# ACTionism > ACTionism is the art of finding the others and taking action together Public Ghost content for AI and LLM tooling. This file includes a bounded export of public pages first, then recent public posts. Append `.md` to any post or page URL to get the content in Markdown (for example, `/example-post.md`). ## Pages ### What is ACTionism? URL: https://www.actionism.space/about/ Last updated: 2026-06-05T12:22:05.000Z facilitate **ACTionism works to help people move from caring to action** ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Actionism-event-banners--1-.png) You know that feeling when you look around you and see what needs changing, but wonder if you're alone in caring? You're not. And you have more power than you think. **ACTionism is the art of finding your people and taking action - together.** Inspired by Jon Alexander's insight in his [book CITIZENS](https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/citizens-jon-alexander/7315064?ean=9781912454884&ref=actionism.space), that "all of us are smarter than any of us," we reject the tired narrative that you're either a passive subject or an isolated consumer. What you are instead is an **active citizen capable of creating meaningful change**. Many of us feel powerless in the face of everything the world needs right now — wondering what difference we can make, silently hoping it will all blow over, or that the next party in power will finally fix things. The research suggests they won't. Because **the key to fixing everything is all of us.** The feeling that nothing we do matters takes a serious toll on our physical and mental health — but here's what ACTionism shows us: When you find your people and act together, something shifts. **You can have an impact. You can also have fun and feel joy in the process.** ## **What we do** **ACTionism is an emerging entity - but we exist to encourage and facilitate people to start finding others and taking collective action.** **How?** 1. We have a documentary film you can screen at a community or workplace screening to introduce people to the idea of Actionism 2. We're developing guides to help you run ACTionism workshops/sessions after the screenings that help people find others and start planning how they want to take action 3. We go to places and spaces and help people practice flexing their citizen muscles by starting conversations that encourage collective action 4. We're on the lookout for enthusiastic **regional ACTionism pollinators** who would like to champion the idea in their region, either by connecting others or by facilitating occasional workshops ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Not-everyone-wants-a-shortcut-to-mending--21-.png) ### **Who is behind ACTionism?** The term ACTionism was initially coined by filmmaker Michael Shaw as a working title for a film created in collaboration with the Re-Action Collective (founded by Gavin Fernie-Jones and Heather Davies) [Tamasine McCaig,](https://www.linkedin.com/in/tamasinemcaig/?ref=actionism.space) who had previously led the Citizens Collective project with [Jon Alexander ](https://www.linkedin.com/in/jon-alexander-11b66345/?ref=actionism.space)and [Olivia Stamp](https://www.linkedin.com/in/oliviastamp/?ref=actionism.space) (an experiment exploring the idea stepping into our agency as Citizens), came together to establish ACTionism as an entity - part movement, part platform, but increasingly **we exist to encourage and facilitate people to start finding others and taking collective action.** ****How we're funding this work** At present, we're run by a micro team of enthusiastic volunteers, writers and creators. As you have read, we have big plans. If you believe in this project and want to support our work financially, ****you can do so here on Open Collective.** By listing on Open Collective, we’re pledging to be completely transparent about the money we receive and where it is spent. [Donate £10 to support ACTionism ](https://opencollective.com/actionism?ref=actionism.space) ## **ACTionism works to:** 1. Help communitises see that there is a way through this - We just have to find our peoople and act together. 2. We exist to share stories, strategies, and practical guidance for collective action 3. Build collective agency and reduce feelings of powerlessness 4. Promote and enable community-led solutions acrossclimate, food, education, nature, repair, and local spaces 5. Help people turn inspiration into practical action in their communities 6. Celebrate and amplify grassroots initiatives that demonstrate collective power 7. Connect people through accessible storytelling and community places and spaces **Stay up to date** We’d love you to go a step further, by signing up for the ACTionism newsletter so we can keep you up to date with the best new content and let you know about upcoming calls and events. Stay up to date by using the subscribe button in the menu. ## **Our ethical commitment** **Regenerative Practices:** We support initiatives that restore rather than extract, measuring success by what we leave behind. **Ethical Funding:** We only accept funding from organisations focused on regenerative practices. We don’t accept funding from entities investing in fossil fuels, arms, or organisations contributing to harm. --- ### Donate URL: https://www.actionism.space/donate/ Last updated: 2025-06-24T09:09:01.000Z **Help create a #CitizenFuture** While ACTionism is about so much more than money, by donating whatever you can afford, you enable real people who care about each other, the places and spaces we live in and the systems we're part of to connect, inspire, organise, and take action together. Every contribution directly funds the tools that help us all learn from each other and take collective action. With your donation, we can continue hosting monthly Spotlight calls, producing our magazine, launching our podcast series, and exploring in-person events. **Time poor or unsure where to start?** If you're unsure how to take your first step, making a donation to support this movement is powerful action. Stick with us - we'll share the inspiration you need when you're ready. For now, **why not donate the cost of a coffee a week to help keep us going?** Every contribution directly funds the tools that help us all learn from each other and take collective action. **When you support ACTionism, you're investing in a future led by people just like you - real people, in real places, doing real things together.** **We use Open Collective for full transparency on how your money is used - donate below** Please note that donating does not automatically subscribe you to our Ghost platform, you will need to do this via the subscribe button here. [Subscribe to ACTionism](#/portal/signup) ### Request a Screening URL: https://www.actionism.space/request-a-screening/ Last updated: 2026-01-30T14:08:39.000Z ## ACTionism is a film about the art of finding your people to take collective action. About collectively moving from passive consumers to active citizens. A story centered around doing things *with* others, not *to* others. [Request a Screening by filling in this form on the Reaction Collective Website](https://re-action-collective.org/actionism/?ref=actionism.space#request) ## WATCH THE TRAILER ## COMMUNITY SCREENINGS We’ve launched ACTionism through community screenings. We’re all about encouraging communities to take action. We hope this film will do just that by inspiring and connecting people through community screenings and conversations. ## INSPIRE ACTionism the film follows Ellie Meredith on a journey from anxiety to action. “School was a tricky time for me—as a neurospicy human, I hated being stuck in four walls all day. The mounting pressure of exams and anxiety became too much, and I crawled inside myself. Add to that cocktail a rising sense of climate anxiety, and it all felt completely overwhelming. I kept thinking about what I could do. The question itself was rooted in uncertainty about my own future—a future that felt like it was being mapped out for me. But what I really wanted was to get stuck in, to find my people. To feel less alone.” “I found myself drawn to the work of Re-Action. At a time when most of the actions I was told to take to “save the planet” felt like joyless personal sacrifices—buying a reusable coffee cup—this kind of action felt different. It meant that there might be a way for me to take action alongside others, not as if I was on some solo mission to save the world. And this film is the unravelling of where that led me next.” ## CONNECT After watching the film we’re encouraging community screenings to save space for conversations. To help, we’ve partnered with our friends [99p Films, ](https://www.99pfilms.com/?ref=actionism.space)the experts of social cinema, to create a guide titled ‘how to social cinema.’ [This guide](https://www.actionism.space/social-cinema/) will include info on how to host a conversation, and how to create space for open and fair discussions. ## ACT COLLECTIVELY We want to be part of building communities of active citizens, not passive consumers. To accompany the film the Re-Action Collective have created a handbook of stories, focusing on the question “how did you start?”. The handbook will feature stories from across the globe of citizens connecting and acting in communities. Sitting alongside this handbook are a set of guides from Party Kit Network founder Isabel Mack about practical, actionable ideas to help you build community connections, spread awareness, and inspire others to get involved. Plus info from Scott Johnson and the Counting Change community (a collective of accountants) about whether we need permission or structures to start taking action. ## Request a screening in your community or organisation [Request a Screening by filling in this form on the Reaction Collective Website](https://re-action-collective.org/actionism/?ref=actionism.space#request) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-03-11-at-20.07.19.png) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-03-11-at-20.04.12.png) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-03-11-at-20.03.37.png) ACTionism would not be possible without the generous support and expertise of our partners: ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Inghams-1--1-.png) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/TS-logo-black-1-1.png) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/99pfilms-1.png) ### The ACTionism Manifesto URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-actionism-manifesto/ Last updated: 2025-06-19T13:23:11.000Z ## **ACTionism works to:** 1. Lift up marginalised voices and ensure our work reflects community diversity. 2. We cultivate joy deliberately - it creates energy, energy creates movement, and movement changes communities and systems 3. Amplify the work of community initiatives and organisations that align with our manifesto 4. Educate by sharing stories, strategies, and practical guidance for collective action 5. Build collective agency and reduce feelings of powerlessness 6. Promote and enable community-led solutions across food, education, nature, repair, and local spaces 7. Help people turn inspiration into practical action in their communities 8. Celebrate and amplify grassroots initiatives that demonstrate collective power 9. Connect people through accessible storytelling and community places and spaces ## **Our ethical commitment** **Regenerative Practices:** We support initiatives that restore rather than extract, measuring success by what we leave behind. **Ethical Funding:** We only accept funding from organisations focused on regenerative practices. We don’t accept funding from entities investing in fossil fuels, arms, or organisations contributing to harm. ### Spotlights URL: https://www.actionism.space/spotlights/ Last updated: 2025-06-24T09:12:10.000Z We're super keen to hear about the amazing individuals, groups and ideas happening all over the world, so we can shine a light on them and use their work as a way to inspire others. If you want to suggest an individual, organisation or idea for a future spotlight call, please [email us](mailto:hello@actionism.space) and we'll see if we can add them to the mix. **Criteria for Spotlights:** 1\. They are an individual, group, or idea/tool that is working towards a Citizen Future. 2\. They can be based anywhere in the world 3\. Ideally they can talk about their work, but are also happy to find ways in which we can inspire action at a grassroots level too! ### Contact us URL: https://www.actionism.space/contact-us/ Last updated: 2025-06-19T13:17:46.000Z If you'd like to get in touch with us, please drop us an email via the button below. [Get in touch ](mailto:hello@actionism.space) ### Events URL: https://www.actionism.space/events/ Last updated: 2025-06-24T09:49:23.000Z _No content available._ ### How to find existing collective action projects near you URL: https://www.actionism.space/findtheothers/ Last updated: 2026-07-14T12:58:48.000Z Not everyone wants to start something from scratch. In fact, one of the most powerful things about ACTionism is recognising that you do not have to. The chances are there is already something happening near you — a community energy project, a food co-op, a repair café, a housing group — that could use your help, ideas and energy. So when it comes to finding the others, why not start there. This page is a growing collection of ways to find those projects and start acting together. If you know of something we have missed, please let us know. ## What's Happening Near You? Thanks to the brilliant work of Matt Golding and the team at [Antidote](https://www.antidotelive.studio/?ref=actionism.space), there is now a postcode search tool that finds up to **five examples of collective action within five miles of your front door**. It is a fantastic asset and a great place to start. [Find projects near you →](https://www.antidotelive.studio/?ref=actionism.space) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Photo-Adventure-Script-Instagram-Post--3-.png) ## Energy Community-owned and locally-run energy projects are happening all over the UK — from solar co-ops to wind turbines owned by the people who live beneath them. Matt and the Antidote team have mapped many of them. [Find an energy project near you](https://www.antidotelive.studio/energy-projects-map?ref=actionism.space) — and if you want to understand how they work, Community Energy England's [Getting Started guides](https://communityenergyengland.org/how-to-pages/getting-started-with-community-energy?ref=actionism.space) are an excellent introduction. Loading map... ## Food Community food projects from growing schemes and food co-ops to community owned farms and shops and community fridges. 1\. [Find a food project near you](https://www.antidotelive.studio/food-projects-map?ref=actionism.space) via the Antidote map 2\. [Sustainable Food Places](https://www.sustainablefoodplaces.org/?ref=actionism.space) — a national network connecting food partnerships 3\. [The Federation of City Farms and Community Gardens](https://www.farmgarden.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space) — a fantastic directory of community-managed growing spaces. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Photo-Adventure-Script-Instagram-Post--2-.png) ## Community-Led Housing From co-housing and community land trusts to housing co-ops. [Find a housing project near you](https://www.antidotelive.studio/housing-projects-map?ref=actionism.space) via Antidote [Community Led Homes](https://www.communityledhomes.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space) — a partnership resource covering everything from how to find an existing project to what community-led housing actually looks like in practice. Check out the Community-led housing guides on [My Community](https://mycommunity.org.uk/affordable-and-community-led-housing?ref=actionism.space) too ## Repair and Reuse If repair is your thing, check out the [Re-Action Collective](https://re-action-collective.org/?ref=actionism.space) — our brilliant sister network co-founded by Gavin Fernie-Jones, Heather Davies, and Ellie Meredith (who you may know from the ACTionism film). Re-Action connects repairers, resellers, rental businesses, and circular economy organisations — particularly in the outdoor sector — with the shared aim of keeping kit in use, skills alive, and communities connected. [You can find their member map and join the collective here.](https://re-action-collective.org/collective%5Fmembers/?ref=actionism.space) **You can also check out:** [Community Repair Network](https://communityrepairnetwork.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space) — maps repair groups across the UK [Repair Café International](https://www.repaircafe.org/en/visit/?ref=actionism.space) — has a global finder [Transition Together](https://transitiontogether.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space) — lists many local groups running repair and reuse projects as part of broader community sustainability work ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Photo-Adventure-Script-Instagram-Post--1-.png) ## Democracy and Governance Mapping is still catching up with the reality on the ground — a huge amount is happening — and we are still building out this section. If you know of projects or resources we should include here, please do [get in touch](mailto:hello@actionism.space) — and give Matt at Antidote a shout too. **In the meantime, these are worth exploring:** [Involve's Citizens Assembly Tracker](https://involve.org.uk/citizens-assembly-tracker?ref=actionism.space) — maps citizens assemblies happening across the UK. [Dem Next](https://www.demnext.org/projects?ref=actionism.space) — a resource for alternative governance projects. [Citizens Assembly UK](https://citizensassembly.co.uk/?ref=actionism.space) — information and background on how citizens assemblies work. ## Broader Sustainability and Climate Action If you are looking for a community group working across multiple themes — energy, food, transport, biodiversity — check out [Transition Network](https://transitionnetwork.org/?ref=actionism.space) and [Transition Together](https://transitiontogether.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space). Between them, they connect hundreds of local groups across the UK who are quietly taking action together, one community at a time. *This page is a living document. Know something we have missed? [Tell us about it.](mailto:hello@actionism.space)* *Thanks to [Antidote Studio](https://www.antidotelive.studio/?ref=actionism.space) for all the work they're doing pulling maps together around these collective action projects.* --- # Find Your People: Organisations Building Community Ownership and Community Power A growing list of organisations, networks and individuals helping people discover, join and build community-owned projects across the UK and beyond. ## Antidote Studios **Website:** [www.antidotelive.studio](https://www.antidotelive.studio/?ref=actionism.space) **People:** Matt Golding Antidote shares stories of ordinary neighbourhoods doing something extraordinary — from community-owned energy and housing to people-powered high streets. Their brilliant postcode search tool finds examples of collective action within five miles of your front door: just type in your postcode and discover the projects already happening near you. ## Screw This, Let's Try Something Else (podcast) **Listen:** [Apple Podcasts](https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/screw-this-lets-try-something-else/id1863391095?ref=actionism.space) **People:** Matt Golding and Maryam Pasha A road trip around the UK visiting communities who've had enough of waiting and are proving there are better ways to approach food, energy, housing and decision-making. From people-owned power in Bristol to a Shropshire farm with 8,000 community landlords, each episode shows what's possible when neighbourhoods take matters into their own hands. Brian Eno called it "a podcast of hope-filled stories that could genuinely change the world". ## Platform Places **Website:** [www.platformplaces.com](https://www.platformplaces.com/?ref=actionism.space) **People:** Bex Trevalyan Platform Places is a UK-wide, cross-sector movement working to change the culture of property ownership in our town centres and unlock empty high-street buildings for community use. It convenes Local Property Partnerships that bring councils, community entrepreneurs and asset owners around the same table — quite literally, often over dinner. Co-founder Bex Trevalyan also co-founded Library of Things, the borrowing network that grew across London's high streets. ## Mycelial Network **Website:** [www.mycelialnetwork.co.uk](https://www.mycelialnetwork.co.uk/?ref=actionism.space) A peer solidarity network for Community Asset Developers — locally-led organisations taking on land and buildings to transform their neighbourhoods and build local power and wealth for the long term. Between them, members have unlocked over 100 buildings for community use and created affordable spaces for thousands of community organisations. Their site includes a map of member projects across England, so you can see who's doing this work near you. ## Re-Action Collective **Website:** [re-action-collective.org](https://re-action-collective.org/?ref=actionism.space) **People:** Gavin Fernie-Jones and Heather Davies A global collective of community organisations, repairers and citizens keeping outdoor clothing and equipment in use through sharing, repairing and repurposing — making the outdoors more affordable and accessible while cutting waste. Re-Action champions community-first, circular alternatives to the buy-use-discard model, and created the #CitizenFriday campaign as a joyful counter to Black Friday: share, repair, and get out in the fresh air. ## Resonance **Website:** [resonance.ltd.uk](https://resonance.ltd.uk/?ref=actionism.space) One of the UK's leading social impact investment companies, managing funds that channel capital into social enterprises, community-led projects and safe, affordable housing. Their Resonance Community Developers fund exists specifically to help communities create and own income-generating assets — from affordable homes to sports facilities and renewable energy projects — so that value stays local. ## Power to Change **Website:** [www.powertochange.org.uk](https://www.powertochange.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space) The independent trust that backs community business across England, funding and championing locally rooted enterprises that are accountable to their communities — from community-owned pubs and shops to energy schemes and high-street hubs. Their research and campaigning make the case for community-powered places, and their reports on community ownership are an excellent starting point for anyone exploring the field. ## New Local **Website:** [www.newlocal.org.uk](https://www.newlocal.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space) A think tank and network of local councils with a mission to transform public services and unlock community power. New Local's work on the "Community Power" paradigm argues that communities themselves — not distant institutions — should be at the heart of decision-making, and their research, events and practical guides help councils and communities make that shift. ## New Economics Foundation **Website:** [neweconomics.org](https://neweconomics.org/?ref=actionism.space) The UK's leading think tank working for an economy that serves people and planet. NEF combines rigorous research with campaigning on issues from housing and work to community wealth building and local economies, developing practical alternatives that put economic power in the hands of ordinary people. ## Locality **Website:** [locality.org.uk](https://locality.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space) The national membership network for community organisations in England, supporting thousands of locally rooted groups that own buildings, run services and strengthen neighbourhoods. Locality provides practical help with community asset ownership and asset transfer, and campaigns nationally for the powers and funding communities need to shape their own places. ## Connectioning **Website:** [connectioning.substack.com](https://connectioning.substack.com/) **People:** Jess Friday A newsletter and network connecting the people and projects building a wellbeing economy — one that supports all of us, not just billionaires. Every week, Jess shares stories from the hundreds of movements creating real alternatives (cooperatives, community land trusts, community wealth building and more), plus events, resources and practical steps for getting started where you live. ## Popular **Website:** [www.popular.org.uk](https://www.popular.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space) **People:** Oliver Holtaway, Dan Gregory and Zoe Walshe A social infrastructure practice offering research and advisory work on the community spaces, assets and connections that hold neighbourhoods together. Their work spans community ownership, high-street renewal and neighbourhood social infrastructure — including the *Pride in Parades* reports on reviving local shopping parades — and co-founder Oliver Holtaway helped take Bath City FC into community ownership. ## ABCs of Community Action (Stir to Action) **Website:** [www.stirtoaction.com/abcs-workshops-open](https://www.stirtoaction.com/abcs-workshops-open?ref=actionism.space) A practical workshop programme from worker co-operative Stir to Action, training a new generation of community asset leaders. Sessions cover everything from an introduction to community assets through to engaging local people, choosing legal structures, raising investment through community shares and negotiating asset transfers — with study visits to inspiring projects like Hastings Commons and Stretford Public Hall. ### The Film URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-film/ Last updated: 2026-06-25T06:34:06.000Z ## The Story ACTionism follows Ellie Meredith, a young adult, on a journey from anxiety to action. From the question of what one person can do, to the discovery that the question itself was wrong. It is a **film about finding your people.** About **moving from passive consumer to active citizen**. About **doing things with others, not to others.** ## Watch the Trailer > “School was a tricky time for me, I hated being stuck in four walls all day. The mounting pressure of exams and anxiety became too much, and I crawled inside myself. Add to that cocktail a rising sense of climate anxiety, and it all felt completely overwhelming. I kept thinking about what I could do. The question itself was rooted in uncertainty about my own future, a future that felt like it was being mapped out for me. But what I really wanted was to get stuck in, to find my people. To feel less alone.” > > Ellie ## Host a Screening The film is not meant to be watched alone at home. It is meant to be felt together, and the conversation after the screening is where you find the others. Over a hundred communities across fifteen countries have already screened it. A scout group in Chepstow, a university in Istanbul, a climbing wall in Kendal, a library in Denmark, a school in Frome and in El Nido in the Philippines. Not through a distribution deal or a marketing strategy. Just people watching it and immediately thinking of someone else who needed to see it. ## Request a screening ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Photo-Adventure-Script-Instagram-Post--4-.png) ## How to Host We've partnered with 99p Films, experts in social cinema, to create a guide to hosting a community screening and conversation. It covers how to create space for open, honest discussion — and how to make sure people leave with more than they arrived with. [Download the screening guide](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1BIWq8flXqcJlaFfJclx%5Fwc-aWwcw12Sp/view?usp=sharing&ref=actionism.space) [Download the workshop materials](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1jfP1ajm3krU-%5FPkTK1m74NZav0myfC4T/view?usp=drive%5Flink&ref=actionism.space) [Attend a monthly drop in session](#/portal/signup) — join the newsletter to stay up to date with sessions. ## The Map - Global ACTionism Screenings **Film Duration** — About 30 minutes **Film "Rating"** — Suitable for all ages **Screening Costs** — Donate what you feel ## FAQs Is there a fee to screen the film? + Donate what you feel. We want the film to reach as many communities as possible — cost should never be a barrier. How long is the film? + About 30 minutes. We also have a 15-minute version suitable for schools or to accompany a longer hands-on workshop session. What age is the film suitable for? + Suitable for all ages. Can Ellie do a live Zoom Q&A after the film? + Yes — get in touch and we'll do our best to make it happen. Can Ellie or other members of ACTionism come to a screening in person? + Yes — if you can cover costs, we will come. Get in touch to discuss. How flexible are the viewing conditions? + Very flexible. Whether you're confirming a date, thinking about charging a fee, or figuring out the right setting — get in touch and we'll work it out together. How do we access the film? + Once you've requested a screening we'll send you everything you need — a link, instructions, and support materials. Can we do an online screening? + Yes — the film works well online for community groups, businesses, and organisations. We'll support you to make the most of the format. Is it just for climate-conscious audiences? + Not at all. ACTionism is for anyone who cares about something and isn't sure where to start — whatever that something is. It has screened to scout groups, universities, climbing walls, libraries, schools, and community groups of every kind. ## Made by communities These posters were made by communities who have screened the film. We love them. If you make your own, send it to us. ![Community screening poster 1](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/ACTionism-Poster--1-.png) ![Community screening poster 2](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/WhatsApp-Image-2026-01-04-at-16.12.50.jpeg) ![Community screening poster 3](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/1780594947751.png) ‹ › Made your own poster? [Send it to us](mailto:hello@actionism.space) and we'll add it here. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/WhatsApp-Image-2026-03-22-at-22.05.31-1.jpeg) A recent workshop and discussion following a screening ### The Book - Find the Øthers URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-book/ Last updated: 2026-08-02T13:58:53.000Z "ACTionism began as a rupture, a phone call in the dark, a life dividing into before and after. But it was also this: a growing inability to pretend that things were fine when everything I loved was visibly changing, and a growing refusal to carry that awareness alone. Something had changed. Not just in the world, in me. And once you feel it, you can't unfeel it." — Gav ![A meadow full of life](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Untitled-design--29-.png) You've felt it. The gap between the world you were promised and the one you're living in. The weight of caring about what's happening, to the climate, communities, nature, and to the way people relate to each other — without knowing what to do with that feeling. The exhaustion of trying alone, the strange loneliness of feeling something you can't quite describe. This book is about what happens next. A story of what it looks like when people who feel what you feel find each other and start building something together. In a ski shop in the French Alps, in a field in Worcester, in a parking lot in the Tarentaise, in a forest in New Zealand. In repair cafes and community hubs and rooftop workshops, in places the system hasn't noticed yet. It starts with grief and ends with a campfire. If you've read this far and felt recognised, this is for you. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Photo-Adventure-Script-Instagram-Post--6-.png) ## The book is almost here. We'll let you know the moment it's ready — along with how to get hold of it, what's inside, and what happens next. Leave your email below and you'll be the first to know. [Sign up to be notified](#/portal/signup) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Photo-Adventure-Script-Instagram-Post--5-.png) "Few books manage to capture both the spark of an idea and the messy, beautiful reality of what it takes to bring that idea into the world. Gavin does exactly that. With beautifully engaging writing, he traces the journey from individual insight to collective action, showing how communities form, momentum builds, and lasting systems change becomes possible. The weaving of personal stories, practical wisdom, and deeper reflections makes this a compelling and deeply relevant read. What emerges is a powerful reminder that movements are not built through grand plans alone, but through relationships, courage, and countless small acts that gather force over time. Thought provoking, hopeful, and deeply human, this is a book that will stay with you long after the final page and one you won't be able to put down. Be sure to read this with your own inspirational journal handy and a tissue for the odd tear." **Jannine Barron** [janninebarron.com](https://janninebarron.com/?ref=actionism.space) ### The Workshops URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-workshops/ Last updated: 2026-06-24T13:29:53.000Z ## ACTionism — The Art of Finding The Others You care. But something keeps getting in the way. Maybe it's the litter on the beach, or the waste in children's party bags, or wishing you knew your neighbours' names, or simply wanting to find others who think the way you do about the climate and the natural world. Whatever it is, the feeling is real. And so is the thing that stops you acting on it: time, confidence, not knowing where to start, not knowing who else feels the same. This is not a talk. It is a practical screening session — done together — where you'll meet others who feel what you feel, get honest about what's in the way, take your first step, and leave with connections and a sense of joy at what is possible. **Come ready to move. You might surprise yourself.** ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Photo-Adventure-Script-Instagram-Post--7-.png) ## How the Workshop Works The workshop follows the ACTionism pattern. It takes around two hours and works with any group of people who care about something and aren't sure where to start. 1\. Find the Others 2\. Listen and Share 3\. Do Something Together 4\. Feel the Joy 5\. Repeat ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Photo-Adventure-Script-Instagram-Post--4-.png) ## Invite Us We are building this with communities rather than at them. If you'd like to host a workshop — at your workplace, community space, festival, or gathering — get in touch. If you can cover costs, we will come. [Invite us to run a workshop](https://tally.so/r/vGg9zl?ref=actionism.space) ## Run Your Own The workshop pattern is open. We are developing a guide so that anyone can run it in their own community without needing us in the room. [Join the waiting list for the guide](#/portal/signup) ### The Handbook- Part 1 URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-handbook/ Last updated: 2026-08-02T14:11:39.000Z ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Photo-Adventure-Script-Instagram-Post--9-.png) ## A magazine-style collection of musings to accompany the film. Pulled together in a week, in France, in the days before the film premiered. Eighty pages of stories, art, interviews, and guides. It is a shorter way in. If the film is the signal and Find the Øthers is the origin story, the handbook is the conversation starter — something to leave on a table, pass to a friend, read before a screening. It includes stories of action from the community, an interview with Ellie, Jon Alexander on the citizen story, a guide to hosting social cinema, and an essay on the power of the campfire. It was made from what was available, in the time that was available, for free. **That, too, is ACTionism.** [Download the handbook](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RKHlScIiL-0RjarZqyl1Ciu1ne0hLpgL/view?usp=sharing&ref=actionism.space) ## The handbook version 2 is coming - get involved. Tamasine and Olivia are currently working on the next version of the handbook - and we want this one to be interactive - think QR codes that link to videos, ACTionism-inspired puzzles, stories and guides to support you and your communities at screenings and beyond. We also plan to include tear-out versions of the ACTionism steps and the talking board posters. If you want to get involved, contribute or sponsor the next version of the ACTionism handbook,drop Tamasine a message below [Get in touch with Tamasine](@hello@actionism.space) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Copy-of-ACTionism---the-magazine.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Screenshot-2026-06-24-at-12.40.24.png) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Screenshot-2026-06-24-at-12.40.08.png) Free to download. Free to share. Made from what was available, in the time that was available. [Download the handbook](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RKHlScIiL-0RjarZqyl1Ciu1ne0hLpgL/view?usp=sharing&ref=actionism.space) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/Photo-Adventure-Script-Instagram-Post--8-.png) ### Start Here URL: https://www.actionism.space/start-here/ Last updated: 2026-07-01T19:26:04.000Z Before the film, before the workshops. Before any of it. These are statements that follow the ACTionism pattern. For each one, mark where you actually are — not where you think you should be. Then look at where the people around you have marked themselves. **That is often where it starts. Not with a plan or a perfect moment. Just with finding out that the person standing next to you is already one of your people.** There are no right or wrong answers — just honest ones. For each statement, mark where you actually are. Then see where others have placed themselves. [Answer the statements →](https://pol.is/5edfembmmw?ref=actionism.space) If the page appears blank, try opening it in your desktop browser — Pol.is works best on desktop. ## Prefer to do it in person? Print the posters and use them at a gathering, a screening, a kitchen table, a park bench. Grab a stamp or a pen and mark where you actually are. Then look at where the people around you have marked themselves. ![Poster 1](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/1.png) ![Poster 2](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/2.png) ![Poster 3](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/3.png) ![Poster 4](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/4.png) ![Poster 5](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/5.png) ![Poster 6](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/6.png) ‹ › [Download and print the posters](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1jfP1ajm3krU-%5FPkTK1m74NZav0myfC4T/view?usp=sharing&ref=actionism.space) ### ACTionism? URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism/ Last updated: 2026-08-02T13:57:28.000Z You might be wondering why we’re using another ism. The word ACTionism makes some people uncomfortable. Isms have a habit of becoming the thing they set out to replace. They start as a response to something real, and end as a defence of themselves. That’s not what we’re doing here. ### **Where the word came from** ACTionism wasn't designed. The very opposite is true; it just emerged from a rupture, a film, and a community that formed around both. We didn’t sit in a room and decide this was the right name. It arrived the way most things in this story arrive: before it was ready, without a plan, out of necessity. It came as language that followed action. Which means it has the same quality as the things it describes. It started before anyone fully understood what it was. That's kind of the point of all we’re doing. We can’t know what to do, we can only try things and respond. ### **What the word is doing** Look at it again. The ACT is capitalised and that is deliberate. It's pointing to the verb, not the ideology. It's saying *do the thing*, not *believe the thing*. That's a meaningful distinction, maybe the most important one. Most isms describe what you are. ACTionism describes what you do. Or more honestly, what you keep trying to do, imperfectly, in the conditions you actually find yourself in. ### **What it isn't** ***ACTionism isn't a movement, an organisation, or a methodology. That's written into*** [***the letter***](https://www.actionism.space/) ***on the homepage, and it bears repeating here***. **There is no doctrine; you won’t find a text that defines what counts. There’s no hierarchy deciding who's in or out, or a purity test. A repair cafe counts, a film screening counts, a walking meetup counts, a conversation with a neighbour counts, as does listening to the place around us.** ACTionism explicitly includes failure. If something doesn't feel right, that's not a failure, this is where we learn. We try again, dogmas don't build in their own failure. They explain it away or expel the people who caused it. ACTionism does neither. And it starts with feeling, not belief. You don't have to agree with anything to belong. You just have to have felt something, the gap, the weight, the thing you can't quite name, and be willing to show up. ### **The Thistle** In the Peak District, thistles grow where land has been grazed to within an inch of its life. They are pioneer species, their dense taproots penetrate even the most compacted soil. When they die, their roots decompose and breathe life back into the ground. And when the farmer sprays them, the disturbance promotes more thistles. The thistle doesn't follow a doctrine. It responds to conditions, and thistles grow differently in different soils, different climates, different levels of disturbance. A thistle in the Peak District is not the same as a thistle in the Tarentaise, even though they're the same species. The place shapes the expression. This means you can't do ACTionism wrong. There is no single correct version, there is only what the place needs and what the conditions allow. ### **Why we still need a word** We don't have the words yet for what we need. The old stories don't fit, and the new ones haven't formed. In that gap, people need something to find each other by. A way of saying: I feel this too, and I'm trying to do something about it, come and find me. That's what ACTionism is, a pointing word. It points at something it didn't make and can't control; the tending, the gathering, the knowing of names, the repairing, the showing up, the listening. The thing that people are doing quietly everywhere, without a name for it, often without knowing others are doing the same. The ism is just a way of saying: this deserves a name. Not so it can become an ideology, so people can find each other doing it. ### **Why action?** Because we have to act to relearn what we've lost. How to be in community, how to really listen, how to tend to a place, how to talk to a stranger, and how to show up for something that isn't your immediate self-interest. These things don't reappear out of thin air. They are recovered through practice, through trying and through doing them badly at first, and then less badly, and then occasionally well. The action doesn't have to be heroic, or grand, it's the small, repeated, relational act of turning up. Of repairing something instead of replacing it. Of learning a neighbour's name. Of sitting with people and place, around something that matters and staying long enough for something to happen. You can't think your way to community. WE can only practice and respond to our attempts. ### **The last ism** Maybe ACTionism is the last ism. The one that points toward a world where we don't need them anymore. Where the doing speaks for itself. There's something paradoxical about it. Do we need a word to say we don't need words, a frame to say we don't need frames. One last ism to get us out of the habit of isms. The moment ACTionism becomes comfortable, settled, defined, defended, is the moment to worry. The discomfort is a feature, it means what we’re doing here is still alive, still resisting closure, still pointing away from itself toward the thing it's trying to describe. If you've read this far and you're still not quite sure what to make of it, that's exactly where we are, and that feels about right. ### Citizen Friday URL: https://www.actionism.space/citizen-friday/ Last updated: 2026-09-15T12:54:44.000Z ### The day formerly known as Black Friday, reimagined - celebrating connection, not consumption Every Friday, people all over the world are choosing to spend part of the day differently - doing anything that signals to others they're doing things differently, ideally with others. We like to think of it as Share, Repair or Get out in the fresh air, but there really are no rules! - Repairing instead of buying - Sharing instead of scrolling - Getting outside instead of getting a parcel **We call it Citizen Friday. Not a campaign, more like a weekly ritual. A chance to be a bit more human than the economy asks us to be.** **Our big push is on Friday 27th November** (funnily enough, it's the same day the rest of the world calls Black Friday**), but the ritual of #CitizenFriday happens every Friday, wherever you are.** **So on 27th November, we're inviting everyone who sees the world a little differently to get involved —** at the same time, but wherever you happen to be. In fields, around tables, in workshops, on walks, online — wherever you are in the world. Every Friday after that, it just carries on quietly, however you fancy it. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/09/Screenshot-2026-03-16-at-15.14.24.png) Forest floors, tables, community spaces, even car parks. Join us for a day of reclamation. ### **Find a gathering on 27th November** People have already added some really creative events to our map: Stitch hikes, print workshops, shared meals, communal naps (yes, really) and whatever else people have dreamt up. Find something near you, or host your own (see below) **The Citizen Friday Map -** *Scroll to find something near you. Click a pin for the details and how to say hello to the host.* Save a chair for the stranger. Actually, scrap that; go and invite them. No gathering near you yet? That's not a reason to sit this one out. --- ### **Host one - it only takes two to citizen** You don't need to be a particular type of person to host a gathering. You don't need experience, a budget, a plan, or anyone's permission. Fancy being a local host for 27th November? **Add yourself to the map**. We'll list your name, roughly where you are, and how people can find you. [**Sign up to host a gathering - Here**](https://tally.so/r/9q8XRX?ref=actionism.space) If you're stuck for ideas: repair something, share something, get outside. That's the whole recipe. Everything else is up to you. --- ****Join the online party** Can't get to a gathering, or you ****fancy connecting to the others** and wishing the global community a Happy Citizen Friday? There's a ****drop-in zoom** call open from 10am until 4pm GMT on the 27th. No agenda, just pop in whenever suits to say hello and celebrate with whoever's around. [Sign up here ](https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/1NFj0RgcT-i92GZNQlSWDg?ref=actionism.space#/registration) ### **Why it matters** Black Friday works because millions of people do exactly the same small thing on exactly the same day, spending money they don't really have on stuff they don't always need. No single purchase moves the needle. It's the pattern, repeated at scale, that shifts billions of pounds and decides what gets made, shipped, and binned. Citizen Friday runs on the same thinking, pointed the other way. One person mending a jacket on 27th November won't shake the world. Thousands of people doing it, on the same day, starts to look like something else entirely. > *"Billions of micro decisions, alongside some pretty big decisions - like basing an economy around the sole measure of GDP - have got us to this point. It will take billions of smaller decisions, which may encourage some bigger ones, before we start to head in a different direction. What that place is doesn't matter right now. What really matters is that we start the journey." Gavin Fernie-Jones* --- ### **What it actually is** **Repair something instead of replacing it. Share something, a tool, a skill, an hour, a lift, a meal, whatever's going. Get outside, even if it's just for ten minutes and a bit of a nosy at the sky. Even better, find people you know. Even better still, find people you don’t. Talk to one another. Be with each other. This is our humanity. This is our power.** No rules on how, or minimum effort required. Some Fridays it's a proper gathering. Most Fridays it's small, and honestly, that's more than enough. Because we know the others are doing the same thing, somewhere, right now. That's how we find the øthers. That's how we see one an øther. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/09/Screenshot-2026-03-26-at-17.36.07.png) A collective repairing and sharing session ### **Why every week after** The original Citizen Friday started as our answer to Black Friday. We ran it once, the first year, then realised once wasn't nearly enough. A single day makes a nice point. A weekly ritual quietly changes you, without you ever really clocking it's happening. So it carries on, every Friday, long after the big day's come and gone. ### **The magazine** Come the end of October, we're putting out a full issue of our magazine on Citizen Friday. Where it came from, stories from people who've been doing it for years and what it's changed for them, and a stack of ideas for gatherings you could run yourself. [Notify me when it's live, sign up to the ACTionism newsletter](#/portal/signup/free) ## Posts ### Let's get flexin' URL: https://www.actionism.space/lets-get-flexin/ Last updated: 2026-06-25T15:56:46.000Z An absolute delight spending last night co-hosting an ACTionism screening with my pal Beccy and fellow [Re-Action](https://re-action-collective.org/?ref=actionism.space) member in Walthamstow at [Big Penny](https://bigpennysocial.co.uk/?ref=actionism.space) with the folks at [Yonder](https://www.thisisyonder.com/?ref=actionism.space). Huge thanks for having us, and to everyone who came along and braved the 40-degree sauna-UK conditions. Proper heroic energy. It feels almost redundant to say it, but yes, it is blooming boiling in the UK right now. Discombobulatingly so. Not normal. I won’t linger there too long, but it really is front of mind what this could all spell for our future. ACTionism, for me, is a kind of antidote to that wider climate-heavy feeling. A way of not getting swallowed whole by the scale of things. It’s about shrinking the field of care, not as retreat, but as focus. Tending to what is right in front of you. Your people. Your place. Your patch. Not because the big stuff doesn’t matter, but because no one nervous system was designed to hold the whole planet at once. Instead, focus on what’s right under your nose. Your family. Your crew. Your street. Your neighbours. Your patch. The work that feels good for the soul. That’s where the real power is anyway. If there’s a future worth having, it’s being rehearsed right now in schools, gardens, community halls and street corners. Good stuff really is happening everywhere, all at once. The Earth will be fine. She’s endured far worse than us. Humans, on the other hand… we’re the perishable ones. So perhaps the sensible move is to get a bit better at being human together. When things get wobbly, people tend to find each other. They connect. They ACT locally on the stuff that really matters. They cook together, fix things together, plant things together, argue a bit, laugh a lot, and slowly build something resembling community again. That’s how a ripple turns into a wave. And that feels unstoppable, because community action changes everything. And if we are, in fact, heading to hell in a handcart… well, we might as well decorate the cart, bring snacks, have a boogie, and get to know the other passengers. No cavalry is coming. But that’s not actually bad news. It just means it’s us. And “us” turns out to be pretty capable when we remember we belong to each other. Last night felt like exactly that in action. A room full of people choosing to show up. To listen. To share. To not look away. Those small acts of attention and togetherness are not small at all. They are the rehearsal space for everything else. If there’s a future worth working for, it’s already being practised in rooms like that. In Walthamstow. In Big Penny. Grateful to have been in it with everyone there. There is so much good around. Some days it’s harder to spot, but it’s there. And once you start noticing it, it’s like a muscle you can’t stop using. Lets' get flexin’ crew. Massive thanks to everyone last night who reminded me of exactly what I needed to remind myself of. What matters is that we start, and that we don't start alone. ### Ellie Meredith [Find Others](https://www.actionism.space/findtheothers/) [Start Here](https://www.actionism.space/start-here/) [Watch the Film](https://www.actionism.space/the-film/) ## Sign up for ACTionism ACTionism is the art of taking collective action. Find ideas, get inspired, and discover your people on the ground. Subscribe Email sent! Check your inbox to complete your signup. No spam. Unsubscribe anytime. ![Image 1](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/13.png) ![Image 2](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/14.png) ![Image 3](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/1780594947751.png) ‹ › ### Is community a muscle we've stopped flexing? URL: https://www.actionism.space/is-community-a-muscle-weve-stopped-flexing/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T12:05:18.000Z ***Is it time we learned how to be in community again?*** When I set out on this journey with ACTionism, I thought it was simple. This platform and project would give people the inspiration — show them that there are other ordinary people who've stopped waiting for someone else to fix it and are doing amazing things themselves — and once everyone has seen how simple and joyful it can be, they'll all join the party. But that's not how it happened. And I've found that really hard to accept — to the point of feeling frozen. Recent conversations with Gav at Re-Action, and reflections on a workshop Olivia and I are designing for The Big Retreat, have got me thinking. While every small action and conversation is vitally important — sending ripples that will one day become a flood wave — right now, I am frustrated by the lack of measurable success and impact - but perhaps, as both Jon and Gav have come to show me, this is because I have spent too many years in the Consumer story - measuring everything, including my self-worth, by numbers and impact. I know this feeling from my work with clients. "I've written this amazing book with incredible ideas — how do I get everyone to read it?" And every time I remind them: It's not about vanity metrics - you don't need everyone to read it. You need the relevant and engaged people to read it. The ones it will actually move, impact or help. If it's an idea for everyone, the ripples will do their work. As is always the case, it can be hard to take your own advice. I've been feeling stagnant, stuck and blocked. Partly energy levels, partly a sense of failure that kept prodding me. In February, having spent six months taking part in Wintering — an in-person community of women who come together to honour the dark, be with nature through the season and emerge into the light of spring — I sat around a fire at our last session and listened to others talk of emerging refreshed and energised, many with new direction and focus. When it was my turn to share, I just cried. Feeling like I was failing - being pulled between ACTionism, this entity that is still very much composting, being slowly turned by the ecosystem around it, being there for my children who are navigating some pretty intense emotions right now, and for my 'work, work' - the one that pays the bills. It's also shocked me to realise I still have one foot in the Consumer story — measuring my success by output, delivery, productivity. Plus, I hate not knowing what is coming out of the compost. But, as Gav keeps reminding me, sometimes it's in the pauses that clarity emerges. **What I discovered in the compost** I've always been a talker. Nosy, which is probably why my first career was in journalism. Always unable to resist chipping into other people's conversations in coffee shops, sharing something I've learned or someone they should connect with. I even found myself telling my daughter's geography teacher about the Climate Majority project at parents' evening last week, because she mentioned how hard it can be to teach climate anxiety. But this week, I realised I'd been feeling really low - rarely leaving the house except for the school run. I don't talk to many people these days, unless you count my cats. So when I dropped my eldest at school after a medical appointment, I took a different road, stopped the car, and went to an independent café I'd never been in before. I tried to read my book, but found myself drawn into the conversation at the next table - a local group trying to figure out how to reach people about their Emergency Climate screening. Two things I know plenty about: bringing people together around important ideas, and community action. But I just sat there. Not interjecting or sharing. I felt numb, almost like I was standing on a diving board and couldn't make the leap. And for the first time in my life, I felt like I didn't know how to engage with people I didn't know — even though we had shared interests and lived within twenty minutes of each other. I am out of practice; I've stopped flexing my community muscle. And this made me realise that the barrier for so many people runs deeper than inspiration. Most of us simply aren't skilled at building and sustaining community. We've lost that muscle. For me, it's working from home, being self-employed, and being mentally exhausted by the gravity of the collapse we are living through. But for many others, social media has quietly done its damage too — stopping us from talking, from starting conversations face to face in the local café, making us believe we don't need to be in the same space to feel things. I know this personally. My husband and I have our best conversations via Messenger these days. We don't even call. We just text. That's not relational. That's transactional. And I think that's true for so many of us. **The biggest blocker that keeps so many people from stepping into their agency as Citizens and finding the others, isn't whether we care. It's our lack of skills for being in community, and without the guidance that elders once offered, too many of us don't know where to start.** ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/04/ACTionism-core-image-templates--79-.png) Tamasine's reflection on what ACTionism might mean - do you agree? ## **The part where I get to the point** While ACTionism continues to adapt, compost, and emerge, maybe that's what it is becoming: a way to hold people while they practise those skills. To create enough safety that, before they know it, they feel confident enough to chip into the conversation across the café — to find the others. But we've been looking at ACTionism from a place of inspiring rather than prescribing. When I once suggested devising a toolkit for Citizen Collective, Jon Alexander reminded me that the Citizen story doesn't prescribe - it's up to Citizens to choose their own path. And I believe that. But I've also seen that most people are between stories right now. We need more than inspiration. We need scaffolding. **I don't think people are passive because they don't care, but because they're so used to being told what to do.** The stories we showcase aim to light the spark — to show people that if they can do it, so can you. But perhaps we also need to help people reach the jumping-off point to action first. ## **What if what comes next is less about inspiring people to act and more about helping them flex the muscles they need to be in community?