-author of the Open Collaboration Encyclopedia. He also helped to found the Gift Circle Network, and has created a number of social and economic architectures, amongst them Facilitator Improv, Empathic Dashboard, Sorry Circles, Coupon currencies, and the Participatory Commons.

Friday, Oct 6| 4:30| Bioregional Hub

How to Design New Social Architectures

2016 Convergence Workshop: The Evolution of Green Acres Urban Village

Autumn Turley spent four years as Assistant Director of Dance Odyssey, a Contact Improvisation class and jam in Santa Cruz, CA. In 2016 she began organizing and teaching Contact Improv classes and events all along the West Coast. She now teaches Contact across the US and Canada as part of Bridge Within. Autumn’s teaching is inspired by her experience studying for ten years under a wide variety of teachers of Contact Improv, as well as Taoist Energy Arts, Spinal Awareness, and Esalen Massage. She carries an extensive toolbox, customizing each class to meet the desires and skill-levels of her students. Autumn uses improv movement as a spiritual practice, a healing technique, and a tool for deepening self-awareness and connection with others.

Friday Oct 6| 3pm| Mediterranean

Contact Improvisation: Rising into Freedom by Deepening Trust in our Dance

Beyond the Culture of Separation uses an innovative approach and interactive learning modalities to expand white-identified participants’ capacities to work toward a racially equitable society. Because shame and isolation are integral aspects of white socialization, our approach is grounded in encouragement and community building. We will explore levels of racism and introduce practical tools for shifting our personal and collective relationship to whiteness.

This workshop is for White-identified people *

*As white-identified people, we have a responsibility to educate ourselves about racism. In addition, coming together in a white-only space enables us to express feelings and share experiences without causing harm to people of color. Honest dialogues about race among white-identified people disrupts the white social norm that inhibits these conversations, while building our capacities to work effectively for racial equity.

Beyond the Culture of Separation is an 8-week class developed and led by me and my co-facilitators (4 cohorts of 15 plus participants over 2 years). we use an innovative approach and interactive learning modalities to expand white-identified participants’ capacities to contribute collectively to the creation of a society with greater freedom and dignity for everyone.

Presented By: Angela Sevin

One of the most important skills of a trained Permaculture designer is observation. Over the last 11 years, Weaving Earth has been focusing heavily on the practice of Bird Language – listening and watching what the birds are telling us about the eco-system. To truly understand what the birds are telling us requires an acute level of observation, which has ultimately served us well as designers. This experiential workshop will be an introduction to Bird Language basics, and a conversation about how it has served us as Permaculture designers. And possibly most important, Bird Language is also a lot of fun!

Presented By: David Hage and the Weaving Earth Team

Bonita Ford – Permaculture Eastern Ontario & LivinghEARTH: Bonita aims to inspire people, giving them tools for healthier living. She teaches permaculture, Reiki and Nonviolent Communication, and has led workshops around the world for over 13 years. She facilitates community design projects and does design coaching with individuals and small businesses. She also does 1-on-1 Reiki and spiritual coaching for individuals. Bonita has written for the Permaculture Design Magazine (and The Activist). She co-founded Permaculture Eastern Ontario (formerly Permaculture Institute of Eastern Ontario) and Transition Perth. Bonita and her partner Sébastien live in Perth, Ontario, which is unceded Algonquin Territory on Turtle Island. The land they call home is 1/5 of an acre in town. They grow most of their own food and are active in their local community. www.livinghEARTH.net

2016 Presentation: Learning from Our Indigenous Friends, Teachers & Allies

Brandi Mack is a mother, holistic health educator, therapeutic massage therapist, and permaculture designer. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Human Service Management and a certification from Starhawk’s Earth Activist Training. Brandi has worked and trained in the youth development sector for 15 years. Brandi currently is the national director of The Butterfly Movement where we are committed to support healing the wounds of our Soul (through Rebuilding and Re Framing our emotional selves), planting a Seed of hope as we Regenerate and Reconnect our hearts and our hands to the earth, leading ultimately to manifestation in the Soil of our Reactivated lives! Brandi uses permaculture principles to support individuals and communities connection back to the land. Brandi offers a Farmers Market basket full of workshops and trainings to help your rural or urban garden grow.

2016 Convergence Workshop: Working at the Edges: Exploring Our Personal and Cultural Eco-Systems

As a caring steward of life Bridget O’Brien strives to explore resilience through many pathways. Her studies and work focus on self-care, social, and land-use design. While utilizing her diverse skills, experiences, and trainings to provide a wholistic approach to culture repair. Bridget shares her passion for playful impactful loving service through her work as a Permaculture educator and designer. She is the Program Director for New Rising Sun (an educational retreat center, farm, and community developing in Ganges, Michigan), and is the creative inspiration of ‘Adapt’ – A Permaculture Game, in collaboration with PermaculturePrinciples.com.

