hello
hope this finds you well.
here in Bath, in the UK, it’s been a beauty of a day. From my studio I’ve been watching a wren building a nest in the garden wall. The leaves and blossoms on my three fruit trees are bristling and about to burst open and last night I saw my first bats of the year as I walked at dusk with my dog Gem.
It feels so good to experience these seasonal shifts and signals of life.
What a time it’s been on this earth of late.
This is the first newsletter I’ve written for months as so much has been happening in my world and much of it quite traumatic.
So here’s some podcast episodes, projects and ideas which speak to me of becoming crew on this spaceship earth.
I hope you find something in them
Love and light
Dan
When my world turned upside down
Last November, one night out of nowhere my 13 year old daughter Olive had a stroke at home. 3 hours later she’s having life saving brain surgery and spent 7 weeks in hospital. In this episode Olive and I tried to make sense of what happened and she shares her story of recovery and learning to live with a rare neuro condition. Available on all podcast platforms.
Stories for Life
I recently co-wrote and designed an offering called Stories for Life. It was the output of a 14 month inquiry exploring the role of stories, narrative, creativity and culture to accelerate a shift to a new form of economic design, which puts the wellbeing of humans and ecology front and centre. An economy in service to life. Imagine that. If you’re an artist, writer, designer, film-maker, musician, journalist, scriptwriter, storyteller, business innovator, TV producer, radio programmer, media owner, creative activist, ad creative, technologist, games designer, culture jammer, content creator, music and lifestyle influencer, comedian, strategist, community activist, social change maker, myth maker, teacher or parent and you know intuitively that we must act urgently to create a more beautiful world, then this is an invitation for you to step into service. The work will be launched with some virtual gatherings and invitations to play with it over the coming weeks.But you can explore it here
Blue Mind
Dr Wallace J Nichols believes that water is medicine. He wrote a best selling book called Blue Mind which explores why being under, on, near or close to water makes us feel and act better. We had a lovely conversation about Blue Mind in this episode. Available on all podcast platforms.
78 reasonable questions to ask about any technology
I like this list of questions to consider when we look at any technology, from the Book of Beautiful Business by the House of Beautiful Business
Forgetting Nature
A provocative, beautiful and urgent short film from Ross Harrison.
“WE HAVE NEVER BEEN MORE DISCONNECTED FROM WILD NATURE.
And as wildlife is declining, we are becoming numb to what we’ve lost.
Forgetting Nature is an urgent reminder to protect the richness of nature in our lives. It is a catalyst to get more people thinking and talking about the importance of connection to wild nature. Then acting on it.”
Mapping the lost rainforests of England
A project from Guy Shrubsole…
Very few people know that England once supported large expanses of temperate rainforest, in a swathe across the western upland parts of the country – from the Lake District in the north, through the Pennines, Dales and Forest of Bowland, to Dartmoor, Exmoor and Bodmin Moor in the Westcountry. They were felled by Bronze Age settlers, medieval tin-miners, Victorian charcoal-makers, and in the modern era by foresters who replaced them with high-yield conifers for timber. Blanket bog formed over large areas of the uplands, deterring the return of dense woodland, and overgrazing by sheep has prevented their regrowth on the hillsides and in the cloughs.
Yet despite all this, pockets of temperate rainforest cling on in England today. They huddle in lost valleys and sprout from piles of scree where boulders prevent even the surest-footed sheep from nibbling fresh saplings. What’s more, they could yet spread further, if we give them the space to grow and protect them from overgrazing. Indeed, as I’ll show in later posts on this blog, some of England’s rainforests are already expanding through natural regeneration.
The trouble is, no-one seems to have comprehensively mapped where England’s last, lost rainforests still survive and thrive today. It’s important for us to know where they are – both to protect what’s left, and to help coordinate efforts to restore them.
And that’s where you, dear reader, come in.
Can we, together, map England’s lost rainforests?
Wisdom from Jon Hopkins
“What I’ve learned about difficulties in mental and physical health, is that they can be seen as gifts, as long as you respond to them in the right way. They are signposts from the body and the psyche, that point to what you need to be doing.”
An insightful interview with Wavepaths founder Mendel Kaelen and musician Jon Hopkins about mental health, meditation, psychedelics and his deep relationship with music.
Stories from Dream Space
Dream Space is a community led creative project I’ve been involved in hatching in my home city of Bath. We’ve been holding spaces, inviting citizens of Bath to listen and share stories of lived experiences around the biggest issues of our time - racism, the climate emergency and living through a pandemic. And exploring how collective imagination can shape better realities where we live. An online exhibition has just launched of the stories we heard, via film, text and audio podcasts. Access here
Tim Green in the Mix
Beautiful deep cosmic house mix from Tim Green via Lost Miracle.