** > How to have difficult conversations. > How to find the others. > How to look honestly at what's stopping you from talking, sharing and showing up. > How to discover that there is real joy and safety in being in community. **So, my question is, is that the bridge that ACTionism has been missing? Not more inspiration. A way into practice.** ## But who wants and needs this most? I'm acutely aware of the risk of trying to build anything when you come from a place of privilege and a desire to 'help others'. People like me who call themselves 'changemakers' do so much good — and in equal measure, we can perpetuate the very hierarchies and harms we're trying to step away from. A movement about community that only ever reaches white middle-class people with the time and privilege to volunteer is not what the world needs. I want to be part of something that welcomes all, operates from real lived experience, and is diverse not as a tick-box exercise, but because it genuinely reflects the places and people embracing it. So what if the next chapter of ACTionism as a project isn't about inspiring *more* people, or creating a blueprint for community action, but about passing the baton via training facilitators in different regions — people with lived experience of the communities they're part of — to co-create the conditions for building community themselves? Not how to get funding, or sort the legal side of things, but how to actually find the others in the first place, who then train another local community - and so the ripples spread. ACTionism as a project provides the seed to get people talking and the scaffolding to help them grow. But how it lands, what it looks like, what it becomes — that is shaped by and belongs entirely to them, and they pay it forward to others who need some scaffolding support. Because what worked for Billy in East Marsh is not what worked for Parisa in Bromley. One started a weekly litter pick and went on to launch a community housing share offer. The other started as a conversation between local parents and went on to become a diverse, well-used community hub. Both found their people. Both went from there. Neither needed to be told what to do; they just needed the confidence to start flexing their muscles — and the willingness to embrace the unknown, welcome others in and build from there. ## **Got something to add to this?** If this has got you thinking about what your version of ACTionism might look like - or if you think you might be the kind of person who could help hold this space in your corner of the UK - [we'd love to chat](mailto:hello@actionism.space), the cats might even make an appearance! ;) ### Common Ground: A group of 'angry women of a certain age' is highlighting that we have more in common than divides. URL: https://www.actionism.space/common-ground-a-group-of-angry-women-of-a-certain-age-is-highlighting-we-have-more-in-common-than-divides-us/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T13:13:19.000Z Billionaires and the media use hate and fear to divide communities and win power. Social media has further segmented us - sorting us into neat boxes of "us and them." But a group of 'angry women' from Devon have decided to prove something else: we have far more in common than we think. "We're a group of angry women of a certain age, says Anthea Lawson. " We're not affiliated with any political party; we just know there has to be a better way, so we're out inviting people to have these conversations with us to show that we have more in common than we are told." At weekends, or whenever they can muster volunteers, the women take to the streets and set up a board of questions in a busy area. They stop people (who often seem relieved to be told they're not from a political party) and ask whether they want to come and talk about what's important to them. They then use a flip chart and stickers to shape and capture the conversations. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/01/image-6.png) **What's key is that these conversations aren't about winning arguments or changing minds - they're about revealing the shared concerns that unite us beneath the noise.** When it comes to politics, the Right/Farage, Trump, Musk, etc. divide-and-conquer strategy is simple: isolate single issues and exploit them. Meanwhile, the rest of us who care about so many different things, too often add nuance across so many issues that people struggle to know where they stand. The result? **We're fractured at precisely the moment we need unity.** But when [Common Ground](https://commongroundorg.co.uk/?ref=actionism.space) talks to people on the streets, something remarkable happens. Someone might say immigration is their top concern. Yet when the conversation deepens, they also care about taxes, climate breakdown, the cost of living, and protecting the NHS. They want these things addressed. And they discover something powerful: the person standing next to them - from a different postcode, perhaps a different faith, speaking a different language- cares about the same things. The sticker boards the team uses to capture the conversations show this. "We also ask people which of these issues affects them personally, and this question really seems to make people think. We had one lady come back the following week and bring her husband because she was keen for him to take part in these types of conversations too," says Anthea Simmons, Editor at West Country Voices and Founder of [Common Ground. ](https://commongroundorg.co.uk/?page%5Fid=46&ref=actionism.space) Anthea Simmons came to this work after becoming involved in the [South Devon Primary](https://www.southdevonprimary.org/?ref=actionism.space), a grassroots initiative to end 100 years of Conservative rule in the Totnes / South Devon constituency. "We ran our ‘democracy meter’ sticker polls on the streets and held ‘Town Hall’ meetings across the constituency to choose one candidate from the progressive parties behind whom to unite. You could call it a step up from tactical voting," says Anthea Simmons. "In July 2024, voters united behind Caroline Voaden, LibDem, and she defeated the Conservatives. And we decided to stay on the streets and keep listening and talking." The divisions we're hearing about are manufactured. The real issues - jobs, healthcare, climate, the cost of living - unite us. But solutions don't come from Reform or Far-Right narratives. They come from something simpler: solidarity, conversations, and a willingness to listen. **The street conversations that Common Ground are starting aren't about convincing or coercing anyone to change their view.** They're not about winning arguments. Sometimes people shift their perspective; sometimes, they don't. That's not the point. The point is simply to start talking - to show that beneath the noise, we're connected by the same concerns and the same need for real change. ## **How to Start Your Own Conversations** Common Ground wants to see boards and conversations like these happening on streets all across the UK. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/image-3.png) ## **Ready** to ACT: Here's how to join in: **Get trained and supported** – Common Ground are keen to speak to others who might want to do something similar where they live. They can teach you where to site your board, how to frame meaningful questions, and how to handle difficult conversations. Training happens via Zoom, or they'll come out with you locally if possible. **Gather the basics** – You'll need a flipchart stand, paper, coloured stickers, markers, sellotape, and a ruler. **Set meaningful questions** – Work together on questions that reinforce shared values rather than play into divisive narratives. Use local issues alongside broader ones. **Share and learn** – Common Ground want to hear from people on how they can spread this idea further and spark more of these uniting conversations, so this is the sign you've been waiting for to reach out! It's not complicated - it's ACTionism and collective action at work. **Ready to start?** [**Get in touch with Common Ground**](https://commongroundorg.co.uk/?page%5Fid=141&ref=actionism.space) **and start talking!** ### Why 'Finding The Others' matters even more following the UK Local Elections URL: https://www.actionism.space/why-finding-the-others-matters-even-more-following-the-uk-local-elections/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T12:02:31.000Z **Looking at the results of the recent local elections in the UK, it is becoming ever more apparent that we need to practise the art of 'Finding The Others 'and taking action together.** Whole communities voting for right-wing ideas that promise to fix what is broken — and we understand why. When you feel abandoned by the systems that were supposed to support you, when the high street is empty and the services are gone and nobody seems to be listening, the appeal of a simple story and a strong voice like Farage/Trump et al is real. But when you stop to ask why, is it actually that these votes stem from something entirely human: a craving for community, for belonging, for a sense that someone, somewhere, has a plan and that you are part of it. We don't believe that Reform, or any of the Right-Wing movements promising to 'make things great again', will deliver that. Not because the people voting for them are wrong to want safety, security, food, a roof, and healthcare — but because those promises are not designed to deliver them. They are designed to divide. When politicians and the billionaires backing them tell us our problems are caused by each other — by people who look different, think differently, came from somewhere else — they are doing so deliberately. Division keeps people from noticing where the power and the wealth are actually going. But when we stop waiting for others to fix things, we start to realise we had the power all along. We just did not always know how to use it. ## **We are not the only ones thinking this** Writing in the Guardian last weekend, [George Monbiot described ](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/may/07/technique-heal-britain-division-hard-right-radical-listening-constituency-volunteers?ref=actionism.space)[a group in South Devon called Common Ground](https://www.actionism.space/common-ground-a-group-of-angry-women-of-a-certain-age-is-highlighting-we-have-more-in-common-than-divides-us/) ([featured here](https://www.actionism.space/common-ground-a-group-of-angry-women-of-a-certain-age-is-highlighting-we-have-more-in-common-than-divides-us/)), led by Anthea Simmons and Anthea Lawson, that is doing something quietly remarkable. With an annual budget of under £400, volunteers set up a handwritten board on a busy street and invite people to add stickers to questions about the NHS, housing, immigration, and public services. No argument. No agenda. Just conversation — and the gradual discovery of what Monbiot calls 'a longing for kindness'. It is, he writes, an example of the kind of genuine, unhurried listening that actually shifts people, durably and meaningfully, in ways that no political leaflet ever has. ***This is ACTionism in practice, even if it does not carry that name.** ## **How to create the ripples** ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/05/image.png) Re-purposed T-shirts screen-printed for ACTionism and Re-Action Collective by Gav to wear at the Big Retreat - we're hoping the caption will start conversations about who the others might be! The good news is that so many communities already know how to find each other and act together. [East Marsh United](https://eastmarshunited.org/?ref=actionism.space) in Grimsby did not wait for a politician. They started with a litter pick, a few people who showed up, and a growing realisation that if anything was going to change in their neighbourhood, they would have to change it themselves. They have since launched a community share offer to create social housing across the town and now renovate wrecked houses and then manage the properties as compassionate landlords. [Coalville CAN](https://coalvillecan.coop/?ref=actionism.space) built something similar — a community that felt abandoned when the mines closed and disconnected from Westminster's priorities, so they acted from necessity, building a hub that now employs, supports, and connects local people. ACTionism is not here to offer another top-down solution. We want to help people remember that the power to fix things has always been in all of us — and to give people the language, the skills, and the permission to find each other and start. ## **Workshops in wider communities** We want to take these ideas to the communities that need them most right now, in the wake of the local elections. Can the practice of finding the others and acting together help restore trust and begin to heal the divisions that have been so deliberately fuelled? If that resonates with you — if you have ideas to help develop these workshops, or want to nominate your community as a test space — [we would love to hear from you.](mailto:hello@actionism.space) We'd also recommend listening to this episode of How to Save Democracy hosted by and Omezzine Khelifa, Jon Alexander 0:00 /3:51 1× This Ep of How to Save Democracy features Turkish writer and political commentator Ece Temelkuran to discuss her brave and beautiful new book, **Nation Of Strangers*. In a world unmaking our sense of safety and belonging, Ece offers something we desperately need: a vision of the future we can create together, requiring all of us. Her most powerful insight? The unhomed among us aren’t simply victims of our times. They’re pioneers, already carrying the know-how we need to build our new home together. ### Become an ACTionism Pollinator URL: https://www.actionism.space/become-an-actionism-pollinator/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T11:59:32.000Z **We're looking for ACTionists around the country who want to help spread the idea of finding others and taking action together, whether that's across a region, a field of expertise, or both.** We're a small group of enthusiastic dreamers who think we're onto something - **encouraging and facilitating people to step into their agency, find the others, and start taking action together.** But we can't be everywhere, and we don't know everything. The more the idea of finding the others and taking collective action takes root in different communities (and different sectors), the more the idea, the impact and the joy spread too. **That's why we're looking for Actionists around the country who want to help it spread, whether that's across a place, a field of expertise, or both.** This isn't a formal role with a job description and a set of instructions. It's an invitation. Maybe you know your city or region inside out — the people, the networks, the gaps, the energy. Or maybe you're deeply embedded in a sector like the circular economy, food, housing, or education, and you can see exactly how these ideas could take root there and cross-pollinate with others. **An ACTionism Pollinator is someone who knows their patch — geographic or otherwise — and wants to help people find each other and start acting togethe**r. > Maybe that looks like connecting two people who should probably meet. > Maybe it's putting your hand up when we get a speaking request, screening, or workshop enquiry near you. > Maybe it's carrying the ideas into spaces and conversations we'd never reach on our own — and letting them spread a little further each time. ### **What we're looking for** What matters is that you're genuinely interested in the ideas behind ACTionism, you like talking to people, and you'd like to help people embrace the ideas of finding others and taking collective action. You don't need any specific qualifications, and there are no targets to hit. We just want your enthusiasm and energy! At the moment, this role is voluntary, though we aim to offer a small fee to those who facilitate at any talks or workshops that we are asked to deliver. If you're an Actionist at heart and you'd like to help ACTionism take root and flourish, we'd love to hear from you. [Get in touch and let's chat](mailto:hello@actionism.space) ### Steps to finding the others URL: https://www.actionism.space/steps-to-finding-the-others/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T13:08:48.000Z So we've been thinking about what it takes to find the others, and we've landed on this as a starting point. Don't overthink it - you don't need a fully formed plan, funding or even a huge group of people - just start small! It is obviously different for everyone, but in a world that sells us the story that being busy and productive is the only way to survive, it can feel like there's no time to stop, connect, or act on the things we care about. But choosing to find your people and act together is where choosing to create a different story and an alternative future starts. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/05/Actionism-event-banners--1-.png) ### First Steps: Simple Ways to Take Action Now URL: https://www.actionism.space/first-steps-simple-ways-to-take-action-now/ Last updated: 2026-06-24T12:38:29.000Z ## **Taking your first steps towards collective action will be different for everyone.** For one person, it might mean reading or watching a video, for others, it might be having a conversation, doing a litter pick with friends or setting up a WhatsApp group for the local allotment. ### Here are some simple 'first steps' to inspire you Got 5-10 minutes: **Notice where you feel frustration:** "There has to be another way." **Grab some chalk and take it for a walk** \- see where drawing on the pavements takes you ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/11/COnciopus-craft-chalk.webp) **Put a "help yourself" box** of books, plants, or produce outside your home **Pin a "skills I can offer" card on a community noticeboard** **Read the original** [**Dance of Collective Action article** ](https://www.actionism.space/the-dance-of-collective-action-from-passive-consumers-to-active-citizens/) **Share your own "**[**aha moment"**](https://www.actionism.space/aha/) with one other person ### Got an hour: **Find two friends and invite them for a walk/litter pick.** Take some gloves and a bin bag for each friend and start collecting litter as you walk and talk. This is a great way to take action while also startin**g** conversations about things other than what to watch on Netflix. **Find a friend and some paint** \- go and spruce up a local bench near you ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/11/IMG_2424-scaled.jpeg) Leeds Civic Trust - Time to…Take a Seat bench **Set up a Street Chat group** \- use Signal or WhatsApp - knock on your neighbours' doors with a poster / QR code to join the group. **Here's a suggestion as to how to explain it to your neighbours:** *"Hi, I'm XX from number X. I'm setting up a street chat group where we can share resources and ask for things we need – like borrowing tools, recommendations for a plumber, or sharing surplus food. It's a simple way for us all to feel more connected and valued. The chances are it'll be just the start of something good for our street. Would you like to join? No pressure – just use it when it's helpful."* ### Got half a day: **Start a conversation in your community about a shared concern** and see where it takes you - go where people already meet - the library, the pub, the local repair cafe **Ask: What are the collective action movements already happening** in this space? **Map the six movements** of collective action in something you're already passionate about **Establish a regular skill-share evening** in your community (cooking, mending, tech help) ### **Got longer:** Create a street map showing who in your area offers what skills or items - include contact details and skills your community has to share Set up a toy library or Toy Swap for local families - [No Crap parties have some guides on how to set these up](https://nocrapparties.org/how-to-organise-a-toy-swap/?ref=actionism.space). ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/11/image.png) **Join something that's already moving** rather than starting from scratch - [#CitizenFriday](https://www.actionism.space/dont-shop-be-a-citizen/) is a simple place to start - Share, Repair, or get out in the fresh air at some point every Friday [**Attend an ACTionism connection call**](https://www.actionism.space/next-actionism-connection-call-9th-october/) to explore collective action across different domains [We would love to add to this list - so please drop us a message or connect with us on LinkedIn and share your best ideas to get started.](https://www.linkedin.com/company/actionism?ref=actionism.space) [Find us on Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/actionismcommunity/?ref=actionism.space) for more information and to find others who are ACTing ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/11/image-1.png) ### A Collective Care Workbook for Organisers URL: https://www.actionism.space/a-collective-care-workbook/ Last updated: 2026-06-24T12:37:23.000Z When we step into our agency as citizens, we often work tirelessly to effect change. And yet, we know first-hand that when care isn't prioritised, we can experience burnout, conflict, and harmful behaviours. Created and launched by Act Build Change, who are on a mission to grow the number of organisers taking collective action, this [Collective Care Workbook](https://docs.actbuildchange.com/collective-care-workbook?ref=actionism.space) is a fantastic tool to support anyone stepping into their agency to act, to strengthen and build collective care in their work and projects ## About the workbook This workbook is designed for community organisers but applies to anyone working towards change, and it is divided into theme-based sections. Each theme then contains teaching, activities and tools to build care in your organising: - Organising relationships and care. - Boundaries and organising. - Navigating stress and urgency. - Anti-oppression and intersectionality. - Joy and celebration. - Rest and recovery. - Building caring teams. Act Build Change wants to support more of us in caring for ourselves and one another as we act on the long arc of justice. How you build your team and who you build it with matter. How you take action, create a sense of belonging and deal with accountability and discomfort matters. *Act Build Change is a transformative community organising school that travels across the UK to support groups to grow teams, build power, and take action together. Transformative community organising is our approach, combining the strategic power-building of community organising with the sustaining practice of collective care.* [A Collective Care Workbook for Organisers | Act Build ChangeA tool to support community organisers to strengthen and build collective care in their organising practice.![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/icon/icon-1ab1976686e7360b15121619ed8ed2d4a7d86a6d07d10540b4320d33a142285f.svg)Act Build ChangeLatifa Akay![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/thumbnail/abc-ill-human-archway-v1-primary-0649577ef4d3288ffd7a3861c6c391c8b02e778d415df88c372097ac20048ec1.png)](https://actbuildchange.com/stories/a-collective-care-workbook-for-organisers?ref=actionism.space) ### How to Start a Repair Café URL: https://www.actionism.space/how-to-start-a-repair-cafe/ Last updated: 2026-06-24T12:39:11.000Z Repair cafés are community-run spaces where people bring broken items — from torn clothing and faulty lamps to bicycles and electronics — run by volunteers. Across the UK, they're already changing the way communities think about waste, skills, and connection. You don't need a large budget or a perfect plan to begin. Many successful repair cafés started with a handful of volunteers, a borrowed hall, and a handwritten poster. The real value is in the community it builds — people learning from each other, reducing waste, and finding connection over a cup of tea and a soldering iron. ## Find a Repair Café Near You Before starting your own, it's worth checking whether there's already something happening in your area. The **Community Repair Network** maintains an interactive map of repair groups across the whole of the UK, searchable by location at [communityrepairnetwork.org.uk/find](https://communityrepairnetwork.org.uk/find?ref=actionism.space). ## **Setting up your own Repair cafe** ## **1.Find a space** Start with what's already in your community. Church halls, libraries, community centres, and village halls are all well-suited — they tend to have tables, power sockets, and either low or no hire fees for community groups. Contact your local council to ask about grant funding or subsidised space; many councils actively support repair and sustainability initiatives. Aim for somewhere with good lightn ( so you can see what you're repairing well), enough room to spread out, and ideally a small kitchen for tea and coffee. A central, accessible location will make a real difference to how many people use the service. ## 2.Find the others You don't need experts in every discipline from day one - start with whoever you can find and build from there. Good places to look include local Facebook groups and Nextdoor, community noticeboards and parish newsletters, libraries a education centres. Be clear about what you're asking for: typically a few hours once a month and practical skills in areas such as sewing, electronics, woodwork, or bike maintenance. Many people are willing to help once they realise the commitment is not huge and as always, for many the appeal is in getting to spend time with others while giving something back. Its also worth chatting to others who are already ruinning a repair hub so you can learn from their experiences - the [Restarters community is a great place to start. ](https://talk.restarters.net/?ref=actionism.space) ## 3.Advertising Try social media posts in local community groups Flyers in libraries and on notice boards, a listing on the Repair Café International map at repaircafe.org, and a press release to your local paper — journalists are often keen on community sustainability stories. Local schools, scouts groups, and environmental organisations may also want to partner or send volunteers. ## 4.Look into insurance The Community Repair network have [lots of information](https://www.actionism.space/alfie-odd-job-doing-good-in-his-community/) on what you need to cover with reagard to Health and saftey and insurance when setting up a repair cafe. The Restarters community also has an[ excellent guide worth a read ](https://talk.restarters.net/t/guidance-safety-risk-and-insurance-at-community-repair-events/568?ref=actionism.space) ## Repair Cafés already running around the UK: These are just a few examples of Repair hubs/cafes in the UK that show what's possible. The **Hungerford Repair Café**, run by local environmental charity **HEAT Hungerford**, is a free community event where volunteers help repair damaged or faulty household items — clothes, furniture, electrical goods, garden tools, toys, and even items of sentimental value. Volunteers bring their tools and materials so that nothing has to be thrown away before it's been given a second chance. **Repair Café Wales** was founded in 2017 by Joe O'Mahoney, and Cerys Jones, frustrated with the unsustainable growth of landfill and waste. Their first café opened in the Cathays area of Cardiff and proved so popular that people were travelling from miles away to attend. The network has since grown to more than 130 repair cafes nationwide, with Welsh Government investment through the Circular Economy Fund helping to establish them. In London, **The Restart Project** was founded by Janet Gunter and Ugo Vallauri in 2013 to help people learn how to repair their broken electronics and rethink how they consume them in the first place. As well as running community repair events, the Restart Project campaigns for the right to repair and collects data from repair events to advocate for more sustainable product design. In Scotland, **Repair Café Glasgow** was founded by Jonathan Dawes on the principles of Repair Café International, with the aim of building social cohesion alongside reducing landfill waste. In Edinburgh, the[ **Edinburgh Remakery**](https://www.edinburghremakery.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space) — an award-winning environmental social enterprise — runs popular repair cafés in partnership with the Edinburgh Tool Library, working to reduce waste across the capital. ### Green and Cleaner Spotlight Write-up URL: https://www.actionism.space/green-and-cleaner/ Last updated: 2026-06-24T12:51:33.000Z What started as informal conversations in a pub has grown into a thriving community hub that's now influencing government policy and supporting over 30,000 people. In this Spotlight call, Parisa Wright, founder of Greener & Cleaner, shared the remarkable journey of creating a space in Bromley that meets people where they are - whether they're concerned about the cost of living, loneliness, mental health, or the climate crisis. **The key insights:** 1. Drop 'political' language in naming your hub 2. Choose accessible, mainstream locations (G&C is opposite the public toilets and near McDonald's), 3. Focus on peer-to-peer skill-sharing that brings people together. Now, with funding secured to create a Blueprint Package and establish a Community Sustainability Support Network for England, Greener and Cleaner is helping others across the UK explore whether a community hub model could work in their area. As participants on the call discovered, you don't need to build a hub tomorrow- every large-scale change begins with one small action this week, whether that's a conversation with a stranger, reaching out to an existing group, or simply chatting to someone in the school queue. You can watch the Spotlight call at the bottom of this page. **Call Summary:** **How Greener and Cleaner began - 2019** - Started with informal conversations between parents in pubs about climate anxiety - Created an A-Z of donation and recycling, shared on local Facebook groups - Initial meetings above a pub with people from across South East London boroughs - Deliberately chose "Greener & Cleaner" over "Climate Action" because the language of climate and action was already politically toxic and would exclude potential partners (councils, PTAs, residents' associations) **Core Philosophy:** - **Inclusive and accessible** \- not about poverty, not about age, for everyone - **Peer-to-peer skill sharing** \- workshops, events, knowledge exchange - **Non-judgemental space** \- meeting people where they are - **Visible action** \- people could see their community doing something tangible ### The Community Hub Model **Strategic Location Choices:** - Placed in The Glades Shopping Centre in Bromley (mainstream, high-footfall location) - **Opposite public toilets** \- to ensure families, elderly people, and those with health vulnerabilities feel comfortable - **Near McDonald's** \- "for the same reason McDonald's chooses to be near bus stops" - to signal this is for everyone, regardless of politics or lifestyle **Impact so far:** - Open five days a week for 3.5 years - Over 30,000 people through the doors - At least 50 per cent of visitors come for cost of living, mental health, loneliness, employability, or language reasons (not primarily sustainability) - More diverse than the borough itself - Research shows: 2/3 of Hub users reduced consumption; almost half reduced energy use at home **What the Greener & Cleaner Hub offers:** - Repair cafés and sewing workshops - Energy efficiency clinics - Library of Things (tool lending) - Community allotment and garden - Connect the Buds (18-25 year olds programme) - Carbon literacy training - Workshops on food growing, habitat creation, and upcycling - Support for micro-businesses wanting to be more sustainable ### Evolution of Language Originally called "Community Sustainability Hub" but now simply **"Community Hub"** because: - Over 50% of visitors come for non-environmental reasons initially - People go on a journey once they're engaged - Removes barriers and political associations - Reflects the reality that sustainability intersects with cost of living, wellbeing, and community resilience ### Current challenges of running the hub 1. **Mental health toll** on leaders (especially when working alone initially) 2. **Funding instability** \- project-to-project funding until recently securing multi-year grants from Lottery, Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, and City Bridge 3. **Staffing** \- needed paid staff to ensure reliability and safety, not just volunteers **Toxification of language** \- since 2022/23, sustainability and net zero increasingly portrayed as attacks on ordinary people ### Funding **G and C have tested out many different ways to fund their work includine** - Trusts and foundations (primary source now with multi-year funding) - Corporate offerings: lunch & learns, carbon literacy training, Climate Fresk, corporate volunteering - Limited community crowdfunding (once every 2 years to avoid overburdening the community during the cost-of-living crisis) - Small-scale sales of community-made items - Occasional ticketed events (theatre, comedy nights) The key learning has been that sales and small events don't provide sustainable income for salaries - you need a diversified approach, including multi-year grants. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/02/ACTionism-core-image-templates--64-.png) ### How to make the impact bigger - roll out the community hub model across the UK ### 1\. Blueprint Package Greener & Cleaner are developing a comprehensive template/blueprints package to encourage others to set up hubs like Greener & Cleaner. It is not let live but will include: - How to negotiate shopping centre/shop leases - How to secure zero rates - Workshop and activity ideas with demographic engagement data - Impact data and research findings - Template forms and slide decks - Carbon literacy training materials - Funding strategies and diversification approaches **Two ways to use it:** - You might want to set up a local hub from scratch using the blueoprint Or - Cherry-pick elements to strengthen existing organisations (expected to be 75-80% of use) ### 2\. **Free One-to-One Consultations** There is also the chance to work with Greener & Cleaner to access funded support for community groups, charities, grassroots organisations, and council officers to: - Explore whether a community hub is feasible - Get advice on specific elements (partnerships, fundraising, space selection, staffing, training) - Take the next steps on their journey ### 3\. **Community Sustainability Support Network for England** (CSSN) Launching April 2026 - Community groups across England often operate in isolation, with limited opportunities to share resources, collaborate on funding bids, or learn from each other's successes and challenges - unless they're part of specific models like Transition Towns or CECs. While Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland already have government-funded networks supporting grassroots sustainability work, England has lacked a central, non-branded space where groups can connect, share templates and research, and work together. The Community Sustainability Support Network (CSSN) that Cleaner and Greener is setting up aims to fill this gap. **CSSN plans to offer:** - Monthly gatherings for peer learning and case study sharing - Space for members to present challenges and get peer support - Highlighting funding opportunities - **Collaboration on funding bids** \- connect with groups doing similar work across England - Members-only resource library (tagged by topic: air pollution, elderly, cost of living, etc.) - **Public-facing map** of all member organisations so people can find local groups ## Want to set up something similar? ### Immediate ACTions: 1. [**Sign up here for updates,**](https://greenerandcleaner2.beaconforms.com/form/756b4081?ref=actionism.space)and you'll get notified when Cleaner and Greener's Blueprint is ready 2. **Request a free UK-wide one-to-one consultation** with Parisa if you're interested in: - Setting up a community hub or permanent space - Exploring feasibility in your area - Getting advice on specific challenges [Get in touch and express your interest for support here](https://greenerandcleaner2.beaconforms.com/form/756b4081?ref=actionism.space) ## Join the Community Sustainability Support Network (CSSN - launching March 2026) - [Sign up via the expression of interest form](https://greenerandcleaner2.beaconforms.com/form/756b4081?ref=actionism.space) - Network with groups across England - Access shared resources - Collaborate on funding bids ## Start your own Hub: **Before setting up something from scratch:** - See if you can join and exisiting group rather than duplicating effort - **Google and search Facebook** for existing groups using terms like "community sustainability" and "community climate" to find what's already happening in your area. - Check existing networks (Transition Towns, CECs) for local groups **If starting new:** - Have conversations with people locally (pubs, cafés, school gates) - Start with what people care about (cost of living, loneliness, health), not just the environment - Make it visible and regular - Choose accessible, mainstream locations and consider facilities to ensure inclusivity for all. - **Scale appropriately** \- could be a post office on Sunday afternoons in a small village, or 5 days/week in a shopping centre - Focus on peer-to-peer skill sharing - Keep language non-political and inclusive ### Small ACTions that SPOTLIGHT participants planned to do after the call: *"From that moment I realised that even the smallest step, that conversation with a stranger, or that moment of deeper connection with an acquaintance, could be the start of a much bigger journey."* - Reach out to a neighbour they've been meaning to connect with - Contact local community groups about collaboration - Attach a box of chalk to our village notice board - we've been 'taking chalk for a walk' this week inspired by Emma at [Playful Anywhere](https://www.actionism.space/the-power-of-play-breaking-barriers-and-building-community/) and I'd like others to join in - Explore using closed libraries or empty spaces for community activities - Chat to someone in the school queue about the call - Visit my local Repair Cafe to make contact with others who want to build a hub there - Reconnect with the Zero Carbon Guildford team and see if we can have another conversation around the power of pensions and collective actions. - [Host an Actionism film screening](https://www.actionism.space/want-to-take-an-action-today-host-an-actionism-film-screening/) - Connect with local "mappers" and networks - Start building resilience networks for those working in sustainability/community work What first action will you take today to make your community a happier, healthier, more inclusive and joyful place to live for everyone? **Here is the full Spotlight call (minus the breakout room chat)** Watch the full ****Greener & Cleaner Spotlight call** [Watch the whole call over on our YouTube Channel ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPCpjmmtP50&ref=actionism.space) ### Fordhall Farm, Shropshire: 1 farm: 8000 Landlords! URL: https://www.actionism.space/fordhall-farm-shropshire-1-farm-8000-landlords/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T20:04:59.000Z ## **Ever fancied owning part of your local farm? Well, here's how to get started.** When the Hollins family faced eviction from FordHall FArm - thier tenanted organic farm in Shropshire due to thier landlord seeking to sell to developers, legal costs quickly exhausted their limited funds and the future of one of the UK's pioneering organic farms looked bleak. That was until the farmer's children stepped in, launching a community crowdfunder that captured the local community's imagination — 8,000 people each contributed £50 to collectively buy the land outright, creating 8,000 co-owners overnight. This is ACTionism and collective action at work! **Listen to Screw This, Let's Try Something Else podcast for a deep dive into how the project was set up, and how you could do something similar where you live.** [Enter your postcode to find projects near you that you can get involved in ](.https://www.antidotelive.studio/near-you) Ford Hall has gone on to prove that this new community ownership model could work better, not only for farmers but all of us, too. Now they’re exploring how it can expand nationwide. Fordhall has become a landmark example of community-owned farming, and sits within a growing movement of nearly a thousand agroecological projects across the UK working towards a food system that is fairer, healthier, and kinder to the natural world. **Listen to the full podcast with Maryam Pasha and Matt Golding, as they go on a journey of the possible, to visit ordinary neighbourhoods doing something extraordinary. *Screw This, Let's Try Something Else offers* a deep dive into how the project was set up and how you could do something similar where you live.** [Enter your postcode to find projects near you that you can get involved in ](.https://www.antidotelive.studio/near-you) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/05/Episode-3_-Let---s-all-co-own-the-farm-next-door.webp) ### Finding the Others - ACTionism at The Big Retreat Festival URL: https://www.actionism.space/finding-the-others-actionism-at-the-big-retreat-festival/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T13:04:39.000Z ACTionism has always been a living thing. What started as a documentary, morphed into a magazine and storytelling platform, keeps evolving — shaped by every room it enters, every conversation it sparks, every person who discovers that they are not as alone in their caring as they thought. Each one creates a ripple that spreads and amplifies the power of finding the others. **But we're seeing that 'Finding the others' isn't as simple as it sounds - so we're experimenting with ways to make this simpler for people, first up by taking some ACTionism ripples to** [**The Big Retreat Festival in South Wales**.](https://www.thebigretreatfestival.com/darwins-den?ref=actionism.space) ## *New Workshop - ACTionism: The Art of Finding the Others* Tamasine and Olivia will be running some newly developed ACTionism workshops in Darwin's Den over the weekend. The workshop, which calling A*CTionism: The Art of Finding the Others* — is built around the idea that most of us care deeply about the world around us, but somewhere between caring and doing, something gets in the way. Life. Doubt. Not knowing where to start or who to start with. The workshop will explore the idea that the key to fixing things has always been in all of us, and yet for many of us, the **biggest blocker to taking action is not whether we care. It is that we are out of practice at being in community.** Most of us simply do not know how to start. We don't know how to: \> find the people who share our concerns, \> begin a conversation that matters \> move from a good chat to something that actually changes things. **So, that is what we are going to practise together**. We want everyone to leave the tent having met new people, with a clearer sense of what has been holding them back from acting in their own communities, and at least one concrete action to carry forward. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/06/PXL_20260524_112504248-2-1.jpg) ## **Re-Action Collective Workshops at The Big Retreat** Alongside the ACTionism workshops, we're joining the Re-Action Collective in Darwin's Den for the full weekend as part of their #CitizenFriday workshops - the tent will be open so people can drop in, make something, learn a skill, and contribute to a growing collective artwork that Gav is coordinating under the theme *Imagine the Future*. We're excited to see Joanne Cooke from [Revive and Revolve](https://re-action-collective.org/collective%5Fmembers/revive-revolve/?ref=actionism.space) running hands-on repair workshops in darning and invisible mending, and [Rebecca Evans](https://www.instagram.com/utilifolk/?ref=actionism.space) leading StitchHikes, and of course, Gavin and Heather, who founded [Re-Action](https://re-action-collective.org/team-members/?ref=actionism.space). The whole weekend will close with an awesome celebration of collective action- unfurling the collective artwork banner as a shared vision of what is possible when we find each other. So if you're coming along to Pembrokeshire at the end of May, do come and find us in Darwin's Den - and if not, but you'd like to find out more about workshops like these, [have a read here. ](https://www.actionism.space/why-finding-the-others-matters-even-more-following-the-uk-local-elections/) [We're also super grateful to Liza Lort-Phillips from Cymbrogi Futures for offering us space to deliver these workshops and test out our ideas. ](https://cymbrogi.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space) ## ## ### Preloved Sports: Kit for Everyone, Less for Landfill- here's why their story might just inspire your next ACTion URL: https://www.actionism.space/this-weekend-preloved-sports-are-at-the-london-marathon-running-show-heres-why-their-story-might-just-inspire-your-next-action/ Last updated: 2026-06-24T12:41:10.000Z ## **Preloved Sports: Kit for Everyone, Less for Landfill** While thousands of runners were picking up their race numbers at the London Marathon Running Show this April, one stand was doing something a little different — not selling the latest kit, but giving old kit a second life. [Preloved Sports](http://www.prelovedsports.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space) CIC were there among the 200,000 people who came through those doors, and the story of how they got there is worth telling. ## **How the idea started** Preloved Sports was founded in March 2021 by Michael and Natalie Hill, just as the country was emerging from lockdown and many were tentatively lacing up their trainers again. From the start, their focus was on helping people — specifically those who wanted to get active but couldn't afford the equipment. By collecting, reselling and redistributing donated sportswear at affordable prices, they set out to ensure that participation in sport didn't depend on your background or income. The happy consequence of that focus is that thousands of kilograms of kit that might otherwise have ended up in landfill found a new home and a new purpose. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/04/image-1.png) ## **They didn't start big - they just started** The early days were humble. On launch day, the entire stock sat in three plastic tubs. Today, the organisation (based in York, UK) operates from two lockups, with 20 supermarket crates and a growing mountain of donated kit. The team grew too — from founders Michael and Natalie, to a four-person CIC following the additions of Jack Slocombe in 2022 and Andy Norton in 2024. ## **What has the impact been so far?** The numbers speak for themselves. Preloved Sports processed over 750 orders and kept more than 2,300 kg of sportswear out of landfill through resale, redistribution and repurposing. Around 70% of donations were redistributed to charities and organisations supporting refugees, homeless people and young athletes - a remarkable ratio that reflects the community-first ethos at the heart of the CIC. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/04/image-2.png) ## **London Marathon Running Show** This month (April 2026), they stepped onto an even bigger stage with their first stand at the London Marathon Running Show at the Excel Centre — an event that saw 200,000 people pass through the doors. Preloved Sports are also part of our sister organisation, [Re-Action Collective](https://re-action-collective.org/collective%5Fmembers/?ref=actionism.space) — a growing community of almost 70 members who are all, in their own ways, challenging the take-make-use-dispose model of the sports industry. What makes being part of Re-Action so powerful is that members know they are not doing this alone. They found others to cheer them on, share ideas with, and draw inspiration from — and they brought just as much inspiration back in return. That exchange of energy between members is exactly what the collective is built on. ## **What could your version of three plastic tubs look like?** What started as three plastic tubs and a good idea became a CIC that keeps tonnes of kit out of landfill and gets it to people who need it most. Michael didn't set out with a grand master plan — he just took a small action, in memory of his dad, and kept going. So here's the challenge: what's the small action you could take? Maybe it's a bag of kit sitting in your wardrobe. Maybe it's a conversation with your running club. Maybe it's an idea totally unrelated to sport, but something you've been sitting on. Or maybe [you'd like to make a donation to the Preloved Sports fundraiser to help them increase their reach and impact.](https://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/causes/preloved-sports/?ref=actionism.space) **You don't need a lockup full of crates to get started. You just need to begin.** *Visit Preloved Sports and* [*check out their online shop of repurposed sports kit here.*](https://prelovedsports.org.uk/shop/?ref=actionism.space) ## ### Community Hub - Sparks Bristol URL: https://www.actionism.space/community-hub-sparks-bristol/ Last updated: 2026-06-24T12:43:19.000Z What if shopping could be an act of resistance? Tucked inside the old Marks & Spencer building on Broadmead, [Sparks Bristol ](https://sparksbristol.co.uk/about/?ref=actionism.space)is doing exactly that - reimagining what a high street space can be, and who it can serve. Created by [Artspace Lifespace](https://www.instagram.com/artspaceuk/?ref=actionism.space) and the [Global Goals Centre](https://www.instagram.com/globalgoalscentre/?ref=actionism.space), Sparks brings together ethical retailers, creative studios, co-working desks, and affordable event hire across three floors. [ Sparks](https://www.instagram.com/sparksbristol/?ref=actionism.space) has one clear aim: to hand the high street back to the people actually trying to change things. Walk through its doors on any given week and you might find a free bike repair clinic run by Bristol City Council's active travel team, a sewing group welcoming migrants and refugees, a seminar on food waste from a UWE professor, or a Climate Café where anyone - regardless of their knowledge or activism - can sit down with a biscuit and talk honestly about the crisis we're in. None of these things feels like a token gesture. They feel like bold acts and a great way to champion a different way of doing things! The building is organised into departments - but these aren't retail categories. They're a map of the issues and an entry point to actions we can all take to make changes in these areas. \> Fashion \> Reuse \> Energy \> Nature \> Imagination \> Community The Department of Energy [Sparks Bristol](https://sparksbristol.co.uk/?ref=actionism.space), for instance, is where the CHEESE Project runs pop-ups helping people find the cold spots in their homes, and where Climate Cafés create space for solidarity and honest conversation. The Department of Reuse hosts a weekly Repair Café, run by No Small Thing every Sunday, where broken things are fixed rather than binned. **The message is consistent and practical: the answers to big systemic problems often start with small, skilled, communal acts.** ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2026/03/image.png) Nowhere is that more evident than in the Department of Fashion. Fashion at Sparks isn't about buying more. It's about wearing what you already have for longer, learning to fix it yourself, and understanding why that matters. ## Brand new Slow Fashion Studio This month (March 2026) sees the launch of the Slow Fashion Studio — a new workshop space and reclaimed fabric shop from [Rethrindle ](https://www.instagram.com/re%5Fthrindle/?ref=actionism.space)CIC and [Rebel Patch](https://www.instagram.com/rebel.patch/?ref=actionism.space) \- joining a floor already home to visible mending workshops, a resident sustainable fashion stylist, and an LGBTQIA+ Little Free Library. In April, Sparks is taking part in the Bristol BID Care and Repair Festival, with a packed programme of free workshops covering jewellery repair, Palestinian embroidery techniques, mosaic-making, cycling skills and clothing repair. > What Sparks understands is that activism doesn't only happen at protests and petition tables. It happens when a community shares skills, when a building refuses to be complicit in waste, when a high street space prioritises people over profit. **In a city centre increasingly shaped by the same chains and the same logic, Sparks Bristol is a stubborn, joyful, practical argument that things can be different.** You can find Sparks at 78 Broadmead, Bristol. ### How social cinema and community workshops transform audiences into movement builders URL: https://www.actionism.space/how-social-cinema-and-community-workships-tranform-audiences-into-movement-builders/ Last updated: 2026-06-24T12:45:16.000Z **What if the most powerful stories about change are told together? Discover how social cinema and community workshops transform audiences into movement builders.** Take a look at this recording of Tamasine (ACTionism co-founder) and Alex (Founder of[ 99p Films](https://www.99pfilms.com/?ref=actionism.space)) talking about this at the recent **Communicate Conference.** Set up by the Natural History Consortium, is a charitable collaboration of 13 organisations working together on a shared mission: engaging people with the natural world through collaborative action. **Why does this matter?** Because the best stories about change happen *with* communities first, not after. This session explores how telling stories through collective viewing builds momentum and agency. --- ## Sign up for ACTionism ACTionism is the art of taking collective action. Find ideas, get inspired, and discover your people on the ground. Subscribe Email sent! Check your inbox to complete your signup. No spam. Unsubscribe anytime. ### Funded Support To Set Up Or Improve Your Own Community Hub URL: https://www.actionism.space/funded-support-to-set-up-or-improve-your-own-community-hub/ Last updated: 2026-06-24T12:54:12.000Z **After six years of building Greener & Cleaner - a community hub in a Bromley shopping centre that's supported over 30,000 people with everything from energy efficiency advice to sewing workshops, repair cafés to mental health support - founder Parisa Wright has secured funding to share everything they've learnt so you can set up or improve your own community hub** Whether you're just curious about what's involved or ready to turn an idea into reality, there's funded support available to help you take the next step. **Greener & Cleaner is offering three ways to support you in setting up or improving your hub** > a comprehensive Blueprint Package with everything they've learnt over six years, > free one-to-one consultations to help you scope out what's possible in your area, > a new England-wide network launching in March 2026 to connect you with others doing similar work. Whether you're just curious about what's involved or you're ready to start turning an idea into reality, there's support available to help you take the next step. ### 1\. Blueprint Package Parisa is developing a comprehensive template/blueprints package to encourage others to set up hubs like Greener & Cleaner. It is not let live but will include: - How to negotiate shopping centre/shop leases - How to secure zero rates - Workshop and activity ideas with demographic engagement data - Impact data and research findings - Template forms and slide decks - Carbon literacy training materials - Funding strategies and diversification approaches **Two ways to use it:** - You might want to set up a local hub from scratch using the blueoprint Or - Cherry-pick elements to strengthen existing organisations (expected to be 75-80% of use) ### 2\. **Free One-to-One Consultations** There is also the chance to work with Parisa to access funded support for community groups, charities, grassroots organisations, and council officers to: - Explore whether a community hub is feasible - Get advice on specific elements (partnerships, fundraising, space selection, staffing, training) - Take the next steps on their journey ### 3\. **Community Sustainability Support Network for England** (CSSN) Launching March 2026 - Community groups across England often operate in isolation, with limited opportunities to share resources, collaborate on funding bids, or learn from each other's successes and challenges - unless they're part of specific models like Transition Towns or CECs. While Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland already have government-funded networks supporting grassroots sustainability work, England has lacked a central, non-branded space where groups can connect, share templates and research, and work together. The Community Sustainability Support Network (CSSN) that Parisa is setting up aims to fill this gap. **CSSN plans to offer:** - Monthly gatherings for peer learning and case study sharing - Space for members to present challenges and get peer support - Highlighting funding opportunities - **Collaboration on funding bids** \- connect with groups doing similar work across England - Members-only resource library (tagged by topic: air pollution, elderly, cost of living, etc.) - **Public-facing map** of all member organisations so people can find local groups ## Want to access the support? ### Immediate ACTions: 1. [**Sign up here for updates,**](https://greenerandcleaner2.beaconforms.com/form/756b4081?ref=actionism.space)and you'll get notified when Parisa's Blueprint Package is ready 2. **Request a free UK-wide one-to-one consultation** with Parisa if you're interested in: - Setting up a community hub or permanent space - Exploring feasibility in your area - Getting advice on specific challenges [Get in touch and express your interest for support here](https://greenerandcleaner2.beaconforms.com/form/756b4081?ref=actionism.space) ## Join the Community Sustainability Support Network (CSSN - launching March 2026) - [Sign up via the expression of interest form](https://greenerandcleaner2.beaconforms.com/form/756b4081?ref=actionism.space) - Network with groups across England - Access shared resources - Collaborate on funding bids ## And if you want to learn more about Cleaner and Greener, [take a look at this Spotlight](https://www.actionism.space/green-and-cleaner/) conversation captured in January 2026 ## ### The Power of Play: Breaking Barriers and Building Community URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-power-of-play-breaking-barriers-and-building-community/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T13:43:07.000Z **It's time we remember that play is not frivolous but fundamental to finding our people and taking meaningful action in our communities.** Here are the key ideas that we explored during our 2025 spotlight call with Emma Bearman from Playful Anywhere - [you can watch the full call here. ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PR0zGTvGulY&t=1s&ref=actionism.space) ## Play as a Barrier-Breaker Emma reminded us that play disarms. Unlike formal activism or community meetings, which can feel intimidating or exclusionary, play invites participation without demanding ideological commitment. Emma described her mission as ***"if we can imagine it together, we can make it"*** \- a philosophy that hinges on collective imagination as something we urgently need in these times. When people play together, they shed their armour. A chalk drawing on a pavement, mud pies, or bubbles don't require membership, credentials, or prior knowledge. They just require presence and curiosity. This accessibility can be transformative. Play happens in the gaps of ordinary life - on the school run, in the park, on your street. It doesn't ask permission. It doesn't require funding or special equipment. A stick becomes a walking companion, a crown, or a conductor's baton depending on who picks it up. This unpredictability is precisely what makes play so effective at breaking down the walls we build between ourselves and strangers. ## Play as Community Organising - Play is how you find your people. When someone notices playfulness happening in their neighbourhood -a child building something creative, neighbours lingering in shared spaces - play becomes a language that says "I'm here, I care about this place, and I'm interested in connection." Window signs declaring "Play welcome in this neighbourhood" transform streets into visible communities of practice. Emma emphasised the power of observation as the first step: noticing where play is already happening, where curiosity is being ignited, and who else is drawn to those spaces. The second step is catalytic action - **doing something small that invites others to join.