Sense-Making in a Changing World

In this episode I am speaking with Churchill Fellow, Community Food Forester, Community Gardens Australia - QLD Coordinator, muliti-award-winning Landscape Architect and Permaculture Educator, Gavin Hardy  - based not far from me in Meanjin Brisbane.

Gav and I go way back - to the early days of setting up Northey Street City Farm in Brisbane, where he is now the education coordinator.

In 2020 Gav was awarded a Churchill Fellowship to investigate the potential of community food forests and orchards . Because of the pandemic his journey was delayed, but finally he got to visit 10 of the world’s exemplar sites and recorded 51 projects in the USA, Canada, UK, The Netherlands and Italy. We sat down shortly after his report was released for this chat.

In this conversation, we talk about what he learned, the insights and recommendations for establishing successful community food forest and orchard projects here in Australia (but obviously ideas that are  relevant around the world) as well as his path into permaculture and how his livelihood is connected.

Gavin's Churchill Fellowship Report.

LEARN PERAMCULTURE
Study permaculture with Morag Gamble at the Permaculture Education Institute.  Discover all our online courses. 

• Permaculture Design Certificate
• Permaculture Educators Program (design and teaching certificates)
• Permaculture gardening - The Incredible Edible Garden Course
• Share permaculture - communications & marketing

I'd love to hear from you. Text me here.

Support the show

_____

MORAG GAMBLE

Founder, Permaculture Education Institute

• Morag's Courses
• Podcast Blog
• Podcast on YouTube
• Podcast Instagram
• Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/in/moraggamble/

I am a possibilitarian and I believe in HumanKINDness.

In this podcast my guests and I explore How are we to live? Really live, as nature ourselves, tending the conditions where life can thrive. We ask How do we become the kind of humans this moment is asking us to be?

This podcast is one of my acts of myceliation. Each conversation is a thread in a vast network of people speaking up for life with love and care. 

This podcast beams out from my hand-built solar-powered studio in the midst of a permaculture food forest in a permaculture ecovillage on Jinibara and Gubbi Gubbi country.

If this episode lights something in you, pass it to one person who needs it. That is how myceliation works.

In Episode 100 of the Sense-Making in a Changing World,  I am delighted to be speaking with STEPHANIE HAFFERTY who is based on a half-acre no-dig permaculture farm in Lampeter, Wales.

From the Half Acre Homestead, Stephanie explains how to grow year round using climate friendly regenerative organic gardening methods for abundant harvests and fewer weeds, working harmoniously with wildlife, and what to do with your harvests, from seasonal meals to preserving, homemade body, home and garden care, remedies and natural dyes.

In this episode, Stephanie shares a wonderful story about how she discovered permaculture and gardening, the joy she derives from it, and how growing food has helped her to put healthy food on her children’s plates on a modest income. This affordability and accessibility piece is a big part of what Steph is about, and what she shares with people - nothing highbrow or expensive. Just straightforward simple advice to get a diversity of healthy food from the pot to the plate.

ABOUT STEPHANIE
Stephanie is an award winning garden and food author - she wrote the Creative Kitchen, and co-authored No Dig Organic Home and Garden - and she’s a cover girl for a recent Permaculture Magazine! Stephanie is actively involved in Permaculture Wales and UK, and is a Vice Chair of the Garden Media Guild.

She’s also been featured on the long-running UK gardening show, BBC Gardeners World  and other shows, and has 30 years of practical experience to share. She runs courses in her edible garden (and soon online) is a simple living and no-dig gardening advocate, a sought-after speaker at gardening events and she consults with edible gardening projects far and wide.

Stephanie has created and worked home, community and market gardens, gardens for  large  estates, restaurants and galleries. In 2021 she led the RHS No Dig Allotment Demonstration Garden at Hampton Court Garden Festival. 

Follow her gardening and homesteading life on YouTube, her blog or social media.

I'd love to hear from you. Text me here.

Support the show

_____

MORAG GAMBLE

Founder, Permaculture Education Institute

• Morag's Courses
• Podcast Blog
• Podcast on YouTube
• Podcast Instagram
• Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/in/moraggamble/

I am a possibilitarian and I believe in HumanKINDness.

In this podcast my guests and I explore How are we to live? Really live, as nature ourselves, tending the conditions where life can thrive. We ask How do we become the kind of humans this moment is asking us to be?

This podcast is one of my acts of myceliation. Each conversation is a thread in a vast network of people speaking up for life with love and care. 

This podcast beams out from my hand-built solar-powered studio in the midst of a permaculture food forest in a permaculture ecovillage on Jinibara and Gubbi Gubbi country.

