Luckily this hasn’t happened to Transition Bedford but it is happening in one of our neighbouring towns, Oxford. Some of the members of the Oxford Initiating group have put together some thoughts and ideas about the problems they’ve encountered as part of a learning process. See here. None of us are immune to these problems and i think some valuable lessons could be learnt.
Easy to understand explanation about energy efficiency…
We come out of decades of needed campaigning and protests against the world we don’t want and we move with exponential momentum towards the systematic and uncontrolable creation of the world we want. Transition involves being aware of the negatives of former but embedding ourselves in the positives of the latter. This video below, with dynamic speaker and author Paul Hawken, exemplifies exactly that.
It’d be interesting to find other video clips that hold a story of unyeilding positivity that’s not told through dreams or fantasies but through real life inspirations.
The tables have flipped, can you feel it? Probably not, it’s not portrayed in the media, nor in our political circles, it’s difficult to see at all in or every day lives but now, today and for the first time the status quo is on the back foot. Those supporting it’s continuation now make up the resistance movement. No longer is the great challenge to change the world, a far greater challenge is resisting the tide of change.
Every hole dug with a shovel, every seemingly boring community meeting, every humble local project started, every personal commitment made……..we have to gain a sense of it’s place in a sea of diversity of small changes across the globe that are building a new and nourished world, one dig of the shovel at a time.
Let’s club together and send Lynn (founder of http://global-wellness-circle.com/) on this training to give local transition initiatives a real boost.
The widget below is up dated in real time, at the time of writing we only need 9 more people. Please take the pledge http://www.pledgebank.com/TTTraining
Invite your mum, call up your long lost friend, email your address book, send out the memo at work; we’re all meeting at the park for a bite to eat…. it’ll be great to meet you!! I’ll make sure i bring a little extra grub to share.
Sunday, 19th July – Russell Park, at 1pm on Sunday – Transition Bedford will be hosting our Big Lunch. Come join us and find out about community action in your areas. You can go to the following link, locate the icon which is placed in Russel Park and register if your going to attend.
Local community members; directors, artists, gardeners, parents, activists, teachers etc….. have decided to spread the word on how to live a more green lifestyle by taking part in an Eden Project initiative called “The Big Lunch”. The plan is for as many people as possible across the UK to sit down to lunch with their friends and neighbours, on one day – Sunday, 19th July.
"Transition Bedford?" event 22nd on June 2009
The Transition Bedford Steering Group Meeting will be on the 7th of July (i.e. next Tuesday) 7.30 to 9pm at the Bunyan Museum on Mill Street, Bedford Town Centre.
While this is a steering group meeting, all interested parties are invited. We plan to have a roundtable discussion dedicated to the steering group, plus a second open table discussing issues related to Transition Bedford (local response to climate change and peak oil). There will be ways in which the non-steering group members can feed into the steering group discussions and decision-making, creating an open and inclusive environment. Please, if you’ve indicated you’re interested in being in the steering group, your presence is essential. Momentum is a resource, don’t lose it!!
Evening’s agenda
Steering group meeting;
1. Report back and debrief from June 22nd “Transition Bedford?” event.
2. Action planning and review of decisions taken on the 22nd (for decisions made see below).
3. Definition of the steering group members functions and commitments, terms of reference etc
Open table discussions;
4. Proposals regarding decisions taken (+support/action people are willing to take)
5. Proposal regarding objectives of TB
If you have any items you’d like to add to this agenda please reply to this mail. In future we’ll have a formal process for setting the agenda.
Windfarm letter writting tool
After a very long period and a reduction to only a fraction of the wind turbines, the council have not made a decision on the Santa Pod wind farm. Now more than ever, those who support the proposal should make their voice heard. Over 80% of windfarms in the UK are refused planning. This new online support tool emails the planning officer direct, whilst enabling you to tailor the response.
We were contacted a while back by an artist offering logos for TT’s. Unfortunately he didn’t have pictures of Bedford. Now he has. What do you think. The artist is Edward Hill. You can see more of his work here www.glartists.com
or perhaps
The photos in this blog post are courtesy of Carl Munson and you can see a lot more images and podcasts.
This three day event, held in the centre of London, at the Battersea Arts Centre. Attended by 350 people from across the
The great hall at BAC
globe, of course the international nature was both ironic and inspiring, but there was something subtle but very different about this event. I’ll return to that later but firstly to the event itself. I arrived before the official start of the conference for an extra session on Community Supported Agriculture. Not knowing what this meant, during the session i went from not sure what to expect to thinking shit “what am i doing here” to a complete YAHOO moment, leaving totally inspired thinking i have to take this back with me to my group in Bedford.
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