** Taking a chalk for a walk or creating a simp, a playful intervention, doesn't require organisation or coordination. It simply requires the willingness to be visible. These acts of play are magnetic for people turning strangers into collaborators. ## Play for Parents, Teachers, and Community Members For adults - parents, teachers, and community organisers - play offers a permission slip to slow down and create space for imagination alongside those we care for. In a world obsessed with productivity, play is radically counter-cultural. It signals that we believe imagination matters, that relationships matter more than efficiency, and that joy is not a luxury but a necessity. Parents and educators can model this. When adults play, we show children that play belongs to all of us, not just the young. We demonstrate curiosity and openness. We create conditions in which others feel safe to be playful, too. Teachers and those looking to connect with others in our communities can use play as a gateway into deeper conversations and connection - it's often easier to talk about what matters whilst doing something together than sitting across a desk. ## Where Play Leads The real power emerges in the collective. Individual acts of play - noticing, inviting, participating - create the fabric of communities where people know one another, trust one another, and eventually organise together. Play is where that journey begins. It's the Trojan horse that carries something essential into spaces where walls once stood. ## Ready to ACT? Play-Based Actions to Try in Your Community **Observe and Notice** Start by noticing where play is already happening in your neighbourhood or workplace. What traces of playfulness can you spot? Where is curiosity being ignited? Who else seems drawn to those spaces? Keep field notes of what you discover. **Take a Talk for a Walk:** Invite someone to talk whilst doing something playful together—walking, drawing with chalk, making something in mud. Conversations flow differently when you're not facing each other across a table. You don't need to hashtag it or announce it; just do it and see what emerges. **Find Your Stick:** Identify something simple and tactile that brings you joy and resets your mood when the world feels overwhelming - a walking stick, a piece of driftwood, a smooth stone. Use it as a companion and an invitation for others to engage with play. **Create a "Play Welcome" Sign:** Display a window vinyl or handmade sign in your window saying "Play welcome here" or "Play welcome in this neighbourhood." This is a visible signal that you're part of a community that values play and invites others to join. **Connect Street Play:** Look into local street play initiatives or create your own informal spaces where children and adults can play together without permission or formal organisation. Simple things like chalk, bubbles, or building materials can transform a pavement. **Slow Down and Imagine Together:** Create intentional space - even just 15 minutes - where you and others (family, colleagues, neighbours) can imagine something together without worrying about productivity. What could you make? What could you build? What would you dream up if there were no rules? **Invite Playful Action:** Do something small and playful in your community, then step back and notice what happens. Does it catalyse others to join? Do conversations start? Play is contagious. **Document and Share:** Collect stories and observations from play happening around you. Share them with your community. Show others that play is real, valuable, and already happening in their communities. [Playful Anywhere](https://www.actionism.space/ts-domestics-cleaning-up-their-community-one-street-at-a-time/) is a Leeds-based social enterprise with a mission to catalyse creativity, inventiveness and playfulness, where we work, live and travel. [Find out more about their work here. ](https://www.playfulanywhere.fun/?ref=actionism.space) ### Seen a story of ACTionism IRL? We want to share it URL: https://www.actionism.space/seen-a-story-of-actionism-irl-we-want-to-share-it/ Last updated: 2026-06-24T12:55:46.000Z **We're building ACTionism as a community, and that means we need you. Not as passive readers, but as contributors, storytellers, and collaborators.** If you're doing collective action work- big or small - we want to help spread the word. **Your story could be exactly what someone needs to hear to realise they can act too. Or maybe** **Here's how you can get involved:** **Share a story.** Write something for our positive story hub, or tag us on [Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/actionismcommunity/?ref=actionism.space) or [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/tamasinemcaig/?ref=actionism.space). We'll cheerlead for you and help amplify what you're doing. It could be a project you are working on yourself, or something you've seen that you think is an excellent example of ACTionism already taking place. **Nominate amazing work.** Know a project or organisation doing brilliant things? Tell us about them. DM us on [Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/actionismcommunity/?ref=actionism.space), email us, or tag us in their work. We want to celebrate and showcase the people driving change. You can also [message Tamasine on LinkedIn with any links](https://www.linkedin.com/in/tamasinemcaig/?ref=actionism.space) **Write with us.** Have something to say about collective action? We'd love to collaborate on a piece for our community. **Just share.** See something inspiring? Tell us about it. Every story shared helps spread the message that the power we need is collective action - and it's already happening around us. **Work with us:** We're always keen to hear from anyone who is up for working with us - from Social Media posting to writing for our story hub - we have a tiny pot of money to cover this, but are up for chatting! **Get in touch.** [Email us,](mailto:hello@actionism.space) tag us on Instagram, mention us on LinkedIn, or use IG or LI to tag us or to send us a DM. Can't wait to hear from you [Tamasine ](https://www.linkedin.com/in/tamasinemcaig/?ref=actionism.space) ### How Ordinary People Start Movements That Actually Change Systems URL: https://www.actionism.space/how-ordinary-people-start-movements-that-actually-change-systems/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T20:00:27.000Z # You've noticed a problem. It bothers you. You've mentioned it to friends, vented about it online, maybe even lost sleep thinking about how things could be different. But then comes the paralysing thought: ***Who am I to start something?*** You're not a business person. You don't have funding. You're not sure you have the right skills. You're already stretched thin with work, family, and life. You don't have a ten-year plan or a five-person team. **So the idea stays an idea. But what if that's not actually what's required?** In a recent conversation with Isabele Mack (who built [Party Kit Networ](https://www.partykitnetwork.org/?ref=actionism.space)k from a single Facebook post into an international lending library of reusable party equipment) and Charlotte Mason-Kerr (who created [No Crap Parties](https://nocrapparties.org/?ref=actionism.space), now reaching thousands on a shoestring budget and passion), we asked them to help us think through this challenge. **What would you tell someone who has an idea but feels completely unprepared to make it happen?** Their answers were remarkably consistent. And remarkably encouraging. Both have now registered as Community Interest Companies. Both reach thousands of people. Both operate on tiny budgets with volunteer teams. Both started with something simple: a Facebook post, a conversation, or a website built in their spare time. And neither of them had a master plan when they started. What they did have was clarity about the problem, a willingness to take one small step, and an understanding that you don't need permission or perfection to begin. **You just need to start.** Here's what they learned along the way -and what you need to know before you launch your own idea into the world. 1. **Start absurdly small.** You don't need a website, a CIC status, or a marketing degree. Begin where you are with what you have. Post in a local Facebook group. Create an Instagram page. Organise a coffee morning with interested neighbours. 1. **Know your problem inside out.** Isabele suggests you answer: what's the problem you're happy to stand on a soapbox and rant about? That clarity helps you stay focused and helps others understand what you're trying to do. 2. **Use your existing skills.** Both have marketing backgrounds, but that's not essential. Can you bake? Organise? Write? Whatever you're good at becomes your contribution. 3. **Find your ally.** You don't need to do this alone. Find one person who believes in the idea and can support you (even just by responding positively when you take your first public step). 4. **Ask boldly.** Isabele needed an accountant and asked in a Facebook group—someone volunteered her time for five years without ever meeting her in person. [Charlotte asked The Times for coverage and got it.](https://www.thetimes.com/life-style/parenting/article/mother-who-bans-birthday-gifts-children-nrljh0q30?ref=actionism.space) If you don't ask, you don't get. 5. **Show, don't tell.** Rather than arguing that parties should be different, both show what's possible. They share stories and examples of other parents doing it successfully. Seeing it done builds confidence. 6. **Get into physical spaces.** Online work matters, but showing up matters more. Attend local meetings, go to community events, be visible. 7. Perhaps the most powerful insight: you don't need to build something massive to create change. One person borrowing a party kit, one parent trying gift guidance, one friend inspired to do the same - these aren't small wins. They're the beginning of a culture shift. As Isabele says, some people start party kits without ever joining the official network. They run them in their school community. That's okay. The waste is still avoided. The conversation is still happening. **If you've been thinking about starting something but felt held back, this is your sign.** **The only qualification you need is caring about a problem and a willingness to take one small step.** **Your ripples might inspire someone else's waves.** [You can read and watch the full interview we did with Isable and Charlote here](https://www.actionism.space/how-two-parents-are-transforming-party-culture-lessons-from-party-kit-network-and-no-crap-parties/) ### Something to watch: How Two Parents Are Transforming Party Culture URL: https://www.actionism.space/how-two-parents-are-transforming-party-culture-lessons-from-party-kit-network-and-no-crap-parties/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T20:06:05.000Z In a recent Actionism Spotlight session, Isabele Mack from [Party Kit Network](https://www.partykitnetwork.org/?ref=actionism.space) and Charlotte Mason-Kerr from [No Crap Parties](https://nocrapparties.org/?ref=actionism.space) shared their inspiring journeys of tackling waste in children's celebrations. [You can watch the whole 45-minute interview here](https://youtu.be/ehyBFJ6uKHc?ref=actionism.space) or read the [ highlights of our chat, all you might want to know about their movements and how to get involved](https://www.actionism.space/how-two-parents-are-transforming-party-culture-lessons-from-party-kit-network-and-no-crap-parties/) ## The Problem Both initiatives address the enormous waste generated by children's parties: single-use plates and cups, plastic party bag tat, and unnecessary gifts that end up in landfills. But more importantly, they're challenging cultural norms around how we celebrate. ## Three Ways to Take Action Right Now If you're hosting or attending a party, the[ No Crap Party Pact](https://nocrapparties.org/?ref=actionism.space#PACT) offers three simple steps (you don't have to do all three): **1\. Ditch the plastic party bags.** Use secondhand items, homemade treats, or sustainable alternatives instead of single-use tat. **2\. Offer gift guidance on invites.** Simply suggest "no gifts necessary," request secondhand items, or ask guests to contribute towards an experience or charitable donation. **3\. Give more sustainably.** When bringing a gift, opt for pre-loved, homemade, or experiential gifts rather than new plastic toys. [Party Kit Network ](https://www.partykitnetwork.org/?ref=actionism.space)complements this by making reusable tableware accessible -you borrow plates and cups rather than buying disposables. ## How They Got Started (And You Can Too) Isabele's **journey** began with a friend's Facebook post about plastic-free toilet roll. That sparked enough curiosity to lead her to [Jen Gale's Sustainablish podcast ](https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/sustainable-ish/id1383805328?ref=actionism.space)about party kits. Within weeks of posting in a local parents' Facebook group asking "Does anyone know of a party kit near here?", she'd found one, learned how it worked, and decided to offer one herself. The growth was rapid: 40 members by August, 250 by Christmas. By the pandemic, she'd registered Party Kit Network as a Community Interest Company (CIC). **Charlotte's awakening** came through climate literacy training that made her realise the future impacts on her children. After organising toy swaps for four years, she attended a "sustainable" friend's party where plastic party bags were handed out—that was her tipping point. Using her marketing background, she created a website, launched on Instagram, crowdfunded £1,600, then secured a lottery grant of nearly £10,000\. She's now also registered as a CIC. **The key lesson? Both started by identifying a specific problem they cared passionately about, then leveraged the skills they already had.** ## The Tricky Bits (& how both Isabell and Charlotte are managing them) ### Social pressure is real Parents worry about being judged for going against convention. Both founders have experienced this, particularly in new social groups like school WhatsApp chats. Charlotte's solution: find an ally first. Before posting to her daughter's class group, she asked a friend to review her message and commit to responding positively. This prevented silence and gave her confidence. The reality? Most people secretly agree with you but won't be the first to say so. ### Building community is harder than you'd think Isabele discovered that communities are surprisingly disconnected. She's only recently, after running her own kit since 2019, had multiple kits out every weekend—and only because she started attending physical spaces: Parents for Future meetups, council meetings, local events. The digital work alone wasn't enough. ### Funding is a genuine challenge Neither project has significant income. Isabele spends roughly £2,000 annually (mostly website costs and software), covering it through donations, her local party kit's income, and occasional speaking fees. All team members work for free. Charlotte raised funds through crowdfunding and a lottery grant covering roughly one day a week of her time—nowhere near what she actually spends. Both struggle to balance their unpaid passion projects with paid work. ### Measuring impact is harder than counting signatures Charlotte initially stressed about pact signatures, but realised the real impact lies in the ripple effects—the conversations happening, the stories coming back from parents, the culture shift. Isabele sees this too: party kit members she'll never know about, people discovering local sharing libraries through searching for party kits, and behaviour changes spreading beyond what's visible. ## What's next? Both are intentionally staying focused rather than chasing shiny new ideas **Party Kit Network's focus for the coming year:** PKN want to help existing kit runners get their kits used more frequently, and develop a sustainable funding strategy that could eventually become her paid role. She's deliberately not expanding the mission - the network doesn't need more features, just better use of what exists. **No Crap Parties** are trying to secure funding to cover dedicated time (Isabele currently spends about two days a week on this projectt, unpaid). They also plan to develop partnerships and sponsorships with aligned organisations, and eventually broaden the conversation from children's parties to gifting across all occasions. Want to see the SPOTLIGHT as it happened? [Watch the whole 45 minute call here ](https://youtu.be/ehyBFJ6uKHc?ref=actionism.space) ## [How to Start Your Own Movement](https://www.actionism.space/how-ordinary-people-start-movements-that-actually-change-systems/) If you've got an idea but feel intimidated by the scale, complexity, or lack of skills, here's what both Isabele and Charlotte recommend: **Start absurdly small.** You don't need a website, a CIC status, or a marketing degree. Begin where you are with what you have. Post in a local Facebook group. Create an Instagram page. Organise a coffee morning with interested neighbours. **Know your problem inside out.** Isabele suggests you answer: what's the problem you're happy to stand on a soapbox and rant about? That clarity helps you stay focused and helps others understand what you're trying to do. **Use your existing skills.** Both have marketing backgrounds, but that's not essential. Can you bake? Organise? Write? Whatever you're good at becomes your contribution. **Find your ally.** You don't need to do this alone. Find one person who believes in the idea and can support you (even just by responding positively when you take your first public step). **Ask boldly.** Isabele needed an accountant and asked in a Facebook group—someone volunteered her time for five years without ever meeting her in person. [Charlotte asked The Times for coverage and got it.](https://www.thetimes.com/life-style/parenting/article/mother-who-bans-birthday-gifts-children-nrljh0q30?ref=actionism.space) If you don't ask, you don't get. **Show, don't tell.** Rather than arguing that parties should be different, both show what's possible. They share stories and examples of other parents doing it successfully. Seeing it done builds confidence. **Get into physical spaces.** Online work matters, but showing up matters more. Attend local meetings, go to community events, be visible. ## The Ripple Effect Perhaps the most powerful insight: you don't need to build something massive to create change. One person borrowing a party kit, one parent trying gift guidance, one friend inspired to do the same - these aren't small wins. They're the beginning of culture shift. As Isabele says, some people start party kits without ever joining the official network. They run them in their school community. That's okay. The waste is still avoided. The conversation is still happening. If you've been thinking about starting something but felt held back, this is your sign. The only qualification you need is caring about a problem and a willingness to take one small step. Your ripples might inspire someone else's waves. ### Read our full guide [How Ordinary People Start Movements That Actually Change Systems](https://www.actionism.space/how-ordinary-people-start-movements-that-actually-change-systems/) \- the ACTIonism guide to starting a movement that creates systemic change when you've no idea where to start. --- **Want to get involved?** Visit [Party Kit Network](https://partykitnetwork.com/?ref=actionism.space) to find or start a kit near you, or explore their reusable party equipment lending library. Sign the [No Crap Parties Pact](https://www.nocrappparties.com/?ref=actionism.space) to commit to more sustainable gifting and parties. Or start your own initiative - the world needs more people willing to challenge the status quo. Want to see the SPOTLIGHT as it happened? [Watch the whole 45 minute call here ](https://youtu.be/ehyBFJ6uKHc?ref=actionism.space) ### Pollinator Pathways Project URL: https://www.actionism.space/pollinator-pathways-project/ Last updated: 2025-12-19T16:36:51.000Z What happens when ordinary people decide their neighbourhood deserves better? In Bristol, they're creating pollinator-friendly green corridors—one action at a time. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/12/image-5.png) Meet the 'Pollinator Pathways Project' - a group of residents in Bristol transforming alleyways based on recommendations from the public. The project, set up by Flora Beverley in Bristol two years ago after a chronic illness left her unable to spend as much time in nature, aims to create pollinator-friendly green corridors throughout Bristol’s urban areas. > As Flora says, "We believe that small changes on a neighbourhood level can lead to powerful collective impact." To get started Flora received a £ 250 grant from the Knowle West Alliance to convert one of the alleyways into a more wildlife-friendly space. " I organised the first weekend in September, and we got masses of help from, not only volunteers, but people donating planters and plants, too” The Pollinator Pathways Project is a community-led initiative that transforms alleyways into mini wildlife corridors and community spaces. > [ View this post on Instagram ](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DL7yHK8BVjD/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) > > [A post shared by BBC Bristol (@bbcwest)](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DL7yHK8BVjD/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/12/image-4.png) **How can I get involved?** Volunteer ops are shared on [this page](https://www.instagram.com/backtobristol?e=a08f80c7-f520-4781-89df-19bf152647b9&g=5&ref=actionism.space) \- they are only every few months, but any volunteering is hugely appreciated! **Can I nominate an alleyway?** [You can also find our more about the project and nominate an alley for clean up and planting ](https://www.actionism.space/the-cost-of-building-alone-why-actionism-needs-you/)on the project's website. **Who maintains the project/waters, etc.?** The project is done in collaboration with each local community, which creates a sense of ownership over the work. After we leave, it’s maintained by the people who live in the area. We’ve only had one plant casualty out of hundreds! **Why remove ‘weeds’ if you’re trying to support pollinators?** This project balances the needs of the community & council with the needs of nature. Any plants blocking access have to be removed, not just because paths need to be useable, but also because they will be sprayed with weed killer if they aren’t manually removed. We remove only what’s necessary, and are actively trying to change the council’s policy on weed spraying, but change takes time. **Why murals?** Bristol is known for its strong art and street art culture, and murals are a celebration of that. They also showcase local talent (all the artists are Bristol-based) and brighter walls are also safer in the dark. ### READY TO ACT? This group of volunteers are building pollinator highways through the city. Not through policy. Not through waiting. Through people showing up and doing the work. This is what collective action looks like. **Could you do something similar where you live?** ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/12/image-3.png) Credit: Pollinator Pathway Project All the alleyway transformations are made possible by a small army of volunteers. The decision-making is led by a dedicated committee of 14 local residents passionate about the community and the environment. - ### The Cost of Building Alone – Why ACTionism Needs You URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-cost-of-building-alone-why-actionism-needs-you/ Last updated: 2025-12-19T10:58:26.000Z This weekend, I attended my first Ecstatic Dance evening in a disused church. A room full of people. Two and a half hours of dancing as I've never danced before – fully aware of those around me, but not looking at them. Just being held in community with them, sensing their presence as we moved through the space, each on our own journey. Very different journeys. I allowed my body to guide my moves. I came out of my head and felt my way through the evening with my feet, my heart, and the vibrations in my soul. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/12/image.png) Image taken by Ecstatic Dance Berkshire\` In our opening circle, I set an intention: creative clarity and freedom. And in that room, surrounded by strangers moving together and yet alone, I felt something shift. You can be in a room full of strangers and still have a profound experience without saying a word. There's something so powerful about the presence of others – even when we don't know them. We know that we share the same desire for change, for connection, for a better world. That's enough. I came out of that church realising something I needed to admit: I've been trying to build ACTionism alone. And you can't build community on individual effort. You need to dance in the presence of others. My dance experience might have felt individual – each of us on our own journey – but I am sure if you looked at the group as a whole, you could see the patterns. The weaving. The interconnectedness of the minds, bodies, and moves that took place. Creating a bigger ripple across the room. **That's collective action.** ACTionism is built on a simple truth – collective action creates change. Yet I've been holding something close for weeks now. **Right now, I'm trying to nurture this movement alone.** My Ecstatic Dance experience revealed the cost of that. ### **Here's what happened**: For now, over the last few months, much pf our small team has shifted its energy elsewhere. Gav and Heather are both refocusing their amazing energies on ReAction Collective. Heather said: “I was sad to have to take the decision to stop working on ACTionism, but between that, Re-Action and my paid work, I was feeling spread very thin. I just couldn’t give as much of myself as I wanted. When I realised I had to make a choice I chose Re-Action due to my role as co-founder and my conviction that this is the work I was meant to do. That’s not to say I didn’t love uncovering all the inspiring stories of citizen action through ACTionism, I really did and hope Tamasine can find the others to continue this important work.” - **Heather* Olivia has found a fantastic role that utilises her passion and expertise with the intersection of citizen participation and technology. I understand completely. This work matters. And so does everyone being able to pay rent and feed their kids. We'd had several funding bids in. None came through. Without funding to sustain this work, people need to put their energy where they can have both impact and joy – where they can survive. I'm still here, feeling a little lost and quite lonely. And that's the irony: I'm becoming disconnected from the very thing we've been trying to build – connection. **This is the hard reality of grassroots work without resources.** > Passionate people scatter because they need to eat. > Important projects pause because there's no funding. > Movements that create individual burnout will always collapse. **Help ACTionism start fresh in 2026** So, having taken a deep breath, I'm relaunching our Connection Calls on January 15th to rebuild this together. It's time to start 2026 as we mean to go on - in community and connection with each other. If you believe ACTionism needs to exist right now and you have skills or ideas you'd like to share, please join this call: 12.30 - 1.30 on Jan 15th. [Register for the call](https://luma.com/krlifizi?ref=actionism.space) If you believe in the power of collective action, please join this connection call to help us practise it – contribute skills, ideas, funding, whatever you can offer. > Come because you've felt lost too. > Come because we share a desire for change and connection. > Come because ACTionism can only work if it's built by a collective of people. Or just come to say hi, and tell me you'd like to fund our work! It's also a chance to meet others, also finding this both a challenging and rewarding space to exist in! [![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/12/ACTionism-core-image-templates--31--1.png)](https://luma.com/krlifizi?ref=actionism.space) [Register for the call](https://luma.com/krlifizi?ref=actionism.space) ### Grow Wild £2000 COMMUNITY GRANT URL: https://www.actionism.space/grow-wild-2000-community-grant/ Last updated: 2025-12-19T16:06:22.000Z Grow wild, the National outreach learning programme @KewGardens have just announced that the Grow Wild Community Programme is back for 2026! Grow Wild will be awarding 23 groups with £2000 to transform urban spaces across Northern Ireland, Wales, Scotland and England. Is your community group ready to... 🌱Connect local people with nature? 🌱Transform an urban space with planting? 🌱Learn more about UK native plants and fungi? [Find out if your group is eligible & apply here ](https://growwild.kew.org/community-programme?ref=actionism.space) Applications close at 3pm, Wednesday 4 February 2026. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/12/image-1.png) 📷Bethnal Green Nature Reserve by Ines Stuart-Davidson © RBG Kew ### Join our Live Spotlight: Parisa Wright - Greener & Cleaner URL: https://www.actionism.space/join-our-live-spotlight-parisa-wright-greener-cleaner/ Last updated: 2025-12-11T11:50:49.000Z **​NEW DATE: ACTionism Spotlight: Parisa Wright - Greener & Cleaner** **ACTionism Spotlight Calls will now be held on the last Friday of the month: Jan 30th 2026 - 1-2 pm GMT.** [**Sign up here**](https://luma.com/5bpnbp4h?ref=actionism.space) Join us for an inspiring and interactive session with Parisa Wright, [founder of Greener & Cleaner,](https://www.greenerandcleaner.co.uk/?ref=actionism.space) who is building local sustainability and resilience in South East London while developing a Blueprint for systemic change across England. **What started as a meetup above a pub is now helping influence government policy.** In this Spotlight, we'll explore: - Parisa's journey from Human Rights Lawyer through ITV to becoming a key strategic thinker in inclusive and accessible sustainability - Why what started off as a Community Sustainability Hub is now called a Community Hub. - How putting the Hub next to the McDonald's and public toilets has been key to its success - How [Greener & Cleaner](https://www.greenerandcleaner.co.uk/?ref=actionism.space) is paving the way for other groups to set up their own Community Hubs Whether you're working in community development, wrestling with how to make community action genuinely inclusive, or curious about what systemic change looks like from the ground up, this session will challenge you to consider what's possible when you put people's day-to-day reality at the centre of your work. We'll hear from Parisa, and also spend time in small groups to help you find one action you can take during the session to move you from paralysis to purpose. [Sign up for the join us on this free spotlight call here](https://luma.com/5bpnbp4h?ref=actionism.space) ### How to host an ACTionism film screening - downloadable guide URL: https://www.actionism.space/how-to-host-an-actionism-film-screening-downloadable-guide/ Last updated: 2025-11-28T11:31:30.000Z ACTionism is built on the idea that change happens when we come together. We want to make it as easy as possible for you to host a screening and spark conversations in your own community. [Ellie Meredith,](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ellie-meredith05/?ref=actionism.space) who features in the film and regularly attends community screenings with Re-Action Collective, has created this guide to walk you through everything you need to set up your screening so everyone leaves inspired and ready to act collectively. The guide includes: 1. Curious about ACTionism? 2. What is a community screening? 3. How can I request a screening? 4. Where can I hold one? 5. Where do I share about it? 6. How to share about it 7. How much does it cost? 8. Who can watch it? 9. What can happen at a screening? Whether you're organising a small gathering with friends or a larger community event, this guide has you covered. [**Download the guide (PDF)**](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uc2ib5WlgAyMmIRjwlpQH3oegvB2B9v%5F/view?pli=1&ref=actionism.space) ### How your small actions can transform your community URL: https://www.actionism.space/how-your-small-actions-can-transform-your-community/ Last updated: 2025-11-26T10:58:11.000Z You've probably felt it before - that nagging sense that something in your neighbourhood isn't right. A pothole that never gets fixed. A neglected green space. Young people with nowhere safe to gather. Elderly residents feeling isolated. These frustrations can feel overwhelming because they seem too big for one person to tackle. But here's what most people don't realise: every significant change starts with someone taking a single action. Not a grand gesture. Not a perfectly formed plan. Just one person deciding to do something different. This is ACTionism - the philosophy that simple, cascading actions create systemic change - when we find the others and start! And you can start today, right where you live. ### The Cascade: From Frustration to Change Think of it like dropping a stone into a river. One ripple isn't much, but it spreads outward, touching everything around it. Let me walk you through how this actually works in practice. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/11/ACTionism-core-image-templates--17--3.png) ### Stage 1: Identify Your Frustration or Need Start here. What's something in your community that makes you think, "There must be a better way"? **Specific prompts to get you thinking:** - Is there a public space that's being underused or poorly maintained? - Do you know someone (or a group of people) who are being overlooked? - Is there a service or resource your neighbourhood desperately needs? - Have you noticed something that affects children, elderly residents, or vulnerable people? - What conversation do you keep having with friends or neighbours about what's "wrong" locally? Don't overthink this. Your frustration is valid. It's the fuel that drives action. **Action: Write down one thing that bothers you. Just one. Keep it specific to your actual neighbourhood.** ### Stage 2: Take Individual Action This is where most people get stuck. They think action requires a committee, a budget, or permission from someone in authority. It doesn't. Individual action means starting small and visible. You're not solving the entire problem—you're making the first move. **Specific prompts for your first action:** - Can you spend two hours this week addressing this issue yourself? - Who could you email, call, or visit to ask about this? - Is there a small, visible change you could make that shows others you're serious? - What information do you need to gather before taking the next step? - Can you document what you find (photos, videos, testimonies) to show the scale of the problem? **Examples:** Cleaning up a neglected community garden. Documenting potholes with photos and location data. Visiting a local councillor. Starting a simple survey asking neighbours what they'd like to change. Organising a small meeting in your living room. **Action: Commit to one specific action this week. Make it something you can actually do.** ### Stage 3: Have Conversations Your action will attract attention. Some people will be curious. Some might want to help. This is where conversations begin. Conversations are where movements are born. You're no longer acting alone—you're sharing your experience and inviting others into the picture. **Specific prompts for starting conversations:** - Who else has mentioned this problem to you? - Which neighbours or friends might care about this issue? - What local groups (schools, churches, community centres, sports clubs) have a stake in this? - How can you tell your story in a way that helps others understand why you care? - What would make someone you know want to join you? **Action: Talk to at least three people about what you're trying to address. Listen to their thoughts. You might discover you're not alone.** ### Stage 4: Find Others This is the exciting bit. You'll discover that other people share your frustration. They've been waiting for someone to start. Now they can join you. Finding others transforms you from a lone voice into a movement. **Specific prompts for building a group:** - Is there a local Facebook group or WhatsApp chat where you could mention what you're doing? - Are there existing community organisations you could approach? - Could you invite people to a simple gathering (coffee, a walk, a park meeting)? - What would make it easy for someone interested to actually show up and help? - How can you make participation feel achievable for busy people? **Action: Host or invite people to one gathering. Keep it simple. Tea and a quick chat count.** ### Stage 5: Regular Collective Action Now you have a group. The real work begins. This is where consistent, sustained effort creates lasting change. Collective action doesn't mean everyone has to do everything. It means showing up regularly, sharing the load, and staying committed. **Specific prompts for keeping momentum:** - How often will you meet or coordinate? (Weekly? Fortnightly? Monthly?) - What specific tasks need doing, and who's willing to do them? - How will you celebrate small wins to keep morale high? - What's your system for communicating between meetings? - How will you welcome new people who want to join? **Action: Schedule your next group meeting or coordination session. Make it a regular thing.** ### Stage 6: Realise Your Power As you work together over weeks and months, something shifts. You'll start to see results. A neglected space transforms. A local issue gets media attention. A councillor finally takes action. Your voices are being heard. This is when you truly understand your collective strength. You're not just complaining anymore—you're creating change. **Action: Take a moment to recognise what you've achieved together. Document it. Share it.** ### Stage 7: Systemic Change The final stage is when your action influences broader systems. A successful community campaign becomes a model. Local policies change. Other neighbourhoods copy what you've done. The system itself starts to shift. This might take months or years. But it starts with that first frustration you had. ## Your First Step This Week You don't need to understand the entire cascade right now. You just need to start at Stage 1. **Here's what to do:** 1. Spend 15 minutes identifying one frustration or need in your community. Be specific. Be local. 2. Write it down. One sentence. 3. Identify one small action you could take this week to address it or understand it better. Something achievable. 4. Do it. **That's it. You've begun.** You've started a cascade. You won't see all seven stages happen overnight. But every significant change in every community started exactly like this - with one person frustrated enough to act, brave enough to try something different. What's your frustration? *What issue in your community makes you think there must be a better way? Share it in the comments below. You might inspire someone else to act—or find an ally who's been thinking the same thing.* 💡 Tell us: What issue in your community makes you think there must be a better way? ****Share it in the comments below.** You might inspire someone else to act - or find someone else who's been thinking the same thing. ### How to find your people to start taking action together URL: https://www.actionism.space/how-to-find-your-people-to-start-taking-action-together/ Last updated: 2025-11-21T10:15:37.000Z **ACTionism - the art of finding your people and taking collective action - but how exactly do you find your people to start taking action together?** **Here are our top tips from communities and groups already flourishing in the art of ACTionism.** **Step 1: WAYS TO DISCOVER WHAT OTHERS CARE ABOUT** **Listen actively:** - Talk to people - be curious about what frustrates them, but also what lights them up! - Pay attention to recurring complaints or concerns you hear in conversation - Ask at community hubs - libraries, cafés, community centres - what are people concerned about - Look at community Facebook groups and Nextdoor to see what people are discussing and worrying about **Observe and notice:** - Walk around your area - what needs fixing? What are people already doing? - Check notice boards, social media, and local council agendas for issues people are raising - Notice informal conversations at the school gates, parks, shops **Start small conversations:** - Have casual chats with neighbours, friends, and people at the school gate - Ask: "What would make you feel better about where we live?" - Share your own concern and see who relates to it **Do a simple survey:** - Create a WhatsApp group or email asking: "What's one thing you'd like to see change locally?" - Post on local Facebook groups asking what's frustrating people - Use an online form (Google Forms works well) or knock on doors and ask your neighbours what bothers them - this is how Lawrence Weston got started (see below) --- ### CHECK OUT THESE GROUPS OR INDIVIDUALS THAT STARTED WITH ONE SMALL ACTION AND BECAME POWERFUL MOVEMENTS OF COLLECTIVE ACTION ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/11/ACTionism-core-image-templates--20-.png) **East Marsh United (Grimsby)** In 2017, a neighbour encouraged Billy Dasein to attend their council meeting: "Our mam's would have gone." At the meeting, residents vented frustration about housing, unemployment, and drug abuse - but councillors had no solutions. Billy stood up and offered something different. Using the Broken Windows Theory (visible decay drives further decay), he proposed: "I just said we should get together and clear up, simple as that really. I got a round of applause, so I said to leave me your name if you're up for it." Fifteen people left their names. That action -consistent litter picks - built momentum and revealed the real issue: housing. Now they've renovated three boarded-up homes as social rental properties, and in 2022, they launched a community share offer to raise £500,000 for ten more homes. They also run arts programmes, a community magazine, and employment initiatives. **Connection point:** Council meetings and neighbourhood concerns about visible decay, which became an open invitation to perform a repeated action (weekly litter picks), during which connections flourished and ideas grew. --- ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/11/ACTionism-core-image-templates--22-.png) **Ambition Lawrence Weston (Bristol)** started in 2012 when residents noticed their community facilities disappearing. To understand what people actually wanted, they trained local residents to knock on every door in the estate with three questions: What's good about Lawrence Weston? What's not so good? What needs changing? Unlike top-down consultations, these neighbour-to-neighbour consultations led to a tangible five-year Community Development Plan. Next up, the community identified community-owned renewable energy as a solution. In 2023, they commissioned England's largest community-owned onshore wind turbine, which now generates over £100,000 per year to reinvest in fuel poverty support and community projects. They also built a £2.2 million community hub with energy-efficient design, a library, fitness facilities, and mental health support. **Connection point:** Community facilities closing sparked listening through door-knocking that helped to identify what people actually needed (warmth, income, community spaces) **Coalville CAN (Leicestershire)** was founded during lockdown as a Community Benefit Society (CBS) focused on community wealth. They took over unused office space and employed 68 young people through government schemes. Now they've created a creative hub with repair spaces, craft rooms, and galleries. Most recently secured £250,000 in government funding to own their community building debt-free, permanently keeping the space in community hands. **Connection point:** A conversation about community benefit societies - empty buildings - local people wanting change in their town --- **Party Kit Network** was founded in 2019 when Isabel Mack heard about reusable party kits on a podcast. She realised there was momentum—she found 40 existing party kits within 2 weeks. The Party Kit Network was born to connect them. Now, over 500 members globally have prevented more than 1 million single-use items from going to landfill. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/11/ACTionism-core-image-templates--21-.png) **No Crap Parties and The Kids Party Pact** was founded by Charlotte Mason-Curl, who experienced a rush of climate anxiety after giving birth to her daughter. Charlotte started by hosting a Toy Swap for local parents - a simple event where families could swap their children's outgrown Christmas gifts for free, avoiding waste and new consumption. The feedback was overwhelmingly positive. From these conversations and the realisation that parents were desperately wanting to break free from the gifting status quo (43% said buying presents for parties strained their family finances, and only 9% actually enjoyed it), No Crap Parties was born. The Kids Party Pact followed—a collective pledge in which parents agree not to give plastic-filled party bags, to give secondhand, homemade, or experience gifts instead, and to provide guidance on greener gifting. **What started as one mum's anxiety about the future became a movement of thousands.** **Connection point:** Personal concern (climate anxiety for her daughter's future) and noticing a shared frustration (parents dreading the gifting aspect of parties) This led to creating a simple test event (Toy Swap) that revealed real appetite for change --- ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/11/ACTionism-core-image-templates--19-.png) **Litter per Follower** Started by Samuel Salamone as an individual challenge: 100 pieces of litter picked for 100 days, shared on Instagram to inspire followers to do the same. He now has 853K followers and is growing into a social media-driven movement in which other individuals document their own litter-picking, sparking action across the world. **Connection point:** One person's personal challenge shared on social media and an invitation for others to join --- **THE PATTERN ACROSS ALL OF THEM** Notice what's common: - They all started with **one frustration or need** (visible decay, wasted parties, littering, empty buildings) - They began with **visible, repeated action** (weekly litter picks, starting a kit, documenting picks) - **Connection happened through showing up** (consistently being there, speaking about it, sharing it online) - The movement grew because people could **see it working** and felt invited to participate - Early wins (cleaner streets, connected parents, renovated homes) built momentum for bigger action ****None of these started with a perfect plan or a mass movement. They started because someone noticed a need, took action, and found their people.** [Got questions - reach out and we'll try to connect you with someone who can help ](mailto:hello@actionism.space) ### How do you make space in your life to decide how to step into your agency and start ACTing? URL: https://www.actionism.space/how-do-you-make-space-in-your-life-to-decide-how-to-step-into-your-agency-and-start-acting/ Last updated: 2025-11-13T12:57:34.000Z We all have them - ideas, dreams, things we want to start doing that will allow us to step into our agency and start shaping the world we want to live in - be that in our communities, with our family, or on a bigger scale, looking at how things could be done better in general. But then life happens. Work piles up. Days blur together. And suddenly those brilliant ideas are filed away, forgotten, buried under the header :busy. Sound familiar? I've been reflecting on this, and I realised: I don't need more ideas. I need to make space for the ones I already have. For me, I need strategies - real, workable ones - for stepping into my agency when everything feels urgent and nothing feels possible. So, I created a video diving into my thoughts on this and how nature is helping me (and yoga). But I want to know: what's your strategy? How do *you* make space to act when life gets in the way? Watch the video, and then let's co-create a list together. Your ideas might be exactly what someone else needs to hear. **Let's inspire each other.** *Want the full exploration? Watch the video below.* > [A post shared by ACTionism (@actionismcommunity)](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DQ%5Fmf4WjJH6/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) > [ View this post on Instagram ](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DQ%5Fmf4WjJH6/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) > > [A post shared by ACTionism (@actionismcommunity)](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DQ%5Fmf4WjJH6/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) ### What if the most powerful stories about change are told together? URL: https://www.actionism.space/new-event-what-if-the-most-powerful-stories-about-change-are-told-together-discover-how-social-cinema-and-community-workshops-transform-audiences-into-movement-builders-with-actionism-a/ Last updated: 2025-11-26T10:58:53.000Z **What if the most powerful stories about change are told together? Discover how social cinema and community workshops transform audiences into movement builders.** Communicate is the UK's leading conference for environmental communicators, taking place in person and online. Set up by the Natural History Consortium, is a charitable collaboration of 13 organisations working together on a shared mission: engaging people with the natural world through collaborative action. Join Tamasine (ACTionism co-founder) and Alex (Founder of 99p Films) on **26th November, 11.45–12.30 online as part of the Communicate Conference.** **Why does this matter?** Because the best stories about change happen *with* communities first, not after. This session explores how telling stories through collective viewing builds momentum and agency. **How to join:** Buy a digital pass for £30 and attend as many online events as you like across the three-day festival. Plenty of inspiration on offer. **Save the date, grab your pass, and come ready to think differently about how stories fuel action.** > **Ready to discover how social cinema and community workshops transform audiences into movement builders?** [See the full programme here, including the online sessions that can be viewed from anywhere after you register for just £](https://heyzine.com/flip-book/ced7118e8e.html?ref=actionism.space#page/1)30. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/11/image-2-1.png) ### ACTionism in Action Newsletter 20th November URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism-in-action-newsletter-20th-november/ Last updated: 2025-11-26T10:59:42.000Z ACTionism is about noticing what needs to change, finding your people, and making it happen. Not waiting for permission. Not hoping someone else will sort it. Just stepping into your own agency - with others - to create better spaces, places, and solutions. We want to share stories of people and communities doing exactly that. To show you what's possible, what's working, and how to start where you are (and meet the others keen to get involved too!) The point isn't to inspire passive awareness. It's to give you ideas, momentum, and to remind you that **all you need to do is pick one thing. Do something.** ## **SOMETHING TO TRY:** [Stop wondering what to do, and just do something](https://www.actionism.space/first-steps-simple-ways-to-take-action-now/) If you're anything like us, you might be feeling excited about stepping into your agency and doing things yourself instead of hoping someone else will. But then comes the moment where you wonder: "Where do I actually start? What's the right first move?" And we're happy to tell you: there isn't one. Your first step might be chalk on a pavement, a "help yourself" box, or a litter pick with friends. We've gathered simple first steps that actually work. Stop waiting for the perfect moment. [Pick one and go.](https://www.actionism.space/first-steps-simple-ways-to-take-action-now/) --- ## SOMETHING TO WATCH: T**he biggest wind turbine in the UK is owned by a community in Bristol** Imagine a future where communities own the power - literally. The people of Lawrence Weston built the UK's biggest community-owned wind turbine, bringing cheaper bills, cleaner air, and local funding for projects that matter. [Antidote Studio](https://www.antidotelive.studio/?ref=actionism.space) have captured their story. Watch it, then get involved in a community power project near you ( or set up your own!) [ Find out more here. ](https://www.antidotelive.studio/lawrence-weston-energy?ref=actionism.space) > [ View this post on Instagram ](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DRMl-qRiJQg/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) > > [A post shared by Antidote Live (@antidotelive)](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DRMl-qRiJQg/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) ## SOMETHING TO READ: [The cascade effect of simple actions (+10 ACTions to get you started) ](https://www.actionism.space/the-cascade-effect-of-simple-actions-10-actions-to-get-you-started/) What if weeding your kerb became a community project that led to owning a park and starting a local veg box scheme? Small actions don't feel small when they're collective actions. One action sparks a conversation. That conversation builds a connection. Connections become movements. And movements create real power and change. Read our guide[ for inspiration on how you can get started with 10 simple actions ](https://www.actionism.space/the-cascade-effect-of-simple-actions-10-actions-to-get-you-started/) ## **SOMEWHERE TO MEET THE OTHERS:** [**Discover how social cinema and community workshops transform audiences into movement builders**](https://www.actionism.space/new-event-what-if-the-most-powerful-stories-about-change-are-told-together-discover-how-social-cinema-and-community-workshops-transform-audiences-into-movement-builders-with-actionism-a/) Join [Tamasine McCaig](https://www.linkedin.com/in/tamasinemcaig/?ref=actionism.space) (ACTionism co-founder) and Alex Fish (Founder of[ 99p Films](https://www.99pfilms.com/?ref=actionism.space)) on **26th November, 11.45–12.30 online as part of the Communicate Conference.** Communicate is the UK's leading conference for environmental communicators, organised by the Natural History Consortium and held in person and online. **Save the date, grab your pass, and come ready to think differently about how stories fuel action.** ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/11/ACTionism-core-image-templates--15--1.png) ## SOMTHING TO TRY TODAY: [Set up a slow-down club](https://www.actionism.space/the-slow-down-club/) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/11/image-3.png) [Olivia Stamp ](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/oliviastamp?ref=actionism.space)shares how to set up the Slow Down Club. Born from a collective desire to find some relief from the pace of modern life, the Slow Down Club is simply a space to reflect and to imagine together. A co-creation of what life might be like with a little more ease, a little more peace, a little less *pace.* --- ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/11/ACTionism-core-image-templates--16-.png) We're searching the UK for stories that showcase ACTionism. Writers, content creators, filmmakers - if you've spotted an action worth sharing, we want to work with you. Get in touch. We're open to skills exchanges and other forms of collaboration. So if you've got an idea you'd like to share, a story you'd like to tell, or a Reel you'd like to make, [get in touch.](mailto:hello@actionism.space) Our ACTionism Contributor Guidelines [Learn more ](https://www.actionism.space/actionism-contributor-guidelines/) ## OTHER WAYS TO GET INVOLVED: Help ACTionism [find a sponsor](https://www.actionism.space/partner-opportunity-with-actionism-empowering-community-action-across-the-uk/) We're looking for a partner ready to invest in amplifying grassroots community action through our monthly Spotlight call series and associated content. [ACTionism Spotlight ](https://www.actionism.space/tag/spotlights/)calls are monthly live conversations with inspiring community actionists and organisations. Know someone who can help fund us? **Contact:**[Tamasine McCaig](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/tamasinemcaig?ref=actionism.space) --- ### The Slow Down Club URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-slow-down-club/ Last updated: 2025-10-23T05:50:44.000Z ### The Inaugural Gathering I invite you to join me on a rainy Sunday in October. Friends gather round an extendable table in a first-floor Brighton flat for a shared breakfast. Pancakes provided by the hosts: toppings provided by everyone else. Plates overflow with giant blueberries (“*I’ve genuinely never seen a blueberry that big”),* pancakes smeared with peanut butter and pistachio creme (“*Two pounds in Lidl, can you believe it?”),* and mugs of coffee clutter the table, mostly decaf as none of us can handle the strong stuff anymore (“*Is that one mine? No, I think that one’s mine, it’s a half and halfer”).* The jar of marmalade sits unopened next to me (“*To be fair Olivia, that was a rogue choice”).* We have gathered for the inaugural convening of the Slow Down Club. Also known as ‘Snail Club’ in certain circles (you know who you are). Born from a collective desire to find some relief from the pace of modern life, the first Slow Down Club is simply a space to reflect and to imagine together. A co-creation of what life might be like with a little more ease, a little more peace, a little less *pace.* I want to share the shape of the day with you because this is eminently replicable. I promised you that ‘Learning to Love Where We Live’ would not ask you to do Big Scary Things. I’ve even given up on asking you to have cold showers (shout out to my long-time readers). But I believe that every single one of you reading this could host a Slow Down Club session: whether that’s with your family, your friends or any other community who you think could benefit. My friend Sam guides us through the day, inspired by Rob Hopkins’ ‘[From What Is to What If](https://thebeautifultruth.org/life/creativity/rob-hopkins-imagination-from-what-is-to-what-if/?ref=actionism.space)’. For anyone unfamiliar with Rob and his work, it’s all about inspiring us to *imagine* in order for us to create the future we want to live in. Amongst the many crises that we bear witness to one of the least talked about is the ‘crisis of imagination’. Genuinely: when was the last time you took a moment to imagine a positive future that looked radically different from how things look today? And I don’t mean just imagining for yourself. This isn’t about manifesting your dream partner, or dream job, or dream holiday. This is about taking time and space to imagine a positive future for everyone that might look wildly different to how things look now. It’s not easy to do. We are all so tired, so overstimulated and overwhelmed that we struggle to imagine how different the world could look. When we do imagine a different world, it tends to be dystopic, fuelled by the endless negativity of the media or dark and frightening *Black Mirror* futures. As Frederic Jameson said “it’s easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.” And yet imagination is the key to so many of our current challenges. If we could allow ourselves and each other to imagine beyond the dystopic future that currently seems writ in stone then perhaps we might be able to change course, dream something new into being. Let us return then to our cosy Sunday gathering and friends committing to imagining something new into existence. Pancakes eaten, marmalade still unopened, we start by closing our eyes and listening to a vision of the future: Vison 1 0:00 /252.025729 1× > *Can you picture a softer rhythm to daily life? At night, laying a clear, relaxed head on a welcoming pillow. Uninterrupted dreams, sweet and sound. Waking up in the morning to the light, not the alarm. A stretch, a breath from deep in your belly, your first spot of attention drawn to a scent not a sight. You’ve still got a little sleep in your eyes. The phone stays tucked away. A communal breakfast. Pancakes, panfried, something warm steeping on the stove. The colours of the morning table are a rainbow of fruits, friends and feelings.