If this episode lights something in you, pass it to one person who needs it. That is how myceliation works.

In this episode of Sense-Making in a Changing World I am delighted to be speaking with Erik Ohlsen - a well-known, successful and much-loved Sonoma-based ecological designer, permaculture practitioner, educator, author, regenerative entrepreneur who runs multiple companies deeply grounded in a love of nature and based on permaculture ethics and principles. Eric is one of those wonderful people who gets stuff done!!!

In this conversation I ask him about how he has grown his wildly successful Permaculture Artisans company that is regenerating landscapes from urban to rural, and even as we spoke in the process of informing the design of a permaculture agrihood. It’s a wonderfully inspiring, uplifting and wide ranging conversation - spanning from with his early volunteering projects giving away gardens while cultivating huge social capital and skill development, to his current work, a his legacy book as he calls it, about to be released by Synergetic Press - the MASSIVE 550 page guide  - The Regenerative Landscaper: Design and Build Landscapes that Repair the Environment.

This is going to become the go to manual and curriculum for permaculture learners who want to put into practice all they are learning in permaculture courses - it gets right into the nitty gritty and shows how to make it work!

Towards the end, I ask Erik about his process of writing and feel entirely liberated in how I can now set about writing too.

Executive Director: Permaculture Skills Center
Owner/Principal: Permaculture Artisans
Youtube Chanel: PermacultureArtisans

I'd love to hear from you. Text me here.

Support the show

_____

MORAG GAMBLE

Founder, Permaculture Education Institute

• Morag's Courses
• Podcast Blog
• Podcast on YouTube
• Podcast Instagram
• Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/in/moraggamble/

I am a possibilitarian and I believe in HumanKINDness.

In this podcast my guests and I explore How are we to live? Really live, as nature ourselves, tending the conditions where life can thrive. We ask How do we become the kind of humans this moment is asking us to be?

This podcast is one of my acts of myceliation. Each conversation is a thread in a vast network of people speaking up for life with love and care. 

This podcast beams out from my hand-built solar-powered studio in the midst of a permaculture food forest in a permaculture ecovillage on Jinibara and Gubbi Gubbi country.

If this episode lights something in you, pass it to one person who needs it. That is how myceliation works.

In this episode I am delighted to be speaking with pivotal figure in the world of deep ecology - a concept I came into contact with at Schumacher College in 1992 when I studied with Arne Naess - the Norwegian mountaineer and philosopher who coined the term Deep Ecology.

 My guest today is deep ecologist, rainforest activist and author JOHN SEED - a fellow ecovillager. He’s based at Narara Ecovillage in NSW and I'm at Crystal Waters on Gubbi Gubbi Country, QLD.

John is the founder and director of the Rainforest Information Centre in Australia. He has worked for rainforests worldwide since 1979. He says many of their campaigns have been successful, but sadly,  for every forest saved, another 100 have disappeared. He realised he cannot save the planet one forest at a time - what we needed is a profound change in consciousness. 

Deep ecology reminds us that the living world is not a pyramid with humans on top, but a web. We, humans, are but one strand in that web and as we destroy this web, we destroy the foundations for all complex life including our own.

It’s not enough to have ecological ideas, says Arne - we have to have an ecological identity and ecological self. To nourish the ecological identity, John and the american peace scholar-activist Joanna Macy developed a series of experiential rituals called the Council of All Beings. John co-write a book, Thinking Like a Mountain in 1988  about the council of all beings, with Arne Naess, Joanna Macy and Australian Pat Fleming.

https://www.rainforestinformationcentre.org/john_seed
https://www.facebook.com/johnseed.deepecology
https://www.instagram.com/johnseed_deepecology/

I'd love to hear from you. Text me here.

Support the show

_____

MORAG GAMBLE

Founder, Permaculture Education Institute

• Morag's Courses
• Podcast Blog
• Podcast on YouTube
• Podcast Instagram
• Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/in/moraggamble/

I am a possibilitarian and I believe in HumanKINDness.

In this podcast my guests and I explore How are we to live? Really live, as nature ourselves, tending the conditions where life can thrive. We ask How do we become the kind of humans this moment is asking us to be?

This podcast is one of my acts of myceliation. Each conversation is a thread in a vast network of people speaking up for life with love and care. 

This podcast beams out from my hand-built solar-powered studio in the midst of a permaculture food forest in a permaculture ecovillage on Jinibara and Gubbi Gubbi country.

If this episode lights something in you, pass it to one person who needs it. That is how myceliation works.

