With session Gabriela Fenesi, Illaria Distefano and Silvie Le Muzic, 7 Sept 2023
Summary
This session with the Empire of Love initiative explored how expanding consciousness can summon leadership as a form of love within organizations and communities. Through grounding exercises, small-group triad breakouts, and open plenary reflections, participants shifted from isolated individual stories into a shared, collaborative space. The session balanced intentional actions with states of presence to experience how structured inquiry can help collective systems flourish.
Key Learning Points
- The Practice of Weaving: Weaving is defined as interconnecting people, projects, and places in synergistic ways to achieve universal well-being
- Universal Well-Being: This core guiding purpose focuses on the deeply interdependent well-being of the individual, the collective community, and the planet.
- The “Protainer” Concept: Adapted from Tavistock Institute language, a protainer is a proactive, generative group container that builds a unique holding environment to nurture systemic creativity.
- Consciousness-Led Leadership: Expanding group and personal consciousness serves as an evolutionary path to switch from organizational apathy to sourcing leadership directly from love.
- Sense-Making Frameworks: Weaving thrives in an abductive thinking frame, where multiple interpretations of present context are synthesised collaboratively
- States of Being Over Doing: True collaborative connection often emerges naturally when participants are invited through practice to shift focus from structure to being together
Action Points
- Embody Group Grounding: Integrate slow, somatic inhalation and exhalation practices at the start of meetings to clear external stressors and co-create a unified field.
- Introduce “Threads”: Utilize intentional introductory questions (e.g., “What is the thread you bring?”) to establish immediate personal accountability and relational depth.
- Engage in Triad Deep Dives: Create 15-minute triad breakout spaces within larger workshops to practice active sharing, listening and mindful energetic reception.
- Move Beyond Words: Actively build on what others have spoken to transition group dialogues from isolated stories into an indistinguishable, interwoven collective fabric.
- Embrace Intentional Silence: Incorporate spacious silences within structured agendas as a core mechanism for deeper presence and relationship building.
- Commit to Continuing Education: Engage with long-form structures, such as the Empire of Love’s 8-week community course, to turn conceptual leadership ideas into active everyday habits.
References
- Oliver, M. — “Instructions for living a life. Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.” (Poem).
- Batiste, J. & Payés, R. — “My Heart” from the album World Music Radio
- Bradbury, H. — Action Research Plus (Methodological framework tool source)
- Grettve, J. — Anon: tomorrow will be here (E-book and soft manifesto recommendation)
Knowledge Base Categories: 1) Inner Work 2) Regeneration & Universal Wellbeing