2016 Convergence Workshop: Adapt – A Permaculture Game “Create a world you want to live in.”

2016 Convergence Panel: Permaculture and the Indigenous Contribution: A Courageous Conversation

If we believe that permaculture can save the world, then it is social permaculture that can implement this on a grander scale. It is social permaculture that can go beyond the linear process of paradigm transitioning, to truly address the core issues we face, not just addressing them at surface/current manifestations. In culture design we anchor in the highest vision first, then bridge with the descending paradigm process. Everything we need to create this highest vision is available, it is just still dispersed and embedded in the descending paradigm, thus unable to be fully realized. To put new culture elements together in more comprehensive ways, in more enlightened context creates the quantum leap we are looking for, to the scale and power needed to face our greatest challenges. The development of these tactics, strategies, organizational structures and venues are our collaborative design templates.

Learn More About Alexa Bernard

Catherine Nkolo Lebongo is a teacher, creative, and activist who is fascinated by how design and social enterprise have the power to elevate everything—from products, to systems, to spaces. As an international, multicultural, woman who studied system nuances and societal constructs, Nkolo teaches the principles of Design Thinking, and how to apply the human-centered design process with an equity mindset, to build the regenerative communities we hope to see in our lifetimes. Her personal mission is to live an abundant life saturated in bliss, gratitude, and learning while artfully weaving spiritual growth and conscious bionomics into the collective reality.

Design Thinking for Equitable Communities

Christopher is a leadership and life coach, facilitator, workshop leader, and Founding Co-Director of Ecology of Leadership Programs at the Regenerative Design Institute in Bolinas, California. Along with decades of deep nature connection and ceremonial work, he also served as a biologist on dozens of wildlife conservation projects over 20 years. He has been lecturer, collaborator, and presenter at numerous local, regional, as well as national conferences and institutions – such as Bioneers, the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE), the California Sustainability in Higher Education Conference, and Permaculture Convergences – on topics of sustainability, change-management, inner permaculture, and heart- and nature-inspired leadership. www.christopherkuntzsch.com

2016 Convergence Workshop: Love in Action – Exploring Your Ecology of Leadership

Friday Oct. 6 / 3pm / Visionary Art Zone 

Presented by the 2017 Visionary Artists of the Convergence, John Hutton and Michael Lott 

The Cogarden platform enables a ‘Do It Together’ food gardening experience. Connecting food growers that share fence, or are miles from each other. Cogardeners help in creating a Community to Consumer food supply chain, that makes neighborhoods resilient, and culturally diverse. Sunil, Founder, Cogarden will introduce the Cogardening framework, its socio-cultural impact, and eco-commerce potential. Join us. Let’s Cogarden.

Presented by: Sunil R Nair and Rob Bennaton

Sunday September 18th | 3:30 – 4:30 PM | Bioregional Hub

In this Contact Improvisation class, we create a safe space to explore our edges, offering tools, techniques, and exercises to deepen our trust in our solo, partner, and group dances.

How can we build trust in ourselves, our partners, our dance, that we may open new spaces of freedom in our movement? In this Contact Improvisation class, we create a safe space to explore our edges, offering tools, techniques, and exercises to deepen our trust in our solo, partner, and group dances. Trust sometimes means fearlessly saying “yes” to opportunities to grow… sometimes means clearly saying “no” to that which is beyond our boundaries… and sometimes means honestly saying, “I don’t know,” in faith that it’s ok to not know. One of the greatest gifts of Contact Improv is the opportunity to develop and honor boundaries, so that we can trust one another and be more free in our dance.

Contact Improvisation is a form of Improv movement that helps connect us more deeply with ourselves and each other. This movement form offers powerful tools for cultivating qualities of boundaries, connection, trust, play, and mindfulness that are fundamental in community-building. Creating containers for authentic movement and safe touch helps communities become healthier and more connected. This workshop will be presented as an experiential movement class.

Friday, Oct 6| 3:30pm| Mediterranean

Presented by Autumn Turley

This three hour workshop has been designed as an opportunity to dive deep and face off with our own need and longing for alliance with one another across the lines of privilege and power. Join us for the brave work of deconstructing the social obstacles that block our ability to work with one another, and re-creating a world where we all can live with dignity.  This  experiential workshop will include small and large group dialogues, somatic exercises for deepening our capacity to work with challenging material and stay centered, and the opportunity to explore embodied strategies for building strong and flexible bridges between us.

Presented by: Amikeayla Gaston, Rachel Kaplan, Wanda Stewart

Saturday September 17th | 9:30 AM – 12:30 PM | Mediterranean Garden