How do we tend to land and culture at the same time?

This episode was a conversation of hope for me, exploring the concept and practice social forestry with Tomi Hazel Vaarde - everything from ancient indigenous knowledge to stories of forests. Also Tomi reflects on design - avoiding it being an imposition, but something that emerges from connection with place and community  - an incredibly important distinction for a permaculture designer.

Social forestry is the Tomi's big picture thinking, their frame of reference for engaging in local and bioregional restoration. "Social forestry is tending the land as people of place. How do we cooperate with each other to do useful things in these places? It's always site specific, and it's always culturally specific."

Tomi Hazel Vaarde is a long-term resident of Southern Oregon and is deeply situated in place and permaculture. He's a prolific permaculturist - advising farms, stewarding forests and teaching environmental sciences for more than 50 years, even helping Bill Mollison in the first PDC on the West Coast.

Tomi's latest book (published April 2023 by Synergetic Press) is Social Forestry: Tending the Land as People and Place - an acclaimed guide of practical placemaking advice and ancient lore - a must-have for anyone wanting to have a reciprocating relationship with their communities, themselves, and most importantly their awe-inspiring forests and landscapes. 

In this conversation, we also discuss this book and the many projects that have informed its emergence.

Enjoy!

I'd love to hear from you. Text me here.

Support the show

_____

MORAG GAMBLE

Founder, Permaculture Education Institute

• Morag's Courses
• Podcast Blog
• Podcast on YouTube
• Podcast Instagram
• Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/in/moraggamble/

I am a possibilitarian and I believe in HumanKINDness.

In this podcast my guests and I explore How are we to live? Really live, as nature ourselves, tending the conditions where life can thrive. We ask How do we become the kind of humans this moment is asking us to be?

This podcast is one of my acts of myceliation. Each conversation is a thread in a vast network of people speaking up for life with love and care. 

This podcast beams out from my hand-built solar-powered studio in the midst of a permaculture food forest in a permaculture ecovillage on Jinibara and Gubbi Gubbi country.

If this episode lights something in you, pass it to one person who needs it. That is how myceliation works.

In this episode of Sense-making in a Changing World  I am delighted to be speaking with Jasmine Dale - permaculture author, designer and educator as part of our special permaculture writers series.

• Jasmine's book is the Permaculture Design Companion: A practical workbook for integrating people and places  -  a step by step guide to applying permaculture in your own life, in any context. It combines creative and analytical activities with self reflection and observation. Published by Permanent Publications.
• Here's a link to one of Jasmine's articles - Developing Personal Resilience with Permaculture (Issue 107: pg 69) in Permaculture Magazine available until  June 18th 2023 
• Here's a link to another of Jasmine's articles - Permaculture Design in Practice in times of crisis. (Here is access to the whole Magazine issue free courtesy of Permaculture Magazine until June 18th 2023 - her article is on pages 45-46)

In our conversation, Jasmine shares a wonderful story about how she discovered permaculture and about how doing a permaculture design course transformed her life.

She also shares insights about being part of the founding group of Lammas - an off-grid ecovillage in wales -  where she cut her teeth as a permaculture educator - and this is where, with her husband, she build the famous hobbit house (which sadly burnt down a few years back).  Jasmine talks about her way of teaching, designing and applying permaculture thinking. 

Right now she mentors community groups with a focus on nature connection and basic skills for resilience.  

Throughout the conversation, Jasmine shares such wonderful tips about writing and what you’ll find in her book the Permaculture Design Companion -  a step by step guide to applying permaculture in your own life . 

When I asked her about the kinds of permaculture books she things we need more of, her observation is that there is a great need for more books that cultivate greater levels of ecoliteracy, earth psychology and bigger picture thinking. 

Permaculture, she says, has also been something that keeps her sane and grounded, and is something she can offer to help others deepen their connection with nature, and for kindness to the planet. 

Enjoy!

I'd love to hear from you. Text me here.

Support the show

_____

MORAG GAMBLE

Founder, Permaculture Education Institute

• Morag's Courses
• Podcast Blog
• Podcast on YouTube
• Podcast Instagram
• Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/in/moraggamble/

I am a possibilitarian and I believe in HumanKINDness.

In this podcast my guests and I explore How are we to live? Really live, as nature ourselves, tending the conditions where life can thrive. We ask How do we become the kind of humans this moment is asking us to be?

This podcast is one of my acts of myceliation. Each conversation is a thread in a vast network of people speaking up for life with love and care. 

This podcast beams out from my hand-built solar-powered studio in the midst of a permaculture food forest in a permaculture ecovillage on Jinibara and Gubbi Gubbi country.