* > *When was the last time you stopped to chat with a neighbour? Sharing stories, a helping hand and a well-intentioned smile.* > *Work still exists, but you know it won’t love you back, so you take it at a pace that is human, that is yours. You feel a sense of belonging and community when you walk through the doors. What you do, you are good at. What you do, brings you joy. What you do, is it good for others too? It makes others happy doesn’t it. I can see that for all of you.* > *Your bare feet accupressured by the undulating pebbles tendering your soles while you gazing at the ocean horizon. Here, you - don’t find time- you make the time to also tend your soul. You gaze down at your used, but gentle loving hands. Looking closely, you spot a little residue dirt under a nail from your last garden session. Or are you still feeling the softness of last night’s self-care routine – moisturised hands, a face mask and a book. Candles and incense of course. Sometimes this is about “me time”. But sometimes you share this intimate space with others.* > *Evenings invite rest and connection, playing music, cooking together, are you learning an instrument or a new skill?* > *Each day is punctuated by small rituals of gratitude like closing your eyes, taking long deep breathes, writing a note, taking time to breathe deeply before speaking. The pace of life allows for depth – about quality over quantity. It is about feeling. Every synapse tingling with the sensation of a grounded calm. In this way, we, all here, move through our days attuned to one another. And by one another, I don’t just mean humans.* > *The idea of productivity has shifted; attention and care are how we check in with ourselves. This is directed inwards as well as outwards. Strapping your oxygen mask first before attending to others. So long as you do also attend to others, there remains a healthy balance. Meetings with friends and families often happen outdoors, around shared meals or in circles that begin with a few moments of stillness – maybe a little silliness. Each mouthful is mindful. Except you’re not eating your nails anymore. With a bowl of warm food on your lap – we never begin without acknowledging our internal gratitude to everything and everyone that helped the bowl reach your hands. Chewing more than 15 times before your food begs to deep dive, please brush your teeth.* > *There are infinite potential ways we could choose to live our lives. Do these resonate? What do you see when you close your eyes? What motivates you being here, wanting to slow down?* > *We’re going to take a minute or so for silence and stillness to let some of these thoughts settle.* ### What Is? We sit around a simple piece of card. In the middle are the words ‘What Is?’. What has brought this group of people here today? From the global machinations of tech billionaires manipulating our brains to keep us addicted to the devices and applications they want to sell us to the daily feeling of just being quite overwhelmed to be honest. Or maybe they’re the same thing. We take a moment to think about this question. And then we begin to write: in all different directions and colours and sizes. Some of us draw instead of writing. A picture emerges: - PHONE ADDICTION - *Disconnection* - Nervous system dysregulation - My alarm clock rules my life - Constantly chasing dopamine hits - **OVERWHELMED !!!** But in the inbetweens the seeds of something else are already emerging, the things that we are already wanting and dreaming into existence: - I want to learn to embrace boredom - There’s so much to be curious about After we’ve spent a good few minutes writing, doodling and reflecting, we each share what we wrote and what brought us here. Colour, humanity and depth is added to the words. We learn about polyvagal theory and that most of us spend our life stuck in a “sympathetic state” colloquially known as the “fight or flight response” because the pace of modern life means that our systems perceive threats and danger even where there are none. Someone tells us about their intentions to pause before reaching for a screen to numb out the exhaustion of the working day and learn to just sit in the discomfort. I talk about my ongoing intentions to lean into curiosity and love rather than fear. And to stop going on Buzzfeed and taking “What kind of cupcake are you?” quizzes (red velvet, in case you were wondering). We take another few minutes to add to our co-created cardboard with reflections on what we’ve just heard and some of the more positive, warm and fuzzy feelings it’s created in us. New things appear: - “Brighton community” (in a heart) “new friends” (in a different pen, wrapped around it) - A snail - *Connection* ### What If? Now it’s time for the really juicy part. Allowing our imaginations to run rampant. Allowing ourselves to ask “What if…?” What if we had the time and energy to be creative every day? What if we regularly had intergenerational communal meals? What if we cared for each other through lending a hand when work is busy, and quiet hugs on sofas when energy is low? What if we all spent much more time outside? Ooh, what if we had wild lynx flourishing in the UK? Wait wait wait, what if a seagull and a lynx created some kind of incredible seabird wildcat hybrid!? Okay maybe not that last one. This is where the fun really begins. We have collectively gathered stacks of magazines and I mean *stacks.* It’s time to collage. I’ll admit, before I moved to Brighton, I hadn’t collaged in a very long time. It struck me as a bit childish, not something that very adult, very grown up women drinking wine in wine bars or going out to restaurants to catch up about work and love lives would do. Since I moved, however, I’ve realised that arts and crafts with pals is in fact an excellent way to spend time and something that I intend to do throughout my thirties and beyond. Whether it’s painting each other as vegetables (the image of me as a red-eyed cauliflower remains as a memento of me in my previous house), or creating something together, the act of using our hands and imaginations without it needing to be *good* or *for* something in particular is very joyful indeed. And so this is what we do together on that rainy Sunday afternoon. We dream into what our futures could look like and we cut words, letters and images from magazines to stick on the board around those all important words: *What If?* The sound of scissors, some big, some ludicrously small (“*All I had was my penknife! I left my other scissors in London.” “What on earth…”)*, slices through paper and air. Cut outs and unread articles litter the floor. The board begins to take shape and energy and excitement grows (*“What if we put this coming out of her head?”, “and what about this little dude, where should he go?”).* This is co-creation in the flesh, gluey-fingered, shouts of laughter and exclamations as everyone stands, shoulder-to-shoulder round the table (“*Guys, this is actually SO good.”)*. Once we’re done we stand back to admire our handiwork, looking at other corners where we haven’t been so involved, appreciating our creations all the more. Words and phrases leap out, mantras for the future we want to see, the *present* we want to usher into being. - “Permission to feel peace” - “Indulge in: pause, sleep, mellow, love” - “I love what I do every day” - “soul soup” For all of my faux-adult feelings about collaging, I have to say these ones are pretty awesome. They feel like a little rebellious act in the face of a media that tells us to feel sad, bad and mad. By the end we feel good, less 'should' and a little “maybe we could?”. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/data-src-image-7e44a398-ef74-41f8-b23b-a2b3879e0b05-1.jpeg) ![Collage image with a woman silhouette with rivers and people. The words say "Permission to feel peace"](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/data-src-image-8f711828-7aa2-4c0b-bfce-6e7d6f015773.jpeg) ![Collage image of a bee. The words say "Re-wilding the landscape in Britain? Really Wild? R-E-A-L-L-Y Wild"](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/data-src-image-41987b34-daf7-41f7-9ca8-9b9287cfd30a.jpeg) My personal favourite ### What Next? My grandmother and father have a wonderful phrase that I have heard many times in my life but never fails to resonate with me: “Strategy is the imagined deemed possible.” See how the act of imagining is core? In order for us to be able to get closer to a future we want, we must first imagine what that future might be. And then we must take actions to make it real, to make it possible. You can’t make it real all at once of course. You must start with a small step. Something that gets you a little closer and then another step that gets you closer still. This is easier when you have others around you. A step taken in isolation can feel intimidating, venturing down an unknown path and not sure what you might find underfoot. If you know that there’s another taking a step alongside you then it’s easier to wander into the dark. And in that spirit, we reach our final activity of the day. Energy has dipped after the tea and the excitement of the collaging, so we close our eyes and tune in for the second half of Sam's vision for the future. Vision 2 0:00 /315.602854 1× > *The power of small actions should never be underestimated. Slowing down is a radical act that ripples outward. Let’s fast forward to the year 2035 and much has changed. We still face social, environmental, economic and political challenges: inequality, unrest and AI, to name a few. But it can’t be ignored that we’re moving in the right direction. See, local currencies are thriving. Small businesses are becoming the norm. Footfall in market streets is the highest it’s been in generations. Urban farms are multiplying. Forests are expanding faster than they’re disappearing. Our more-than-human kin are returning to our coasts, waterways and streets. (David Attenborough, at the ripe age of 109, is still making documentaries about it.)* > *The invisible hand of the free market no longer grips; it only lightly tickles those chips on our shoulders.* > *What sort of values become the societal norm when we embrace a slower rhythm of life? And those everyday choices, multiplied across millions of lives, have shifted culture, economics, and even politics. The revolution didn’t begin with grand gestures.It began when we stopped rushing.* > *And the catalyst you ask? It was when you and your friends gathered, tearing into batter while drinking coffee in communion with the holy trinity of reflection, imagination, and action. The outcome being a crafted manifesto that aligned the stars, harmonized the universe, and attuned to the energy of the eternal slow down.* > *February 3, 2034 – the next time when we witness a planetary parade – the almost total alignment of seven planets in our galaxy – slowing down occurred on a scale never before seen. At this point, the pandemic became just an irrelevant bit of yesterday’s news. People’s average speeds halved overnight, 300000000% less energy was spent watching trash, 20000000000000 more hugs were shared compared to the previous day. And for the first time since the late 1700s when the Scottish engineer, James Watt’s contribution to the steam engine became the foundational technology that ushered in era of industrialisation, love and connection surpassed fossil fuels as the number 1 energy source. Interestingly, however, the unexpected happened… British politics was sent into a snap election with almost all parties dissolving effortlessly into a healthy state of chill. Tories – gone. Kemi Badenoch – more like Kemi’s in Bed with socks. Labour – gone. Sir Keir Starmer – more like Sir Here’s an Urban Farmer. Lid Dems – gone. Surprisingly. If there was ever a politician that embodies the fun, silly vibes it’s Ed Davey – ahem\* I mean more like Chillerman Head Wavey. Reform – sadly still going but only down to the one-man band of Farage. Shame because his name would have gone down a treat with a foraging-based pun. But from the ashes to challenge the nutty mania was Albert Einslime and Mary Anning-from-a-tree, the co-leaders of the new political party, Snail Sloths Slow Down Club.* > *In this two v one bake beaned up sauce fest fight between Reform and the Snail Sloths Slow Down Club, a future hangs in the balance. Nevertheless, it can’t be underestimated that Farage is outnumbered and the power of the collective always rests in the togetherness of connection and creativity. And so, together, between the slimey palm of Albert Snail and the death grip of Mary Sloth, they raise their manifesto, and it shows…* > *What does your slow down manifesto show? What is that world you seek to reimagine and rebuild? Whatever it is I am sure it is beautiful. Is the future one where we are harder to contact but when we do meet each other, our presence is unmatched. Our attention to one another is caked in adoring care, insatiable laughter and is totally undistracted. Is it one where we’d go to bed each night without screen time overloading our senses, fracturing our attention and depleting our mental reserves? What if silence was a state we could access at will so we can turn down external volume and turn up internal insight? What if green spaces were less than a hop, skip and jump away? What if it was possible to carve out more opportunities for creative hobbies? What if we, altogether, cultivated a life of gratitude? So, what do you see? Our motivations may be diverse and plenty. I know our lives truly are. Maybe it is the world that we reimagine and rebuild together. Welcome to the future – it is right here, right now. Present, intentional and in safe loving company.* After we have laughed and congratulated Sam for 'Albert Einslime', we get ready for our final activity of the day. I hold the pen to the last piece of blank card, noting and doodling what I hear so that others can just talk and share how they feel. We discuss what we might do next, what matters to us and how we might begin to show up slightly differently in the world. The conversation ranges from the concrete (reading together, creating together, playing together, “*You know, I’ve actually always wanted to try Dungeons and Dragons”*), to the ephemeral (patience and actually noticing the world around us). We come up with some guiding principles that feel important: **1\. We need to create spaces where people can come exactly as they are.** Somewhere along the way, recharging seems to have become a solo activity. Self-care spins the narrative that peace can only be found alone, that to be with others we must be energetic and funny and that if we are not feeling those things it will be better for all involved if we stay home. Can we create safe spaces for each other to exist in all our states, can we begin to create homes away from home? **2\. Making changes is easier together.** It’s a difficult thing to decide that you’re deleting Instagram or WhatsApp or that you’re going to introduce a phone free day when no one is doing it with you. It’s also hard to have a pot-luck on your own as it turns out. But having each other means being able to share challenges and wins, tips and alternative plans to scrolling the night away. **3\. It’s okay to try.** This part was twofold. All of us felt the need to rethink our relationships with productivity and perfectionism and this extends to the creation of Slow Down Club. We agree that it will emerge as it emerges at the pace that feels right. We agree that it’s okay if you put a suggestion out there and it doesn’t work out. It’s okay to say you’re going to watch the starlings and does anyone want to come and to not get a response. It’s okay. And so, with these principles agreed, a vague suggestion of when the next session should be (it feels wrong somehow to get our phones out to plan) the inaugural meeting of The Slow Down Club winds down. A group hug cements the feeling of connection. Boots go on feet, arms stuffed into winter coats (“*Thank you for having us! Those pancakes were genuinely delicious”),* unopened marmalade tucked safely back into bag,and the group disbands into the seaside gloaming. For now at least. So there you have it: your first challenge, should you choose to accept it. **Host your very own Slow Down Club.** You can use ours as a guide but feel free to be creative. Make it yours. If you've got kids then use this as an entertaining afternoon activity to think about what life would have been like before Peppa Pig and Bluey. If you're an organisation use it as a way to think about prioritising the important work over the urgent work. Because the first rule of the Slow Down Club? You talk about Slow Down Club. And if you do want to join our little snail revolution, please reach out and let me know, I’d love to hear about it. Oh and P.S. If you'd like to know what happened to that seagull lynx-hybrid, look a little more closely at the top right hand corner of the header image. Turns out anything is possible. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/IMG_2788.jpg) ### A Different Kind of Fight: The Story Behind a Collective Campaign URL: https://www.actionism.space/a-different-kind-of-fight-the-story-behind-a-collective-campaign/ Last updated: 2025-10-16T21:16:22.000Z A few weekends back, at the ACTionism Weekender, I found myself lying on the forest floor during a forest bathing session led by Jannine. Just an hour of quiet, an awakening of the senses, a settling of the noise. And when I stood up, something stayed with me: a message, clear as the wind through the trees. It was about the word **“fight.”** Not the aggressive, destructive kind, but a **constructive fight**. A fight for community. For connection. For those trees, for a slower, saner rhythm of life. That feeling has stayed with me, and I’ve carried it into the Citizen Friday campaign. The nature of our work, at ACTionism, the Re-Action Collective, and One Tree at a Time, is emergent, messy, community-led. That often means things move in unexpected directions, and I sometimes (quite often) find myself asking a lot from people who are already stretched. Recently, I shared some early campaign graphics for Citizen Friday in our networks. And… silence. At first, I took it personally. But then I realised, it wasn’t disinterest, it was capacity. Or lack of it. These are people I know deeply *want* to do this work. But we’re all navigating burnout, underfunding, and the sheer weight of trying to build something different with too few resources. And weirdly, that silence was what I needed. Because it helped me see what was right in front of me. We’ve *always* done this work collectively. We co-design outdoor gear at ReSki. We co-create community solutions at One Tree. At Re-Action we dream of a new outdoor community, together. At ACTionism, WE imagine new stories. So why not make **the campaign itself** collective? Why not reimagine the way we campaign? Then, last Tuesday, during an ACTionism Spotlight Call with Charlotte from No Crap Parties and Isabel from Party Kit Network, another moment of clarity dropped. They talked about the courage of simply **asking for help,** and doing it regularly. That was it. **The way this campaign becomes global is not by doing more alone, it’s by doing it together.** So that’s what we’re doing. Not just a campaign *for* citizens, but a campaign *by* citizens. --- ### So, what does a collective campaign look like? Honestly, we don’t know yet. But we’re going to find out. And it starts here, with 7 ways in: 🧵 **Share a story** \- about something you’ve repaired, shared, or felt connected to (don’t forget to tag it #CitizenFriday) 🎨 **Design a poster or sticker** \- DM us or tag someone with visual skills 🗳 **Join the conversation** \- we’ll be launching a Pol.is poll this week 🌲 **Plan a walk, film screening, or community event** for November 28 - get in touch if you’d like support 📣 **Share the campaign** with your group, organisation, mailing list or WhatsApp group 📬 **Sign up to the ACTionism newsletter** for weekly updates, actions and stories 📞 **Join our Citizen Friday Community Call next week** \- we’ll shape this campaign together Sign up for the community call, [here.](https://luma.com/0gswxjx5?ref=actionism.space) --- This is just the beginning. Let’s shape this thing, together. **What can you offer?** **What would you love to see?** **What could we create if this campaign was truly *ours*?** Today, Citizen Friday, I’ll be back in the forest, lying on the floor, looking up through the trees, and dreaming about what’s possible when we go, together. Who’s coming with US? ### Citizen Friday: Co-create with us URL: https://www.actionism.space/22nd-october-join-the-citizenfriday-co-creation-crew-and-weekly-call/ Last updated: 2025-11-14T12:54:29.000Z **Calling all citizens, pirates, trouble makers - come to our weekly plotting call to help co-create, activate and amplify Citizen Friday 2025** This is the **third year of Citizen Friday,** a grassroots, citizen-created campaign that primarily takes place in community spaces, workshops, and the outdoors. But this year, we’re thinking bigger. We have a dream. That Citizen Friday won’t just replace Black Friday in our lives, but that it might one day replace the *consumer story itself*. And to do that, we need **YOU**. This year, we’re making the campaign **collective**. **Crowd-sourced and citizen-led.** Which means shaping it together: asking questions, trying ideas, testing messages, and building it in public, as a community. We are going to start with a call on Wednesday 22nd October 1pm-2pm GMT [ ](https://luma.com/0gswxjx5?ref=actionism.space) What might we need? - Posters for the streets - let’s go guerrilla - Stitch & Hike kits and event guides - Polls and collective tools to shape the message - ACTionism film screenings (on Nov 28?) - Banners, patches, and there will be sewing throughout - Maybe even a party... We’ll also need time, skills, energy - and yes, funding - to bring this vision to life. What can you bring? There are so many ways to get involved, at all levels. You might: - Share a story - Host a community event - Join the debate - Run a repair session or a local walk - Help design or paste up posters - Offer skills in graphics, tech, outreach, or logistics - Or simply spread the message in your community, workplace or organisation This isn’t just a protest against consumerism. It’s a practice of something better. ## The Plan (So Far) Over the next 6 weeks, we’ll shape the campaign together: - **Week 1:** Campaign co-creation: What’s the message? What do we need? Posters, stickers, ideas? Expect community polls, open calls, and shared design. - **Week 2:** We dig into **Repair:** as a practical skill and political act. - **Week 3:** We explore **Sharing,** from tool libraries to stories. - **Week 4:** We dig into the power of stepping outdoors - **Week 5-6:** We build momentum, create resources, and bring the campaign to life. And then, on **November 28th**, we gather in our **community spaces**, our **fields and forests**, in the **fresh air and shared warmth**, to mark **Citizen Friday** \- together. ### Learning to Love Where We Live URL: https://www.actionism.space/learning-to-love-where-we-live/ Last updated: 2025-10-20T12:44:25.000Z This one has been a long time coming but now that I’m writing, it’s hard to know where to begin. See, I'm a millennial who got Instagram in the final year of university: that heady time where the structure of the obvious next step is taken away from you and you could literally do *anything*. Some people chose grad schemes with £50k starting salaries (no work experience required, apparently). Others decided to carry on studying, delaying those big life decisions just a teensy bit more. And I chose the path I always seem to choose: make no commitments and see where the wind takes me. I was talking to a friend a few months ago about the 'escape hatch' fantasy. That weird, wonderful urge, seemingly shared by a lot of young(ish) folks, that there's always the option of selling all your belongings, shaving your head, and moving to South America to experience true spiritual connection and discover the meaning of life. For some millennials it looks a little less head shave-y and a little more 'Bali and beach cocktails'. For older generations it's Eat, Pray, Love and sexy Italian men (though, actually, I think that also ends up in Bali… I watched that film a long time ago and mainly remember intense romantic encounters and a lot of Julia Roberts eating pasta). The point is: in our modern culture we have a bit of an obsession with travelling and moving around as a way to 'find ourselves'. This, we tell ourselves, is the path to adventure. The path to a BIG life, one full of experiences and stories and deeper truth. The travel influencers and #vanlife algorithms come for us hard, convincing us that only by being on the road can we ever experience true freedom. Don't root, don't 'settle', and *don't* be boring. Obviously I'm generalising, some people's algorithms are full of house design content and how to make as much money as possible. And some of us did head straight for South America after graduation. ![Selfie of a young woman at the Bolivian Salt Flats at sunset](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/image-1.png) Living my best travelling life (no shaved head for this particular trip though) But here I am, 18 months since I moved to Brighton, and I can feel those familiar sirens singing for me again. Which is exactly why I need to commit to telling you what I've been thinking about for the past few months. Because 'Learning to Love Where We Live' started one little piece about appreciating being in Brighton but it has come to represent pretty much everything I've been thinking about on this weird and wonderful journey. ### Origins As a recap for anyone new here (or who's forgotten me because it's been so long since I posted): I'm Olivia and about two years ago I started a [Substack](https://oliviastamp.substack.com/) called 'Unravelling Together' about challenging our collective understanding of how the world works. And boy oh boy did I unravel. I unravelled *real* hard. The last two years have been the most difficult but also the most vital years of my life. I choose that word *vital* deliberately. I've realised that I spent most of my twenties chasing a feeling of being alive through movement. Travelling the world, first dates and too much wine, chasing career accolades and titles (that rarely actually came). Basically, always looking towards the next thing. I’m sure many of you can relate. It’s so easy to think that the next thing will be what finally gives us peace or makes us happy. Maybe the reason we're all so addicted to movement is because staying still long enough to actually *love* something - a place, a person, or yourself - is one of the hardest things we can do. Don't get me wrong, I still want to see new places and meet new people (please don't @ me if you see some newly shorn pictures from a South American mountain). But I've realised that 'Learning to Love Where You Live' isn't just a little project about appreciating being in Brighton, it's about alleviating the need for an escape hatch at all. Because how sad is it that we spend so much of our lives trying to be anywhere other than where we actually are? ### Learning to love ***where*** we live: The Place Initially this was all about learning to love the place that you're in. My increasingly strong belief, is that if we could all care just a bit more about the places we are physically in, then we might actually stand a chance at tidying up some of the metaphorical and literal mess that we're in. We're in ecological crisis partly because we've become so utterly disconnected from the land. Most of us couldn't tell you which birds migrate through our area, or what grows wild in the hedgerows, or where our water actually comes from. We live on top of places rather than within them. And when you don't really know a place, when you haven't sat with it through all four seasons and learned its moods and rhythms, it's very hard to care about its suffering or fight for it's future. For me, this started as a very local question: what does it mean to actually know Brighton and Sussex? To recognise the plants in my garden, to understand the tides, to know who's doing what in the local community. There's something very humbling about realising you can't name most of the living things (including people!) that you share space with. And that you’d be pretty stuffed for dinner if the internet went down and the local Sainsburys closed. There's something else here that's been growing for me over the past few weeks. I’ve been talking a lot to close friends about the fairly urgent need to reclaim 'Englishness' given the context of the UK right now. We're watching nationalism rise, watching people weaponise belonging and use 'our land' as a rallying cry for exclusion and hatred. And yet. What if we could reclaim the idea of being rooted without being exclusionary? What if loving where you live meant caring for all the beings who live there, human and more-than-human? What if Englishness could be about ancient woodlands and chalk streams and the right to roam, rather than about walls and borders and keeping people out? What if we tried to tune back into the wisdom of the wild places? What if we actually grappled with our colonial past and met it head on, using the collective reckoning as an opportunity to move forward into something collectively reimagined? I don't have the answers yet. But I know that learning to love this place - the southern coast of this rainy, complicated, but beautiful island - feels like an important part of the work. This cannot be a nostalgic, backwards-looking love, but a clear-eyed commitment to understanding where we are and what it needs. But before we can love a place, we need to love where we literally live. ### Learning to love where you ***live***: Ourselves Where do we actually live? In these fleshy, fallible, fabulous bodies. These temporary collections of atoms that have come together for a period of time to allow us to experience the notion of being 'alive'. Now this is a really difficult share for me and one around which I carry a lot of shame. I've spent most of my adult life feeling deeply uncomfortable in my own body. I’ve had chronic pain since my early twenties and I have lived in a state of conflict and frustration with my body ever since. This has led to endless procrastination of actually doing the work to get strong and feel good in myself. I say, 'Oh I’ll start properly next week... next month... okay maybe next year. Just once I’ve figured out the right approach'. I've treated my body like a problem to be solved rather than a place to inhabit. And I'm definitely not alone in this. We've inherited so much cultural baggage about bodies: productivity culture that treats rest as laziness, fitness as punishment for the crime of eating too much, the idea that our bodies are projects to optimise rather than homes to live in. We're sold the story that happiness lives on the other side of transformation: just lose the weight, just build the muscle, just fix the thing, and then you can finally, actually live. But what if loving where you live starts with accepting this body, this mind, these limitations, right now? I want to be clear: this isn't about toxic positivity or just deciding to "love yourself!" as if self-acceptance is a simple choice you can make one morning. It's not about pretending chronic pain doesn't hurt or that ableism doesn't exist or that all bodies are treated equally by society (they absolutely are not). It's about something smaller and more radical: actually inhabiting your life rather than constantly planning to start living once you've fixed yourself. It's about asking your body and mind what it needs rather than what you can force it to do. It's about recognising that this body, imperfect and complicated as it is, is the only place you'll ever actually live. And when we can stay with ourselves through the boring bits and the painful bits and the deeply unsexy bits, maybe then we can finally stay with others. ### Learning to ***love*** where you live: Each Other There’s a Sufi maxim I recently discovered: *Fear knocked at the door.* *Love answered and there* *was no-one there.* I’ve thought about fear a *lot* over the last two years. It's been an almost constant companion for me. The fear that seems to always be knocking: fear of change, fear of others, fear of the future. How that fear is entrenched in us by the world we inhabit, the media and vested interests that want to keep us afraid because fear keeps us isolated and stuck. So we build walls instead of bridges, we ghost or run away instead of having difficult conversations and we stay surface-level because going deep feels too risky. We see each other as potential threats rather than potential friends. In constantly seeking to protect ourselves from hurt we end up hurting ourselves and each other all the more. So we see fear masquerading as anger, taking centre stage and allowing fascism to rise again. What if we could learn to choose love rather than fear? To love each other through the messiness of being human? We're all messy. Every single one of us is complicated and contradictory and sometimes deeply annoying. We're grumpy before coffee and lovely after a hot shower. We have strong opinions about loading dishwashers. We say things we regret and fail to show up the way we meant to and forget important dates and hurt people we love. And we need to accept that messiness - in ourselves and in each other - if we're going to build anything resilient. Because the work of resisting authoritarianism, of fighting for a liveable future, of creating the communities we'll need as systems continue to collapse - none of that can happen from a place of isolation and fear. It requires us to actually be connected to each other, willing to show up imperfectly, ready to love each other through the mess. When fear knocks, we need to answer with love and we need to remember, as Alan Watts once said "Love is the organising and unifying principle which makes the world a universe and the disintegrated mass a community." And that brings me to something important: this can't just be about "you." ### Learning to love where ***we*** live: we’re in it together When I started thinking about this project, it was very much about "you" (or rather, ME, mwahaha). Learning to love where YOU live. YOUR body, YOUR place, YOUR life. But I had an epiphany the other day when I reconnected with my friends at ACTionism and after finishing 'The Wisdom of Insecurity' by Alan Watts (I really *really* liked it, in case you couldn't tell from the two references in the space of 10 seconds). There is no "I" without "we." We only exist in relation to the world around us - to other people, to place, to the living systems we're part of. The idea that we're separate individuals who can transform ourselves in isolation is another one of those very harmful stories we need to unravel. You can learn to love your body, but bodies don't exist outside of culture and systems. You can commit to a place, but places are shaped by communities and histories and power structures. The personal journey matters enormously but it only makes sense in the context of collective transformation. This is why I'm shifting from "you" to "we." Not to erase individual experience, but to acknowledge what's actually true: we're in this together. The project of learning to love where we live is inherently collective. And this matters practically too. The resilience we need to navigate the coming years - the climate chaos, the political turbulence, the systems in collapse - that doesn't come from individual self-optimisation. It comes from interconnected communities who've learned to care for each other and the places they inhabit. Yes, I'll be doing things to learn to love where I live. But I'm inviting you along not as spectators to my personal journey, but as co-creators of something bigger. This works when we do it together. So this is the start of my next creative journey. The Substack started as Unravelling Together and I have found wonderful people with whom I think I will continue to unravel and re-ravel for all my days. The unravelling is all part of the journey. But the time has come for me to take action and to live the reality of what I believe: that by learning to love where we live we can make genuine and lasting change. Each week (give or take) I will be doing something that helps me to learn to love where I live. I’ll share the experience and I’ll invite you to have your own experience, if it resonates with you. I don’t plan for these to be massive or frightening steps. I’m not going to tell you to quit your job and give up cheese and go on a 10-day silent retreat to find yourself. In fact, I’m going to encourage you to stay exactly where you are. I’m going to do things like invite my neighbours round for tea and cake, and go and watch the starling murmuration on Brighton beach. I’m going to visit a local community garden and I’m going to go for a run along the seafront rather than scrolling Reddit. I’m going to sit and watch the insects in my garden. Because if I’ve learned anything these last two years, it’s that the smallest actions can take you to places you’d never expect. So, come with me, and let’s learn to love where we live. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/IMG_8395.jpg) One very happy woman learning about trees at Wakehurst Place ### The Story Origins of Citizen Friday URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-story-origins-of-citizen-friday/ Last updated: 2025-10-16T14:08:40.000Z **How a question turned into a weekly act of resistance, repair, and reconnection.** Citizen Friday didn’t start with a press release or a big plan. It began with a quiet feeling, the kind that creeps in slowly when the world feels out of step. A sense that perhaps, beneath the noise of sales and urgency, something more human was trying to surface. It started in a Discord thread. A message from Rebecca at Tentshare: *“What if we did something to challenge Black Friday?”* It was late. One of those small messages that’s easy to scroll past. But something about it stayed. That question got stuck in my head, later that night, spinning around and around, at 3am whilst feeding my youngest Kai. The next day during a conversation, Heather Davies made a massive contribution. > *Instead of just another anti-Black Friday campaign, how about we start asking, what we want to do instead?* Maybe the point wasn’t to fight Black Friday head-on. Maybe it wasn’t about launching another loud campaign. Maybe the most radical thing we could do was to simply put our time, energy, and attention somewhere else, and invite others to do the same. And that’s where Citizen Friday began, not as a protest, but as an invitation. A simple weekly rhythm. Every Friday, all year round, we take time to share, repair, and get out into the fresh air. That ritual has changed us. It’s helped us find each other, swap skills and stories, build reciprocity, and reconnect with nature. Over time, it’s grown from an idea into a practice, from a quiet act of resistance into a joyful habit of care. And now, at the time of year when the consumer story goes wild with excess, we choose to step into a different kind of wild. A *wild new story of togetherness*. --- ## What’s Coming: Citizen Friday 2025 - Join us for a weekly Co-creation/plotting call This is the **third year of Citizen Friday,** a grassroots, citizen-created campaign that mostly lives in community spaces, workshops, and the outdoors. But this year, we’re thinking bigger. We have a dream. That Citizen Friday won’t just replace Black Friday in our lives, but that it might one day replace the *consumer story itself*. On the streets. Across the billboards. In public spaces and public imagination. And to do that, we need **YOU**. This year, we’re making the campaign **collective**. **Crowd-sourced and citizen-led.** Which means shaping it together: asking questions, trying ideas, testing messages, and building it in public, as a community. > [Register for the 1st call here:](https://luma.com/0gswxjx5?ref=actionism.space) Wednesday 21st October - 1-2pm GMT ### What might we need? - Posters for the streets - let’s go guerilla - Stitch & Hike kits and event guides - Polls and collective tools to shape the message - ACTionism film screenings (on Nov 28?) - Banners, patches, there will be sewing throughout - Maybe even a party... We’ll also need time, skills, energy - and yes, funding - to bring this vision to life. ### What can you bring? There are so many ways to get involved, at all levels. You might: - Share a story - Host a community event - Join the debate - Run a repair session or a local walk - Help design or paste up posters - Offer skills in graphics, tech, outreach, or logistics - Or simply spread the message in your community, workplace or organisation This isn’t just a protest against consumerism. It’s a practice of something better. ## The Plan (So Far) Over the next 6 weeks, we’ll shape the campaign together: - **Week 1:** Campaign co-creation: What’s the message? What do we need? Posters, stickers, ideas? Expect community polls, open calls, and shared design. - **Week 2:** We dig into **Repair:** as a practical skill and political act. - **Week 3:** We explore **Sharing,** from tool libraries to stories. - **Week 4:** We dig into the power of stepping outdoors - **Week 5-6:** We build momentum, create resources, and bring the campaign to life. And then, on **November 28th**, we gather in our **community spaces**, our **fields and forests**, in the **fresh air and shared warmth**, to mark **Citizen Friday** \- together. --- SPONSORED [Join the #CitizenFriday co-creation crew and weekly call ](Register for the 1st call here: Wednesday 21st October - 1-2pm GMT ) This all started with a quiet question. And now, it’s become a practice. A movement. A story we’re writing together. And for the record, this year’s campaign? You can blame Jon Alexander. He messaged me last week to ask, *“Is Citizen Friday happening again?”* And, I took the bait. I'm all in. **Who’s with us? What can you bring? What can we create - together?** ### ACTionism in Action Newsletter 13/10/2025 URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism-in-action-newsletter-13-10-2025/ Last updated: 2025-10-13T11:10:53.000Z ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/ACTionism-core-image-templates--26--1.png) ## Something to join: ["How To Save Democracy" at The Conduit ](https://www.theconduit.com/upcoming-events/how-to-save-democracy-facing-climate-reality/?ref=actionism.space) Tonight live at the Conduit, at 7:30pm Jon Alexander meets Caroline Lucas and Ellie Meredith to ask if and how people power can still provide a meaningful response to the climate emergency. If you cannot make it to the Conduit, there is a live online stream available [here.](https://www.theconduit.com/upcoming-events/how-to-save-democracy-facing-climate-reality/?ref=actionism.space) --- ## Something to read: [Beginnings and Endings](https://www.actionism.space/endings-and-beginnings/) An [article](https://www.actionism.space/endings-and-beginnings/) written by myself, about 'Aha' Moments, and how the origins of ACTionism lie with grief. Fittingly, I'm re-sharing this today, because this journey into possibility has been full of what some might call coincidences. But I don’t believe in coincidence anymore. There have been too many. As we build collective action, it doesn’t feel like fate or chance, it feels like truth pulling us together. So, it’s no surprise, to me, that ACTionism is beginning to receive the platform it deserves, right around the anniversary of the event that first sparked this whole adventure. Very proud to see our collective work put into the spotlight through the voices of 3 humans I admire deeply. Have a lovely evening you incredible citizens. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/Not-everyone-wants-a-shortcut-to-mending--29-.png) ## Something to Join: [A Party](https://www.actionism.space/endings-and-beginnings/) Tomorrow - Join our Live Spotlight ACTionism Call, featuring the founder of the Party Kit Network and No Crap Communities **Ever felt like the only one who cares? Ready to act on your values but worried about standing out?** Join us for an inspiring conversation with two changemakers, **Isabel Mack** and **Charlotte Mason-Curl,** who turned their frustrations into thriving movements, because the best community movements start with people who decide enough is enough - and then show others it can be different by coming together and taking collective action. Oh, and don't forget to bring cake. Not only are we celebrating the work of two incredible citizens, it is my first time in the interviewing hot-seat and it's my Birthday. Let's celebrate! Find out more and register [**here**](https://www.actionism.space/join-our-live-spotlight-actionism-call-zero-waste-parties-community-building/). ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/ACTionism-core-image-templates--2--1--1-.png) --- ## Something to read: [Learning to Love Where We Live](https://www.actionism.space/learning-to-love-where-we-live/) ## A beautiful [article](https://www.actionism.space/tag/lovewherewelive/) from Olivia. This is more than just an article to read, it's a call to ACTion. This is the start of a creative journey, one that is essential, and one we're all very lucky to join. In this first piece, Olivia describes, that it’s no surprise that sometimes we feel the urge to reach for the *escape hatch*. > “That weird, wonderful urge, seemingly shared by a lot of young(ish) folks, that there's always the option of selling all your belongings, shaving your head, and moving to South America to experience true spiritual connection and discover the meaning of life.” But here’s the thing: even these escape fantasies are still part of the same story. The one that centres *the individual*. The idea that if you just go far enough, cleanse deeply enough, or curate your life beautifully enough, you’ll finally be free. **Learning to Love Where You Live** invites us to let go of that story. It’s a front-row seat to what happens when we choose to stay, to connect, and to build collective action within our communities. > "The time has come for me to take action and to live the reality of what I believe: that by learning to love where we live we can make genuine and lasting change." > > "Because the work of resisting authoritarianism, of fighting for a liveable future, of creating the communities we'll need as systems continue to collapse - none of that can happen from a place of isolation and fear. It requires us to actually be connected to each other, willing to show up imperfectly, ready to love each other through the mess." > > "This is why I'm shifting from "you" to "we." Not to erase individual experience, but to acknowledge what's actually true: we're in this together. The project of learning to love where we live is inherently collective." This is such important work, I’m not sure it gets more relevant than this. Thank you, Olivia, for such a beautiful and brave piece of writing. We can’t wait to walk this journey with you. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/A4DF1C27-2DE9-4C33-B84C-6650CBC1A999-1.jpeg) ## Thank you Citizens Thank you for reading, and for showing up with your energy and support for this movement. If this resonated, and you’re enjoying the Citizen Spotlights, Calls to Action, and everything beginning to take shape in this collective space, please share it with a friend. With love, Gav. > We’ve found the escape hatches. > But there’s just one catch. > We can only open the master one if we choose to act, together. ### Next ACTionism Connection Call 13th NOVEMBER 12-1pm GMT URL: https://www.actionism.space/next-actionism-connection-call-9th-october/ Last updated: 2025-10-13T10:19:59.000Z [13th November - 2nd Thursday of every month - 12.00 GMT](https://luma.com/8fv0q9k2?ref=actionism.space) **Feeling like you need a little more community in your life? Keen to meet, share and grow with others who are working to change and grow communities or ideas?** ​This friendly online meetup is perfect for anyone who wants to: - ​Catch up with familiar faces and meet new members of the ACTionism community - ​Share interesting initiatives, projects, or campaigns you've discovered recently - ​Enjoy informal conversation with like-minded people passionate about collective action - Get a boost from sharing co-working company and fresh perspectives ​Whether you're seeking new ideas and inspiration or simply looking for friendly faces who understand your drive for positive change and collective action, this session offers a welcoming space to reconnect and recharge. ​No formal agenda - just good conversation, mutual support, and the chance to hear what's capturing everyone's attention. Come as you are, share what you'd like, and leave feeling more connected to our community. Register for the free online connect call here [Sign up here ](https://luma.com/8fv0q9k2?ref=actionism.space) ### Finding the Escape Hatch URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-instagram-escape-hatch-and-the-unravelling-of-englishness/ Last updated: 2025-10-13T06:03:26.000Z Olivia recently returned to the core of the ACTionism community, after a short time away working on Citizens’ Assemblies, exploring fairness, politicians’ pay, and what it means to value public service, vital work. And now she's back to do something just as important: the work of reimagining belonging, care, and culture through Actionism. She’s joined Tamasine and me on a journey, one with no clear destination, only a shared commitment to learning, feeling, and doing things differently in the world. And I’m deeply grateful. Not just because Olivia is an amazing citizen and writer. But, because Olivia has this gift, she knows how to name the truth of a moment. She did it beautifully in the first [*Learning to Love Where We Live*](https://www.actionism.space/learning-to-love-where-we-live/) blog, a series that isn’t just about geography or home, but about loving ourselves, each other, the land beneath us, the bodies we inhabit, and the communities we are part of. This weekend I've been reflecting. Because she’s right: the consumer story we’ve all been living inside has stripped us of something essential, our capacity to love. Love for ourselves. For our neighbours. For the more-than-human world. It hasn’t just made us consumers, I think it’s *us* who’ve been consumed. We have lost the very essence of our being. Instagram is where we now market ourselves. Where life is broken into fragments, filtered and uploaded for likes. And over time, that logic, what performs, what sells, what scales, what goes viral, has seeped into everything. Our culture, our politics, our sense of place, even our ideas about nationhood. So it’s no wonder we feel something is missing. Not just personally, but collectively. Identity feels hollow when it’s built around consumption. And we see the effects everywhere: our high streets stripped of character, replaced by the cold efficiency of Starbucks. Our public services and safety nets auctioned off. Our values reshaped by ownership and isolation. Our relationship with nature reduced to supply chains, the food on our plates severed from the soil it came from. The suffering of the more-than-human world hidden beneath plastic packaging and marketing slogans. Community spaces closed in the name of efficiency. Connection replaced by convenience. As Olivia describes, it’s no surprise that sometimes we feel the urge to reach for the *escape hatch*. > “That weird, wonderful urge, seemingly shared by a lot of young(ish) folks, that there's always the option of selling all your belongings, shaving your head, and moving to South America to experience true spiritual connection and discover the meaning of life.” But here’s the thing: even these escape fantasies are still part of the same story. The one that centres *the individual*. The idea that if you just go far enough, cleanse deeply enough, or curate your life beautifully enough, you’ll finally be free. But this is the same logic, just in different clothes. Still chasing freedom through *individual action*. Still trying to outrun the system. And it doesn’t work. Because, our ecological, social, and economic systems are in collapse. And there is no safety hatch that takes us away from that. There is no individual happiness without *collective agency*. No private peace in a world at war. No liberation that leaves others behind. So maybe the real question isn’t where can we run, but what can we face? What if, instead of trying to escape to somewhere that will never deliver what we truly need, we stayed and learned to love where we live? Faced truths with commitment and courage? Because if the human story is to continue, it won’t be because we ran. It will be because we stayed. Because we repaired, and found love, together. ## Reimagining Value Over the weekend, I came across a quote, one you’ve probably seen before: > *“The most environmentally friendly product is the one you didn’t buy.”* And, honestly, I am not a fan. Not because it's entirely wrong, there’s truth in it. But it doesn’t go deep enough, it doesn't tell the whole story. Because the most environmentally friendly product *might* be the one you didn’t buy, but more often, it’s the one you *loved*. The one you borrowed from a friend. The one you shared through your local library of things. The one you fixed at the repair café with a stranger who became a mate. It’s the item you swapped at a community event, giving it a second story, and someone else, joy. The one you mended, patched, or repurposed with your own hands, proudly, visibly, creatively. It’s the coat with the stitched elbow that started a conversation. The lamp you rewired instead of replacing, supporting a local tradesperson. The chair you painted rather than tossing, now unique and full of your character. The phone you kept for five years, not five months, reducing e-waste in your local area, supporting repair shops on your high street, and demonstrating that longevity is a form of respect for both people and planet. It's the boots you re-soled so you could get back outside and reconnect with nature. The jeans you embroidered. The toaster you took apart, just to learn how it works. It’s the product that sparked a connection, taught a skill, and inspired someone else to do the same. It’s the one that didn’t just avoid waste, it built community, strengthened resilience, and reimagined value. ## **What has any of this got to do with escape hatches, loving where we live, and Englishness?** Everything. Because the consumer story teaches us to throw away what’s broken. It severs our relationship with the earth, its resources, and our things. It says we are alone, that progress is winning, that value is ownership. But it *could* be different. When Olivia speaks about learning to love the places we live, I think about loving the *things* in our lives, too. Not just because it makes sense, but because it unlocks a door to another world. Here is the real escape hatch, not the fantasy of a life elsewhere, but a practice of re-connection. In the jacket you repaired. In the shelf you fixed. In the neighbour you shared with. In the joy of mending what once seemed disposable. That’s how it began for me. My escape hatch started with a jacket that needed a zip repair. That jacket became a community space, that space became a global network, and that network became a movement. A movement where we, as citizens, work together to escape not the world, but *this story*. A movement from consumption to connection, from isolation to belonging, from despair to action. It’s a messy, complicated space. But it’s also full of joy, love, and possibility. Where once the consumer story closed us down, this space once again opens us back up. It gives us back our humanity. And maybe, just maybe, our future too. My escape hatch doesn’t take me away, it keeps me right where I am, and it teaches me love. ## **But what’s any of this got to do with Englishness?** A lot. Because just like identity, our idea of Englishness has been hollowed out by the same consumer logic. It’s been sold back to us in fragments, Union Jacks, wartime nostalgia, closed borders, fear of the ‘other’. A kind of branding exercise that turns belonging into exclusion. Olivia wrote, > “And yet. What if we could reclaim the idea of being rooted without being exclusionary? What if loving where you live meant caring for all the beings who live there, human and more-than-human? What if Englishness could be about ancient woodlands and chalk streams and the right to roam, rather than about walls and borders and keeping people out? What if we tried to tune back into the wisdom of the wild places? What if we actually grappled with our colonial past and met it head on, using the collective reckoning as an opportunity to move forward into something collectively reimagined?” And here’s the truth: that version of Englishness, rooted, generous, reimagined, won’t be delivered by GDP. It won’t come from a budget line, a border policy, or another cycle of growth, we won't consume it into existence. You can’t measure it in quarterly returns or vote for it in a general election. It will emerge form a different place. It will come citizens. Ellie shared a beautiful piece of her writing this weekend that contained the following quote: > “Transformation doesn’t crash through like a storm — It unfurls, soft and certain, like trees learning the language of light.” Transformation cannot come from the same story that holds us in a headlock, it cannot be found in consuming more. To write a new story we must, find the cracks in the canopy, search for the light and write together, with creativity, love and joy. And, that’s what is happening now, in quiet corners, in repair cafés, in community hubs, in borrowed tools, and shared meals. Across citizens’ collectives, around fire circles and repair tables, through watching [starling murmurations](https://www.actionism.space/learning-to-love-where-we-live/), in the facing of our history, and in reconnection through the laying of our bodies on land. It’s being written in the small actions and the stories we choose to tell each other. Written by Olivia, and others, that are learning to love where they live. This is where Englishness will be reimagined, not as exclusion, but as care. Not as consumers, as creative, with love. It will be written through ACTionism: the art of finding the others and taking collective action. And here’s the thing: these escape hatches from the old story? They’re everywhere. In loving what you already have, in lying on the ground and really listening, in small-local acts of care that ripple outwards. But most of all, they’re found in showing up, for your community, for each other, again and again. We’ve found the escape hatches. But there’s just one catch. We can only open the master one if we choose to act, together. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/ACTionism--Find-the-Others--9-.png) ### Politics Needs to Open Up to Citizen Collectives URL: https://www.actionism.space/politics-needs-to-open-up-to-citizen-collectives/ Last updated: 2025-10-09T17:06:37.000Z All across the world, citizens are coming together, not to campaign, not to protest, but to build. **'WE' are demonstrating alternative futures**, from a space of possibility. Citizen collectives are stepping up to deliver what governments and markets are failing to provide: care, repair, food, energy, housing, meaning, connection. This isn’t charity work. It’s a **structural workaround**. We're **hacking** our way into a new story. As Heather Davies pointed out in the blog: [*Comparing three paths to Citizen Participation: volunteering, activism and ACTionism*](https://www.actionism.space/comparing-three-paths-to-citizen-participation-volunteering-activism-and-actionism/) what's happening isn’t volunteering in the traditional sense. It’s not about filling gaps left by the state with unpaid labour. And it’s not activism in a model of opposition. Both of these are necessary, but this is something different. It’s **ACTionism**: the art of finding the others, and taking collective action. It's grounded, participatory, collective, and *generative*. A whole bunch of citizens are not asking for permission. 'WE' are just getting on with the work. If you look and listen, you can find this **everywhere**. So my question is: **When will politics wake up and meet this moment?** ## The Rise of Citizen Collectives isn’t a fad. It’s a Symptom. And it’s a point **Hans Stegeman** recently made powerfully in this [post](https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/we-must-support-structure-not-just-story-hans-stegeman?ref=actionism.space). > Across Europe, people are organizing - from energy to food, from care to housing. Not to “do good.” Not as volunteers. But because formal institutions are failing to deliver. He framed it clearly: **citizen collectives are not a trend, they're a necessity**, born from gaps our institutions are no longer filling. His call? For politicians and policymakers to **create the conditions** for collectives to thrive, not just praise them after the fact. I would go even further. I think there is much politics could learn from this emerging power. Politics should build the conditions, open up, and share the power but, I also think it should embrace the collective message and the togetherness. There is something deep to learn here, about how we come together and halt the division. ## What Politics needs to do now Here’s what I see politics needing to do, urgently, if it wants to meet this energy, not stifle it: - **Listen** \- not to reply, not to win points, but to *actually* understand what’s emerging on the ground. - **Open up** \- be human, be vulnerable, be in the room *without an agenda*. Our systems are collapsing, we feel it, and so do you. - **Learn from our approach** \- because citizen collectives aren’t waiting for permission. We’re already doing what governments talk about: co-creation, localism, care, resilience, transformation, belonging. - **Share power** \- not just symbolically, not just in policy, but in real structures, decision-making, resources. But more than all that, I believe **politics needs to learn from the way we're creating a culture of togetherness.** Because what’s emerging through citizen collectives isn’t just new services, it’s a new way of being political. It’s relational. It's grounded. It’s less about messaging and more about meaning. If we want to build a political culture that works for this century, then politics must stop trying to “represent”, it has to start showing up as part of the collective, and it must work to halt the division. That means **acting with**, not speaking for. ## A Note to Politicians: Stop trying to win the game we’re trying to leave Take Zack Polanski, the new Green Party leader in the UK. He's gaining momentum, and I agree with a lot of his policies. He’s clearly trying to do things differently. He’s been out there, speaking in communities, talking about how he feels. That *matters*. But then, he turns that connection into a political message, “talking to anyone who wants to take the fight to Reform”, framing opponents. And I get it. The system rewards that kind of oppositional framing. But when we do that, we shut down the space we just opened. We reinforce the very dynamics we *need* to move beyond. > **If we keep using the old tools to build something new, we’ll just recreate the same system.** What’s needed now isn’t just better messaging. It’s a **reimagining of how power is held, shared, and practised**. ## A Vision: Returning Collective Power to Citizens I believe our politics needs to be reimagined entirely, in ways that return collective power to citizens. Take **Our House**, for example - a collective of participatory democracy practitioners and community organisers who believe in a people‑powered future. They’re building democracy differently, creating an inclusive, creative system that works for everyone. > Starting locally, we are forming a distributed network of local leaders for political systems change, embedded and connected in our communities, and advocating for their People’s Charter through thousands of conversations across England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Then there’s **Jon Alexander**, whose framing of the “consumer story” as a dominant but flawed narrative is deeply compelling. He argues that the issues aren’t only individual or oppositional, they’re systemic: extraction, passivity, being treated as receivers rather than as creators. This framing isn't forming opposition or 'others' it's saying that the system is the problem. And crucially, he reminds us that what’s needed is not some heroic leader, but *us all*. > Why the Key to Fixing Everything is All of Us Also: heres' [a piece](https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7381638761136427008/?ref=actionism.space) about the recent **Citizens’ Forum on MPs’ Pay and Funding** from Olivia, that demonstrates this in practice. Ordinary people, across economic status, background, geography, deliberated complex questions: what an MP’s pay should reflect, how parliamentary work should be funded. What emerged was not polarisation, but insight. This togetherness matters because many political actors still don’t meet people where they are. They speak *at* people rather than *with* them. They forget to listen and head straight into policy. At this moment, I’m finding it hard to connect with any politician. Yet I find it incredibly easy to connect with other citizens. ## Building Collective Agency through Listening and Shared Feeling: Lessons from ACTionism If leaders began with real listening, acknowledging what people feel, not dismissing it, sharing their real emotions and opening up, they’d lay the groundwork for genuine collective agency. And if, on top of that, they celebrated our collective actions, no matter how small, they could help *'US'* rewrite our story. Not one of division, but of shared power, interconnection, and possibility. We’re experiencing this shift firsthand at **ACTionism**. We’re learning to organise not just around actions, but around deep listening and sharing our feelings - grief, hope, fear, love. This emotional openness is becoming the foundation for how we build collective power and trust. It’s through this blend of heartfelt connection and small, consistent actions that we’re starting to unlock true collective agency, and we believe this holds lessons far beyond our own community. So, this isn't just about opening up to a rising power, it's deeper, it's about listening to what that power is learning, and leaning into it. ## Why this Matters to me Personally At ACTionism and the Re-Action Collective, we’ve seen firsthand how this shift happens. We’ve been part of the quiet building, from listening circles in the forest to new citizen projects emerging within days. We’ve seen how [**sharing feelings + taking small actions in community** ](https://www.actionism.space/finding-the-others-on-feeling-listening-building-collective-action/)creates a kind of momentum that politics can’t replicate. It’s relational. It’s real. And honestly? I find it easier to connect with other citizens than with any political leader right now. Not because I’ve given up on politics. But because *they feel so far away,* still speaking *at* people instead of *with* them. ## The Invitation Come and meet us where we are, not on podiums or in campaign offices, but in the forests, the sheds, the kitchens, on the streets, and in community halls. Join us on this journey, there’s so much for all of us to learn. If you can’t join us, we’ll keep walking it anyway. But it’ll be a damn sight easier to walk it together. ### Finding the Others: On Feeling, Listening & Building Collective Action URL: https://www.actionism.space/finding-the-others-on-feeling-listening-building-collective-action/ Last updated: 2025-10-09T08:06:13.000Z Fellow traveller, Heather Davies recently [wrote](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/heather-davies-communicating-sustainability%5Fcommunicatingsustainability-climatecommunications-activity-7381648322664497152-J00C?utm%5Fsource=social%5Fshare%5Fsend&utm%5Fmedium=member%5Fdesktop%5Fweb&rcm=ACoAADAV6bIB0ThDBAsFj5-C6Qv0sEn5bG2X9f8) about a BBC Academy event, with neuroscientist Kris De Meyer. Kris reminded us, that you can’t reliably drive action by trying to *generate* fear, guilt or anger in others. Emotions manipulated often backfire, polarising people, causing overwhelm, or shutting down possibility. Instead, he shared the insight many of us already live: **action leads to belief**. Taking steps, even small ones, with others builds agency, meaning, momentum. That’s why I find Tamasine’s approach here on the ACTionism platform so powerful. Sharing simple, grounded actions, clear do-able steps, rooted in real examples, is an invitation. It’s not just “look what we’re doing,” it’s: *you can do this too*. And that’s one of the strongest routes to collective agency I’ve seen, quietly building momentum, one honest action at a time. I believe strongly that **action leads to belief**. My experience with ACTionism, Re-Action, and other community movements has shown me that connection through action is how change begins, and how it grows. The result is that I have a believe in my fellow humans and the power of collective action. But I also find myself wondering: is there still a role for emotions, fear, hope, anger, grief, in our work? And how? I think the answer lies not in *using* those emotions as tools, but in *honestly naming them* as part of our shared experience. ### Naming what we feel = Inviting others in When I say, > “I feel ashamed about how I’ve lived, and the impact it’s had on the more-than-human world, the way I have, knowingly or not, 'othered' nature. At times I have treated it as something separate from me, something to use rather than belong to. And, how even now, I continue to do this, as I'm trapped in a system." And, > I’m scared. The speed at which climate change is unfolding feels palpable where I live. It’s not abstract, it’s in the changing seasons, the shifting weather, the collapse in biodiversity.” I’m not trying to shame others. I’m not trying to make citizens feel bad or guilty. I’m simply speaking my truth. And in doing so, I open space for someone else to say, > “Yes… I feel that too.” That “me-too” is a bridge, and an opening: it’s the moment where isolation gives way to shared ground. That is where connection begins. When emotions are expressed not as weapons (to provoke shame or fear), but as vulnerable truths, they invite resonance, not defensiveness. It’s an invitation, to feel, to reflect, and to stand together. Whether it’s sharing a feeling or offering a [slice of cake](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/alexevansuk%5Fso-how-do-you-start-a-conversations-with-activity-7380847146926882816-Wsrz?utm%5Fsource=social%5Fshare%5Fsend&utm%5Fmedium=member%5Fdesktop%5Fweb&rcm=ACoAADAV6bIB0ThDBAsFj5-C6Qv0sEn5bG2X9f8), bridges to connection are built through small, disarming acts of honesty and care. When people feel they *aren’t alone in what they feel*, they begin to lean in. They begin to trust that together, they can act, not out of coercion, but out of belonging, curiosity, and care. I live in a tiny village in the French Alps, a place where the landscape itself can be isolating. And for a long time, I did feel isolated. But since I began sharing my feelings, honestly, without trying to persuade or perform, alongside taking action, I’ve been able to build real bridges with others. Now, that isolation has given way to connection. So yes: I think emotions still matter. But only when we speak them *from our own hearts and guts*, not project them onto others. ### Why we’re leaning more into in‑person events That’s why at ACTionism, we’re increasingly committed to meeting in real, physical spaces, through listening events, workshops, film screenings, and creative practice, because it’s there that safe space for speaking and truly listening can be created. Online can do many things well, but the real work, the kind that shifts how someone *feels in their body,* is hardest to host virtually. In person, we can: - Hold a circle where people sit with their feelings - Invite spontaneous creative responses (poetry, movement, sound, sewing, art) - Use shared silence, eye contact, gesture - Offer trust, witness, mutual accountability These are the conditions for emotional honesty. And once people have spoken deeply, the rest of the work (conversations, decisions, action) lands differently. ### A Workshop that Landed: ACTionism x Pol.is At a recent ACTionism event, I ran a workshop near the end: **“ACTionism x Pol.is: Can we build better Conversations about change?”** Earlier in the weekend, we created space for people to share their feelings: frustration, grief, hope, doubt. We even lay on the forest floor together, deepening our connection to nature, which helped open those emotional channels. By the time we reached the Pol.is exercise, I felt that the emotional groundwork had been laid, and the group was truly ready. We took statements generated via Pol.is (the machine-learning democracy tool) and brought them into a live conversation. People physically placed themselves along a line from “Strongly Agree” to “Strongly Disagree,” then paired off with citizens at different positions. It wasn’t debating. It was listening, reflecting, exploring tension. Because people had already built relationships, and named some of their internal emotional states, the exercise landed safe, grounded, generative. It became a pathway toward shared insight, not conflict. ### It massively shifted me, in fact the whole weekend did. This transformation inspired me to write [*The Dance of Collective Action: From Passive Consumers to Active Citizens*](https://www.actionism.space/the-dance-of-collective-action-from-passive-consumers-to-active-citizens/), where I explored how small, intentional dance moves can lead to meaningful collective action. In this piece, the first “dance move” I describe on the journey is about embracing emotion and sharing openly. It’s about creating spaces where we can express our feelings, frustration, hope, grief, joy, and truly be heard. This kind of emotional honesty forms the very foundation of collective agency. But beyond just sharing emotions, what happens next is even more crucial. The trust and bonds that are built between people in these spaces become the bedrock for collective action. When we listen deeply and vulnerably, we forge connections that go beyond surface-level agreement. These connections create a sense of safety and solidarity, empowering us to take risks and work together toward shared goals. In my experience, ACTionism’s in-person gatherings, like the Weekender, provide the fertile ground where this trust can grow. It’s here that individual voices come together, and collective power takes root. ### Why ACTionism Matters That’s why I believe that what we’re doing at ACTionism is powerful. We’re creating safe spaces for sharing feelings, offering simple actions, and doing it all from a place of togetherness. We’re also not 'othering', and that’s essential. Because it’s in that refusal to divide that we begin to honour our deep interconnectedness, with each other and with the more-than-human world. To me, ACTionism is truly beginning to feel like a movement, one where we're putting down roots of lasting cultural change. And, I think that change begins with sharing our emotions and taking small actions. ### An Idea So here’s what I’m offering, and asking: - Let's ACT so that we build belief - Let's celebrate small actions. - Let’s stop using emotion as a lever. - Let’s begin with honesty: *I feel these things*. - Let’s listen, not to convert, but to connect. - Let’s build events and community spaces, for conversations that make space for those feelings. - And from that soil, let’s collective agency. In a time of climate crisis and social violence, it’s tempting to push people forward with fear and urgency. But we must build the trust, the safety, the shared ground. Because when someone says, “I feel this too,” and someone else hears it, something cracks open. Something shifts. And *that* is how collective action begins. ### Where Stories Spark Action URL: https://www.actionism.space/where-stories-spark-action/ Last updated: 2025-10-07T11:12:00.000Z Last week I headed South West… First stop: Bristol, to catch up with my crewmates from Re-Action - Matt, Zoe, and Lisa. Big love! Then onward to Falmouth, with the human who somehow puts up with all my quirks and still makes ACTionism magic with me - our brilliant filmmaker Michael Shaw. I’ve been looking forward to this little misadventure for months. The seed of the idea - how ACTionism might ripple out across the world - was first planted in Gav’s noggin by the wonderful Alex Fish, founder of [99p Films](https://www.99pfilms.com/?ref=actionism.space). A 99p Film night is not your average cinema experience. It’s a revolutionary community interest company that turns film screenings into shared, heart-centered gatherings - complete with mindful breathing, honest conversations, and communal feasts. The perfect home for a film like ACTionism, which invites people into the story and sparks real talk about what we can do together, right here, right now. There’s something intensely human about that. We need spaces where we can dream into what could be - places to raise a hand and say: I care about this. Who else? Plotting. Pollinating. Dreaming. Imagining what if… Doing something together. The screening coincided with the Falmouth University Sustainable Fashion department’s Fashion Reclaimed - part of Sustainable Fashion Week. All day at the Cornish Bank, people were repairing, stitching, and sewing life back into loved things. Sharing stories. Showing they care. 0:00 /0:25 1× I even got to hang out with the magic that is Gina Umney for some seaside shenanigans, who I’ve had the pleasure of collaborating with through Transition Together. Essentially, I’ve spent the week surrounded by people I adore - by the sea, telling stories, and hearing others share theirs. The energy in the room was unlike anything I’ve ever felt: alive, pulsing with care, creativity, and the resilient heartbeat of community. Blooming marvelous. This is community power, my friends - served with a generous helping of joy ❤️💪 --- > "I went to watch Actionism on a whim, and I'm so glad I did. > Just about everything Ellie said resonated with me and I feel genuinely inspired. > > I think the main message I took from last night was something along the lines of: the best way to get stuff done is to find people who feel the same way, and just go Do The Thing. > > Some really interesting discussion afterwards, I'm keen on the idea of communities sharing tools, knowledge and skills like some people mentioned. > > For my part, if anyone is interested I can teach people how to do car maintenance, servicing, simple repairs. (As much as I'd love to live in a world where we don't need cars, they are pretty useful, especially in Cornwall!) > > And conversely I'm always eager to learn new stuff from other people! > I believe the most resilient communities are built on solidarity and mutual aid. > > Anyway enough rambling from me. > Take it easy everyone 🤙" **A new ACTionist** --- > "They made a group chat, there and then, during the event and theres like 18 people all looking to come together for direct action! We’ve called the chat ‘Falmouth Reaction’. First mission is to save a place called Pants (charity shop in Fal getting the boot from it's venue... Lots of ideas shooting off in the group it which is exciting to see." [alexander fish](https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexander-fish-32794a1b5/?ref=actionism.space) --- The Collective Agency is building and we'd love to see more ACtionism community screenings. If you would like to get involved, please complete the form on this [page](https://re-action-collective.org/actionism/?ref=actionism.space). Thank you Citizens. ### Is convenience a barrier to finding the others? URL: https://www.actionism.space/is-convenience-a-barrier-to-finding-the-others/ Last updated: 2025-10-06T15:16:37.000Z ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/image.png) [Dominick Shattuck, PhD](https://www.linkedin.com/in/dshattuck?miniProfileUrn=urn%3Ali%3Afsd%5Fprofile%3AACoAAAHciDYBiUZB2SoUv6iY4jB9ykAxKSPU3TA&ref=actionism.space) **Are we designing connection out of our lives?** I was interested to see this image shared on LinkedIn, sparking a debate about how our daily conveniences quietly narrow our worlds. "Every shortcut we take - every delivery, automation, and algorithm - saves time but also skips touchpoints. Moments that once stitched our days together. Each one, tiny on its own. Together, they make up the relational fabric of life."[Dominick Shattuck, PhD](https://www.linkedin.com/in/dshattuck?miniProfileUrn=urn%3Ali%3Afsd%5Fprofile%3AACoAAAHciDYBiUZB2SoUv6iY4jB9ykAxKSPU3TA&ref=actionism.space) **So what does this mean for actionism?** To build the future we need, for ourselves and the planet, we need to practice the art of taking collective action, and if we never set foot outside our house, look up from our phone, or step outside of our comfort zone, how will we ever meet the people who want to take action with us! **So here are my top actions to help you make more connections - and maybe even find 'the others' to start taking collective action with.** ### **One simple change could spark something amazing** - **Take the same walk at the same time** for a few days - you'll start recognising faces, nodding hello, maybe exchanging a word about the weather. Regularity creates familiarity. - **Leave your headphones at home** for one journey - notice who's around you, be available for spontaneous conversation. - **Linger somewhere** \- the park, the café, the library. Don't rush. See who else lingers. ### **To find the others who care like you do:** - **Wear or carry something that signals your values** \- a badge, a bag, a book cover on display. It's a conversation starter for the right people. - **Go to where the thing is happening** \- the community garden, the repair café, the local meeting about the thing you're frustrated about. Show up in person. - **Ask your neighbours a question** \- not just "how are you?" but something specific: "Do you know if there's a tool library around here?" or "Have you noticed the bins overflowing too?" - **Say yes to the thing you'd normally decline** \- the street party planning meeting, the school parents' gathering, the local action group. ### **To build relationships that lead to action:** - **Suggest doing something together, not just talking** \- "Shall we walk while we chat?" or "Want to come with me to check out that community project?" - **Share what frustrates you** \- when someone mentions something that bothers them about the area/system/world, don't just sympathise. Say "Me too. I've been thinking about..." - **Invite people to something you're already doing** \- if you're going to a talk, a meeting,a community event - **experiences build connections,** so ask someone to come with you. **So, I encourage you to choose the less-travelled road. The option that takes slightly longer requires you to be present, to think differently. That's where the others are**. ### How to save democracy URL: https://www.actionism.space/how-to-save-democracy/ Last updated: 2025-10-13T08:35:32.000Z The next "How To Save Democracy" EVENT is coming soon - live at [The Conduit](https://www.linkedin.com/company/theconduit/?ref=actionism.space) in London and online from **6pm on Monday 13th October.** [**Sign up here.**](https://www.theconduit.com/upcoming-events/how-to-save-democracy-facing-climate-reality/?ref=actionism.space) [Jon Alexander](https://www.linkedin.com/in/jon-alexander-11b66345/?ref=actionism.space) will be hosting [Caroline Lucas](https://www.linkedin.com/in/caroline-lucas-981955335/?ref=actionism.space) and [Ellie Meredith](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ellie-meredith05/?ref=actionism.space) to face up to the reality of the climate emergency, and together asking some big questions... things like... How can and should democracies respond to the climate emergency? Where (if anywhere) is doing it well, in the face of the rise of the Far Right? How should we understand the relationship between the failure to address the climate emergency meaningfully and the crisis of democracy? > "At a time when Trump is dismissing this reality outright at the UN General Assembly, and you can be pretty sure there won't be much mention from the Labour Party Conference, these feel important questions. > > But we'll also be discussing some questions I'd argue matter even more... How can and should WE respond as citizens and communities, especially if our governments are arguably not doing it? Where can we look to for inspiration on that front? > > I do want to get into the first set of questions, the Big Democracy stuff, and I'm excited to have some proper time to dig into this with Caroline, who has been at the forefront of this work for many years - often acting with true heroism. > > But we're going to spend most of our time in the latter set, not least because as I understand it, this is where Caroline's personal inquiry has been taking her - out of Westminster and into communities, with the [Climate Majority Project](https://www.linkedin.com/company/climatemajorityproject/?ref=actionism.space) among others. > > I can't wait to bring Ellie and her work with the [Re-Action Collective](https://www.linkedin.com/company/re-action-collective/?ref=actionism.space) and on the concept of [ACTionism](https://www.linkedin.com/company/actionism/?ref=actionism.space) into that conversation - I've known her for a few years now, and I know she'll have plenty to say. Her personal journey from anxiety to action is one I couldn't be more excited for you all to learn from." Jon ****You can sign up here:** [****https://lnkd.in/eRBP63NU**](https://lnkd.in/eRBP63NU?ref=actionism.space) ### The cascade effect of simple actions (+10 ACTions to get you started) URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-cascade-effect-of-simple-actions-10-actions-to-get-you-started/ Last updated: 2025-10-01T11:20:56.000Z ### What if weeding your kerb could lead to your community owning a park and starting a local veg box scheme for families in your area? Sometimes it can feel like small actions have no impact - we're told to switch off the lights, wash at 30 °C to protect the environment, or shop more sustainably. We hear you. These actions seem to have no impact, and you feel the only 'real power' is with the politicians you've lost trust in. **ACTionism is different** \- the power is yours and you don't have to give it away. And the best part: **your first small action can quickly lead to something much bigger** **It may sound unlikely, but this is exactly how change occurs**. \> Small actions spark conversations \> Conversations lead to connections \> Connections build into movements \> Movements create real change and power **The Pattern** Identify a frustration or need → Take Individual action → Conversation → Finding others → Regular collective action → Realising your power → Systemic change Here's an example: **From weeding your kerb to community land ownership and growing space** **Step 1** **Identify frustration:** Notice how overgrown the kerbs are on your walk to work because the council has lost its handyman. **ACTion** (10 mins): Weed the kerbs outside your house and plant wildflower seeds. **Conversation**: A neighbour stops to chat about what you're doing and mentions the lack of green space in your area **Step 2** (30 minutes): You meet to plant more wildflowers together along the street. **Connection**: Local business owner notices and offers to donate bulbs and space for planning meetings **Step 3** (2 hours): First meeting of "Green Our Neighbourhood" group – six people turn up **Regular action**: Monthly litter picks and planting sessions with a growing volunteer base **Realisation**: This group has real power – 30+ active members, local council starts to take an interest in how you're working **Step 4** (Ongoing): Launch a community share offer to purchase derelict land and transform it into a community park and growing space, which eventually produces enough to create a vegetable box scheme for local families in need. The space also becomes a gathering place where the wider community can connect, facilitating more actions, conversations, and connections, ultimately leading to greater power and change. > **We know what you're thinking - "This sounds great, but I'm just one person with a job/family/dog/cat/no time!"** Obviously, one person does not need to do all of this because ACTionism is about ***finding others and taking collective action***, but often, we need one small action to become visible to others, one frustration to be shared, or one action to be seen, for the cascade effect to take place. ## Ready to ACT, here are some quick-win ideas to start with: - Plant wildflower seeds in neglected kerbs - Leave free plant cuttings outside your home - Offer to mend clothes for neighbours (note through doors) - Fix or upcycle something broken on your street (painting benches is a great place to start) - Offer to teach a skill via your local noticeboard - Set up a street book swap box - Run a bike repair session in your garden - Put out a "help yourself" box of unwanted items - Start a street WhatsApp group for sharing and borrowing We'd love to know what you think- do you have any Quick-Win ideas to share? Let us know on [Instagram ](https://www.instagram.com/actionismcommunity/?ref=actionism.space)or [LinkedIn. ](https://www.linkedin.com/company/108068884/?ref=actionism.space) ### Hacking the System, Gently URL: https://www.actionism.space/hacking-the-system-gently/ Last updated: 2025-11-26T11:03:40.000Z *Citizen Friday as Ritual, Resistance, and Reprogramming* The system we live in is fast, loud, and relentless. It’s wired to keep us consuming, to keep us scrolling and shopping, reacting and refreshing, eyes always on the next thing. And, it’s smart. It learns what pulls us in and feeds it back to us, urgency, outrage, scarcity, shiny things, endless offers. But here’s the quiet truth: we don’t have to play along. Citizen Friday began as a small refusal. A gentle turning away. A choice, once a week, to step outside of that system and into something else. A different rhythm. A slower pace. A shared space. Just a few hours on a Friday to share what we have, repair what we can, and get out into the fresh air. And over time, that small ritual became something much more, it became a kind of weekly reprogramming. A soft, repeated hack into the dominant story that tells us who we are and what we’re here for. Not to consume. Not to hustle. But to connect. To care. To co-create. This year, we’re leaning further into that idea. What does it really mean to *hack the system,* not in a hostile or flashy way, but in a deep, intentional, collective way? Can we gently subvert the machinery by creating new patterns, new neural pathways, new algorithms, new stories? And what happens if we don’t just hack the algorithm, but also ourselves? We’ve been thinking a lot about how to make Citizen Friday a truly collective campaign, not something designed by one person or organisation, but shaped and built by a community. So this year, we’re using **Pol.is**, a collaborative tool for shared decision-making. It’s an experiment in participatory culture, where everyone who wants to be part of the campaign can help shape its direction. The poll is live. Add your voice, [here.](https://pol.is/9rmkwekuyh?ref=actionism.space) Your responses will literally change the message. The questions we ask, the tools we make, the words we share on the streets, the look and feel of the campaign, it’s all up for shaping. That in itself is a hack. Because we’re not waiting for permission or approval or funding or a boardroom strategy, we’re building it together, from the ground up. Even the tiniest contribution matters. A like. A comment. A share. All of it helps bend the algorithm toward something slower, kinder, and more human. These small actions, they tell the system that 'OUR' story matters. That repair, reciprocity, and reconnection are worth surfacing. That a stitched seam, or a shared walk, or an ACTionism community film night is worth more than a limited-time offer and an online discount code. The act of joining in is a reprogramming, of the self, of the feed, of the future. So, this week, consider it a gentle call-in. - A call to vote in the Pol.is poll. To add your voice, not to a debate, but to a collective sense-making process. - A call to show up, with your hands, your heart, your humour, and help build something better (join the Citizen Friday Community Call on Wednesday) - A call to disrupt the scroll with stories of real connection. We’ve said it before and we’ll keep saying it: this campaign only works if it’s co-created. That means you’re not just invited, **you’re essential**. And this Friday, as I step outside again, likely to the forest floor, the place where I seem to be learning most these days, I’ll be thinking not just about the system we’re trying to hack, but the world we’re trying to build in its place. Let’s build it together. ### One Step Leads to Another: The ACTionism Dance of Party Kit Network & No Crap Parties URL: https://www.actionism.space/one-step-leads-to-another-the-actionism-dance-of-party-kit-network-no-crap-parties/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T20:10:00.000Z I*n this article, we're applying Gav's "movements of collective action" to see how No Crap Parties and Party Kit Network - have been dancing through them. And more importantly, how you might join the dance.* **Tamasine:** I love a framework. Ask anyone who works with me - I'm the person who gets excited about toolkits, processes, and clear steps forward. I love having a structure that keeps me focused and working towards an end goal. So when Gav first started mapping the ACTionism journey towards collective action, I completely understood his instinct to create a framework - clear steps, a logical progression, a destination to reach. But he soon realised something crucial: frameworks suggest finality, an endpoint where the work is done. **Collective action isn't like that at all. It's much more like a dance.** We weave in and out of one another, adapting our moves based on those around us, learning as we go, feeling our way forward, and creating together. Sometimes we lead, sometimes we follow. Sometimes we're confident in our steps, sometimes we stumble. We move through these movements not once, but again and again, in different rhythms, with different partners, in response to different music. That's why this work is joyful, iterative, and there's no barrier to getting started. You don't need permission, perfect knowledge, or a master plan. You just need to hear the beat and start moving. --- ***Let's use the idea of the different dance moves Gav has been working with and see how they apply to the work of our*** [***upcoming Spotlight focus:*** ](https://www.actionism.space/join-our-live-spotlight-actionism-call-zero-waste-parties-community-building/)***No Crap Parties and Party Kit Network (and how you might join them)*** ## **Movement 1: Face the Truth, Together** **The awakening moment** ***The first step in collective action is breaking the silence - admitting what's wrong, naming our feelings, and discovering we're not alone in what we see.*** **No Crap Parties and The Party Kit Network's experiences:** - That sinking feeling at yet another party: bin bags full of plastic plates, cheap toys destined for landfill, the waste, the expense, the pressure - The isolation of being "that parent" who cares when it feels like no one else does - Speaking the truth: "This doesn't feel right. There has to be another way." - Finding the courage to admit: I'm frustrated, but I can't do this alone - Breaking the silence around party culture - being the first to say "I see this too" ## **Movement 2: Decide What Matters, Together** **Clarity emerges** ***Once we've faced the truth together, we can move beyond complaint to clarity - identifying our shared values and what we're actually working towards.*** **What they discovered:** - **Charlotte:** Children's parties should be joyful, affordable, and sustainable - not stressful, wasteful, and expensive - **Isabelle:** Reusable party supplies shouldn't be a privilege; they should be accessible to everyone through sharing - **Both recognised:** By setting something up, we're not just fixing parties, we're changing culture. We're helping parents remember what we truly value - connection, celebration, community - not consumption **The action:** Creating space to listen, learning from what works, building on what others have started. The Kids Party Pact and Party Kit Networks emerged from this listening and deciding together. ## **Movement 3: Find Your Role in the Work** **Everyone has their part to play** ***Collective action thrives when everyone finds their own way to contribute - not everyone does everything, but everyone does something that matters.*** **How roles emerged:** - Charlotte created a community and a pact - giving parents permission and a common language - Isabelle built the infrastructure - making reusables accessible through local networks - Parents join as organisers, kit lenders, pact signers, story sharers - Some hosted kit libraries, others spread the word, many simply started having different parties - Each found their rhythm **The pattern:** Some repeat the same essential work (running kits, organising swaps), others move between roles (advocate, organiser, participant). All contributions matter. All actions shape the whole. ## **Movement 4: Build Local Relationships & Trust** **The foundation forms** ***Real change requires trust, and trust is built through showing up, being there for each other, creating safety through action.*** **Trust building through action:** - Charlotte asked another parent to comment with support on her WhatsApp message, the first time she announced gift guidance for her child's party - knowing she wasn't the only one who thought this way gave her the courage to press send - Requesting second-hand gifts and having another voice publicly agree: "This is a great idea" - creating permission for others - Lending party kits to strangers who become friends - Borrowing supplies and returning them clean, building reciprocity - The vulnerable conversations: "I can't afford another expensive party" or "I feel so alone in caring about this" > **The reality:** Trust is the mycelium - the invisible web beneath the surface that holds everything together. Adrienne Maree Brown reminds us that "change moves at the speed of trust." Sometimes trust starts with just one other person saying: "I'm with you" when you're about to do something brave. This foundation, built on joy and mutual support, can weather anything. ## **Movement 5: Take Collective Action** **The demonstration begins** ***This is where ideas become reality - we move together from talking about change to actually creating it, building alternatives*** **Collective action in practice:** - **Party Kit Networks:** **A** **network** of **party** kits makes it easy to switch to reusable tableware. Borrow what you need, reducing waste and saving money! - **No Crap Parties & The Kids Party Pact:** A parent-led, collective movement to reduce wasteful party culture AND a collective building of something better - Parents hosting waste-free parties, proving it works, showing others it's possible - Communities creating reuse networks, tool libraries for celebrations - Not just resisting plastic plates and cheap toys, but reimagining what celebration looks like **The movement:** Two clear actions working together : **We resist AND we build.** **We don’t JUST object, we demonstrate possibility.** ## **Movement 6: Reimagine the Future, Together** **The vision becomes real** ***The final movement is about imagination becoming concrete - using shared dreaming to make the future we want so vivid and compelling that it pulls us forward.*** **Where they're heading:** - A future where waste-free, affordable, joyful parties are the norm, not the exception - Where children grow up understanding that celebration doesn't equal consumption - Where communities have the infrastructure to share, not just for parties, but for everything - Where being "that parent" becomes "our community" - connection replacing isolation - Where collective agency around parties ripples outward: if we can change this, what else can we reimagine? **The transformation:** They're not just changing parties - they're changing who we are as communities, as citizens, as people who create the future together through shared action. ### **Join the Dance** Party Kit Network and No Crap Parties embody the entire movement: 1. **They faced the truth** about wasteful party culture 2. **They decided what mattered** \- joy, affordability, sustainability, community 3. **They found their roles** \- building infrastructure and creating cultural change 4. **They built local trust** through repeated, reliable action 5. **They took collective action** \- networks, pacts, demonstrations of possibility 6. **They're reimagining the future** \- where celebration strengthens community rather than filling landfills **Having met both these wonderful women, we can honestly say they've created wonderful examples of ACTionism: finding the others, building in the cracks, proving another way exists, and inviting everyone to join the movement.** ## **So what now?** **Here's the beautiful truth: you don't need to start your own movement like Charlotte and Isabelle did.** We can take collective action by joining with them and adding our voices to the movements they've already established. This is how a joyful dance works. We're not all first on the dance floor. Some people step out first, creating the rhythm. Others join in when they hear the beat, feel it in their bones, and can't resist tapping their toe. Before you know it, you're moving alongside each other, on the table even, wondering how you ever resisted the rhythm before this moment. **When we're all moving together to the music, the energy and impact of our bodies in space become powerful and infectious**. That's how change spreads - like a ripple through the crowd. **Charlotte and Isabelle have created the rhythm - now it's about joining the dance, adding your energy to theirs. That's collective action. That's how the ripple spreads. That's how we dance a new world into being.** ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/ACTionism-core-image-templates--6--2.png) ## **If you have 5 minutes:** ### **No Crap Parties:** - [**Sign The Kids Party Pact** ](https://nocrapparties.org/?ref=actionism.space#PACT)\- choose which parts resonate with you: - Agreeing not to give plastic-filled party bags - Giving second-hand, homemade or experience gifts (or none at all) - Issuing guidance on no gifts or sustainable/reused gifts for your own children's parties - **Join the** [**No Crap Parties Instagram community** ](https://www.instagram.com/no.crap.parties/?ref=actionism.space) - Get three friends to sign The Kids Party Pact - if everyone does this, the movement quadruples in size ### **Party Kit Network:** - [**Find your nearest Party Kit location** ](https://www.partykitnetwork.org/find?ref=actionism.space) - Set up a [Reminder for before your next party to remind you to hire kit](https://www.partykitnetwork.org/reminder?ref=actionism.space) - **Join the Party Kit Network** [**Facebook group**](https://www.facebook.com/partykitnetwork) to connect with the community - **Start a conversation** with another parent about party waste ## **If you have an hour:** ### **No Crap Parties:** - **Have a conversation** with a few parents about what's bothering you about current party culture and see where it goes - **Draft gift guidance wording** for your next party invitation using [No Crap Parties templates](https://nocrapparties.org/free-birthday-party-invite-template/?ref=actionism.space) ### **Party Kit Network** - **Set up your own Kit and rent it out.** [Download the free Party Kit Network "Get Started" guide](https://www.partykitnetwork.org/getting-started?ref=actionism.space) \- packed with everything you need to know about setting up your own party kit to rent out - **Research what reusable party supplies** you and friends already have that you could share - **Explore and attend other local collective action initiatives** in your area (repair cafés, tool libraries, community gardens) ## **If you have ongoing time:** ### **No Crap Parties** - **Start a WhatsApp/Signal group** for parents interested in alternative party approaches in your area or school - **Document your experience** of implementing gift guidance and share it with the [No Crap Parties community](https://www.instagram.com/no.crap.parties/?ref=actionism.space) to inspire others ### **Party Kit Network** - [**Become a Party Kit Network organiser** ](https://www.partykitnetwork.org/join?ref=actionism.space)in your community - it's free to join, no membership fees or commission - **Register your existing party kit** on the Party Kit Network map if you already lend supplies - [**Attend the ACTionism call on 14th October** ](https://www.actionism.space/join-our-live-spotlight-actionism-call-zero-waste-parties-community-building/) to hear Charlotte and Isabelle's stories and ask questions ## **If you have more time:** ### **No Crap Parties:** - **Get three friends to** [**sign The Kids Party Pact** ](https://nocrapparties.org/?ref=actionism.space#PACT)\- if everyone does this, the movement quadruples in size - **Become an active voice** in your community, normalising sustainable gifting practices - **Start documenting and sharing stories** of parents making different choices - [we'd love to publish them on the ACTionism site](https://www.actionism.space/actionism-contributor-guidelines/) ### **Party Kit Network:** - **Apply for Party Kits for Schools funding** if you're connected to a UK primary school PTA - **Build connections** between party waste initiatives and other reuse/sharing movements **The invitation is open to all.** **The music is playing.** **What's your first move?** ### Some ACTions for this week (6th Oct) URL: https://www.actionism.space/some-actions-for-this-week-6th-oct/ Last updated: 2025-10-06T10:38:47.000Z ## Something to Join: [Live Spotlightcall : Zero Waste Parties - Turning your values into community action](https://www.actionism.space/join-our-live-spotlight-actionism-call-zero-waste-parties-community-building/) **"Collective action doesn't have a final destination. It's much more like a dance.** We weave in and out of one another, adapting our moves based on those around us, learning as we go, feeling our way forward, and creating together. Sometimes we lead, sometimes we follow. Sometimes we're confident in our steps, sometimes we stumble. We move through these movements not once, but repeatedly, in different rhythms, with different partners, in response to various music. That's why this work is joyful, iterative, and there's no barrier to getting started. You don't need permission, perfect knowledge, or a master plan. You just need to hear the beat and start moving." ***Tamasine Mc*** Does it get much more joyful than at parties? Want to start moving, or maybe keep moving in this dance of collective action? Join us for an inspiring conversation with two remarkable ACTionists: [Charlotte Mason-Curl](https://www.linkedin.com/in/charlottecurl/?ref=actionism.space) and [Isabel Mack](https://www.linkedin.com/in/isabeljmack/?ref=actionism.space) who turned their frustrations into thriving movements - **No Crap Parties and Party Kit Network** The call is also Gav's birthday, so bring cake. **We'll explore:** - Their **"aha moments"** that sparked action - **What it's really like to be "that person" who does things differently** \- and why it matters - How **one person's brave choice creates permission** for others to follow - **Practical steps** to start anything you're passionate about that brings people together - **How to sustain energy** and stay anchored when others question what you're doing - The surprising allies that emerge when you **act on your values** - What they've gained beyond the environmental impact - the deeper rewards of building community [Register for the free call](https://luma.com/u2tw0uh1?ref=actionism.space) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/ACTionism-core-image-templates--2--1.png) --- ## Something to Read: [One Step Leads to Another: The ACTionism Dance of Party Kit Network & No Crap Parties](https://www.actionism.space/one-step-leads-to-another-the-actionism-dance-of-party-kit-network-no-crap-parties/) In this article, Tamasine applied Gav's "movements of collective action" to see how No Crap Parties and Party Kit Network - have been dancing through them. And more importantly, how you might join the dance. This is a work of exploration, so feedback is greatly appreciated.[ Have we forgotten anything? Is Collective ACTion a linear journey, or a messy one? ](mailto:hello@actionism.space) --- ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/ACTionism-core-image-templates--18--1.png) ## Something to Join: [How to save democracy](https://www.actionism.space/how-to-save-democracy/) Three incredible citizens having a conversation about democracy, what's not to **love**?! [Jon Alexander](https://www.linkedin.com/in/jon-alexander-11b66345/?ref=actionism.space) will be hosting [Caroline Lucas](https://www.linkedin.com/in/caroline-lucas-981955335/?ref=actionism.space) and [Ellie Meredith](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ellie-meredith05/?ref=actionism.space), as they face up to the reality of the climate emergency, and together ask some big questions: \> How can and should democracies respond to the climate emergency? \> Where (if anywhere) is doing it well, in the face of the rise of the Far Right? \> How should we understand the relationship between the failure to address the climate emergency meaningfully and the crisis of democracy? This is live at the Conduit in London, as well as online. Sign up [here.](https://share-eu1.hsforms.com/1UV85V3pSTziJftDqKlONhA2b2ovr?ref=actionism.space) --- ## Something to attend: [A space for "OUR' community](https://www.actionism.space/next-actionism-connection-call-9th-october/) The next, **ACTionism Connection Call is on the 9th October 12.00**: no formal agenda - just good conversation, mutual support, and the chance to hear what's capturing everyone's attention. ​This friendly online meet-up is perfect for anyone who wants to: - ​Catch up with familiar faces and meet new members of the ACTionism community - ​Share interesting initiatives, projects, or campaigns you've discovered recently - ​Enjoy informal conversation with like-minded people passionate about collective action - Get a boost from sharing a co-working company and fresh perspectives [Next ACTionism Connection Call 9th OctoberNext ACTionism Connection Call 9th October 12.00 No formal agenda - just good conversation, mutual support, and the chance to hear what’s capturing everyone’s attention.![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/icon/Untitled-design--80--14.png)ACTionismACTionism![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/thumbnail/ACTionism-core-image-templates-2.png)](https://www.actionism.space/next-actionism-connection-call-9th-october/) --- ## Something to ponder: [Letters to the Earth](https://www.actionism.space/letters-to-the-earth-the-wolf/) **Gav**: At [**Earthed**](https://www.earthed.co/earthed-summit-2025/?ref=actionism.space), Kay Michael**, CEO & Creative Director** at​ [**Letters to the Earth**](https://www.letterstotheearth.com/?ref=actionism.space) led a beautiful workshop, inviting us to write from the perspective of another being, to step outside ourselves and speak on behalf of something wild, and alive. I found myself writing instantly… as a **wolf**. This was an interesting experience, one that maybe more of us could do? For me, speaking as a wolf was instinctive, maybe even inevitable. Wolves live on the land around our home. We catch glimpses of them in the shadows at night. Their presence fascinates me. As a keystone species, they hold the balance in our local ecosystem, and they stir something ancient in us. Writing from their voice was more than just creative. It was grounding. It makes me wonder: **What would shift if more of us tried this? *What might the world look like if we gave space to the voices we’ve forgotten how to hear?*** [Letters to the Earth: The WolfAt the Earthed Summit 2025: Generation Restoration, I met Kay Michael, CEO & Creative Director at Letters to the Earth. “Kay is a theatre-maker, creative producer and facilitator. She is a JMK Directors Award Finalist and recipient of the MGCfutures Bursary and the Arts Council’s DYCP Award for her work![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/icon/Untitled-design--80--15.png)ACTionismGavin Fernie-Jones![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/thumbnail/ACTionism-core-image-templates--17-.png)](https://www.actionism.space/letters-to-the-earth-the-wolf/) --- ## Something to Feedback on: [The Dance of Collective Action - From Passive Consumers to Active Citizens](https://www.actionism.space/the-dance-of-collective-action-from-passive-consumers-to-active-citizens/) **ACTionism feels very alive right now.** Especially after the recent Weekender and the deep, honest connections that have been forming between us. In this piece, Gav has started to explore *why* that might be. What is it we’re actually doing, consciously or not, that helps build **collective action**? ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/10/ACTionism-core-image-templates--16-.png) ### Can we tell your story of collective action? We've been talking a lot about the importance of weaving our stories together, so if you want **your story of collective action to inspire others, do get in touch** \- we're happy to 'collaborate' with you on [Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/actionismcommunity/?ref=actionism.space), cheerlead for you on [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/company/actionism/?ref=actionism.space), or maybe you'd like to[ write something for our positive story hub?](https://www.actionism.space/actionism-contributor-guidelines/) ### Letters to the Earth: The Wolf URL: https://www.actionism.space/letters-to-the-earth-the-wolf/ Last updated: 2025-10-02T10:54:44.000Z At the Earthed Summit 2025: Generation Restoration, I met Kay Michael**, CEO & Creative Director** at​ [**Letters to the Earth**](https://www.letterstotheearth.com/?ref=actionism.space). "Kay is a theatre-maker, creative producer and facilitator. She is a JMK Directors Award Finalist and recipient of the MGCfutures Bursary and the Arts Council’s DYCP Award for her work as an ecological artist and facilitator." ​Letters to the Earth is a global participatory storytelling platform, they empower *all of us* to write letters to (and from) the Earth: a space to bring forward our fears, frustrations, hopes, and love. Through these simple acts of expression, the project surfaces a collective voice, transforms our inner experiences into public art, and sparks regenerative change. At [**Earthed**](https://www.earthed.co/earthed-summit-2025/?ref=actionism.space), Kay led a beautiful **Letters to the Earth** workshop, inviting us to write from the perspective of another being, to step outside ourselves and speak on behalf of something wild, and alive. I found myself writing instantly… as a **wolf**. Wolves live on the land around our home, rarely seen, but often sensed. We glimpse them in the shadows, hear them in the quiet, and feel their presence in the balance of the ecosystem. As a keystone species, they hold more than just biological importance, they carry wisdom. This is the letter that came through me, from them. ## The Wolf I am not to be feared. Not by you. The stories you tell, built from shadows, shaped by misunderstanding. I do not eat grandmothers. I do not hunt your livestock. I do not wait outside your door at night. I move through the dark, silent, unhurried, working where you cannot see, a force of balance, a keystone in this world. As once were you. If you listen to your gut, you know that to be true. I regenerate what you have forgotten, what you have lost. I carry it in my blood, in the rhythm of my steps. I am not to be feared. In my world, there are no fences, no ownership, no borders. Abundance shared, life flows freely, untouched by your need to claim, to possess, to control. In your forgetfulness, you fail to see, that I am more important than you know. More than your constructs, your designs, your solutions, your plans. I am the beat of what was, and what is to come. Next time you step into the night, strain your eyes, and there, in the stillness, in the glint of an eye, you will see truths. When you do. Do not flinch, do not turn in fear. Step forward, for this is the work. You must reclaim your place in this world, become a keystone. Only then, can the regeneration begin. I'm not to be feared, and once upon a time, neither were you. ### The Dance of Collective Action: From Passive Consumers to Active Citizens URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-dance-of-collective-action-from-passive-consumers-to-active-citizens/ Last updated: 2025-09-29T14:47:47.000Z Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about the future, not just the problems we face, but what it could look like if we truly came together to shape something better. This piece is part of that exploration: imagining how we move from being passive consumers to active citizens, and what it might take to get there. The result. A message from the future, about how we found the others and danced a new world into being. ### The Dance began in 2019. At first, it was hard to notice. The floor was empty, and no music played to guide the steps. It felt lonely, fragmented. A few brave dancers entered, their presence fleeting, uncertain. In other places, there were dance floors too, more structured, yet rooted in fear, in anger, in the notion of the “other.” Inherently fragile. But this… this was something else. ### Movement 1: Face the Truth, Together (to the melody of the Robin) These first dance steps were like the robin’s dawn chorus, not a clear melody, but a tentative, high-pitched whistle, broken by silence. A first voice piercing the dark. We had forgotten how to sing, how to move together, buried under the weight of consumerism, separated into individuals, defined by the things we owned. We were learning again. Learning that we were citizens, not consumers. Those early steps were awkward. We stumbled. We shamed instead of celebrated. Few joined at first. But slowly, we discovered the power of truth shared in community. Grief, fear, anger, and overwhelm, once seen as weakness, became a route to connection. As we made space for honesty, we began to form bonds. ### Movement 2: Decide What Matters, Together (to the song of the Blackbird) Next others began to dance. Like the song of the Blackbird, they laid foundations. Their part carried something new. We had been isolated, divided by systems that fed on separation. But the more we danced, the more we allowed ourselves to feel, the more we shook off paralysis. And then something sparked: we realised we weren’t alone. We were discovering ACTionism: the art of finding the others and taking collective action. There wasn’t just one dance floor forming, there were many. They sprang up across places and practices. Farmers danced to the rhythm of regeneration. Designers and makers reshaped consumption into community. Accountants helped us remember what we valued. Educators reimagined how we grow. Elders stepped forward, carrying wisdom. Activists challenged. Ancient culture reminded. Citizens rebuilt politics. Each floor developed its own beat, its own rhythm. But they were connected, they echoed from the past, repeating, evolving. Like the Blackbird’s song: a melancholic whistle, full of space, we listened as much as we moved. The dance was still imperfect, it always would be, the endings unfinished, but they were made together. Blackbirds are known to mimic. And so we mimicked one another, not in uniformity, but in collective spirit. A shared dance took shape. And with it came the questions: **What do we truly care about?