Building Regenerative Cultures – Resources

The roots of the world Culture can be traced back to mid 15the century which comes from the Latin root “Cultus’ – which means “the act of care or promoting growth” 1https://doi.org/10.5204/mcj.1833. It was primarily used in the context of plants through tending to the soil and the crop. Culture in the modern sense is used more broadly.

Anthropologically it is defined as:
“A collective name for all behavior patterns socially acquired and transmitted by means of symbols; hence a name for all the distinctive achievements of human groups, including not only such items as language, tool-making, industry, art, science, law, government, morals and religion, but also the material instruments or artifacts in which cultural achievements are embodied and by which intellectual cultural features are given practical effect, such as buildings, tools, machines, communication devices, art objects, etc.”


Culture in a true sense is the life blood of a vibrant society. On a personal level a conscious awareness and participation in culture brings a sense of delight and wonder for the individual. A culture gives a sense of place, belonging and purpose. Through culture one sees themselves as part of a larger whole, not separate but inter-connected. Cultures provide a sense of safety and security for individuals, where cultures hold the parts of psyche which are difficult to interact directly. Cultures revitalizes the daily lives through a continuous reorientation and settling.

Cultures help create vibrant societies, as they act as fabric which brings relational element to our individual existence. This relational fabric holds many elements of the social human experience, which otherwise would need to be dealt as internal conflicts. It brings communities into societies – creating basis for vibrant economy to emerge.

Healthy & regenerative cultures create vibrant economies and personal belonging. A culture provides accepted “ways of doing things”, guidelines, which one can rely on unconditionally. For every aspect of an individual life – guidelines, said or unsaid, written or oral, help us orient ourselves to the essential nature of that aspect. As we recognize the importance of more personal freedom, broad cultural guidelines risk the danger of being constraining and traumatic.  What is needed is conscious participation and emergence of cultures to hold the diversity of individual and communal experience. Here I share some tools & practices as guidelines that can bring more consciousness into our daily modern lives and support building healthy cultures.

These tools and practices have been compiled through much personal and social experimentation – inspired by many traditional wisdoms as “teachings – oral or written” and modern knowledge as  social technologies. I refer to the original source when they are available. In some cases these tools follow a thread across many different schools and traditions, where they almost become recurrent patterns as something more fundamental to human organizational experience – in these cases there is no easy way to cite a source.

Tools & Practices for Building Regenerative Cultures

Notes

  • 1
    https://doi.org/10.5204/mcj.1833