Books
This is a list of various books dealing with ideas around regenerative cultures in their widest sense.
Designing Regenerative Cultures - Daniel Wahl
In this remarkable book, Daniel Wahl explores ways in which we can reframe and understand the crises that we currently face and explores how we can live our way into the future. Moving from patterns of thinking and believing to our practice of education, design and community living. The book covers the finance system, agriculture, design, ecology, economy, sustainability, organizations and society at large.Patterns of thinking and believing, to our practice of education, design and community living.
Cultural Emergence - Looby Macnamara
Cultural Emergence is an invitation to create cultures of personal leadership, collective wisdom and Earth care. Emergence initiates breakthroughs that expand our thinking and enable us to build personal and collective resilience, and embody new ways of being and interacting. It nourishes and empowers us to design the world we want to live in.
Burnout Immunity - Kandi Weins
An essential guide for all those seeking to fortify themselves against the all to common threat of burnout.
Saving Us - Catherine Hayhoe
Argues that facts alone are not enough to convince people about climate change, and instead we must focus on having personal conversations rooted in shared values to foster collective action.
Climate, Psychology and Change - Steffi Bednareck
An exploration of the psychological and emotional dimensions of the climate crisis
Holding the Hope - Linda Aspey
The chapters in this thought-provoking, honest, moving and sobering book explore the frameworks, theoretical constructs and ways of working talking therapists have devised to hold hope and build agency in the face of this immensity of complexity, uncertainty and injustice.
Emergent - Miriam Kate McDonald
Emergent tells us what we long to hear - that we are nature. Miriam challenges the contemporary narrative of Human Vs Nature, which has enabled us to dismantle the very ground upon which we stand. This book tracks the journey of that separation and reminds us of our true nature. It reminds us to tend our gardens as all living creatures do, as an integrated part of the beautifully complex and dynamic ecosystems we inhabit
The Spell of the Sensuous - David Abram
The spell of the sensuous explores the earthly, ecological dimensions of sensory experience and language. The book uses diverse sources like phenomenology, shamanism, and magical traditions to show how our cognitive abilities are intertwined with the environment. It challenges the separation between "human" and "more-than-human" worlds and suggests a recovery of our senses can lead to ecological sanity. A philosophical exploration of human connection to nature: The book explores how humans have become separated from the natural world and suggests ways to recover this relationship.
Sensitive; the power of the thoughtful mind in an overwhelming world - Jean Granneman and Andre Solo
Highly sensitive people:
- Have a heightened sense of empathy
- Tune into subtle details and make connections that others miss
- Are often wonderfully creative Through fascinating research, expert storytelling and practical insight, this book will teach you how to unlock the potential in this undervalued strength and leverage it in your relationships, your work and your life.
How to Listen - Kate Columbus
From opening up a conversation with someone who might be struggling, to how to use gentle encouragement to help others share their stories, How to Listen demonstrates the power of listening without judgement and draws on the extensive experience of Samaritans in offering practical advice to apply to your own life.
Active Hope - Joanna Macy & Chris Johnstone
The challenges we face can be difficult even to think about. Climate change, the depletion of oil, economic upheaval, and mass extinction together create a planetary emergency of overwhelming proportions. Active Hope shows us how to strengthen our capacity to face this crisis so that we can respond with unexpected resilience and creative power. Drawing on decades of teaching an empowerment approach known as the Work That Reconnects, the authors guide us through a transformational process informed by mythic journeys, modern psychology, spirituality, and holistic science. This process equips us with tools to face the mess we're in and play our role in the collective transition, or Great Turning, to a life-sustaining society.
Braiding Sweetgrass - Robin Wall Kimmerer
A hymn of love to the world, Robin Wall Kimmerer has been trained to ask questions of nature with the tools of science. As a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, she embraces the notion that plants and animals are our oldest teachers. In Braiding Sweetgrass, Kimmerer brings these two ways of knowledge together. Drawing on her life as an indigenous scientist, a mother, and a woman, Kimmerer shows how other living beings - asters and goldenrod, strawberries and squash, salamanders, algae, and sweetgrass - offer us gifts and lessons, even if we've forgotten how to hear their voices. For only when we can hear the languages of other beings will we be capable of understanding the generosity of the earth, and learn to give our own gifts in return.