** **What are we protecting, restoring, or creating?** As we danced and sang, a common purpose emerged. We remembered: we didn’t need permission to act. ### **Movement 3: Find Your Role in the Work** (to the warble of the Thrush) Everyone had a role to play. You didn’t have to master the steps, just find your own rhythm. Maybe you cooked, organised, repaired, listened, designed, taught, told stories. Every contribution mattered. Every action helped shape the whole. The volume began to rise, like the Thrush. Loud, diverse, patterned. Some repeated familiar moves, like a stitch in a sewing machine, they knew what was theirs to do. Others shifted, floating between roles, guides, ushers, igniters. They watched, listened: **What’s already happening?** **Where can I add energy?** **How can I show up in ways I love?** That’s when the movement began to thrive. The action became joyful. It became real. ### Movement 4: Build Local Relationships & Trust (to the chirp of the sparrow) Then came the next phase: relationships. Trust formed, like conga lines weaving through the crowd. Like the: social, adaptable, house sparrow, loud in its togetherness. Its chirps cut through the chorus, reminding us that connection is everything. Before real change, there must be trust. And that trust didn’t arrive overnight. It grew through ACTion, by showing up, helping out, listening, dancing, over and over again. Trust became our mycelium, unseen, but holding everything together. We soon learned that change moved at the speed of trust. Unlike the dance floors built from fear, this foundation couldn’t splinter. It was built on joy. It could weather anything. ### Movement 5: Take Collective Action (to the rhythm of the chiffchaff) The dance began to crystallise. Two even, clear movements, like the call of the Chiffchaff, rippled across the floors. The sign of spring. A metronome of renewal. We moved into collective action. Ideas took shape: energy co-ops, food growing schemes, repair cafés, reuse networks, tool libraries, community kitchens, transitions at work. The dance floor became a demonstration, we protested, learnt the power of collective boycotts, but we also built, grounded in possibility. Our notes were creativity and action, they played one after an other, until we spiralled, hand in hand into a future. We didn’t just respond to crisis, we **built**. Not alone, **together**. With one foot in the old world, and the other in the new. We didn’t just resist, we reimagined. ### **Movement 6: Reimagine the Future, Together (to the sound of the citizens)** Now, we sang, our chorus rose, rattling windows. And with it: story, art, ritual, listening, imagination. Dreaming wasn’t a distraction. It was the **direction**. Our faith returned, restorative, rooted, rebuilt as citizens of a more-than-human world. As systems collapsed, we didn’t just survive, we reimagined. Hope became our resource. Shared imagination, our power. And yes, we danced. We danced hard, not with fists, but with joy. The dance floors built on fear, on anger, on the idea of the “other” began to crack and fall apart. In their place, *our* dance floors swelled, as we dismantled division. Our conga lines grew longer, our sense of interdependence deepened. We repeated our moves, strengthened our rhythms: **feel, connect, act, imagine,** again and again. Our dance didn't become a march to a single beat; it was messy, wild, and uncontainable. We weren’t just changing what we did, we were changing who we were, together. And that changed everything. The movements, shaped by relationship, sparked real change. They rippled outward, across neighbourhoods, networks, systems. They formed the roots of a just, regenerative future. Our true agency arose from the collective rhythm. ### And we did it. In 2035 we drowned out the fear with creativity and action. A shared rhythm. A collective vision. There is still much work to be done but, 'WE' have reconnected, built bridges to each other and the more-than-human-world. 'WE' own the energy, 'WE' own our future. We dance like everyone is watching. And we don’t care. From that messy, joyful, deeply human rhythm, **our collective agency is born.** We are no longer passive consumers, we have become active citizens. With a voice. With rhythm. With collective agency. We found the others, and danced a new world into being. Our collective vision isn't a distant dream, we now create it, it is real. And as we move together, ‘OUR’ dance reaches full swing. All of a sudden, everything is possible. We danced ourselves free from the shackles of the system. ### ACTionism Weekender - Photo Journal URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism-weekender-photo-journal/ Last updated: 2025-09-24T10:30:17.000Z ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-19-at-15.13.28.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-19-at-15.13.40--1-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-19-at-15.13.40.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-21-at-10.35.42--1-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-21-at-10.35.42.jpeg) 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![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/1.png) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-21-at-10.35.58.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-21-at-10.35.59--1-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-21-at-10.35.59.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-21-at-10.36.00.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-24-at-11.48.23--3-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-24-at-11.48.23--4-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-24-at-11.48.23--6-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/4.png) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-24-at-11.48.21--1-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-24-at-11.48.22--3-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-24-at-11.48.22--1-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-24-at-11.48.21.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-24-at-11.48.22--4-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-24-at-11.48.22--5-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-24-at-11.48.22.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-24-at-11.48.23--1-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/5.png) ### Ripples in the Shed URL: https://www.actionism.space/ripples-in-the-shed/ Last updated: 2025-09-25T13:09:19.000Z *(Note: This piece has evolved through discussion, collaboration, and lived experience. It began as “From Passive Consumers to Active Citizens: Six Steps Toward Collective Action.” But through feedback (thanks everyone that got involved) and reflection, we realised: this isn’t a tidy sequence of steps. It’s not a straight path. It’s more like a dance.* *The journey toward collective action moves in rhythms, not rules. You find the others by voicing your feelings. You decide what matters. You explore your role, which will likely shift over time. You build trust through action. You reimagine the future, again and again.* *These are movements you return to. Shapes you learn and improvise with. So, instead of steps, we now offer this as a dance: one where you practice the moves, feel the tempo, and respond as needed.*) --- I recently found myself standing in a shed at the ACTionism weekender, surrounded by ideas and dreams of transformation. I was stood with citizens that are reimagining education. Transforming school canteens. Redesigning the built environment. Repairing our things, restructuring finance, reconnecting people to nature, telling stories of possible futures, supporting legislation to transform care, creating collective action - and much more. It was energising, all that ambition, creativity, possibility, in one space. All those ideas and dreams of transformation are sending out ripples that are beginning to overlap. At the weekender ACTionism felt like a living movement. > "At Actionism Camp I was reminded of teaching an A-Level social psychology lesson on minority influence. Research shows that for social change to happen, the minority must show consistency, commitment, and flexibility – and I saw all three alive this weekend. Magical. > > It felt like building community. A place where I belonged, amongst incredible people who believe in the interconnected nature of us all, and the importance of valuing our relationships with ourselves, with each other, and with the world. And of course, no community is complete without eating together! " Shenel Shefik What brought us together wasn’t just shared meals and workshops. It was a deeper search for agency, belonging, and the will to act, together. On the journey home, I began writing. I started with “steps” toward collective action. But the more I reflected, the more I realised: these aren’t steps. They’re movements, part of a larger, dynamic dance we’re all learning in real time. ## From Passive Consumers to Active Citizens: The Dance of Collective Action ### *Six Interwoven Movements* *\- Face the Truth, Together* *\- Decide What Matters, Together* *\- Find Your Role in the Work* *\- Build Local Relationships & Trust* *\- Take Collective Action* *\- Reimagine the Future, Together* ### **Face the Truth, Together** Feel what’s real. The grief, fear, anger, and overwhelm in response to a world in crisis. These feelings are not weaknesses, they are openings. Share them with others. When we voice what’s true, we create connection. When we face the truth together, we build the foundation for something new. > *Why it matters:* Unspoken fear isolates us. But naming what we feel breaks through paralysis and ignites collective energy. It signals to others: you’re not alone. ### **Decide What Matters, Together** Come together, in your community, workplace, or shared space, and ask: *What do we care about? What are we protecting, restoring, or creating?* This isn’t about big numbers. It’s about meaningful connections. From shared meals to repair cafés to small conversations, these are the spaces where common purpose begins to grow. > *Why it matters:* When we reclaim the power to decide what matters, we remember that we don’t need permission to take action. ### **Find Your Role in the Work** You don’t need to do everything. You don’t need to be perfect. You just need to find your place. Maybe you cook, organise, listen, design, teach, repair, or tell stories. Every role matters. Every contribution helps shape the whole. Look around. What’s already happening? Where could you add energy? What do you love? > *Why it matters:* Movements thrive when people commit to what they can offer. Action becomes more sustainable, more joyful, and more real. ### **Build Local Relationships & Trust** Before any big change, there’s relationship. Trust isn’t built overnight, it grows through showing up, ACTing, listening, helping out, and staying connected. In every community, trust is the mycelium: invisible but essential. It’s what holds everything together. > *Why it matters:* Change moves at the speed of trust. Without it, action fractures. With it, we can weather anything. ### **Take Collective Action** This is where ideas take form. Join or start something that creates real-world alternatives: energy co-ops, food growing schemes, tool libraries, repair cafés, community kitchens, workplace transitions. This is where hope meets practice. > *Why it matters:* These projects don’t just respond to crisis—they model the future. They show that another world is possible, and already in progress. ### **Reimagine the Future, Together** Don’t just resist, dream. Use story, art, ritual, listening, imagination. Envision systems built on care, justice, and belonging. Dreaming isn’t a distraction, it’s direction. > *Why it matters:* In times of collapse, imagining a different future is an act of defiance and renewal. Hope is a resource. Shared imagination, a form of power. ## **The Result** When we engage in this dance, this rhythm of feeling, connecting, acting, imagining, we begin to shift not just what we do, but who we are together. These movements, practiced in relationship, spark real change. They ripple out, shaping neighbourhoods, networks, and systems. They form the roots of a resilient, just, and regenerative future. True agency is always collective. And when enough people start moving, something powerful begins to form. A shared rhythm. A collective vision. A new chapter in our human story. **Let’s share our feelings. Let’s dance. Let’s throw out some shapes.** From that rhythm, messy, joyful, human - **our collective agency will rise.** ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/ACTionism--Find-the-Others--9--2.png) ### ACTionism Sounds URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism-sounds/ Last updated: 2025-09-23T15:37:31.000Z We’ve just wrapped up the ACTionism Weekender, a joyful and deeply connective experience. Coming together to share meals, participate in workshops, spend time on the land, and engage in open discussions sparked a real shift in our emotions. It deepened our connections and broadened our understanding of what others are feeling. This powerful experience has inspired us to build on the momentum created by the ACTionism film, which now has 109 screenings scheduled across the UK and internationally, including upcoming shows in Vermont, Perth, Winchester, Cornwall, Bristol, and the Isle of Wight. From these screenings, we’ve learned that sitting in rows isn’t the best setting for meaningful conversation. Many participants also find it hard to tap into their creativity or feel they need permission to act. That’s why we’re developing the next chapter of the ACTionism movement, one that actively fosters collective action through storytelling and shared experience. And, one that gets us out of our seats and acting. **Introducing ACTionism Sounds, a new project designed to move people beyond inspiration toward real, community-led change.** ## Overview ACTionism Sounds is a UK-wide audio documentary series and community engagement project that transforms social and environmental frustration into hope and collective empowerment. Featuring six immersive episodes and supported by live listening workshops, the series tells real stories of ordinary people coming together to create extraordinary change, showing that the gap between caring and acting is smaller than we think. By blending rich soundscapes with shared listening experiences, **ACTionism Sounds** inspires people to **connect, reflect, and take local collective action**. This project builds on the momentum of the ACTionism film (2025), addressing the key challenge audiences face after inspiration: knowing how to act. ### **A Call for Support** ACTionism Sounds is a fully designed project ready to go, from episode themes, narrative structure, workshop formats, to community partnerships, yet we currently have no secured funding. We’re looking for individuals, companies, foundations, or collaborators who believe in the power of collective action and storytelling. With funding or in-kind support, we can bring this audio documentary + workshop series to life, spread it widely, and empower more communities to move beyond inspiration into real change. Keep reading for further details about the project. --- ### Six Steps of ACTionism: The Path to Collective Change ACTionism Sounds unfolds across six episodes, each exploring a vital step on the journey from awareness to collective action. Together, these stories guide listeners through facing difficult truths, discovering shared purpose, finding their unique role, building trust, taking collective action, and imagining a hopeful future, showing how ordinary people can create extraordinary change. **1\. Face the Truth, Together** *Recognise and name your feelings, - grief, fear, anger, overwhelm - and share them to build connection and solidarity, breaking through paralysis with shared purpose.* **2\. Decide What Matters, Together** *Gather with your community to identify shared values and the future you want to build, reclaiming your power to act locally.* **3\. Find Your Role in the Work** *Discover how your unique skills and passions can contribute to collective efforts, joining existing initiatives or starting new ones.* **4\. Build Local Relationships & Trust** *Build trust through consistent presence and care, the foundation of strong, resilient movements.* **5\. Take Collective Action** *Participate in or start projects that create new ways of living, demonstrating alternatives to broken systems.* **6\. Reimagine the Future, Together** *Dream boldly through storytelling and dialogue, inspiring collective hope and building new systems rooted in care and justice.* **The Result** By coming together to explore our shared values and build connections, we lay the foundation for meaningful, community-led change. These early conversations and gatherings spark trust, inspire creativity, and fuel collective action. Over time, this growing network of relationships and shared purpose becomes a powerful force, capable of transforming our neighbourhoods and systems, shaping resilient futures, and proving that real change begins with us. Eventually the collective power and ACTing forms a collective vision and our human story shifts. --- ### The Result These steps spark trust, inspire creativity, and fuel collective action, growing into a powerful network that transforms communities and systems. By sharing feelings and stepping into the power of *us*, we activate collective transformation. --- ### About the Audio Documentary Series ACTionism Sounds is a six-part audio documentary series designed to immerse listeners in the journey of collective transformation. Each episode delves into one of the six steps of ACTionism, guiding audiences through a process of reimagining and rebuilding community. Through rich storytelling, ambient soundscapes, and firsthand accounts, the series invites listeners to not only hear but also sense and feel the power of collective action. By weaving together personal narratives and communal experiences, ACTionism Sounds aims to inspire and mobilise individuals to take meaningful steps toward a more connected and just future. - **6 episodes** featuring UK grassroots projects focused on food, nature, mental health, repair/reuse, community, and education. - A young narrator guides listeners on a journey from climate anxiety to active citizenship. --- ### **Workshops & Community Toolkit** The ACTionism Sounds workshops are designed to bring the audio documentary to life by creating spaces where people can listen, reflect, and connect deeply with the stories and themes. We know that real change happens when individuals come together to share experiences, explore ideas, and support one another in taking collective action. The ACTionism Sounds workshops will transform citizens from passive listeners into active, collective engagement. By creating spaces where participants can openly share their fears, discuss shared values, identify individual roles, and build trust, these workshops foster a sense of community and empowerment. The workshops will involve art, music, creative writing, movement and much more. The goal is to unlock action through action. Through collaborative creative activities, participants will experience firsthand the power of collective action and be inspired to imagine and work towards a different, more just future. We will begin with three pilot live listening workshops that will inform the development and direction of the ACTionism Sounds tour. The ACTionism Sounds tour will be community-driven and locally hosted, taking place in workspaces and everyday settings, just as the ACTionism film has done. - **Three live listening workshops** across the UK blend audio storytelling with group discussion, hands-on workshops, sparking emotional connection and practical action. - A **free downloadable toolkit** will enable communities to host their own workshops, expanding impact beyond initial events. --- ### Why This Project, Why Now? With overwhelming doom in media narratives causing paralysis, **ACTionism Sounds** offers a hopeful alternative, showing that active citizens can create real change. Building on the ACTionism film’s success, it bridges the gap between inspiration and action through accessible storytelling, diverse voices, and joyful collective experiences. --- ### Inclusion & Reach - Geographically spread UK stories and venues - Free entry and accessible workshops to remove barriers. - Recruiting of a diverse young narrator from underrepresented communities, offering training and pay. - Community engagement shapes all aspects to ensure relevance and inclusivity. --- ### **Partnering with Soundquake: Elevating ACTionism Sounds** We are collaborating with Soundquake, an audio production agency renowned for its innovative approach to storytelling. With over a decade of experience working with major brands, Soundquake has redirected its expertise towards mission-driven organisations, focusing on creating impactful audio documentaries. Their methodology centres on producing high-quality, finite audio series, typically 6 to 8 episodes, that delve deep into the narratives of organisations, showcasing their missions and the change they are driving. This approach ensures that each project is not just heard but felt, leaving a lasting impression on its audience. By leveraging Soundquake's expertise, ACTionism Sounds aims to craft an audio documentary that resonates deeply with listeners, fostering a sense of connection and inspiring collective action. Their commitment to quality and purpose aligns seamlessly with our vision, ensuring that the project not only reaches its audience but also moves them to engage and act. ### **Seeking Partnerships and Support** ACTionism Sounds is an ambitious community-led initiative that aims to amplify collective action through immersive audio storytelling and participatory workshops. While we currently operate without dedicated funding, **we are actively seeking partnerships with organisations**, companies, and individuals who share our commitment to fostering community engagement and social change. Support could come in various forms, including **financial contributions**, in-kind resources, or collaborative efforts to host workshops and screenings. By joining forces, we can expand the reach and impact of this project, bringing people together to listen, reflect, and take meaningful action. If you're interested in supporting or partnering with us, please reach out, we'd love to explore how we can work together to create lasting change. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/ACTionism--Find-the-Others--9--1.png) ### Join our Live Spotlight ACTionism Call: Zero Waste Parties - Turning your values into community action URL: https://www.actionism.space/join-our-live-spotlight-actionism-call-zero-waste-parties-community-building/ Last updated: 2025-10-13T09:17:10.000Z **​NEW TIME BELOW:** **Ever felt like the only one who cares? Ready to act on your values but worried about standing out?** [**When:** ](https://luma.com/u2tw0uh1?ref=actionism.space)Tue 14th October 12-1 GMT ​This month we'll be spotlighting **Charlotte Mason-Curl**\- Founder of [No Crap Parties ](https://nocrapparties.org/?ref=actionism.space)\- A community of parents who want to make children's *parties* more affordable & sustainable. She has also created The Kids Party Pact to help change the culture around kids' parties. And **Isabel Mack** \- Founder of [Party Kit Network](https://www.partykitnetwork.org/?ref=actionism.space) \- a network of party kits making it easy to switch to reusable tableware) She is also co-creator of The Alternative High Street ​**What we'll explore:** - Their "aha moments" that sparked action - **What it's really like to be "that parent" who does things differently - and why it matters** - **How one person's brave choice creates permission for others to follow** - Practical steps to set up something similar in your area - it could be party related or not - just **lots of good advice for starting anything you're passionate about that brings people together** - **How to sustain energy when creating something like this - and stay anchored when others question what you're doing** - **The surprising connections and unexpected allies that emerge when you act on your values** - **What they've gained beyond the environmental impact - the deeper rewards of building community around your values** - Plus much more ## [**​**](https://luma.com/0rypfh3f?ref=actionism.space)**When: Tue, October 14th 12-1 GMT** [**Register now to secure your spot**](https://luma.com/u2tw0uh1?ref=actionism.space) ​Ready to turn your concern into community action? We'll see you there. ### Why we need ACTionism and Activism to end the Genocide in Gaza URL: https://www.actionism.space/why-we-need-actionism-and-activism-to-end-the-genocide-in-gaza/ Last updated: 2025-09-17T16:45:37.000Z **ACTionism fills cracks with action where activism shows you the problem – but ending genocide needs both working together.** This week I have been thinking about: **why sometimes imperfect action is better than perfect inaction.** Since discovering the idea of ACTionism and setting up this hub, I've always believed that activism identifies and raises awarness about injustice, whilst ACTionism bridges the gap to tangible action. But, right now, watching the genocide continuing to unfold in Gaza, I know that we need every tool available: the awareness that activism brings AND the practical steps that ACTionism provides. **This isn't a moment for choosing sides between approaches – it's a moment for combining them with our shared humanity at the centre.** That's what pushed me, after almost 18 years working behind the scenes in social media and content, to step in front of the camera. I rarely do this, – but there was no time to find the "right" person to deliver this message. So in the spirit of ACTionism and all that it has taught me, I made my own video, as a way to help me find people willing to take action together. As you'll see, I'm not a political expert – just someone who cares deeply about what's happening in our world. I've noticed so many friends staying silent, and I want to believe it's not because they don't care, but because they genuinely don't know what they can do to help. So I made this video If that's you, this video is for you. This is ACTionism in practice: turning awareness into concrete steps you can take right now. ## **Ready to ACT?** **We think this needs to happen TODAY as the meeting is scheduled for September 18th. Sometimes imperfect action is better than perfect inaction.** If I got anything wrong in terms of my understanding of how this works, please let me know.**,** Here's how you can help with the UN General Assembly's Uniting for Peace resolution – add your voice and contact your representative: [Uniting for Peace - STOP THE GENOCIDE ](www.stopgenocide.com/unga) > [ View this post on Instagram ](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOhLMORDBOM/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) > > [A post shared by ACTionism (@actionismcommunity)](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOhLMORDBOM/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) ### Monthly Connection call - online meet - 2nd Thursday of every month - 12.00 GMT URL: https://www.actionism.space/monthly-connection-call-online-meet-2nd-thursday-of-every-month-12-00-gmt/ Last updated: 2025-09-17T13:48:09.000Z **Our summer connection call went so well, we've decided to make this a regular thing - so add it to your diary** ​This friendly online meetup is perfect for anyone who wants to: - ​Catch up with familiar faces and meet new members of the ACTionism community - ​Share interesting initiatives, projects, or campaigns you've discovered recently - ​Enjoy informal conversation with like-minded people passionate about collective action - Get a boost from sharing co-working company and fresh perspectives ​Whether you're looking for new ideas and inspiration or simply looking for some friendly faces who understand your drive for positive change and collective action, this session offers a welcoming space to reconnect and recharge. ​No formal agenda - just good conversation, mutual support, and the chance to hear what's capturing everyone's attention. Come as you are, share what you'd like, and leave feeling more connected to our community. Register for the free online connect call here [Sign up here ](https://luma.com/s659iuw1?ref=actionism.space) ### Ride the Change x ACTionism URL: https://www.actionism.space/ride-the-change-x-actionism/ Last updated: 2025-09-09T12:07:30.000Z Hello people of Brighton! If you're in town on the evening of Saturday 27th September, there is an event we want to share with you. As part of this year's [Ride the Change](https://www.linkedin.com/company/ridethechange/?ref=actionism.space) bike ride, there will be a screening of ACTionism, the film created by [Re-Action Collective](https://www.linkedin.com/company/re-action-collective/?ref=actionism.space) and we're opening up the screening to non-riders to join. The details: 📆 Sat 27th September, from 6.30pm 📍 Fabrica (next to Pizza Pilgrims) in Brighton 🍿 Film at 7.30pm followed by discussions, drinks and mingling 🎬 Tickets are £5 (pizza not included, but order next door and bring over) > *"It would be great to get as many of the people of Brighton there as possible. Let's get together and discuss the things that matter."* ### Winchester Green Week x ACTionism - 24th September URL: https://www.actionism.space/winchester-green-week-x-actionism/ Last updated: 2025-09-04T13:42:08.000Z Near Winchester? Interested in repair, reuse and the sharing economy? Want to find out more about the [Re-Action Collective](https://www.linkedin.com/company/re-action-collective/?ref=actionism.space) and the quiet revolution happening? As part of [Winchester Green Week](https://www.winchestergreenweek.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space), join the [Party Kit Network](https://www.partykitnetwork.org/?ref=actionism.space) for a screening of ACTionism 🌱 🗓️ Wed 24th September, 7.00pm 📍 St Mark’s Church, Oliver's Battery, Winchester SO22 4EZ 🎟️ £5 including tea and biscuits! And here's Isabel Mack, Party Kit Network explaining exactly why she is hosting a screening. "I was just writing a Facebook post about the upcoming screening of [Re-Action Collective](https://www.linkedin.com/company/re-action-collective/?ref=actionism.space)’s short film ACTionism (while making lunch for my kids - school holidays 🤯) and found myself reflecting on why I’m hosting a screening in the first place. I realised that being part of Re-Action has been one of the most uplifting things I’ve done. Even while stewarding a global network of over 600 party kit hosts, the day-to-day can feel lonely. Trying to navigate the “old world” while building something new is exhausting. I didn’t fully understand why until I read Citizens by [Jon Alexander](https://www.linkedin.com/in/jon-alexander-11b66345/?ref=actionism.space). Joining the Re-Action crew gave me the space and the solidarity to keep going. So if you’re near Winchester and would like to share in a little bit of that sparkle, please join us on 24th September! ✨" ACTionism isn’t the only thing happening in town. Winchester Green Week is a vibrant annual celebration of community-powered climate and sustainability action. It brings together local groups, organisations, and residents for a week of events, talks, workshops, and hands-on activities, all designed to inspire practical change and spark hopeful conversations. It’s about learning, connecting, and taking real steps together toward a greener, fairer future. That sounds like our kind of event. Click here for more info about Winchester Green Week [Check out the full schedule ](https://www.winchestergreenweek.org.uk/events?ref=actionism.space) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/1755515606353.jpeg) ### The collab we need - 5th October - Cornish Bank in Falmouth URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-collab-we-need/ Last updated: 2025-09-04T14:22:42.000Z Together with [99p Films](https://www.99pfilms.com/?ref=actionism.space) we're taking ACTionism to Falmouth University Sustainable Fashion department as part of Fashion Reclaimed, a Sustainable Fashion Week between 27 Sept – 5 Oct 2025. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-03-at-16.47.11.jpeg) **99p Films is a community cinema that turns film screenings into shared, transformative experiences , combining film, mindful breathing, discussion, and communal feasts.** Founder Alex Fish has been a close friend of ACTionism since we met at Goodfest in 2023, and his Social Cinema approach helped shape how we released the ACTionism film, not for passive viewing, but as a catalyst for community dialogue. 99p Films also contributed to the first ACTionism handbook with a brilliant guide: *How to Social Cinema,* helping us and others hold space for meaningful conversations around film. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/20.png) So we're beyond excited to be screening ACTionism with the champions of social cinema, 99p Films. If you're in the Falmouth area on the 5th of October, join us! ### ACTionism x Pol.is: Can We Build Better Conversations About Change? URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism-x-pol-is-can-we-build-better-conversations-about-change/ Last updated: 2025-09-11T10:29:35.000Z There are days when the anger hits hard. Recently, there's been a lot of them. The injustice, the violence, the collapse, it can be overwhelming. And in those moments, it's easy to feel torn between wanting to scream in protest and needing to curl up and disappear. Rage can be clarifying, but it can also be exhausting. And sometimes, it leaves you asking: *What should I actually be doing with all this?* Is this the moment for shouting in the streets? For throwing yourself into direct action? Or is there another way, a quieter, more creative path that builds the foundations of something new? The truth is: **we need it all**. We need the frontline activists, the community builders, the storytellers, the disruptors, the healers, and the dreamers. No single approach is enough on its own but together, they form the roots to change. Maybe the real skill, especially in times like these, is deciding: **Where is my energy most effective right now? What’s the work that only I can do?** As the system unravels, it can be hard to answer that. And frankly, it can give you sleepless nights. There’s a part of me that longs to be on a flotilla heading to Gaza. And yet, I sense that my role right now is to be here, as a creative citizen. Not just speaking out against the system, but helping to dismantle it by building a whole new story. At ACTionism, we don’t pretend to have the answers. But we do believe in making space for the question. And maybe the most powerful way to explore it is together, through conversation, reflection, and collective listening. ### Pol.is Live What happens when you take a machine learning-powered democracy tool, strip away the anonymity, and bring it to life, in a field? We don’t know but at the ACTionism Weekender, we’re going to find out. ### **Why?** Because ACTionism isn’t just about what we do, it’s about *how we talk about* what we do. And more importantly, how we listen, reflect, and grow together as citizens navigating complex challenges. ### **The Tool: Pol.is** Pol.is is a real-time digital platform that helps large groups of people understand what they collectively think, using their own words. Participants respond to statements and add their own, while the system uses advanced statistics and machine learning to map consensus and division. Typically, it’s done anonymously online. But we wondered… **What if we brought that conversation into the real world? What if we could *embody* the disagreement? What if we could *practice listening*, not just to confirm what we think, but to grow our understanding?** ### **The Experiment: Pol.is in the Field** We’ve launched a live Pol.is poll in the lead-up to the ACTionism Weekender. The Weekender is more than just a gathering, it’s a co-created, community-powered space where citizens come together to rest, connect, imagine, and build. Set in nature and shaped by the rhythms of shared meals, conversations, and playful workshops, the weekend brings to life the spirit of actionism: hopeful, hands-on, and grounded in joy. From lego play and storytelling to collective imagining and real-time democracy experiments, each activity invites participants not just to observe change, but to practise it. To help us practise listening, reflecting, and questioning our assumptions with curiosity, we’re running a live Pol.is experiment, starting with this opening statement: - Does actionism offer the kind of change we need now, or is it too quiet for the urgency of this moment? Over the next couple of weeks participants will respond to this [online poll](https://pol.is/3jfxsjefcp?ref=actionism.space). From there, the tool identifies the most *divisive* statements, those that generate thoughtful disagreement. Share your thoughts and opinions about ACTionism. Take part in the poll. [Learn more ](https://pol.is/3jfxsjefcp?ref=actionism.space) ### **The Workshop: From Poll to Pathway** At the Weekender, we bring those divisive statements from the poll into physical space. **How it works:** 1. We mark a long line on the ground: One end is **“Strongly Agree”**, the other is **“Strongly Disagree”**, and the middle is **“Not Sure.”** 2. We read aloud 10 of the most divisive statements from the poll. 3. Participants position themselves on the line based on where they stand on each statement. 4. From there, we invite two types of dialogue: - Small group chats with those around you - Or one-on-one conversations with someone who stood in a very different place This isn’t a debate. There’s no winner. It’s a practice: in listening, reflecting, and challenging your assumptions with curiosity. ### **Why This Matters** The conversations that change us most aren’t always the loudest ones. They’re often quiet, respectful, embodied, and surprising. In an age of polarisation and burnout, **ACTionism invites us into a different kind of civic space,** one built on imagination, joy, and shared possibility. This workshop is part of that invitation. It’s not just about how we fight for the future. It’s about how we *build it together,* one thoughtful conversation at a time. ### **Join the Conversation. No Matter Where You Are** Even if you can’t make it to the ACTionism Weekender in person, you can still be part of this live experiment and have your voice heard. Through the online [Pol.is ](https://pol.is/3jfxsjefcp?ref=actionism.space)platform, anyone anywhere can respond to the opening statement and seed statements, sharing their thoughts and experiences. This means the conversation isn’t limited to those physically present in the field but extends to a broader community eager to explore what actionism means. By participating online, you contribute to shaping the divisive and thought-provoking statements that will be brought to life during the weekend’s workshop. Your input will help spark meaningful dialogue, challenge assumptions, and build a collective understanding of how we want to create change, wherever we are. So whether you’re joining us around the campfire or logging in from your living room, you’re part of this living, breathing democracy experiment. This is our chance to practice listening, reflecting, and imagining together how actionism can grow beyond words into real-world, shared possibilities. Share your thoughts and opinions about ACTionism. Take part in the poll. [Learn more ](https://pol.is/3jfxsjefcp?ref=actionism.space) ### What I’m Proud Of (and Why That Matters) URL: https://www.actionism.space/what-im-proud-of-and-why-that-matters/ Last updated: 2025-09-03T07:36:31.000Z Lately, I’ve been doing some reflecting. It was sparked by something Jon Alexander [wrote](https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7366080744751906818/?ref=actionism.space): > “I have a plan - or rather, some plans. But first I wanted to reflect on a few of my proudest moments - for a reason. We have to celebrate and build on what’s good, not just stare at what’s wrong, because what we pay attention to grows.” So, during a busy summer with the kids, while work has taken a bit of a back seat, I’ve been taking time to notice the good. And asking myself: *What am I proud of?* ### A Stack of Stories Jon shared three things he was proud of, which got me thinking. One moment stood out recently, a social media post showed the logos of the three organisations I helped found, stacked like chapters of a story. At the top was **One Tree at a Time**, the community hub in our village of Bozel, now in its fourth year. It started with a simple mission: rescuing and repairing outdoor gear to reduce waste. But it quickly grew into something more, a space for reuse workshops and community events, all centred around a work table where we use our collective creativity to dream. That creativity sparked the **Re-Action Collective**, a growing network of grassroots organisations challenging consumerism and building regenerative, community-led alternatives. Rooted in repair, reuse, and systems change, Re-Action shares resources and stories that show real change starts from the ground up. It’s here that we’re learning how to organise globally, building a sociocracy that replaces hierarchy with shared leadership, using consent-based decisions and clear roles to ensure everyone’s voice counts. It’s an ongoing experiment in working together with clarity, trust, and purpose. And, Re-action was the seed for **ACTionism**, a movement that is building a radical shift from consumption to collective power. At ACTionism we amplify untold stories, mobilise communities, and spark a citizen-led movement for a just, new re-imagined future. This isn’t reform, it’s a cultural shift powered by joy, imagination, and the belief that change is something we create together. ACTionism is us paying attention to what is good, so that it grows. ### The Journey Matters You might think the obvious choice would be to say I’m proudest of One Tree, Re-Action, and ACTionism, but that’s not quite it. Firstly, I’m proud of the **journey** we’ve been on, and how our community continues to show up for the hard work, day after day. There’s a creative spark, a quiet stubbornness, and a deep refusal to accept the status quo that runs through everything we do. That journey has taken us from fixing old outdoor gear to building a collective movement. At every step, we’re learning, how to organise, how to challenge dominant systems, how we don't need permission, and how to support each other through it all. Andy Middleton recently wrote: > “One of the few things that 'keeps the light on' for me is the certain knowledge of how dislocated and unconnected the hundreds of thousands of organisations and tens of millions of people are who work to address the roots of our systemic crisis. If - and it's a mightyly big 'if' - we can find a cadence and melody to sing as one, then nothing would stop us.” That’s been our journey, **finding a shared cadence**, learning to move in harmony, listening deeply, supporting each other’s growth, and connecting like-minded organisations along the way. What began with fixing outdoor gear at One Tree has grown into something much larger: a pathway from local action to global collaboration. From a small community hub to ACTionism - a movement with the potential to become a true home for regeneration, collective power, and systemic change. ### Staying Power Is a Radical Act The second thing I’m most proud of is that **all three of these organisations are still going**, that’s no small feat in today’s system. Just yesterday, we secured enough funding to keep One Tree running for at least another three years. That means the dream continues, and as a community, we can keep reimagining what’s possible. I’m proud that even as our vision spreads and new opportunities arise, I’m still drawn back to that work table at One Tree. That’s where it all began, and it still holds the heart of everything we do. And while none of these organisations are in perfect financial health, they are rich in something far more sustaining: the strength, creativity, and commitment of their communities. In that sense, they’re not just surviving, they’re thriving. ### Citizens of Possibility Lastly, I’m proud of the citizens I’m surrounded by, people who are **quietly and courageously building strong systems**, reimagining what’s possible, and expanding the range of sustainable futures for people, nature, and the planet. They choose to live in a place of possibility, actively trying to create the conditions where all forms of life can thrive. Indy Johar wrote a recent article about [Pre-Emptive Peace](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/indy-johar-b440b010%5Fdm04-pre-emptive-peace-activity-7367880470853820417-Ifa2?utm%5Fsource=social%5Fshare%5Fsend&utm%5Fmedium=member%5Fdesktop%5Fweb&rcm=ACoAADAV6bIB0ThDBAsFj5-C6Qv0sEn5bG2X9f8). Indy describes how we often think peace means just stopping war, but real peace is more than the absence of violence, it means addressing the deeper, connected harms like environmental destruction, poverty, and unfair systems that quietly cause damage every day. What I’m most proud of is this **community**, creative, joyful, stubbornly hopeful people who dare to believe things can change. Who understand that everything is connected, that this system isn’t for fixing, it’s for **transforming**. Together, we’re doing just that, building pre-emptive peace by deliberately cultivating joy. Because joy generates energy, energy fuels action, and action transforms everything. ### Re-Action to ACTionism: From Outdoor Gear to Collective Action URL: https://www.actionism.space/re-action-to-actionism-from-outdoor-gear-to-collective-action/ Last updated: 2025-09-02T07:20:11.000Z What if the future wasn’t something decided by governments or corporations but something built by us, together, from the ground up? That’s the question that launched the **Re-Action Collective**. We’re a growing community of over 60 organisations and citizen-led initiatives united by a shared belief: **we are citizens, not consumers**, and the way forward isn't through protest alone, but through **demonstration**. We’re not just imagining a better future, we're living it, building it, and sharing the blueprint. ### Where We Began: Challenging the Outdoor Industry Our roots are in the outdoors but not in the way you might think. Re-Action began as a response to a toxic story told by the outdoor industry: that you need shiny, high-tech, expensive gear to access nature. We knew this wasn’t true. We live and work in the outdoors. We’ve hiked, climbed, camped, and surfed without the latest kit. But the industry is stuck in a growth machine driven by shareholder returns and profit margins. That machine is churning out more gear than we need, promoting disposable culture, undermining quality, and telling stories that feed our insecurities. Worse still, it’s damaging the very places we seek to enjoy. So in 2022, we said: enough. We founded the **Re-Action Collective** to tell a new story, one that is citizen-led, community-powered, and values-driven. ### What We’re Building: A Citizen-Led Movement Inspired by a message from the book ‘Citizens', in which [Jon Alexander](https://www.linkedin.com/in/jon-alexander-11b66345/?ref=actionism.space) describes how ’a Citizen Future, rooted in the deep truth that all of us are smarter than any of us, is still possible’, we started to **find the others.** And, in just under three years, we’ve grown from 5 grassroots organisations to a **global network of over 60**. We’re multi-faceted because imagining a new future can’t be one-dimensional, and we're deeply collaborative because that future can only be imagined together. Here’s how we work: ### 1\. The Re-Action Collective (Better Economics) We’re re-imagining the economy from the ground up beyond consumerism and into community-driven, circular systems. Our members include charities, for profit businesses, social enterprises, and community hubs working on repair, reuse, peer-to-peer lending, redistribution, and ethical entrepreneurship. The Re-Action Collective is a space of possibility, light on rules, heavy on action. The result is that as a community, from a systems perspective, we’re out innovating entire industries, helping us collectively move beyond this stuck system. Together we’re re-imagining an economy with a focus on well-being, communities and citizens. An economy where our values are not just represented by the things we own. We're also working on governance and community structure by becoming a **sociocracy,** a governance model where power is shared, not hoarded. This model distributes leadership, encourages active participation, and creates a resilient structure that can adapt and evolve. The truth is Re-Action is not a charity, limited company. C.I.C. or a not-for-profit, we’re a community operating under our rules. We’re documenting this journey so others can learn and build their own systems of inclusive leadership. ### 2\. Place-Based Action (Beyond Consumerism) As a community we don’t just talk about change, we show it. We take our collective re-imagining, the **Alternative High Street**, a living, breathing example of a citizen-led circular economy on the road to festivals, schools, and towns across the world. Imagine a high street where nothing new is sold, and everything is shared, mended, borrowed or repurposed. Where citizens are at the centre, with real collective agency, real options and real freedoms, that’s the world we’re demonstrating. We also run campaigns like **#CitizenFriday**, now in its third year. It flips Black Friday on its head, encouraging people to **repair, share, and get out in the fresh air**. The campaign has become our weekly ritual, helping us move beyond consumerism. And, it's spreading fast, with businesses, community groups, and citizens joining in across the globe. ### 3\. ACTionism (New Voices) ACTionism is our storytelling platform turned grassroots movement. It was born out of the realisation that citizens need to see people like themselves making change not just protesting, but **doing**. To build this movement we’ve moved beyond outdoor gear to cover the collective action that is taking place across topics such as food, transport, education, community hubs, repair and much more. ACTionism is a movement built from the ground up, alongside the creative citizens that are doing the work of demonstrating a new system. We convene, listen, practice and act. We share ideas, stories, guides, and time together (online and at in-person gatherings). We spotlight effective action through a multitude of media, with monthly calls, a magazine, (a soon to be) audio documentary series, the platform [ACTionism.space](http://actionism.space/?ref=actionism.space), a newsletter and community film screenings. Our first film, **“ACTionism: The Art of Finding the Others to Take Collective Action”**, follows the journey of **Ellie Meredith**, our 18-year-old apprentice who transformed her climate anxiety into hopeful, practical action. The film has sparked over 100 community screenings and wherever we go, we stay for the conversation. These dialogues are where we see imagination ignite. And that’s what ACTionism is really about: restoring agency, sparking imagination, and bringing in new, diverse voices especially from communities historically excluded from environmental narratives. ### Why We’re Different We work in **emergence**. That means we move with what's needed. We respond to community momentum, opportunity, and creativity not five-year plans written in boardrooms. While this makes us adaptive and resilient, it also makes us harder to fund. Funders often want clearly defined outcomes, KPIs, and logic models. But what we’re doing doesn’t always fit in boxes. It’s real, it’s alive, and it’s deeply rooted in place, people, and possibility. Still, our impact is clear: - **60+ organisations** working in coordination, not competition - **Tens of thousands of items saved from landfill** through repair and reuse - **Hundreds of citizens** trained in repair, organising, storytelling, and governance - **A growing movement** that puts well-being, interconnection, and citizens at its heart ### Where We’re Going We’ve come a long way on very little. But to continue, we need support. Our small team [Heather Davies](https://www.linkedin.com/in/heather-davies-communicating-sustainability/?ref=actionism.space), [Michele Kaye](https://www.linkedin.com/in/micheleakaye/?ref=actionism.space), [Tamasine McCaig](https://www.linkedin.com/in/tamasinemcaig/?ref=actionism.space), [Ellie Meredith](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ellie-meredith05/?ref=actionism.space) and I, have mostly worked voluntarily. We've proven the concept. Now, we need to build capacity, scale our impact, and **keep showing what’s possible**. In the next three years, we’ll: - Expand and support our 60+ member organisations - Scale the in place demonstrations of the **Alternative High Street**, and continue to build on the momentum of the **Citizen Friday campaign** - Deepen the ACTionism platform: spotlighting more communities, increasing community film screening and community workshops. - Create a new ACTionism audio documentary series that takes the sounds of collective action into the hearts of communities through a live listening experience, helping to bring new voices to the movement. - Use storytelling and mapping to demonstrate the breadth of emerging citizen action. - Complete our sociocratic transition and share the blueprint - Work with national policy organisations and researchers to influence systemic change We’re not building a brand. We’re building a **movement**, one where citizens lead, share, and create the future together. This isn’t just a project. It’s the future being prototyped, by the people who live it every day. Together, as citizens, we’ve started on an adventure. An adventure that began with outdoor gear, where we quickly found the others, and soon came to understand the power of collective action. Now, as a community and a movement, the adventure is taking us beyond this story, and into a new world. ### Want to Get Involved? You don’t need to start an organisation to be part of this. You can **host a film screening, run a repair café, join one of our community calls, sign up to the ACTionism newsletter, write an article for the ACTionism platform** or simply take part in the next **#CitizenFriday**. The future isn’t something we wait for. It’s something we create, together. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/ACTionism--Find-the-Others--9-.png) ### ACTionism in Action Newsletter 08/09/2025 URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism-in-action-newsletter-08-10-2025/ Last updated: 2025-10-02T11:11:40.000Z ACTionism exists to inspire you by showcasing ordinary people who are challenging the system to create change. ## Something to take part in: [ACTionism x Pol.is: Can We Build Better Conversations About Change?](https://www.actionism.space/actionism-x-pol-is-can-we-build-better-conversations-about-change/) ## What happens when you bring a democracy tool powered by machine‑learning into a field, and make it live and non‑anonymous? We're putting that to the test at the **ACTionism Weekender**, and you can be part of it too. Through a [**live Pol.is poll**](https://pol.is/3jfxsjefcp?ref=actionism.space), we’re inviting everyone, whether you're gathering by the campfire or reading from your living room, to weigh in on this opening statement: > *“*Is actionism powerful enough to meet the scale of today’s crises, or just a comforting distraction?*”* Your responses will help surface the most thought‑provoking perspectives to explore during our on‑site workshop, where we’ll embody disagreement, listen deeply, and challenge our assumptions, together. This isn’t a debate. It’s an invitation to **listen, reflect, and imagine change.** Join us. Let’s build better conversations. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/ACTionism-core-image-templates--5--1.png) --- ## Something to join: [Winchester Green Week x ACTionism screening - 24th September](https://www.actionism.space/winchester-green-week-x-actionism/) The Party Kit Network is hosting an ACTionism screening at the Winchester Green Week. If you're in the area, why not get along and meet some folk? We're not the only party in town that week. The Winchester Green Week is a vibrant annual celebration of community-powered climate and sustainability action. It’s about learning, connecting, and taking real steps together toward a greener, fairer future. That sounds like our kind of event. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/ACTionism-core-image-templates--6--1.png) --- ## Something to Read: [What I’m Proud Of (and Why That Matters)](https://www.actionism.space/what-im-proud-of-and-why-that-matters/) A piece by Gav, inspired by Jon Alexander's [post](https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7368908203755085824/?ref=actionism.space) reflecting on the last 3 years. "I have a plan - or rather, some plans. But first, I wanted to reflect on a few of my proudest moments - for a reason. We have to celebrate and build on what’s good, not just stare at what’s wrong, because what we pay attention to grows." So, what is Gav proud of? Spoiler alert... all of us. "What I’m most proud of is this **community**, creative, joyful, stubbornly hopeful people who dare to believe things can change. Who understand that everything is connected, that this system isn’t for fixing, it’s for **transforming**." ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/ACTionism-core-image-templates--4--1.png) ## Something to watch: Instagram [@\_\_we\_love\_you\_](https://www.actionism.space/winchester-green-week-x-actionism/) We love this Reel as a way to explain to a friend why ACTionism is the way to build the future we want to live in. > [ View this post on Instagram ](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOL1pyhDNwd/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) > > [A post shared by We Love You (@\_\_we\_love\_you\_)](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOL1pyhDNwd/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) ## Something to listen to: [How to Save Democracy](https://jonalexander.net/podcasts/?ref=actionism.space) A brand new podcast series from Jon Alexander and Omezzine Khelifa. "Welcome to Season Zero of How To Save Democracy, a new podcast that aims to heal society’s broken relationship with democracy. Join us – Omezzine Khelifa, Jon Alexander, and producer Jo Barratt – as we hold the space for the tough conversations we need to have. We love democracy, genuinely, wholeheartedly. But it’s like a dysfunctional relationship. Democracy today is full of flaws. It’s not “by the people, for the people” anymore. There are resentments and frustrations and anger, and we can’t go on like this. We need to have the tough conversations, and that’s what we are doing on this podcast." Check out [episode 1](https://episodes.castos.com/606341822879e2-35871598/2078813/c1e-kdp7qbggqzja9410x-okmrvwgvb9zm-2oxtzk.mp3?ref=actionism.space), and get to know co-host, Omezzine Khelifa, who has some story: reformer, revolutionary, politician, and practitioner. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/Screenshot-2025-09-04-at-16.10.41.png) ## Something to check out: [A beautiful ACTionism poster from our friends at 99p Films](https://www.actionism.space/the-collab-we-need/) Together with 99p Films w**e're taking ACTionism to Falmouth University** Sustainable Fashion department as part of Fashion Reclaimed, a Sustainable Fashion Week between 27 Sept – 5 Oct 2025. [**99p Films**](https://www.99pfilms.com/?ref=actionism.space) **is a community cinema that turns film screenings into shared, transformative experiences , combining film, mindful breathing, discussion, and communal feasts.