If this episode lights something in you, pass it to one person who needs it. That is how myceliation works.

The Sense-Making in a Changing World podcast, hosted by Morag Gamble is an initiative of the Permaculture Education Institute.  We teach permaculture teachers around the world, and host global permaculture conversations and learning communities.  Our Permaculture Life is our  permaculture gardening Youtube channel with hundreds of helpful videos.

I am joined here by the wonderful Pippa Chapman -  author, permaculture designer, forest gardener and mother - based in Yorkshire, who has been gardening for 30 years. In 2007 she left her job as Head Gardener on a private estate, to take a year-long practical apprenticeship at RHS Harlow Carr and then she discovered permaculture and everything changed!

In her (first) book, The Plant Lover’s Backyard Forest Gardenpublished by Permanent Publications, Pippa explores how to grow your own beautiful multilayered food forest in your own backyard.

Pippa explains how to create multiple layers on a small-scale to maximise your growing area, using polycultures and guilds for healthy, low-maintenance food. She shares how to use perennials for structure and for year-round food, and how to incorporate flowers for beauty, wildlife and for the kitchen.

She was introduced to forest gardening and permaculture and in 2010 set up a sustainable gardening business with her husband - Those Plant People.

She grows a wide variety of fruits, flowers, herbs and annual and perennial vegetables in her small backyard, creating a beautiful, edible and wildlife friendly space.

You can find her on instagram and youtube too.

LEARN PERMACULTURE WITH MORAG GAMBLE

•  Permaculture Gardening Course 
• Permaculture Design Course (coming June 2023)
• Permaculture Educators Program - includes integrated Permaculture Design Certificate and Permaculture Teacher Certificate program 

I'd love to hear from you. Text me here.

Support the show

_____

MORAG GAMBLE

Founder, Permaculture Education Institute

• Morag's Courses
• Podcast Blog
• Podcast on YouTube
• Podcast Instagram
• Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/in/moraggamble/

I am a possibilitarian and I believe in HumanKINDness.

In this podcast my guests and I explore How are we to live? Really live, as nature ourselves, tending the conditions where life can thrive. We ask How do we become the kind of humans this moment is asking us to be?

This podcast is one of my acts of myceliation. Each conversation is a thread in a vast network of people speaking up for life with love and care. 

This podcast beams out from my hand-built solar-powered studio in the midst of a permaculture food forest in a permaculture ecovillage on Jinibara and Gubbi Gubbi country.

If this episode lights something in you, pass it to one person who needs it. That is how myceliation works.

In this episode of Sense-Making in a Changing World, I am so delighted to be speaking about financial dimensions of permaculture and the new economy with renegade economist and permaculture educator Della Duncan.

Like me, Della has also spent a lot of time at Schumacher College (she completed her MA in Economics for Transition) and she works closely too with Fritjof Capra and his course, the Systems View of Life.  Della also podcasts - her show is Upstream Podcast - check it out in the show notes.

Della Duncan teaches financial permaculture on several Permaculture Design Courses throughout the Bay Area of California, as well as  the Work that Reconnects, following Joana Macy’s work.

Della is also

• a Senior Fellow of Social and Economic Equity at London School of Economics
• a Gross National Happiness Master Trainer
• a founding member of the Doughnut Economics California Coalition (DECC) 
• a Senior Lecturer at the California Institute of Integral Studies and Gaia Education. 

Read more - her article in Kosmos Journal: Cultivating Right Livelihood

Together, Della and I explore the economic dimensions of permaculture. 

Thanks for joining us.

I'd love to hear from you. Text me here.

Support the show

_____

MORAG GAMBLE

Founder, Permaculture Education Institute

• Morag's Courses
• Podcast Blog
• Podcast on YouTube
• Podcast Instagram
• Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/in/moraggamble/

I am a possibilitarian and I believe in HumanKINDness.

In this podcast my guests and I explore How are we to live? Really live, as nature ourselves, tending the conditions where life can thrive. We ask How do we become the kind of humans this moment is asking us to be?

This podcast is one of my acts of myceliation. Each conversation is a thread in a vast network of people speaking up for life with love and care. 

This podcast beams out from my hand-built solar-powered studio in the midst of a permaculture food forest in a permaculture ecovillage on Jinibara and Gubbi Gubbi country.

If this episode lights something in you, pass it to one person who needs it. That is how myceliation works.

"What gives me hope is people who have the guts to stand up … like you!"

"There’s an urgency. The earth is in the intensive care unit - acutely ill.  We’ve got nothing to lose, and everything to gain from speaking up."

