As the old world continues dying around us, there are many who have been laying the groundwork for birthing what comes after the end of this extractive globalized system. The Design School for Regenerating Earth hosted a bioregional design immersion February 24–28 in Barichara with forty members of the Design School to give them direct experience with a bioregional weaving process that has been underway for more than five years.
This was the first of what will be many local immersion events around the planet throughout the upcoming six-month learning journey, How to Organize Your Bioregion.
It may be helpful to explain what we mean by "design immersion" before sharing what happened in Barichara.
The two key elements are in the words themselves. "Design" in its most general expression can be thought of as the application of tools and knowledge to address some kind of challenge. In our case, we want to help people engage in design thinking about the regeneration of their own bioregions.
Combine this with what it means to "immerse" ourselves in the real world: to have direct experience. This is about learning first-hand about the challenges and potential for regeneration in each unique bioregional context.
So, what we mean by a design immersion for bioregional regeneration is that we gather people in a local context and they directly experience the design thinking that is helping weave regenerative processes up to the landscape, territorial, or bioregional scale.
The Barichara Design Immersion was our first in-depth demonstration. We wanted to have members of the Design School who know what it means to host an immersion, so that we can encourage other members to host their own.
Barichara is a small town in the Northern Andes of Colombia with about 7,000 residents. It is situated on a plateau with a tropical dry forest – a threatened ecosystem at risk of disappearing.
We gathered on the first day in a very special place called Bioparque Móncora that is a community reforestation project led by two women (Camila Encinales and Vicky Camacho), one man (Don Jesús Barragán), and involving hundreds of children from local schools. The bioparque is a symbol of peace in this territory – and the perfect place to feel the heart and soul of bioregional regeneration.
A guided tour took us into the ruins of an abandoned house that is in the process of being transformed into a regenerative school for children. We felt the dreaming of families who want their kids to restore the health of native forests and local rivers. To say it was powerful is a bit of an understatement.
This was followed by a walk through the bioparque itself, led by Vicky Camacho as she recounted the history of these six hectares of land that were denuded and bare earth in 2009.
We held an opening circle to share and feel into the weaving of regenerative processes that would be coming throughout the week. We set the intention to notice our feelings, and the internal healing each of us is called to do, because this kind of work is deeply collaborative and community focused. Everyone had a turn sharing what brought them to Barichara and what was in their hearts to contribute into the flow of the immersion. Then everyone shared a delicious local meal.
Our immersion continued into its second day by visiting our regenerative school for kids – where Anamaria Guerra Forero shared the philosophy and pedagogical practices that inform the school learning. Many were moved to tears as we shared what is happening with the children at Sueños del Bosque. The cycles of nature are deeply shaping how we help our children grow into this world.
Participants brought gifts in the form of books and seeds for the garden. We set up a simple alter to receive them and hearts were melded together.
Afterwards, we went to Casa Común (Common House) to learn about Fundación Barichara Regenerativa with a talk given by Natalia Ortiz. She explained what community philanthropy is and how we are explicit about creating bioregional frameworks to weave regenerative processes throughout our territory. Now our participants could see how the organizing is being done. We had another delicious meal, and were left to digest the inspiration and knowledge that was shared.
Going deeper into what it means to regenerate an entire bioregion – on the third day our group visited an important reforestation site and learned about human relationships for new economic realities. We traveled by chiva (a party bus for tourists) to the land of Origen del Agua where Jessica Lisiewski explained how her team is restoring native forest while also engaging in regenerative education practices with several rural schools.
As we walked the land, we were continually struck by how much it has healed in these four years of work since we purchased Origen del Agua with crowdfunding money back in the spring of 2021.
Later we returned to Casa Común to talk with Margarita Higuera and Felipe Spath about the deep relational patterns of economic exchange that are possible when people learn how to live in community with each other. They shared their knowledge and the guiding questions that are helping to create different economic realities among the more than 120 local producers who engage in real exchanges through this center for transformation.
And then… how can we even describe what happened on the fourth day of our immersion? We met in the central park with Juan Daza. He showed us how deeply colonial the compass is and why we need to reorient how we look at maps from the perspectives of people in South America. This began a process of inquiry into syntropic agroforestry and how differently we can relate to food forests.
As we drove into the agricultural zone of Santa Elena, we could feel ourselves being woven into a living tapestry of landscapes. The watershed of the Paramera held us as we flowed into different microclimates and soil types. We were asked to explore the syntropic system in small groups with our brains looking for patterns and our guts feeling into mystery. Such power in the human intuition as we felt into land in this way.
Later, we journeyed to the community theater of Caney Colibri with Fundación Cultural Ojo de Agua to learn the power of telling stories that have been erased from cultural memory. This inquiry into the regeneration of local narratives brought tears to our eyes and opened the wounds in our hearts. It was so moving… and we all came away transformed.
On the fifth and final day, we had the task of synthesizing our experiences throughout the week as we had been learning what it means to weave regeneration across an entire bioregion.
People came away changed. We could tangibly feel our planetary network of bioregions as real now – with people who gathered with us from Cascadia, the Great Lakes, the Ozarks, the Mediterranean, the Gulf Coast, the Rivers of the North Sea, the Northern Andes, and the Rocky Mountains.
Feeling how personal this all was – the depth to which we opened our wounds and explored the deep healing that is possible – stirred our souls. In order to regenerate the Earth, we must also regenerate ourselves.
You can view short highlight videos for each day: Day 1; Day 2; Day 3; Day 4; Day 5.
As participants headed out on their journeys back to their bioregions scattered around the planet, all who gathered in Barichara can now help others learn how to live into their bioregion.
More bioregional immersions, please! Wherever you are, we hope this inspires you to plan your own design immersion for bioregional regeneration.
A pilot immersion took place in the Greater Tkaronto Bioregion, in Canada, over several days in September, 2024 to launch the Earth Regeneration Fund. As part of the Fund, we're now starting the Bioregional Activation Pool which can help you make your own immersion a reality.
This is our vision for design immersions that catalyze bioregional regeneration across the entire planet. Join us and let's all do this together!