The Biology of Wonder - Andreas Weber
In The Biology of Wonder, scientist Andreas Weber reframes this fundamental enigma by arguing that all living beings, like humans, are not biological machines, but living, creative agents fueled by meaning and expression. Weber proposes a new approach — the development of a “poetic ecology” — which intimately attaches our species to every being and underpins the entire range of human experience. He argues that feelings and emotions, far from being superfluous to the study of organisms, are the very foundation of life. .
Mindfulness — Finding Peace in a Frantic World - Mark Williams & Danny Penman
Rediscover peace and contentment, for there is a deep well spring living inside us all no matter how trapped and distraught we might feel. This wellspring promotes a deep seated authentic love of life, seeping into everything you do and helping you to cope more skillfully with the worst that life throws at you. Remember how to live a good and joyful existence. Mindfulness meditation is used to reveal our innate joie de vivre. This can prevent feelings of anxiety, stress and sadness from spiraling downward into prolonged periods of unhappiness of exhaustion.
The Serviceberry - Robin Wall Kimmerer
As Indigenous scientist and author of Braiding Sweetgrass Robin Wall Kimmerer harvests serviceberries alongside the birds, she considers the ethic of reciprocity that lies at the heart of the gift economy. How, she asks, can we learn from Indigenous wisdom and the plant world to reimagine what we value most? Our economy is rooted in scarcity, competition, and the hoarding of resources, and we have surrendered our values to a system that actively harms what we love. Meanwhile, the serviceberry’s relationship with the natural world is an embodiment of reciprocity, interconnectedness, and gratitude. The tree distributes its wealth―its abundance of sweet, juicy berries―to meet the needs of its natural community. And this distribution ensures its own survival.
The Compassionate Activist - Lucy Draper-Clarke
We are living through a time of environmental and humanitarian disasters, underpinned by a crisis of consciousness. Communities are polarised and people isolated, despite our technological connectivity.The Compassionate Activist is for changemakers, meditators and activists, offering guidance to transform our wounded world from the inside out. What can we do in the midst of uncertainty and overwhelm? Attend to what is within us and around us, moment-by-moment.This book is for all who see activism as a relational practice built on an ethic of care. It calls for engagement inspired by love not hate, and the mobilisation of communities through solidarity not separation.
White Fragility - Robin DiAngelo
Robin DiAngelo explains that white people are used to viewing themselves as “raceless” or the “default” race, and as such insulate themselves from feelings of racial discomfort. She describes racism as systematic rather than overt and conscious.
How to be an Antiracist - Ibram Kendi
Professor Kendri argues that “not being racist” is not sufficient in the struggle against racism. He proposes that racism isn’t just about hatefulness or ignorance but a structural phenomenon in society.
Me and White Supremacy, Combat Racism, Change the World and Become a Good Ancestor - Layla Saad
This book written for white readers is structured into a 28 day guide. It poses questions to the reader. The book aims to aid readers to identify the impact of white privilege and white supremacy in their lives.
Hospicing Modernity - Vanessa Machado de Oliveira
This book is not easy: it contains no quick-fix plan for a better, brighter tomorrow, and gives no ready-made answers. Instead, Vanessa Machado de Oliveira presents us with a challenge: to grow up, step up, and show up for ourselves, our communities, and the living Earth, and to interrupt the modern behavior patterns that are killing the planet we’re part of. Driven by expansion, colonialism, and resource extraction and propelled by neoliberalism and rabid consumption, our world is profoundly out of balance. We take more than we give; we inoculate ourselves in positive self-regard while continuing to make harmful choices; we wreak irreparable havoc on the ecosystems, habitats, and beings with whom we share our planet. But instead of drowning in hopelessness, how can we learn to face our reality with humility and accountability?
Outgrowing Modernity - Vanessa Machado de Oliveria
A workbook to follow up on her previous book Hospicing Modernity.
Coyote's Guide to Connecting with Nature - Jon Young, Evan McGown, Ellen Haas
Coyote mentoring is a method of learning that has been refined over thousands of years, based on instilling the need-to-know. Coyote's Guide to Connecting with Nature, 2nd Edition reveals this approach and what happens to student and teacher during the mentoring process. Strategies like questioning, storytelling, tracking, mapping, and practicing survival skills will inspire student curiosity and encourage self-sufficiency. Background information will help parents, teachers and others feel more confident in introducing children to new ways of experiencing and learning about the natural world.
As naturalist Jon Young writes in the Introduction, "Experience has taught me that Coyote Mentoring, working on so many levels, is by far the most effective learning and healing journey I have yet to encounter. I have seen people fully connect to the birds of their landscape, discovering hawks, foxes, and owls with the help of birds and other animals."