This episode takes me to the essence of why I do what I do and why I speak up - the peace movement, my love of this planet, the political precariousness in which we dwell and my deep concern for our common future.

Dr Helen Caldicott (from Melbourne near where I grew up)  is the world’s most articulate and passionate advocate of citizen action to remedy the nuclear and environmental crises. 

She practices global preventative medicine and has spent 5 decades educating world leaders, influencers, physicians and communities of the impacts of the nuclear age - nuclear energy, nuclear war and nuclear disasters on the planet, on life, on humanity and the necessary changes in human behaviour to stop environmental destruction.. She's spoken Presidents, Prime Ministers, celebrities - even the Dalai Lama.

At this point in time, she has never been more concerned. She warns that have never been closer to a major nuclear catastrophe at the same time as being in the midst of climate and biodiversity catastrophes.

This is not easy to hear, but we must.  Let it move you, empower you, stoke the fires in your belly and let it rise up.

The Smithsonian named Helen one of the most influential women of the 20th Century.  She taught at Harvard in the 70s and practiced at Children’s hospitals around the world.  In 1980 she resigned and became a planetary physician.

Helen has: 

• written 7 books
• received 21 honorary doctorates
• been the subject of several films including the oscar-winning IF YOU LOVE THIS PLANET
• received multiple awards, and prizes - including the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985 as part of a international network - the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War 

When I was a teenager,   I was deeply motivated by Helen's work. I consider her a catalyst of my lifework. And like her, I am astounded that there is so little media attention while we teeter on the edge of nuclear catastrophe.

Please listen and share this widely.  Follow Helen's work. Watch and share her film. Speak up. Show up.

I'd love to hear from you. Text me here.

Support the show

_____

MORAG GAMBLE

Founder, Permaculture Education Institute

• Morag's Courses
• Podcast Blog
• Podcast on YouTube
• Podcast Instagram
• Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/in/moraggamble/

I am a possibilitarian and I believe in HumanKINDness.

In this podcast my guests and I explore How are we to live? Really live, as nature ourselves, tending the conditions where life can thrive. We ask How do we become the kind of humans this moment is asking us to be?

This podcast is one of my acts of myceliation. Each conversation is a thread in a vast network of people speaking up for life with love and care. 

This podcast beams out from my hand-built solar-powered studio in the midst of a permaculture food forest in a permaculture ecovillage on Jinibara and Gubbi Gubbi country.

If this episode lights something in you, pass it to one person who needs it. That is how myceliation works.

How to teach permaculture?

This is a very special episode - my way of celebrating the late Graham Bell - a tribute to a permaculture elder, pioneer, forest gardener, teacher, mentor, author, father, husband, friend. Graham died in early March 2023 after a brief illness.

I join the permaculture community around the world in acknowledging his enormous contribution to the field of permaculture, and to teaching permaculture teachers. I send my deepest condolences to his family.

Our focus here at the Permaculture Education Institute is about teaching permaculture teachers, and Graham has been teaching for decades too - one of the early pioneers of the movement.  I was keen to talk with him about his insights and experience as an educator. And oh my, what richness is within. I hope you thoroughly enjoy listing to Graham’s story spanning decades and the globe, and his wisdom shared.

I actually recorded this episode late 2022 and had been trying to work out how to edit it - Graham and I talked for almost 2 hours. I thought I needed to edit it to about an hour, but I could simply not work out which stories to leave out. In the end, I have decided to simply share the whole conversation with you.

You can watch this over in our Sense-Making in a Changing World Youtube channel here.

Graham Bell's Books

• THE PERMACULTURE WAY - Practical Steps To Create A Self-Sustaining World
• THE PERMACULTURE GARDEN

I'd love to hear from you. Text me here.

Support the show

_____

MORAG GAMBLE

Founder, Permaculture Education Institute

• Morag's Courses
• Podcast Blog
• Podcast on YouTube
• Podcast Instagram
• Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/in/moraggamble/

I am a possibilitarian and I believe in HumanKINDness.

In this podcast my guests and I explore How are we to live? Really live, as nature ourselves, tending the conditions where life can thrive. We ask How do we become the kind of humans this moment is asking us to be?

This podcast is one of my acts of myceliation. Each conversation is a thread in a vast network of people speaking up for life with love and care. 

This podcast beams out from my hand-built solar-powered studio in the midst of a permaculture food forest in a permaculture ecovillage on Jinibara and Gubbi Gubbi country.

If this episode lights something in you, pass it to one person who needs it. That is how myceliation works.