** Founder Alex Fish has been a close friend of ACTionism since we met at Goodfest in 2023, and his Social Cinema approach helped shape how we released the ACTionism film, not for passive viewing, but as a catalyst for community dialogue. Thanks go to Jack from the 99p team for the awesome poster design. We love it. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/09/WhatsApp-Image-2025-09-03-at-16.47.11-1.jpeg) ## Something to help us with:[ Find a sponsor for the ACTionism Spotlights](https://www.actionism.space/partner-opportunity-with-actionism-empowering-community-action-across-the-uk/) We're looking for a partner ready to invest **£20,000** **annually** in amplifying grassroots community action through our Spotlight call series and associated content. [ACTionism Spotlight ](https://www.actionism.space/tag/spotlights/)calls are monthly live conversations with inspiring community actionists and organisations. Know someone who can help fund us? **Contact:**[Tamasine McCaig](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/tamasinemcaig?ref=actionism.space) or [Gavin Fernie-Jones](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/gavin-fernie-jones?ref=actionism.space). **Drop us an email** [**here or reach out on LinkedIn**](mailto:hello@actionism.space) ## **Why partner with ACTionism?** - Communities face complex challenges but lack connections and practical guidance to drive change. **ACTionism bridges this gap by showcasing real people making a difference, then providing tools for others to replicate success locally.** - **All our work to date has been voluntary with minimal funding. Sponsorship** will enable dedicated promotional resources for the first time, significantly expanding reach and impact. - **We measure success beyond numbers -** through authentic connections formed during calls, ongoing collaborations between participants, and concrete actions taken post-call, from starting local initiatives to joining existing movements. ## Something to share: [ACTionism Contributor Guidelines](https://www.actionism.space/actionism-contributor-guidelines/) News cycles sharing doom and gloom are causing paralysis - a feeling that we cannot effect change on the scale required. So we have set up ACTionism.space to inspire others by sharing examples of ordinary people bucking the system to effect change. We're building a joyful movement of everyday citizens stepping into their agency to create positive change in their communities, spaces, and challenges. And, as true agency is only collective, we're doing that together. If you'd like to **contribute to the platform,** please read the [guidelines](https://www.actionism.space/actionism-contributor-guidelines/) and get in touch. Our ACTionism Contributor Guidelines [Learn more ](https://www.actionism.space/actionism-contributor-guidelines/) --- ### 5 simple play-based actions to try as way to unlock possibilities for community engagement and ACTionism URL: https://www.actionism.space/5-simple-play-based-actions-to-try-as-way-to-unlock-possibilities-for-community-engagement-and-actionism/ Last updated: 2025-08-01T15:16:55.000Z ## *What if the key to transforming our communities was as simple as blowing bubbles or taking chalk for a walk?* Emma from [Playful Anywhere ](https://www.playfulanywhere.fun/?ref=actionism.space)calls play a 'Trojan horse' - it slips past our adult defences and opens up conversations we might otherwise avoid. When we play in our places, we see them differently, connect with others naturally, and suddenly those tricky conversations about what our communities need become... well, playful. **Here's why imagination and play aren't just for kids - they're essential tools for anyone wanting to connect more deeply with where they live and work.** Watch this short clip of Emma talking about the power of play and imagination ## **Ready to ACT: 5 Simple Play-Based Actions to Get Started:** 1. **Blow bubbles in unexpected places** \- parks, high streets, outside your office. Watch how people's faces change and conversations begin. Nobody can resit giant bubbles! 2. **Take the chalk for a walk** \- draw hopscotch squares, positive messages, or simple arrows leading to something beautiful in your place or space - people will start to talk and maybe even join in. 3. **Carry a big gnarled stick** \- it gives you the chance to adopt a character, makes you approachable, and turns any walk into an adventure that others want to join. 4. **Start a paper aeroplane contest** \- fold planes from recycled paper and see whose flies furthest in your local park or courtyard. You could even have a stack of paper to hand for others to join in 5. **Create a 'curiosity trail'** \- leave small, intriguing objects (painted stones, origami, tiny toys) for others to discover and hopefully continue the chain. **Remember: you're not being silly, you're being strategic. Play is one of the fastest way to turn strangers into collaborators.** You can find our more about Emma and Playful Anywhere here: [Playful Anywhere ](https://www.playfulanywhere.fun/?ref=actionism.space) ### Summer ACTionism ideas for Children and Families URL: https://www.actionism.space/summer-actionism-ideas-for-children-and-families-2/ Last updated: 2025-07-30T10:02:12.000Z ### As a parent to three small people, I am well aware that the summer holidays can feel overwhelming - weeks stretching ahead with expensive day trips, costly activities, and societal pressure to keep children 'entertained'. **But what if this summer could be different?** ****What if, instead of spending money on expensive attractions, you discovered the magic waiting right outside your front door, while also teaching your kids that they hold so much power to create positive changes where they live?** This summer presents a perfect opportunity to introduce your family to ACTionism - the art of finding your people through small, meaningful actions. It's about recognising that we all have the power to create positive change, starting with the most straightforward steps in our neighbourhoods. **The beauty of ACTionism lies in its accessibility. You don't need expensive equipment or grand plans. You simply need to begin.** When you start with one small action - whether it's picking up litter, planting flowers in forgotten corners, or sharing books or toys with neighbours - something remarkable happens**. Your children see that change isn't something that happens to them, but something they can actively create.** These visible acts of care naturally draw others in. Neighbours become curious, other families want to join, and before you know it, you've not only connected more deeply with your children but also woven stronger threads in your community fabric. The following simple actions cost little more than your time and attention, but offer rich rewards: deeper family bonds, stronger community connections and children who understand that positive change starts with them. --- ## Ready to ACT? ## **1\. Community Litter Pick** Begin on your own street or local park. Wear bright colours, and you'll often find neighbours joining in or asking how they can [help](mailto:help.@litter.per.follower). [Check out this IG account for some child led inspiration](https://www.instagram.com/litter.per.follower/?ref=actionism.space) \- this young man is picking up 100 buits of litter for 100 days. > [ View this post on Instagram ](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DL0XSeJsfa6/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) > > [A post shared by Samuel Salamone (@litter.per.follower)](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DL0XSeJsfa6/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) ## **2\. Guerrilla Gardening and DIY Seed Bombs** Plant flowers in neglected public spaces, tend to abandoned planters, or create seed bombs for wasteland areas. Children love getting their hands dirty. [Check out this IG account for some inspiration ](https://www.instagram.com/p/C6tccE6Ka8A/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fweb%5Fcopy%5Flink&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==)And watch the below on how to make your own simple Seed Bombs at home. > [ View this post on Instagram ](https://www.instagram.com/p/CNNJ852J2DN/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) > > [A post shared by Brightly (@brightly.eco)](https://www.instagram.com/p/CNNJ852J2DN/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) ## 3\. **Doorstep Repair Cafe** If you or your children enjoy taking things apart and fixing them, or sewing, then you could set up a stand on the drive/garden to fix/repair broken clothes. Others will notice and may bring their broken things or offer skills. ## 4\. **Free Little Book Library** Build and stock a small book exchange box. Perfect for involving children in carpentry and book sorting whilst creating a community gathering point. [Lots on inspiration here](https://www.instagram.com/littlefreelibrary?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fweb%5Fbutton%5Fshare%5Fsheet&igsh=ZDNlZDc0MzIxNw==) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/Screenshot-2025-07-30-084850.png) ## 5\. **Chalk Art Messages** Create positive, weather-washable messages on pavements - "You're amazing!" or "Have a lovely day!" Kids love this, and it sparks conversations. [Lots of ideas here](https://www.instagram.com/davidzinn/?ref=actionism.space) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/Screenshot-2025-07-30-085004.png) Inspire your kids with @davidzinn on Instagram who creates lots of chalk pavement joy ## 6\. **Community pantry** **shelf** Start with a small shelf outside your home for surplus food sharing. Others often contribute once they see it working. [We love this account from ](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DLPtTGPt1ak/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fweb%5Fcopy%5Flink&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==)@rosewoodandlovaine, who set up a community shelf outside her house to pass on joy and surplus stock from her kitchen business- so joyful! > [ View this post on Instagram ](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DLPtTGPt1ak/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) > > [A post shared by Rosewood & Lovaine (@rosewoodandlovaine)](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DLPtTGPt1ak/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) ## 7\. Create your own **Nature Trail** Make simple identification signs for local plants/wildlife or create a small nature scavenger hunt route for other families. [The RHS has a great little guide to get your family started](https://www.rhs.org.uk/education-learning/children-young-people/family-activities/do-it/make-and-follow-a-trail?ref=actionism.space) ## 8\. **Toy Swap driveway box** Put a box of toys on your drive and get the kids to make a sign offering them to neighbours to spark a little joy – many people make this a toy swap – take a toy, leave a toy for others. Children can also help organise and curate the collection. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/Screenshot-2025-07-30-091413.png) ## 9\. **Pavement Weeding** Clear weeds from pavement cracks and plant edges. Satisfying for kids and highly visible to potential collaborators who might join in! Take a look at what a simple first ACTion can lead to in your community courtesy of @mcrurbangardener! > [ View this post on Instagram ](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DMQhwE2qGjO/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) > > [A post shared by Yasmine / Yaz (@mcrurbangardener)](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DMQhwE2qGjO/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) ## 10\. **Yarn/Wool Art** Why not create bunting for lamp posts or check out these knitted Post box toppers - Art naturally attracts curious helpers.[ Here’s a simple way we found on Instagram to get started! ](https://www.instagram.com/p/BzBOr4lHwdd/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fweb%5Fcopy%5Flink&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/Screenshot-2025-07-30-092646.png) @[blooming\_artists](https://www.instagram.com/blooming%5Fartists/?ref=actionism.space) on IG has helped some of their 9-year-old students make simple Yarn art to hang on local trees and railings. ## ## We're going to try as many of these as we can this summer and will report back. If you try them, do share your progress either [on email](mailto:hello@actionism.space) or over on [Instagram.](https://www.instagram.com/actionismcommunity/?ref=actionism.space) ### The Alternative High-Street URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-alternative-high-street/ Last updated: 2025-07-30T07:31:19.000Z An Alternative High Street is the vision of the Re-Action Collective. It is a space that champions repair, reuse, repurposing, sharing, and upskilling. It promotes a culture where caring for what we have and sharing it becomes the norm, rather than defaulting to buying new. ### Vibrant hubs of community interaction We need to create engaging spaces that can demonstrate just what a more sustainable future will look like. Spaces that highlight solutions, offer knowledge sharing, and act as a way to inspire people to attribute more value to the items we already have. To consider: do I need to buy this new thing or is there another way? To show there is a way we can live better while using less. > **"At Re-Action our reimagined Alternative High Street represents a shift towards a more inclusive, environmentally conscious, human experience. Moving beyond the consumer towards the citizen. We reimagine public spaces as vibrant hubs of community interaction, building connections between individuals, promoting sustainable living practices and bringing life back to our high streets."** [Download the Guide](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1wpsN7vsk6tJkFLaXgW3JxL0z9btQRlaR/view?usp=sharing&ref=actionism.space) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-16-at-11.18.05-1.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-16-at-11.18.05--2-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-16-at-11.18.05--3-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/3M5A0280.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/3M5A0250.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Untitled-design.zip---1.png) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Untitled-design.zip---10.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/IMG_6784.PNG) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/LOWRES-BBS25-STILLS-74.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Untitled-design.zip---2.jpg) ### Partner opportunity with ACTionism: Empowering Community Action Across the UK URL: https://www.actionism.space/partner-opportunity-with-actionism-empowering-community-action-across-the-uk/ Last updated: 2025-09-04T14:30:13.000Z ACTionism is a movement inspiring people to take action in their communities and "find the others." Born from showcasing real people making a difference locally, ACTionism has evolved into an online hub connecting changemakers who believe meaningful change happens when ordinary people step into their agency as active citizens. ## **The opportunity - Sponsor ACTionism Spotlights** We're looking for a partner ready to invest **£20,000** **annually** in amplifying grassroots community action through our Spotlight call series and associated content. [ACTionism Spotlight ](https://www.actionism.space/tag/spotlights/)calls are monthly live conversations with inspiring community actionists and organisations. Currently, we have around 200+ people register with 60-100 attending live calls, with recordings published on YouTube and clips shared across social media by advocates and influencers. Each call includes practical action guides and breakout room networking time for participants to connect with like-minded individuals. P**revious ACTionism Spotlight Calls:** - **Smart School Council** \- empowering student voice in school decision-making - **Playful Anywhere** (Using the power of play to start conversations within your communities about how spaces and places are designed and influence wellbeing) - **CAN Team** \- community action networks driving local environmental change - **Democracy Fitness** \- building democratic participation skills and civic engagement - **Open Collective** \- transparent funding platforms for community initiatives - **Pol.is** \- digital tools for inclusive community decision-making **Confirmed Future Spoltights include:** - **Smartphone Free Childhood** \- tackling children's digital wellbeing through parent power - **Warwick Bike Bus** \- creating safer, sustainable school journeys whilst building community connections ## **Why partner with ACTionism?** - Communities face complex challenges but lack connections and practical guidance to drive change. ACTionism bridges this gap by showcasing real people making a difference, then providing tools for others to replicate success locally. - All our work to date has been voluntary with minimal funding. Sponsorship will enable dedicated promotional resources for the first time, significantly expanding reach and impact. - We measure success beyond numbers - through authentic connections formed during calls, ongoing collaborations between participants, and concrete actions taken post-call, from starting local initiatives to joining existing movements. ## **Partnership benefits & what we offer** - Authentic alignment with grassroots community empowerment - Association with solution-focused activism that inspires action - Access to engaged audience ready to take action in their communities - Brand positioning alongside positive social change **We Provide:** - Primary sponsorship of monthly Spotlight call series - Logo placement and verbal acknowledgements during live calls and recordings - Co-branded action guides distributed to participants and online audience - Featured partnership content on website and social channels - Access to engaged community of local actionists and change-makers ## **Ready to amplify Community Action?** We're seeking one primary sponsor to authentically connect your brand with positive change whilst supporting communities across the UK to step into their agency as active citizens. With proper promotional support, we anticipate substantial growth in our engaged audience of changemakers --- **Next Steps:** Initial conversation to discuss alignment with your values and goals. **Launch Timeline:** Partnership can begin with our next monthly call in September **Contact:**[Tamasine McCaig](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/tamasinemcaig?ref=actionism.space) or [Gavin Fernie-Jones](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/gavin-fernie-jones?ref=actionism.space). **Drop us an email** [**here or reach out on LinkedIn** ](mailto:hello@actionism.space) ### Cooperation Hull - Top 8 tips for starting a community powered group of ACTionists URL: https://www.actionism.space/cooperation-hull-things-weve-learned-since-starting-acting-in-hull/ Last updated: 2025-07-20T14:22:24.000Z --- Cooperation Hull is pioneering a grassroots movement that embodies the very essence of ACTionism - the belief that ordinary people have the power to create extraordinary change when they come together with purpose. Through their innovative People's Assemblies, they're replacing traditional party politics with people power, bringing together teachers, shopkeepers, doctors, and community members to develop their own solutions to local challenges. What makes Hull particularly exciting is its already thriving ecosystem of community organisations - from housing co-ops to tool-sharing libraries and bike delivery cooperatives - proving that when people recognise their collective agency, transformation becomes not just possible, but inevitable. Their approach demonstrates that real change happens when communities are empowered to participate directly in decisions that affect their lives, creating inclusive platforms where every voice is heard and transparency is paramount. This is ACTionism in action - showing that we don't need to wait for permission to build the world we want to see. We came across this Reel the team made this week with their key observations on what it takes to do this kind of work - and we thought the advice was nothing short of perfect! [You can follow the Cooperation Hull team on IG here. ](https://www.instagram.com/cooperation.hull/?hl=en-gb&ref=actionism.space) > [ View this post on Instagram ](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DLmxycKuDZO/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) > > [A post shared by Cooperation Hull (@cooperation.hull)](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DLmxycKuDZO/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) **Key Takeaways:** - **Show up consistently** \- No one can tell you exactly how you'll fit in or what your exact role will be; sometimes you just need to show up and keep showing up - **Remind yourself daily of your purpose** \- Every day you'll need to remind yourself why you're here and that it's possible to change the world, inspiring yourself and each other again and again - **Remember the importance of creativity** \- It's easy to forget how important art is to us as humans and to our work - **Balance productivity with joy** \- Meetings are important, but so is silliness, nonsense, and joy - **Build your courage muscle** \- Challenging power and doing things that scare you is a muscle you need to flex as often as you can - **Find your community** \- Finding your people makes everything easier and more possible; do the scary things together - **Celebrate each other** \- Celebrating one and another might feel cringey or unnecessary, but we're humans too and need to feel like we have a place and belong - **Trust the process** \- Trust the people who show up consistently alongside you. ### ACTionism in Action Newsletter URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism-in-action-newsletter/ Last updated: 2025-09-04T14:34:07.000Z ACTionism exists to inspire you by showcasing ordinary people who are challenging the system to create change. --- We've had a busy few weeks since we launched this newsletter and our content hub - thanks to everyone who has been in touch with supportive messages and ideas on how we can grow ACTionism - we're now looking for funding - so if you have any ideas, [please do get in touch](https://www.actionism.space/fundraising-actionneeded/). Something to do: Find your people- [r*egister for the ACTionism summer connections call*](https://lu.ma/4huuygm7?ref=actionism.space) We won't be hosting a Spotlight call in August, but you can join us for a relaxed online gathering to keep our ACTionism community connected over the summer. This friendly virtual meetup is perfect for catching up with familiar faces, meeting new people, and sharing interesting initiatives you've discovered recently. No formal agenda - just good conversation with like-minded people passionate about collective action. Come as you are, share what you'd like, and leave feeling more connected to our community. [Register for the summer ACTionism connect call](https://lu.ma/4huuygm7?ref=actionism.space) --- ## Something to watch: [Playful Anywhere Spotlight](https://www.actionism.space/actionism-spotlight-emma-bearman-playful-anywhere/) Thank you to everyone who joined our first official ACTionism spotlight call with Emma Bearman of Playful Anywhere last week. If you missed it the full recording can [be found here](https://www.actionism.space/actionism-spotlight-emma-bearman-playful-anywhere/). **And don't forget -** [**you can email us**](http://mailto:hello@actionism.space/?ref=actionism.space) **if you'd like to contribute to our play inspired guide to ACTionism** ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/ACTionism-core-image-templates.jpg) --- ## Something to listen to:[ Spaceship Earth Podcast- Ep 103](https://becomingcrew.substack.com/p/ep-103-gavin-fernie-jones-actionism) Enjoy this moving conversation between podcast host Dan Burgess and Gavin Fernie-Jones of the Re-Action Collective, exploring how personal loss and witnessing climate collapse in mountain landscapes sparked a repair movement. This episode is an invitation to feel grief as a portal into collective purpose and action. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/image.png) --- ## Something to read: [From Awareness to Action - Social Cinema ](https://www.actionism.space/what-if-all-documentary-films-were-screen-like-the-actionism-doc-at-community-screenings/) ## ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/ACTionism-core-image-templates--4--2.jpg) We're drowning in documentary content that shows us every crisis but leaves us feeling powerless. We see the problems but don't know how to act on them - often making us feel worse than before we watched the film. The future of documentary impact isn't just reaching more people - it's empowering communities to act together. Social Cinema screenings are transforming how films move audiences from awareness to action, turning passive viewing into collective power. [Find out how this approach is changing everything.](https://www.actionism.space/what-if-all-documentary-films-were-screen-like-the-actionism-doc-at-community-screenings/) --- ## **Someone to follow:** [**Antidote Studio**](https://www.antidotelive.studio/about?ref=actionism.space) Matt Golding has taken his viral content expertise from brands and charities and created something powerful: Antidote Studio - a storytelling platform and framework that aims to make collective action as compelling as national news. Antidote showcases ordinary people doing extraordinary things - but presents these stories in a way that actually breaks through social media's endless scroll. [Follow Antidote to see local stories that don't get lost in the noise - and discover how your community can take action today.](https://www.antidotelive.studio/about?ref=actionism.space) > [ View this post on Instagram ](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DLpRj44I79f/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) > > [A post shared by Antidote Live (@antidotelive)](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DLpRj44I79f/?utm%5Fsource=ig%5Fembed&utm%5Fcampaign=loading) --- ## Somewhere to go: [Re-Action Basecamp, 19th July, Peak District](https://www.actionism.space/re-action-basecamp/) Re-Action member [Outside](https://www.outside.co.uk/?ref=actionism.space) (a family run independent outdoor store in the Peak District) is hosting the first-ever Re-Action Basecamp, a special event dedicated to giving donated gear a second life. Expect tents, waterproofs, rails of outdoor clothing, and some seriously good deals - all in support of [Moors for the Future](https://www.moorsforthefuture.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space) & the [Archer Project](https://archerproject.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space). There will be live repairs from Re-Action members Becky ([Sheffield Clothing Repair](https://sheffieldclothingrepair.com/?ref=actionism.space)) and workshops on caring for our outdoor kit from Katy ([Upcycle\_kit](https://www.instagram.com/upcycle%5Fkit/?ref=actionism.space)). Plus as if that wasn't enough, there will be a community walk led by guide Neil Summers - a 14.5km loop, reconnecting to nature, and visiting the wonderful Stanage Edge. --- [Fundraising ACTionist neededWe’re looking for someone with fundraising and partnership skills to help our small volunteer-led team secure funding. We’re excited to have started on this journey, and are already seeing and hearing so many positive things about what we’ve created so far with no budget! But we need to secure funding![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/icon/Untitled-design--80--7.png)ACTionismACTionism![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/thumbnail/ACTionism-core-image-templates--6-.jpg)](https://www.actionism.space/fundraising-actionneeded/) [Donate to help ACTionism reach more people](https://opencollective.com/actionism?ref=actionism.space) 💡 ****ACTionism aims to:** 1\. Educate and inspire by sharing stories, strategies, and practical guidance for collective action. 2\. Cultivate joy deliberately - it creates energy, energy creates movement, and movement changes communities and systems 3\. Amplify the work of community initiatives and organisations that align with our manifesto 4\. Build collective agency and reduce feelings of powerlessness 5\. Promote and enable community-led solutions across food, education, nature, repair, and local spaces 6\. Lift up marginalised voices and ensure our work reflects community diversity. 7\. Help people turn inspiration into practical action in their communities 8\. Celebrate and amplify grassroots initiatives that demonstrate collective power 9\. Connect people through accessible storytelling and community places and spaces 💡 ****Got a postive story of ACTionism we should feature?** [****Ge**t in touch and let us know ](mailto:hello@actionism.space) ### What if all documentary films were screened like the Actionism doc - at community screenings? URL: https://www.actionism.space/what-if-all-documentary-films-were-screen-like-the-actionism-doc-at-community-screenings/ Last updated: 2025-07-17T11:54:59.000Z ### *Documentary filmmaking is at a crossroads. For decades, we've mastered raising awareness about critical issues: from climate change to social justice, from environmental threats to global systemic problems. I've been a huge Stacey Dooley fan for years, and I love searching iPlayer for the next documentary to watch. But something is missing.* --- In my own experience, **awareness without action just creates paralysis.** We feel powerless - in a way, we're worse off because we now see the problem but don't know how to do anything about it. Or, as with so many environmental documentaries, we're simply told to shop better or sign a petition. **The question facing documentary makers today isn't whether they can make people care, but whether they can empower them to act.** Since working with Gavin and Heather at Re-Action and seeing how they chose to screen the ACTionism film through community screenings, I'm confident that the answer lies in social cinema. **The** [**99p Films**](https://www.99pfilms.com/?ref=actionism.space) **Social Cinema Model** If you haven't heard of it, social cinema is a revolutionary approach that transforms documentary screenings from passive consumption into active community engagement. Our friends at 99p Films in Cornwall are pioneering this model, proving that how we screen documentaries can be as transformative as the films themselves. Their approach goes far beyond traditional film screenings by incorporating mindful breathing, engaging discussions, and communal feasts. This four-stage process creates transformative experiences. The genius lies in their integration of the physical, emotional, intellectual, and social dimensions of human experience. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/Screenshot-2025-07-15-111135.png) BRINGING PEOPLE TOGETHER THROUGH THE POWER OF CINEMA - The 99p FILMS model Their success is tangible: events consistently sell out across Cornwall. More importantly, their model shows how documentaries can become catalysts for genuine community action rather than mere sources of information. ## **ACTionism. Film: Case Study Experience** Take the [documentary film ACTionism](https://www.actionism.space/request-a-screening/), created by Two Step Films and the Re-Action Collective as an example. The 30-minute film, made on a shoestring budget, follows [Ellie Meredith](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ellie-meredith05?ref=actionism.space)'s journey from climate anxiety to empowerment, demonstrating how collective action - not just individual effort - can lead to real change. Since launching through community screenings, the ACTionism.film has generated over 100 screening requests globally, with 30 already screened. **But the real measure of success isn't in the numbers - it's found in the discussions, connections and initiatives sparked in these communities.** This is documentary filmmaking designed for impact from the ground up. Rather than hoping viewers will somehow translate awareness into action, by sharing ACTionism at community screenings the conditions for collective engagement during the screening itself becomes the catalyst for people to start their own journeys like Ellies – from anxiety to collective action. ## **The challenge faced by documentary makers** Consider David Attenborough's recent documentary Ocean. By traditional measures, it's a success - beautiful cinematography, compelling storytelling, and widespread distribution. But imagine if it had been screened through the social cinema model: communities gathering to watch together, followed by discussions about local marine conservation efforts, ending with a feast featuring locally produced vegan ‘fishy’ alternatives to seafood. Instead of viewers leaving with vague advice to "buy more sustainable seafood," they might exit with concrete plans for beach clean-ups, connections to local marine conservation groups, or commitments to support specific coastal restoration projects. ****ACT**: [If you're interested in some ideas on how to ACT when it comes to the Ocean take a look at our starter for 10 here](https://www.actionism.space/why-david-attenborough-needs-to-lean-into-actionism-in-his-documentary-ocean/) ## **The Social Cinema Advantage for Filmmakers** It’s worth saying, this isn't just something to add to your documentary as an afterthought - ideally, it should be baked into the film's process – what are the actions that you want communities and viewers to take after watching your film – surely that’s why you’re making it in the first place? If you’re a film-maker here are some ways I think that Social cinema offers documentary makers like you a number of crucial advantages: **1\. Immediate Community Building**: Rather than hoping individual viewers will somehow connect with others who share their concerns, social cinema creates those connections during the screening itself. **2\. Localised Solutions**: While documentaries often address global problems, social cinema discussions naturally focus on local manifestations and solutions. This makes collective action more tangible and achievable. **3\. Sustained Engagement**: Traditional documentary viewing is a one-time event. Social cinema creates ongoing relationships and commitments that extend far beyond the screening. **4\. Enhanced Impact Measurement**: Rather than relying on viewing figures or social media engagement, social cinema provides concrete metrics of impact—initiatives launched, connections made, commitments taken. ## **The ACTION: Film and distribute for ACTION, not just awareness** The success of ACTionism suggests we need to rethink how documentaries are conceived, produced, and distributed: **During Production**: Consider from the outset how your work will translate into community action. Include local solutions, feature community organisers alongside experts, structure narratives to lead naturally to discussion and action. **During Distribution**: Rather than pursuing the widest possible reach, prioritise deep community engagement. Work with local organisations, provide discussion guides and action resources. **During Exhibition**: The screening becomes part of the film's impact strategy, not just its distribution. Think about venues, timing, facilitation, and follow-up activities as integral to your documentary's success. ## **The future of documentary impact** Social cinema represents more than just a new distribution model - it's a fundamental shift towards community-led power and collective action. For documentary makers committed to creating change, not just awareness, this approach offers a proven pathway from screens to community action. The question isn't whether your documentary can make people care about an issue—it's whether it can empower them to do something about it. Social cinema provides the framework for that transformation, turning passive audiences into active communities and individual concern into collective action. > The future of documentary impact isn't just about reaching more people—it's about empowering communities to act together. **The tools exist. The model works. The communities are ready. The only question is: will documentary makers embrace the challenge of creating not just awareness, but action?** 💡 **For more information about social cinema and community screenings, visit 99p Films at* [**www.99pfilms.com*](https://www.99pfilms.com/?ref=actionism.space) *or* [**explore hosting an ACTionism screening* ](https://www.actionism.space/request-a-screening/) ### ACTionism Spotlight: Emma Bearman - Playful Anywhere URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism-spotlight-emma-bearman-playful-anywhere/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T20:13:14.000Z We were delighted to host this inspiring spotlight call with Emma Bearman, founder of Playful Anywhere, a Leeds-based Community Interest Company that works with communities to transform their relationship with place and space. Emma described play as a "Trojan horse" - a powerful tool that opens up deeper conversations about how communities connect with their environments. Through her work, she demonstrated how playful interventions can unlock new possibilities for community engagement and place-making. ### **In this spotlight call, we explored:** - Emma's journey setting up Playful Anywhere as a CIC - How play becomes a catalyst for meaningful community conversations - Practical, play-based approaches you can try in your own places and spaces - The transformative potential of playful community engagement Whether you were curious about creative approaches to local engagement, working in community development, or passionate about place-making, this session provided both inspiration and practical tools to take away. Participants left thinking differently about how we connect with our communities and spaces - and perhaps discovered the playful ACTionist within! ## **Watch the full call here:** We will be writing up an inspiration guide with Emma, with lots of ideas about play as a way to connect with you community. If you have ideas and would like to contribute, [please email us](mailto:hello@actionism.space) ### Fundraising ACTionist needed URL: https://www.actionism.space/fundraising-actionneeded/ Last updated: 2025-07-17T11:54:19.000Z ### We're looking for someone with fundraising and partnership skills to help our small volunteer-led team secure funding. We're excited to have started on this journey, and are already seeing and hearing so many positive things about what we've created so far with **no budget!** But we need to secure funding in the next few months to enable us to further develop our hub, workshops, podcast, magazine and community events that help more people discover the art of ACTionsim, find their people and start taking collective action. If you have experience in grant writing, corporate partnerships, or fundraising strategy and can spare a few hours to help us find the right funding opportunities, we'd love to hear from you. ### Your expertise could help us reach more people and build the movement for collective action. [Get in touch ](mailto:hello@actionism.space) ### Why David Attenborough needs to lean into ACTionism in his documentary - OCEAN URL: https://www.actionism.space/why-david-attenborough-needs-to-lean-into-actionism-in-his-documentary-ocean/ Last updated: 2025-07-09T19:58:21.000Z **David Attenborough’s new documentary, Ocean, might be visually stunning, but I think it's missing the most important part - people.** Almost everyone I know who has seen Ocean has been moved by the beauty and urgency of what’s happening beneath the waves, but they also share a common concern: **where’s the call to action?** What are we, people on the street, in schools, on beaches, in coastal communities, supposed to do after watching? Yes, we can buy more sustainably (and, for the record, I’m a vegan and fully support the importance of knowing where our food comes from and shopping as sustainably as possible). But as [Jon Alexander](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ACoAAAmHkucBn7ohqvz1ZOqq8JVOWZddkBZ1OG4?ref=actionism.space) says, *we are so much more than Consumers. We’re Citizens, capable of getting stuck in, stepping into our agency and taking action* \- and when it comes to the oceans, we need to be regenerating, not just reducing harm. I’m hopeful, therefore, that we can build ACTionism energy around this film, even if it wasn’t baked into the process from the start. ## Ready to ACT: Here are some hands-on ACTionism-style projects that are currently improving our coasts and oceans, and invite others to get involved. > **These are just a few of many projects that don’t ask us to shop better - they ask us to step in, take part, and make change.** 1\. [Coastwatch ](https://www.linkedin.com/company/coastwatch-irish-coastal-environment-group-coastwatch/?ref=actionism.space)– Volunteers monitoring, protecting and restoring the Irish coast 2\. [Project Seagrass](https://www.linkedin.com/company/project-seagrass/?ref=actionism.space) – Community-driven mapping and planting of underwater meadows 3\. [Wild Oyster Project](https://www.linkedin.com/company/wild-oyster-project/?ref=actionism.space) – Citizen-supported native oyster bed restoration across the UK 4\. [Sussex Kelp Recovery Project](https://www.linkedin.com/company/sussex-kelp-recovery-project/?ref=actionism.space) – Bringing back vital underwater forests, supported by local campaigns 5\. [Seawilding](https://www.linkedin.com/company/seawilding/?ref=actionism.space) – Community-led oyster and seagrass regeneration in Loch Craignish, Scotland 6\. [**Lamlash Bay No Take Zone (Arran)** ](https://www.lamlasharran.co.uk/about-lamlash/no-take-zone-coast/?ref=actionism.space)– Scotland’s first community-led marine reserve, established in 2008, where local citizens secured protection for marine life and proved regeneration is possible when people step in. 7.[**Shorewatch** ](https://uk.whales.org/whales-dolphins/how-we-help/shorewatch-scotland/?ref=actionism.space)**(Whale and Dolphin Conservation)** – Volunteer network conducting regular surveys across Scotland to gather data that influences policymakers and advises developers for better whale and dolphin protection 8.[**UOCEAN 2050** ](https://uocean.org/?ref=actionism.space)– Climate and ocean action platform with practical steps for individuals to make a difference. 9\. **Ayana Elizabeth Johnson** – Read everything you can by this amazing ocean and climate scientist whose work offers numerous actionable solutions (author of "What If We Get It Right?") 10\. [**Seawatchers** ](https://www.seawatchfoundation.org.uk/sea-watcher-app/?ref=actionism.space)– Award-winning campaign (2024 EU Greening Award) that developed a verified method for national-scale marine monitoring using Citizen science --- > > We need to flood the conversation around [#Ocean](https://www.linkedin.com/search/results/all/?keywords=%23ocean&origin=HASH%5FTAG%5FFROM%5FFEED&ref=actionism.space) with these kinds of stories - stories that prove regeneration is possible, and collective action is powerful. 💡 Do you have a favourite coast or ocean project that empowers people? [Let me (Tamasine) know](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/tamasinemcaig%5Focean-ocean-citizenfuture-activity-7326625773379796993-531h?utm%5Fsource=share&utm%5Fmedium=member%5Fdesktop&rcm=ACoAAACEFioBrCJvzLU6zaka8MwsdKqqtjHbds0) and I can add them to this list - ****who knows, maybe someone reading this wants to make a map with all these amazing Ocean ACTionism projects** ### How can you take action when it comes to food and farming right now? URL: https://www.actionism.space/how-can-you-take-action-when-it-comes-to-food-and-farming-right-now/ Last updated: 2025-07-06T09:22:25.000Z Food is one of our most fundamental connections to the world around us - yet most of us have lost touch with where our meals actually come from. Reclaiming this connection isn't just about eating better; it's about finding your people and discovering the collective power that comes from understanding the real stories behind our food systems. When we get to know the farmers, the land, and the communities that sustain us, we start to see ourselves not as isolated consumers but as part of a web of relationships that can drive real change. ## Supporting local food networks strengthens communities reduces environmental impact and creates the kind of human connections that make collective action possibl**e.** ## ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/Not-everyone-wants-a-shortcut-to-mending--10-.jpg) ## **Start small, think local:** 1. **Find your local food cooperative** \- and visit to see what they offer - [Sustain is a good place to help you find one near you.](https://www.sustainweb.org/foodcoops/finder/?ref=actionism.space) 2. **Buy one meal's worth of ingredients** from a local farm shop or farmers market this week. Community gardens are also great places to find local products- [lots of lovely ones on a map here](https://www.goodtogrowuk.org/map/?ref=actionism.space) 3. **Ask one local restaurant** where they source their food - spark the conversation **Start a neighbourhood food conversation** \- ask three neighbours where they shop and why 4. **Host a "food story" dinner** \- invite friends to bring one dish and share the story of where the ingredients came from, who grew them, and why they chose it 5. **Propose a group buying scheme** for your street, workplace, or community group. [Lots of info on how to get started here](https://www.sustainweb.org/foodcoopstoolkit/buyingclubs/?ref=actionism.space) 6. **Visit a local food processing facility** or community kitchen to understand the system 7. **Choose one product** you usually buy and find a local alternative this month 8. **Post about a food producer** (not just a product) on social media to shift the narrative towards a #CitizenFuture. [We'd love to hear how you get on ](mailto:hello@actionism.space)and if you can think of more ideas - let us know and we will add them to the list! ### ACTionism is about acting towards something, not just resisting the world as it is, but reimagining what it could be. URL: https://www.actionism.space/its-about-finding-your-people/ Last updated: 2025-07-04T11:19:20.000Z There’s a growing feeling that many of us carry. An ache. Knowing that something’s not working, and that we want to be part of building something better. But how? Where do we start? Where do we belong in this story of change? At Re-Action, we’ve been exploring that question, and one of the responses we’re beginning to shape is something we call ACTionism. It’s a term we’ve coined to describe a kind of space - one that lives somewhere between traditional volunteering and full-on activism. It’s not as well-worn a path as either of those, and that’s kind of the point. It opens up something new. A space for people who want to do something but aren’t quite sure where they fit. A space for people who are tired of feeling like passive observers or solo travellers, and are ready to find their people. ACTionism is about acting towards something, not just resisting the world as it is, but reimagining what it could be. It’s about finding your people. It’s about doing with, not just doing for. Its collective, creative, and deeply courageous. It’s about power - realising you have it. It’s about community - feeling part of something bigger. It’s about embracing the unknown and choosing to act anyway, even when the outcome isn’t guaranteed. To ground all of this a little more, we’ve been hugely inspired by Jon Alexander’s book Citizens. In it, he describes three “stories” that shape the way we see ourselves and our role in society. First, there’s the Subject Story - where power is held by the few, and the rest of us are expected to obey, comply, follow the rules. This is the story of kings and empires and institutions telling us what’s best. Then came the Consumer Story - a story that whispered of freedom, but mostly in the language of binary choices. What to buy. Who to vote for. What to scroll, swipe, stream. It promised us everything - if only we kept choosing. We were told we could have anything we wanted. But in truth, we were expected to keep the machine turning. To keep consuming. Keep producing. Keep going. This story brought us convenience, comfort, and a powerful sense of individualism. But it also left many of us isolated, exploited, and longing for the tides to change. Because when meaning is something to be bought, it becomes just another transaction. And slowly, we forget how to build it for ourselves. Or with each other. Now, we find ourselves on the cusp of a new way to be - a different kind of story entirely: the Citizen Story. This story says we are not just passive subjects to be ruled, nor consumers to be sold to. We are Citizens - not in the narrow, legal sense, but in the deepest, most human sense. People with agency. People with the power to shape the world around us - not alone, but together. In the Citizen Story, we stop asking “What am I allowed to do?” and start asking “What do we want to act towards?” It’s a story rooted in care. It values justice, not just efficiency. Creativity, not just productivity. Interdependence, not just independence. It invites us to show up - not as saviours, but as co-creators. To bring the wholeness of ourselves. To take part. To reimagine what’s possible - together. The truth is we won’t be enough on our own - we need to get entangled. We need to find the others. That’s where ACTionism lives. It’s our way of helping bring the Citizen Story to life - not just in theory, but in real, grounded, everyday ways. It starts with the doing. With the ACTing. We’re not trying to invent something from scratch. We’re naming and nurturing what already exists. There are people already living in this story - unassumingly, boldly, beautifully. ACTionism celebrates them. Not to place them on pedestals, but to learn from them, walk beside them, and remind each other: this way of being is not only possible - it’s already happening everywhere and all at once.And it’s powerful. Because small actions matter. Because the world rarely changes all at once - it changes in ripples.Simply showing up, with an open heart and a willingness to care, is already an act of courage. At Re-Action, we ask: What if the future isn’t something we have to fight for - but something we can reimagine together? We don’t pretend to have all the answers (or any of them)But we believe deeply in the questions. And in reimagining the systems, stories, and roles that shape our lives. We build connections between people, between places, between ideas. We welcome many ways of taking part. Because we know: There is a place for everyone in this story. Whether you’re just dipping your toe in, you ache for something new, you’re searching for that first ACTion or you're already getting your hands very messy, ACTionism is for you. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/ACTionism--Find-the-Others--9-.png) ### ACTionism Meets the American West: How Montana Cowboys Are Rewriting the Food Story URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism-meets-the-american-west-how-montana-cowboys-are-rewriting-the-food-story/ Last updated: 2025-07-09T15:15:17.000Z As hard as I find it to believe, two weeks ago today I was talking [#CitizensNotConsumers](https://www.linkedin.com/search/results/all/?keywords=%23citizensnotconsumers&origin=HASH%5FTAG%5FFROM%5FFEED&ref=actionism.space) with a group of ranchers in a field in the middle of nowhere in Montana, US… and it was one of the most inspiring gatherings I’ve ever had the joy to be part of. Food and farming is where this work all started for me. Over a decade ago, fresh out of adland, I led a project to hand over decisions on a real working farm to the public by online vote and debate for the [National Trust](https://www.linkedin.com/company/national-trust/?ref=actionism.space) as a way of involving people in sustainable food production instead of just selling them sustainable food. It nearly killed me and several animals - but I learned a LOT. Not least that those producing our food often feel both a deep connection to the land, and intensely trapped by the Consumer Story - which treats them as commodity producers, rather than stewards of that land. The Old Salt Festival was a powerful reminder of that. I’ll admit, I was a little wary going to a state that broke 60% for Trump…But what [](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ACoAADeUmHEBeYE-WFAXJtrXch4-kOiWyK7Af-E?ref=actionism.space)[Cole Mannix](https://www.linkedin.com/in/cole-mannix-7a9354220/?ref=actionism.space) and the [Old Salt Co-op](https://www.linkedin.com/company/old-salt-co-op/?ref=actionism.space) team are building is simply astounding. ## By pooling the resources of 5 ranches, the Old Salt Co-op are finding collective agency to reclaim their rightful role as land stewards - and proudly declaring their belief that “Land Is Kin”. In practice, that means not just producing, but also processing, and actually feeding people. “Vertical integration”, so they don’t lose out to the margins of mega business through the supply chain. They’ve bought their own processing plant, and operate two restaurants so far with plans for more - as well as working with local hospitals and schools to put good local food on their menus. > The motivation for all of it is to build a different relationship between land and humans - and that means a whole different relationship with the original peoples of the region too. It was a privilege to meet some of the [Piikani Lodge Health Institute (PLHI)](https://www.linkedin.com/company/piikani-lodge-health-institute-plhi/?ref=actionism.space) folks and see how all these humans, from all their different backgrounds, are collaborating as the momentum builds.Perhaps most exciting of all is the Old Salt approach to sharing the learning - by holding an annual festival of music and ideas on the land, and inviting folks who are trying to work in similar ways from all over the world. **What could be better than amazing food, astonishing people… and some cowboy poetry and country music???** This is community power my friends… served with a big helping of joy❤️💪 Written By [Jon Alexander ](https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7346446412949204993/?ref=actionism.space)and originally published on LinkedIn --- ## How can you take action when it comes to food and farming right now? ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/Not-everyone-wants-a-shortcut-to-mending--10-.jpg) ## **Start small, think local:** **Find your local food cooperative** \- and visit to see what they offer - [Sustain is a good place to help you find one near you.](https://www.sustainweb.org/foodcoops/finder/?ref=actionism.space) **Buy one meal's worth of ingredients** from a local farm shop or farmers market this week. Community gardens are also great places to find local products- [lots of lovely ones on a map here](https://www.goodtogrowuk.org/map/?ref=actionism.space) **Ask one local restaurant** where they source their food - spark the conversation **Start a neighbourhood food conversation** \- ask three neighbours where they shop and why **Propose a group buying scheme** for your street, workplace, or community group. [Lots of info on how to get started here](https://www.sustainweb.org/foodcoopstoolkit/buyingclubs/?ref=actionism.space) **Visit a local food processing facility** or community kitchen to understand the system [We'd love to hear how you get on ](mailto:hello@actionism.space) ### From a balloon to global network URL: https://www.actionism.space/from-a-balloon-to-global-network/ Last updated: 2026-06-20T21:46:20.000Z ## **An interview with Isabel Mack** **Finding the right people has been key. Jon Alexander’s book Citizens helped me reframe the challenges I was facing and articulate why this work can feel hard. Supportive spaces like the Re-Action Collective have been invaluable, offering fresh perspectives.** **What problem did you see?** Parties are a magical time - an opportunity to step outside the everyday, try new activities, and, of course, eat lots of cake. But they’ve also become hugely wasteful. It’s cheap and easy to buy disposable tableware and decorations, only for them to end up in the bin at the end of the celebrations. I started my own journey to reduce waste when my son was small, so I faced the upcoming years of children’s parties with a sense of trepidation. Then I stumbled across a podcast by Jen Gale, where she interviewed Tillie Mabbutt, who had set up a reusable party kit in Frome. The idea was beautifully simple: by sharing reusable tableware and decorations, we can easily avoid unnecessary waste at parties. The solution made perfect sense to me - but how could I find out if there was a party kit near me? That one question started a journey I never could have imagined! **How did you start?** Through my interest in reducing waste at home, I came across an online directory of zero-waste initiatives. I had previously submitted new projects I’d discovered, so when I read about the party kit concept, it made sense to suggest party kit could be added to this directory. I spoke to Dian, the website founder, and we agreed I would help by putting together a spreadsheet of party kits. I set about crowdsourcing the information by posting in local plastic-free and parenting Facebook groups, asking people to help me find existing party kits. Then someone suggested we should have a Facebook group—so I set one up. As more and more people got involved, it felt like we needed our own website—so I built one. Within 5 months we had 250 party kits listed. **What did you find difficult when starting out?** It was an exciting time, but the speed of growth was overwhelming. I had worked reactively rather than following a plan. When the first lockdown began it felt devastating to pack away our party kits when we’d only just started. But it gave me an unexpected opportunity to step back, reflect on what we’d built, and consider what it should look like moving forward. I registered the network as a community interest company, recruited a board of directors, and created a simple plan for what we wanted to achieve with the time and resources available to us. I also had the opportunity to partner with zero-waste author Erin Rhoads and together we launched the network in Australia. **What role has the community played in your journey?** The Party Kit Network wouldn’t exist without our community of members. There are 600 people, united by their passion for the party kit concept, who give up their time to run local party kits. I see their dedication every day. Our community spans counties, time zones, and continents. While I may never meet most of our members, I’ve seen the value they gain from being part of this network - the encouragement to get started and the ongoing support they offer each other. It really is joyful. I’m very aware that my role within the community carries a lot of responsibility. It’s up to me to keep our space safe and positive. Early on, as we found our way, I spent time navigating conflict and setting the tone for how we engage with one another. Setting our core values has been really important. It can be tough doing something new when it feels like everyone else is just carrying on as before - buying those Paw Patrol plates only to throw them away. I’ve noticed that people often start their party kit journey with excitement, but motivation dips when they struggle to connect with local users. I see it as my role to keep the mood upbeat, celebrate successes, and occasionally offer a dose of perspective. Living more sustainably is a journey and not everyone is at the same stage. It’s important to acknowledge that and recognise that members have joined for a variety of reasons. Sometimes, people just need someone to step up and make a decision. I learned this during the early days of the pandemic. I didn’t have all the answers, but I could share what I did know, helping to remove ambiguity for those unsure of what to do. I don’t always get it right, but making a decision and adjusting as you learn is okay. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Untitled--1920-x-1080-px--1.png) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/PartyKitNetwork-kit-109--2--1.jpg) **What have you learned that you wish you’d known before starting?** I wish I’d trusted my gut from the start. If something doesn’t feel right for your project or align with your values, don’t do it. Working on mindset and resilience is an ongoing process. I’ve been fortunate to find support through programmes like Inspired Women Lead! and Accelerating Women’s Enterprise, which gave me space to reflect, build confidence, and connect with others. Working on something new, especially promoting a behaviour change, can be tough. But small sparks—a chat with a new member, a shared success, or a mention in a magazine—keep me going. Finding the right people has been key. Jon Alexander’s book Citizens helped me reframe the challenges I was facing and articulate why this work can feel hard. Supportive spaces like the Re-Action Collective have been invaluable, offering fresh perspectives. I can’t overstate how valuable it is to be in a group where people truly understand my ambitions and challenges. Networking isn’t my favourite thing, but the right connections make all the difference. **Creating more community hubs will be such an important part of tackling the climate crisis and improving the quality of people’s lives and joyful celebrations should be part of that.** **What is your vision for the future of your project?** We have already seen how using a party kit can act as a stepping stone for people to engage more with the wider sharing economy. As sharing and reuse become more commonplace, more and more people will look to use party kits. Reuse solutions will become more mainstream, returnable cup schemes will gain traction, and food packaging will shift away from single-use. And the Party Kit Network will be here, ready to help more people make the shift to reusables at celebrations. With the rise of community lending libraries, I think there will be a shift in our membership from individuals running party kits from their homes to more community-driven projects. Creating more community hubs will be such an important part of tackling the climate crisis and improving the quality of people’s lives and joyful celebrations should be part of that. ## Ready to take ACTion? [Find a local party kit](https://partykitnetwork.org/find?ref=actionism.space) [Get support to launch your own party kit ](https://partykitnetwork.org/start?ref=actionism.space) [Join the Party Kit Network network ](https://partykitnetwork.org/join?ref=actionism.space) ### ACTionism Contributor Guidelines URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism-contributor-guidelines/ Last updated: 2025-07-30T07:32:17.000Z Thanks for expressing an interest in contributing to the ACTionism.space. You know that feeling when you look around and see what needs changing, but wonder if you're alone in caring? You're not. And you have more power than you think. **ACTionism is the art of finding your people and taking action - together.** Inspired by Jon Alexander's insight in his book CITIZENS, that "all of us are smarter than any of us," we reject the tired narrative that you're either a passive subject or an isolated consumer. What you are instead, is an **active citizen capable of creating meaningful change** \- from regenerating local ecosystems to transforming education, healthcare, transport, and community spaces. News cycles sharing doom and gloom are causing paralysis - a feeling that we cannot effect change on the scale required. So we have set up ACTionism.space to inspire others by sharing examples of ordinary people bucking the system to effect change. We also help people find their tribe so they can start taking collective action. We're building a joyful movement of everyday citizens stepping into their agency to create positive change in their communities, spaces, and challenges. **Our Mission** We believe in the power of collective action to transform our world. Whilst we acknowledge systems need changing, our focus is on **empowering others to take action** rather than dwelling on what's broken. We're apolitical but deeply committed to strengthening democratic participation and community engagement. **ACTionism works to:** 1. Lift up marginalised voices and ensure our work reflects community diversity. 2. Cultivate joy deliberately - it creates energy, energy creates movement, and movement changes communities and systems 3. Amplify the work of community initiatives and organisations that align with our manifesto 4. Educate by sharing stories, strategies, and practical guidance for collective action 5. Build collective agency and reduce feelings of powerlessness 6. Promote and enable community-led solutions across food, education, nature, repair, and local spaces 7. Help people turn inspiration into practical action in their communities 8. Celebrate and amplify grassroots initiatives that demonstrate collective power 9. Connect people through accessible storytelling and community places and spaces ## **What kind of articles are we looking for?** **Inspiring AND Actionable = Perfect ACTionism Content** Every piece should leave readers thinking: "I can do this too!" Whether you're sharing a personal journey, offering practical guidance, or spotlighting brilliant initiatives, end with clear steps readers can take. **Where will your writing / content be shared?** Initially we are sharing content on [www.actionism.space](http://www.actionsim.space/?ref=actionism.space) but also have an Instagram channel, and are working on the next edition of our magazine. We also have plans for a podcast/audio workshop series. At present we are looking for relevant contributions for the website and newsletter. But may also ask if you would like to be featured on our other platforms. ## **Payment & Expenses** We're currently an unfunded grassroots movement, which means we can't offer payment for articles. However, if you need to incur reasonable expenses whilst creating your piece (travel for interviews, event tickets) please discuss this with us beforehand. We'll do our best to cover necessary costs that help you create brilliant content for our community. ## **Content Categories** ### We've identified key themes that spark both inspiration and action. Choose one of these topic areas for your contribution: - **Food** \- Examples might include: Community gardens, food justice, local food systems, community dining - **Learning/Education** \- Examples might include: Skill-sharing, community education, informal learning networks, new democratic systems for parents and children - **Repair/Reuse** \- Fix-it cafes, repair culture, sustainability through mending - **Community Hubs** \- Creating and activating spaces for connection and action in local places and spaces - **Energy and Power** \- Community energy, local power generation, energy democracy - **Health and Wellbeing** \- Community health initiatives, mental health support, wellbeing networks -e.g Andy’s Mens club - **Transport** \- Sustainable transport, community mobility solutions, active travel ### **Content Types** - **Guides** \- Step-by-step how-tos (e.g., "How to Start a Repair Cafe in your town") - **Spotlights** \- Celebrating people and projects creating change - these are led and created by the ACTionism team, but you are welcome to suggest people/organisations for us to feature. - **Reflections** \- Personal journeys and lessons learned (always ending with actionable next steps) - **Events** \- Listings of inspiring gatherings, conferences, or community actions that focus on the idea of ACTionism ## **Writing Guidelines** ### **Tone & Style** - **Joyful and welcoming** \- we want the content to exude joy and inspiration - **Encouraging** \- Focus on possibility, not just problems - **Practical** \- Give people concrete steps they can take, as well as where they can find out more or who they can talk to for help - **Inclusive** \- Welcome all backgrounds and experience levels, and where possible lift up under-represented and marginalised voices and initiatives. ### **Structure Tips** - Use **clear headings** to break up your content - Include **bullet points** for easy scanning - Add **bold text** for key takeaways - Embed **YouTube videos** or link to relevant resources - Always include an **" ACT/What You Can Do Now"** section ### **The ACT Principle** Every article should end with **ACT** \- specific actions readers can take: - **A**ccess - What resources or connections do they need? - **C**onnect - How can they find others doing similar work? - **T**ake action - What's the first step they can take this week? ## **Geographic focus** Whilst we're UK-focused, we celebrate ACTionist initiatives worldwide. Share your local initiatives, but help readers understand how they might adapt your approach to their own context. ## **Technical requirements** ### **Submission Process** 1. **Express interest** \- Email us hello@actionsim.space with your idea and if we’re interested we’ll get back in touch - we’re volunteer led atm so please bear with us. 2. **Get set up** \- We'll create your Ghost profile for easy drafting 3. **Write and save** \- Draft your piece directly in Ghost 4. **Review process** \- We'll edit collaboratively and schedule publication 5. **Celebrate** \- Share your published piece with your networks and drive new ACTionists to our site and newsletter. ### **Online Optimisation** - **Length** \- Write as much as needed to be helpful (typically 500-1500 words) - **Headers** \- Use H2 and H3 headings for easy navigation - **Links** \- Include relevant external resources and YouTube embeds - **Images** \- Add photos that bring your story to life (ensure you have permission and please note we may edit these to include ACTionism styling before we publish) ## **Content we love** - Personal stories of stepping into agency - Practical guides that others can replicate - Spotlights on unsung community heroes - Reflections on lessons learned (with actionable insights) - Documentation of successful community initiatives with actionable insights - Creative approaches to common challenges that others can replicate ## **What we're not looking for** - Purely academic pieces without practical application - Complaint-focused content without solutions - Partisan political content - Content that doesn't empower readers to act - Anything that discourages or overwhelms rather than inspires ## **Questions?** Ready to contribute? Have questions about your idea? We're here to help you craft something brilliant that inspires others to step into their own agency. [**Contact Tamasine McCaig** ](mailto:hello@actionsim.space) ## **Background** **How ACTionism came to exist** The term ACTionism was initially coined by filmmaker[ Michael Shaw](https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-shaw-286293142/?ref=actionism.space), as a working title for a film created in collaboration with the [Re-Action Collective](https://re-action-collective.org/?ref=actionism.space), founded by Gavin Fernie-Jones and Heather Davies. Through hosting a number of community film screenings and discussions, it became clear the idea of ACTionism was resonating with people. It also ties in closely with the work of the Citizens Collective - an experiment led by Jon Alexander, Tamasine McCaig and Olivia Stamp to spread the idea of ‘active citizening’. A merging of minds occurred and the ACTionism project was born. **Our Team**The core team (for now) comprises [Gavin ](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/gavin-fernie-jones?ref=actionism.space)and [Heather ](https://www.linkedin.com/in/heather-davies-communicating-sustainability/?ref=actionism.space)and[ Tamasine McCaig](https://www.linkedin.com/in/tamasinemcaig/?ref=actionism.space) ### ACTionism in Action Newsletter 28/07/2025 URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism-in-action-newsletter-2/ Last updated: 2025-09-04T14:34:41.000Z ACTionism exists to inspire you by showcasing ordinary people who are challenging the system to create change. --- ## Something to join: [A conversation about JOY & ACTionism](https://www.actionism.space/joy-actionism/) - What if #JOY was a form of climate action? - What if *reuse, repair, and radical connection* became the most powerful way to push back against consumerism? - What if *community* was the strategy? These are just a few of the questions Gav will be discussing tomorrow with [Clare Morris](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ACoAABCJFuQBn%5F8cnzWwrQYLeLbBVeVi6jjRmVo?ref=actionism.space) from [Conscious Entrepreneurs](https://www.linkedin.com/company/conscious-entrepreneurs/?ref=actionism.space). Join for ****free**, at ****10am tomorrow,** by [signing up here.](https://calendly.com/clare-cmr/network-speaker-events-conscious-entrepreneur-free?ref=actionism.space) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/ACTionism-core-image-templates--1--1.png) --- ## Something to read: [PLAY (INSPIRED BY A CALL WITH GAV) by Jamie Prow](https://www.actionism.space/play-inspired-by-a-call-with-gav/) In this piece, Jamie Prow explores the power of play and its essential role in unlocking creativity and possibilities. "In the fabric of my youth, one resounding question echoed: 'Can I play outside?' Those were joyful days of boundless exploration, where even the most inconspicuous treasures—a backyard stick or drifting leaves—beckoned with the promise of adventure." "Yet, as the years unfolded, the vibrant hues of play began to fade. Our adult responsibilities encroached, schooling tempered our spirits, and societal norms nudged us toward the path of conformity. The symbolic crown of childhood gradually yielded to the weight of societal expectations, its once-potent magic waning in the face of growing obligations and social pressures." ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/Not-everyone-wants-a-shortcut-to-mending--28-.png) --- ## Something for feedback: How Change Happens? ACTionism: the art of finding your people and taking collective action The term ACTionism emerged from a film created by the Re-Action Collective. It's exciting to see the term gain more meaning and context as more people use it. The following is how Jon Alexander announced the launch of the Actionism.space platform. "The underlying idea is in creative tension with the idea of "activism," which tends to accept the premise that power lies in existing governments and big businesses, and demand that those actors use their power differently. **ACTionism, by contrast, is rooted in the fundamental insight that - if and only if we act together - we all have agency, and in what we can do if we insist on starting from where we are, finding the others, and building that agency together.** It is about exploring what we can do without asking permission or expecting anyone to do it for us. It's about building the world we want to see, from where we are, using what we have - and maybe then demanding that existing power structures come in behind us." Gav has tried to add visual context to ACTionism and how it contributes to the building of the world we want to see. If you have any feedback on this diagram, any thoughts or ideas, please get in touch. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/ACTionism--Find-the-Others--9--1.png) "ACTionism is about acting towards something, not just resisting the world as it is, but reimagining what it could be. It’s about ****finding your people**. It’s about ****doing with**, not just doing for. Its ****collective, creative, and deeply courageous.** It’s about ****power with others** \- realising we have it. It’s about ****community** \- feeling part of something bigger. It’s about ****embracing the unknown and choosing to act anyway**, even when the outcome isn’t guaranteed." Ellie Meredith. --- ## Something to read: [Radical Transparent Accounting](https://re-action-collective.org/2023-2024-financial-review/?ref=actionism.space) ACTionism is the result of two Collectives colliding, the Re-Action Collective and the Citizen Collective. Both of these communities have taken a transparent approach to accounting. They’re sharing everything they can about where money comes from - and where it goes. Grants, donations, earned income, in-kind support: it’s all visible. Not to tick boxes, but to nurture a culture of honesty, shared stewardship, and mutual accountability. In this [blog](https://re-action-collective.org/2023-2024-financial-review/?ref=actionism.space) Re-Action walks you through their financial accounts for the year ended November 2024. In the same spirit, the Citizen Collective has been run on the Open Collective platform, where you can find [ACTionism](https://opencollective.com/actionism?ref=actionism.space). Here you can see all our finances and contribute to the movement. ****How we're funding this work** At present we're run by a team of enthusiastic (and unpaid) volunteers, writers and creators. As you have read, we have big plans. If you believe in this project and want to support our work financially, ****you can do so here on Open Collective.** By listing on Open Collective, we’re pledging to be completely transparent about the money we receive and where it is spent. [Donate £10 to support ACTionism ](https://opencollective.com/actionism?ref=actionism.space) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/group-hug-2.jpeg) --- ## Something to watch: [The Revolution Will Not Be Incorporated](https://www.youtube.com/@actionismspace?ref=actionism.space) The ACTionism.space YouTube channel is live. Here's a snippet from a Spotlight featuring, Esther Foreman and Pia Mancini, of the Open Collective discussing why we need new forms of governance. The Open Collective was formed to make it easy to **raise, manage, and disburse money with full transparency**. The platform is a Fiscal Host for collectives, allowing you to unlock funding for your community—free from red tape. --- ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/07/Screenshot-2025-07-28-at-10.00.10.png) ## Something to listen to: [Composting Spoiled Maps](https://becomingcrew.substack.com/p/ep-104-dan-burgess-composting-spoiled) In this Spaceship Earth Podcast episode, Dan Burgess asks the question, what if the maps we’ve been using to make sense of the world… are no longer capable of guiding us? "Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps, the most revolutionary act right now is to create space, to gather, to connect, and to commune with our fellow humans and more than human kin. To quieten the noise and cleverness of modernity, to learn to listen deeply, to open our hearts and to contemplate these times judgement-free. And, perhaps, as the great Joanna Macy suggests, just begin with gratitude." Dan Burgess. Perhaps, indeed. --- [Donate to help ACTionism reach more people](https://opencollective.com/actionism?ref=actionism.space) 💡 ****ACTionism aims to:** 1\. Educate and inspire by sharing stories, strategies, and practical guidance for collective action. 2\. Cultivate joy deliberately - it creates energy, energy creates movement, and movement changes communities and systems 3\. Amplify the work of community initiatives and organisations that align with our manifesto 4\. Build collective agency and reduce feelings of powerlessness 5\. Promote and enable community-led solutions across food, education, nature, repair, and local spaces 6\. Lift up marginalised voices and ensure our work reflects community diversity. 7\. Help people turn inspiration into practical action in their communities 8\. Celebrate and amplify grassroots initiatives that demonstrate collective power 9\. Connect people through accessible storytelling and community places and spaces 💡 ****Got a postive story of ACTionism we should feature?** [****Ge**t in touch and let us know ](mailto:hello@actionism.space) ### How to empower and spark collective action in children as young as 4 URL: https://www.actionism.space/how-to-empower-and-spark-collective-action-in-children-as-young-as-4/ Last updated: 2025-06-26T18:14:21.000Z **Empowering Young Voices: How Smart School Council Transforms Children into Changemakers** What if children as young as four could identify problems in their school and take meaningful action to solve them? Smart School Council is revolutionising how we think about student voice and democratic participation in education, proving that age is no barrier to making a difference. This innovative idea started by [Greg Sanderson](https://pt.linkedin.com/in/gregisanderson?ref=actionism.space) gives even our youngest Citizens the tools to spot issues, propose solutions, and mobilise their peers for collective action. From playground safety concerns to lunchtime improvements, children are discovering they have the power to create real change in their school community. The results speak for themselves: increased engagement, stronger problem-solving skills, and a generation of confident young citizens who understand that their voices matter. But perhaps most importantly, Smart School Council is showing us that when we trust children with responsibility, they rise to meet it in remarkable ways. --- ### Citizen Future: why we need a new story of self and society URL: https://www.actionism.space/citizen-future-why-we-need-a-new-story-of-self-and-society/ Last updated: 2025-07-07T12:08:20.000Z “The doom-laden headlines of our times would seem to indicate there are two futures on offer. In one, an Orwellian authoritarianism prevails. Fearful in the face of compounding crises — climate, plagues, poverty, hunger — people accept the bargain of the “Strong Man”: their leader’s protection in return for unquestioning allegiance as “subjects”. Think Orban, Xi, Putin. What follows is the abdication of personal power, choice, or responsibility. In the other, everyone is a “consumer” and all faith is placed in economic growth and technological advance to keep humanity ahead of the game. The richest have their boltholes in New Zealand and a ticket for Mars in hand just in case. The rest of us strive to be like them, fending for ourselves as robots take jobs and as the competition for ever-scarcer resources intensifies. The benefits of technology, whether artificial intelligence, bio-, neuro- or agrotechnology, accrue to the wealthiest — as does all the power in society. This is a future shaped by the whims of Silicon Valley billionaires. While it sells itself on personal freedoms, the experience for most is exclusion: a top-heavy world of haves and haves-nots. And if anything, as the alliance of Donald Trump and Elon Musk evolves, it is beginning to feel like these two futures are becoming one. Yet despite the bandwidth and airwaves devoted to these dystopias, there is another trajectory: Ariane Conrad and I call it the “Citizen Future”. In 2022, we published a book called Citizens, in which we propose a narrative for the 21st Century that is both more hopeful and more powerful. In this future, people are citizens, rather than subjects or consumers. With this identity, it becomes easier to see that all of us are smarter than any of us. And that the strategy for navigating difficult times is to tap into the diverse ideas, energy and resources of everyone...” **The challenge is not that the Citizen Future is difficult to find or complicated to articulate. It is simple, rooted in deep truth, and emerging everywhere. But it is hidden because every day people are telling themselves other stories of society, and their role within it. Critically, institutions reinforce these other narratives, taking up the oxygen of imagination, making them seem like the only possibilities.** **Written by: JON ALEXANDER,** co-author of [Citizens](https://www.jonalexander.net/?ref=actionism.space) \- Why the key to fixing everything is all of us. ### Spotlight: Using Pol.is: A Dynamic Tool for Consensus Building URL: https://www.actionism.space/spotlight-using-pol-is-a-dynamic-tool-for-consensus-building/ Last updated: 2025-06-24T08:40:35.000Z ### Pol.is is a tool designed to facilitate large-scale, open-ended conversations while identifying areas of consensus. It enables groups, whether face-to-face or online, to engage people in active decision making and participatory processes in an inclusive and scalable way. **The challenge:** Traditional consultation and decision-making processes often fail to capture genuine consensus or engage participants meaningfully. Conventional surveys and discussions can be dominated by a few vocal voices, whilst quieter participants remain unheard. This leads to false consensus, poor engagement, and decisions that don't reflect the true priorities of the community. Face-to-face meetings and workshops frequently struggle with unequal participation, making transparent and democratic decision-making difficult to achieve. ### **The ACTion:** Pol.is facilitates large-scale, open-ended conversations whilst identifying areas of genuine consensus through collective intelligence. Unlike traditional approaches, it enables groups—whether face-to-face or online—to engage people in active decision-making through an inclusive and scalable platform. The system allows participants to respond to statements and suggest their own ideas whilst mapping out areas of agreement and divergence in real time. This helps decision-makers and facilitators understand diverse group perspectives without forcing artificial consensus. **For face-to-face and place-based groups, Pol.is provides:** - Real-time input gathering from participants in meetings, workshops, and community events - Discovery of unexpected areas of agreement that traditional discussions might miss - Opportunities for quieter voices to contribute without speaking-up pressure - More transparent and democratic decision-making that fosters greater trust and engagement **Why pol.is is better than a survey:** **Real-time interaction:** Participants can respond to and refine ideas **Idea generation:** New ideas can be added by anyone. **Consensus building:** Similar ideas are grouped together automaticall **Transparency:** Conversations are visible to all participants. **Data-driven insights:** Easily identifies group sentiment. ## Ready to take ACTion and start exploring Pol.is in your community? Download this one pager with lots more info on how to set it up and make the most of it in your community . You can also watch the Spotlight call hosted by Jon Alexander where we meet and chat to Colin from Pol.is to find out why he thinks its so important that this kind of decision making tool is critical if we are to design a #CitizenFuture [one pager - Pol.isThis one pager has lots more info on how to get started with Pol.is including set upone pager - Pol.is.pdf542 KBdownload-circle](https://www.actionism.space/content/files/2025/06/one-pager---Pol.is.pdf "Download") ### Spotlight: CanTeam URL: https://www.actionism.space/spotlight-canteam/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T20:16:32.000Z What if schools could become thriving community hubs that tackle food poverty, reduce waste, and strengthen social connections all at once? This article explores how Can Team's innovative approach works to transform school food systems into sustainable community assets, why more schools and communities need this model, and how you can take action to bring community-centred food provision to your area. **Spotlight Summary: CANTEAM - Community-Centred School Food Systems** **Recorded June 2025 with Jonathan Harper - CEO of Future Foundations & Founder of CanTeam.** **You can watch the whole call below or read the summary of the call below** **The Call Summary** This spotlight call featured CANTeam, an inspiring UK initiative helping schools open their doors beyond the school day to create after-school dinner clubs - warm, welcoming spaces where young people and families can come together for community connection and healthy, affordable meals. We were joined by CanTeam's founder Jonathan Harper, Big Change Education Challenge Winner, alongside one of the inspiring young people who has played a key role in setting up the project in their own school, and Shenel Shefik, who established Can Team in her children's school and now supports other schools across the country to implement similar initiatives. **Key insights from the call:** **Young people leading change:** The conversation highlighted how young people are at the forefront of shaping these community dinner clubs, designing them to meet the genuine needs of their peers and local communities rather than adult assumptions about what's needed. **Beyond just meals:** Can Team provides more than food - they create spaces for belonging, support, and meaningful conversation. These dinner clubs tackle food insecurity whilst simultaneously strengthening school communities and building social connections. **Practical implementation:** Shenel shared her journey from setting up CanTeam in her own children's school to now supporting other schools nationwide, offering concrete insights into how schools, parents, and local organisations can get involved or start similar initiatives. **System change through collaboration:** Jonathan explained how Can Team supports wider transformation by working with others who share their belief in the power of social dining to address multiple community challenges simultaneously. **The ripple effect:** The call demonstrated how opening school doors beyond traditional hours creates lasting impact - not just addressing immediate food needs, but building the social capital and community connections that help families and young people thrive. ## Ready to take action? We've working with CANTeam to create a one pager that to help you set up a community dining experience in your school. In the meantime you can [ express an interest and register your school for more info here.](https://score.future-foundations.co.uk/canteamschool?ref=actionism.space) ### Video Spotlight: Smart School Council URL: https://www.actionism.space/spotlight-smart-school-council/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T20:19:14.000Z What if every child's voice mattered in school decisions, not just the loudest ones? This article explores how Smart School Councils work, why more schools and communities need this approach, and how you can take action to bring democratic education to your area. **Building a citizen future in schools** **Spotlight Summary: Smart School Councils (SSC)** **Recorded March 2025 with Greg Sanderson - Founder of SSC and Rachel Gray - Primary Teacher and SSC user, Gateshead.** **You can watch the whole call below or read the summary of the call below** **You can also scroll to the end of this page to download our one pager to give to a teacher or parent in your life to help them set up the tool in their community.** **The problem SCC are trying to solve:** Too often, only the loudest or most confident children are heard in schools, leaving many without the chance to develop vital skills such as empathy, collective problem-solving, and critical thinking—all essential skills for thriving as adults. Traditional school councils reinforce this problem. **The solution:** Smart School Councils are a charity that changes that by making every pupil part of the conversation and giving all children equal opportunities to lead and contribute by introducing a simple, affordable platform that helps schools provide every pupil, not just a select few, a voice. **What are Smart School Councils (SSC)?** - A platform helping schools make every pupil part of decision-making. It’s like a fancy set of PowerPoint slides that supports kids from age five and up to run their own meeting without adult help.” - Greg Sanderson - Moves away from traditional “one-child-per-class” school councils. - Empowers children as young as four to lead class meetings and make their voices heard. **How it works in schools (example: Gateshead Primary)** - Weekly 30-minute class meetings, run by two pupils each time. - Questions range from fun (World Book Day themes) to serious (community responses to riots). - Pupil feedback is gathered, discussed by the communications team, and acted on. - Regular “We asked — You said — We did” assemblies show pupils their voice matters. **Discussion topics include:** - School improvements (e.g., girls-only sports days). Health and well-being (importance of sleep). Real-world issues (riots, community clean-ups). **The SSC platform** - Supports teachers with a bank of over 2,000 child-friendly discussion questions. - Works for primary, secondary, special schools, and pupil referral units. - Affordable (£300–£400 per year), simple to use, and cited positively in Ofsted reports. **Skills SSC helps build in every child:** - Supporting British Values, Personal Development, Oracy and SMSC - Leadership and facilitation - Confidence in public speaking - Active listening - Critical thinking and respectful debate - Empathy and community awareness - Responsibility and collaborative problem-solving **The founder’s story (Greg Sanderson)** - Inspired by inequalities in who gets heard in education and beyond. - Started as Google Slides shared between schools in Tottenham. - Now, working with over 600 schools and the charity is focused on democratic participation for every pupil, so spread the word! **A teacher’s view -** **(Rachel Gray - Primary Teacher)** Rachel talked passionately about how much the platform has become an easy and valuable part of life at her school. > “In all of the years that we’ve done this, there’s never been a glitch... As someone who sets the questions, it’s so easy — and over time, the children just take ownership. It’s become part of our school culture, and I absolutely love seeing them lead.” **Reflections from the call** - Schools should model collective learning, not just top-down teaching. - Huge potential for pupils to influence larger policy issues (e.g., AI in education). - Importance of safeguarding inclusion and ensuring all voices are heard, especially marginalised groups. **Future aspirations** - Enable collective discussions across whole cities and regions. - Feed young people’s voices into policymaking and local government. - Connect schools with local mayors, councils, and national conversations. ## Ready to take action? We've created a one pager that you can print off or email to a teacher or parent in your life - it gives them all the information on how the tool works, what it costs, and why it's so easy to make part of their school day. ### You can download it here. ### [Teacher one pager - Smart School Council - ACTionismTeacher one pager - Smart School Council - ACTionism.pdf1 MBdownload-circle](https://www.actionism.space/content/files/2025/06/Teacher-one-pager---Smart-School-Council----ACTionism.pdf "Download") ### [Do tell us how you get on](https://www.actionism.space/contact-us/) so we can add your experiences to the website/future issues of the magazine. ### ACTIONISM + ACTIVISM URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism-activism/ Last updated: 2025-06-19T18:48:22.000Z Just Stop Oil have hung up their hi-vis. After years of relentless action, the government has finally agreed to stop issuing new oil and gas licenses in the UK. Whatever you think of their approach, this is a monumental shift - one that wouldn’t have happened without sustained pressure from those willing to disrupt the status quo. It’s had me reflecting on activism - what it means, where it’s led us, and whether it’s still the most effective path forward. A while back, I stopped calling myself an activist. The word never quite fit the way I showed up for what I cared about. It felt reactive, tied to resistance rather than creation. I wasn’t interested in just fighting against something - I wanted to build something new. Protest has undeniably reshaped history - cracking open possibilities and making the once unthinkable possible. But I wonder: how much of our energy is still tied up in resistance rather than creation? Are we so focused on pushing back that we forget to move forward? What if, instead of only rejecting the old, we poured more effort into actively building the new? Activist (noun) /ˈæk.tə.vɪst/ A person who campaigns to bring about political or social change. Campaigning matters. Pressure works. But campaigning alone won’t build the world we need. We’re so entangled with the system that even when we win, we often find ourselves trapped within its logic. Swap fossil fuels for green energy, and many of the deeper problems remain - extraction, inequality, disconnection. We need a broader vision, one that isn’t just about opposing but about embodying something different. I’m not so sure anymore that activism - at least in the way we’ve traditionally understood it - is where my energy is best placed now. Foe me, the real work begins in what we create, in the community we build to replace what’s crumbling. It’s time to move beyond protest and into practice. To embody and demonstrate, not just demand. The power of demonstration is in the quiet, steady act of revealing. Not just resisting, but making visible what’s possible when we dare to step beyond the familiar. We tell new stories, weave fresh narratives, and light the way for others. We stay attuned to what must be unsettled while tending to what longs to emerge. It’s not just about shaking the old - it’s about bringing the future into focus. Let our deeds, not just our placards, demonstrate our protest. We must build. We need more ACTionism. > It is easier to act yourself into a new way of thinking, than it is to think yourself into a new way of acting.” - Millard Fuller. ### COMPARING THREE PATHS TO CITIZEN PARTICIPATION: VOLUNTEERING, ACTIVISM, AND ACTIONISM URL: https://www.actionism.space/comparing-three-paths-to-citizen-participation-volunteering-activism-and-actionism/ Last updated: 2025-06-17T20:41:19.000Z In a world grappling with climate change, inequality, and social injustice, more people than ever are looking for ways to make a difference. At the same time, others are frozen in inaction, fearing that what they have to offer isn’t enough to make meaningful change. Let’s take the idea of a ‘citizen future’. It comes from Jon Alexander and Ariane Conrad’s book, and says that “all of us are smarter than any of us” and involves tapping into the diverse ideas, energy and resources of everyone. But how? Getting involved isn’t one-size-fits-all. There are many forms of active citizening, and they vary not only in approach but also in impact. Among them, volunteering, activism, and a lesser-known but increasingly relevant concept – actionism – stand out. Each approach has its strengths and challenges. Let’s unpack what they are, how they work, and why understanding the differences can help us become more effective changemakers. ### VOLUNTEERING: BEING ‘IN SERVICE OF’ Volunteering is perhaps the most familiar form of civic engagement. It’s service-based, usually quite transactional in nature, and designed to help a person, group, or cause. Think soup kitchens, park cleanups, event stewarding, or helping out at your local charity shop or animal shelter. Volunteering usually fits neatly within existing systems. It’s about giving your time at a designated place, at a specific time, often under the structure of an organisation. It promotes cohesion and community spirit but doesn’t necessarily push for systemic change. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-16-at-20.41.48.png) The great thing about volunteering is that it’s convenient and system-fitting, which makes it accessible for many people. However, because it works within the status quo, it rarely questions or transforms the deeper structures that create the need in the first place. Don’t get us wrong though, volunteers are really valuable and many organisations wouldn’t be able to run events or be as impactful as they are without them. ### ACTIVISM: CHALLENGING THE SYSTEM If volunteering is a helping hand, activism is a clenched fist raised in defiance. Activism is all about railing against injustice. It’s rooted in protest, resistance, and calling out systems of power that harm or exclude. From climate marches to social justice rallies, activism thrives on visibility and tension. It doesn’t ask for permission, it demands change. But activism can also be polarizing. It often involves high emotional stakes and confrontation, which can be intimidating or inaccessible for some. It’s not always inclusive, as not everybody can afford the time, and / or take the associated financial and legal risks that are part and parcel. Activism disrupts. It forces society to look at what it would rather ignore. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-16-at-20.42.31.png) In many cases, activism opens the door for conversation and can lead to change (think Rosebank for example), but, in our view, its effects are often limited due to the fact that it rarely offers a vision for what comes next. ### ACTIONISM: CO-CREATING CHANGE Enter Actionism. This is a newer, less familiar term that arguably fills the space between volunteering and activism. It’s a way of engaging that’s less about helping for or protesting against, and more about building with. Actionism is co-creative and participatory. It’s about demonstrating possibilities, not criticising the status quo. Think community gardens, pop-up libraries, or local repair cafés, projects that evolve through doing, experimenting, and sometimes failing. And on the subject of failure, that’s ok. In fact, failure is seen as necessary and valuable to the creative journey. Where volunteering fits within the system and activism challenges it, actionism aims to evolve it. It’s inclusive, letting people participate on their own terms, meaning anyone can get involved, and focuses on building something new rather than serving or fighting what’s already there. In many ways, Actionism is where imagination meets practice. It’s about prototyping a better future, not just talking about it, but living it and doing it together. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-16-at-20.43.00.png) At Re-Action, we are embracing actionism as an apolitical, joyous and fulfilling activity that taps into our creative juices and our human need for community connection. Following Jon Alexander’s advice, we seek to identify the work that needs doing, find the others, and get on with it. Check out the [ACTionism film](https://re-action-collective.org/actionism/?ref=actionism.space) we created that follows 19 year old Ellie, as she sets out on her journey to find the others. If people are frozen by fear that the problems we face are too huge, actionism can provide a creative outlet for them to find their agency, experiment and connect. ### THREE MODES, ONE GOAL: BETTER FUTURES Volunteering, activism, and actionism each offer unique routes to engagement. Volunteering provides much-needed support and serves communities. Activism shakes the ground, challenges norms, and drives urgent change. Actionism creates space for experimentation and long-term transformation. One isn’t better than the others, they just serve different purposes. The real power lies in knowing when and how to use each. Sometimes we need the service of volunteering, the urgency of activism, and the creativity of actionism all at once. In the end, building a citizen future isn’t a fixed pastime, it’s a practice. And whether you’re serving a meal, helping toads cross a road, marching in the streets, or building something new in your neighbourhood, you’re part of the story. What kind of story do you want to help write? ### FROM PARALYSIS TO PURPOSE: THIS IS THE DAWNING OF THE AGE OF AQUARIUS. URL: https://www.actionism.space/from-paralysis-to-purpose-this-is-the-dawning-of-the-age-of-aquarius/ Last updated: 2025-06-19T18:46:05.000Z ### OR WHY WE NEED TO USE THE NEXT 19 YEARS VERY WISELY. Anyone who knows me personally knows that I’ve got a complicated relationship with astrology. Bear with me on this one. On the one hand, my logical, rational and Westernly-educated brain thinks that it’s all nonsense, and that it’s embarrassing to give it the time of day. Then there’s the part of me that thinks that it might well be nonsense but if it can help you to reflect on your life, choices and relationships then maybe there’s a place for it (presuming you don’t let it dictate all of your decisions). Then there’s the part of me, a part which has only emerged relatively recently, that says: ultimately humans are just a bunch of atoms thrown together for a period of time. We think we understand where these atoms came from but we’re not really sure and maybe, just maybe, there’s more in heaven and earth than we can possibly understand. I’m not religious so I’m using heaven as a bit of a catch-all here but the point stands: I guess we’ll never really know. So maybe, if we’ll never really know, we could entertain for a moment that there might be something in this whole ‘Age of Aquarius’ shebang. For those whose social media algorithms aren’t feeding you this information already (and I imagine that’s most of you who aren’t white queer women): last Thursday, Pluto moved into Aquarius for the first time in over 200 years. To understand what this means, I took to reddit, where someone helpfully explained that the Zodiac signs (i.e Aquarius in this case) are like the wallpaper of the sky, so all this means is that Pluto has moved to a new part of the wallpaper. Supposedly, Pluto is a planet of metamorphosis and change as well as of power and truth. Aquarius is about paradigm shifts and breakthroughs and embodies communal and societal progress through a process of individual truth seeking. So when you put them together you get a powerful vision of collective liberation through the mechanism of examining our own personal relationships to what currently exists within us and around us. And questioning all of it. Whether or not you believe in astrological ages, I think that sounds pretty fun. And last time this happened, we had the French and American revolutions and the beginning of the Industrial revolution, so go figure (and no, I’m not going to get into all the less than ideal things that came from those events, or at least not right now). So, whether this incoming era is defined by the stars or by our rapidly collapsing systems, one thing is becoming increasingly clear: we have about two decades to fundamentally reshape how we live on this earth. **We’re in real trouble** I often say to my family, friends, acquaintances, and, let’s be real, to almost anyone I meet, that I don’t think most people realise quite how much trouble we are actually in (yes, I have been a real hoot at parties this year). Sure, we like to throw around terms like “climate crisis”, “societal collapse” and one I heard on a podcast last week: “late-stage capitalist hellhole”, but I don’t think that most of us, myself included, have truly grasped what these terms mean. Which is probably fair enough because it’s quite difficult for the human brain to comprehend and when we do try, it’s deeply painful and overwhelming. > WHAT I WANT TO BE ABLE TO SAY TO HIM IS, “I KNEW. AND I REALLY TRULY TRIED.” And yet, we do have a responsibility to try. Because until we do, we won’t make the necessary changes to ourselves and our societies to mitigate the worst of the oncoming collapse. Sadly, I do now think we’re at a stage where collapse is inevitable and what we need to work towards is doing all we can to minimise harm to existing and future inhabitants of the planet. Some may disagree with me on this and that’s great, I’d love to be shown alternative visions of the future. But for now I think we need to embrace and understand the urgency of the situation with our eyes open. We look set to enter into catastrophic environmental collapse within the next 20-25 years [according to the IPCC](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/may/08/world-scientists-climate-failure-survey-global-temperature?ref=actionism.space) (the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, an organisation you should definitely know about if you don’t already), if we don’t rapidly adapt or overhaul our existing systems. Relatedly, in something that should have been front page news across the world, [scientists have claimed](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/sep/23/earth-breach-planetary-boundaries-health-check-oceans?ref=actionism.space) that we have now breached 6 of the [9 planetary boundaries](https://www.stockholmresilience.org/research/planetary-boundaries.html?ref=actionism.space) that are essential to sustain human life on earth. We have also just witnessed the election of an authoritarian populist septuagenarian to one of the most powerful positions in the world, as well as a recent legal amendment from Russia that makes it much easier for it to deploy its nuclear weapons. Yikes. If we truly understood what this meant for ourselves, our children and our grandchildren I believe we’d be completely unable to continue with business as usual. I think we might be tearing down the physical manifestations of overconsumption and rampant exploitation with our bare hands. And yet we continue in our cognitive dissonance of consuming images of the Atacama desert filled with fast fashion outcasts whilst simultaneously buying ourselves new clothes, because surely a few new coats and dresses here and there can’t really hurt. Which brings me to my real point, which is that there is so much possibility for change if we can just start to imagine and then live beyond the system that we’ve grown up in. But this is going to take work: it’s not enough to sit there wringing our hands saying that it’s all too late. There are real people and real beings that are going to bear the cost of the decisions we’re all making today and it’s not looking pretty for them. Or, indeed, for us: if you’re alive today and under the age of about 50, it’s likely that you’re going to look back in 30 years and think “god I wish I could go back 30 years and do things differently”. The pivotal moment for me was when my first nephew was born, 3 years ago now. Let me be clear - I have infinite respect for parents today who are juggling the immense challenges of raising children within our current system. They're already doing the hardest job there is. This isn't about judgment or shame - it's about all of us, in whatever way we can, trying to create a better world for these children we love. And for me personally, I just couldn’t imagine looking my nephew in the eye in 20 years and saying “yes, I knew how bad it was but I didn’t really want to know because it made me sad. So I carried on taking flights for weekend getaways multiple times a year, buying things I didn’t need and sticking my fingers in my ears pretending that someone else was going to come along and fix things.” What I want to be able to say to him is, “I knew. And I really truly tried.” **Trying does matter** In no way am I saying that I am doing a great job of trying: I am a hypocrite in many ways. I do things imperfectly. I spend a lot of days not doing many things at all. And I know that 99.99% of the world does not have the time, space and privilege that I do to try and forge a new path and imagine things differently. However. > GIVEN THIS, FRANKLY ALARMING, TIMELINE, WHAT IF MORE OF US DECIDED TO JUST STOP PLAYING BY ‘THE RULES’? IF YOU KNEW, FOR SURE, THAT YOU WERE NOT GOING TO BE ABLE TO BUY YOUR DREAM HOUSE; THAT THE JOB YOU’RE CURRENTLY IN WON’T EVEN EXIST IN 10 YEARS; THAT MORE AND MORE OF YOUR FRIENDS WILL STOP JOKINGLY TALKING ABOUT LIVING IN COMMUNES AND WILL ACTUALLY START DOING IT: WHAT WOULD YOU DO DIFFERENTLY NOW? You’d probably want to start strengthening your local communities and not waiting for national governments to do it. You’d be establishing mutual aid societies and building community-led infrastructure. You might be worrying a little bit less about that email sitting in your inbox that you don’t want to reply to. Maybe you’d want to start learning some key skills that might become necessary: how to grow food; how to maintain and repair what we already own; how to heal ourselves and each other by understanding and reconnecting with nature. As I’ve said before, I'm not suggesting everyone needs to quit their job tomorrow or move to an eco-commune. The changes we need will look different for everyone based on circumstances, responsibilities, and resources. What I am suggesting is that we all need to start somewhere: maybe it's learning one new skill, joining one local group, or just beginning to question the assumptions we've built our lives around. The key is to start moving in a different direction, however small those first steps might be. And to take those steps right now. And the great news is that there are thousands and thousands, if not millions, of people all over the world who are already doing all sorts of incredible and inspiring things. We just need to amplify their voices, their projects and their knowledge so that more of us can get involved. Look at the [Re-Action Collective](https://re-action-collective.org/?ref=actionism.space) and their mission to challenge the status quo with community-based circular solutions for the outdoor industry. For the second year running they’re getting #[citizenfriday](https://www.actionism.space/citizen-friday/) trending as an antidote to the consumerist nightmare of ‘Black Friday’, where instead of buying things at a fake discount, they want us all to: share, repair and get out in the fresh air. Or take the wonderful humans who created [Trust the People](https://www.trustthepeople.earth/?ref=actionism.space), who offer an incredible course (that I’ve just completed) to teach and empower community builders committed to building a real democracy from the grassroots up. Examples like these mean that my social media and LinkedIn feeds are now full to the brim with people working for a fairer, greener and more conscious and connected world. As well as just a teeny bit of astrology. ### WHAT STORY DO YOU WANT TO TELL? So I’m choosing to buy into the Age of Aquarius. Whether you’d rather be guided by stars or science, or both, we're being called to examine our individual relationships with truth and power, while simultaneously working towards collective liberation. And by the estimates I’ve seen, we have about 19 years to do it. Over the next few weeks, I'll be exploring: - How we lost our ability to imagine futures beyond our current conception of global capitalism (and how we might get it back) - The cognitive dissonance that keeps us trapped in harmful patterns - How different philosophical traditions might help us think beyond the Western frameworks that got us here - The relationship between personal and collective healing as we try to exist in these transformative times Because if Pluto in Aquarius really does herald an era of radical change - just as it did with the American, French, and Industrial revolutions - then this time we better make damn sure we're steering that change in the right direction. For now though, I invite you to sit with these questions: - What would you do differently if you knew for certain that everything was going to change beyond recognition within two decades? - What skills and relationships would you want to build? - What would truly matter to you? And what story do you want to be able to tell that grown up baby boy when he looks at you and says: “what did you do?” ### Citizen Friday URL: https://www.actionism.space/citizen-friday-2/ Last updated: 2025-06-20T13:02:33.000Z [#CitizenFriday](https://www.actionism.space/dont-shop-be-a-citizen/) is an anti-Black Friday campaign that began in October 2023\. Companies use sales events like Black Friday to manipulate people into buying things they don’t need (or even want). This annual overconsumption frenzy has a high toll on our mental health and the health of our planet too. #CitizenFriday provides an alternative to the ‘everything at all costs’ approach that promotes agency, benefits body and soul and limits our impact on the environment: **share**, **repair** and **get out in the fresh air**. ## Share Sharing is a way of collaborating to reduce the amount of stuff we all need to own. It can be as simple as renting, lending or borrowing equipment that you don’t need on a regular basis. It also includes buying pre-loved / second-hand items. Sharing doesn’t have to involve kit either. Find your agency by sharing your time, your knowledge and / or skills. You never know where it might lead. ## Repair Repairing your clothing or equipment prolongs the life of an item and is a vote against buying new. Repairs can be invisible or celebrated. We prefer the latter, making patches and getting creative to celebrate the life of a particular item. Learn to repair yourself (online tutorials are great), or find someone local to you who can fix your kit. It’s cheaper than buying new, you get a professional job AND support a creative member of your community. ## Get out in the Fresh Air We’ve become dopamine addicts, getting our hits from screen time, social media and online shopping. The companies selling these highs have created algorithms to keep us coming back for more. But there is another way, and it involves getting yourself outdoors. Exercising outside stimulates you into producing dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, vitamin D and immunity boosting endorphins. This means you, and the people you get outside with, can expect positive mental and physical health outcomes with no downsides. Take part in Citizen Friday, every Friday. - Share - Repair - Get out in the Fresh Air ### PLAY (INSPIRED BY A CALL WITH GAV) URL: https://www.actionism.space/play-inspired-by-a-call-with-gav/ Last updated: 2025-06-16T20:39:11.000Z In the fabric of my youth, one resounding question echoed: “Can I play outside?” Those were joyful days of boundless exploration, where even the most inconspicuous treasures—a backyard stick or drifting leaves—beckoned with the promise of adventure. Nestled within a rural community, I was blessed by the nurturing embrace of a close-knit group. Trust flourished, birthing a band of what could aptly be described as “wild” or even “feral” children, meandering through woods, mud, grass, and oceans. Beneath starlit skies, we shared fireside tales woven together by shared experiences, overseen by watchful guardians who, in our youthful exuberance, formed a loving community around us, seeing reflections of their own bygone days of play. Amidst the peak of my playful escapades, a tiny island, untouched by the march of time, became a cherished refuge. There, my family and I embarked on regular pilgrimages, camping, fishing, and reveling in the untamed splendor of nature. A singular memory remains etched in my mind: a trek with my father to the island’s highest point, where he ceremoniously crowned me “protector” of its realm. Yet, as the years unfolded, the vibrant hues of play began to fade. Our adult responsibilities encroached, schooling tempered our spirits, and societal norms nudged us toward the path of conformity. The symbolic crown of childhood gradually yielded to the weight of societal expectations, its once-potent magic waning in the face of growing obligations and social pressures. Transitioning from the unencumbered joys of youth to the roles of worker and consumer, we found ourselves ensnared by the trappings of a mechanised society. Innocent delight gave way to the relentless encumbrance of success and status. We burdened ourselves with quantifiable tasks, transforming play into toil, and sacrificing the innocent wonder of fantasy and imagination upon the altar of productivity. We turned play into work, giving ourselves mountains to climb, goals to score, tasks to tick, rules to follow, equipment to buy and questions to not ask. But amidst the noise of adulthood, the enduring spirit of play endured—a gentle refrain in life’s grand orchestra. It nestled within the recesses of our souls, a silent testament to the enduring magic of childhood. Let us, then, return to the sun-drenched meadows of our youth, where laughter flowed freely and creativity knew no bounds. In the unbridled whimsy of childhood play, we unearth not only fleeting moments of joy but also a pathway to our truest selves—a sanctum where dreams flourish. In heeding the siren call of nostalgia, we can rediscover the innocence and wonder that lies dormant within us. In the embrace of play, we uncover echoes of the past and the very essence of our being—a melody as timeless as the rustle of leaves and the simple joy of a stick in the yard. Armed with these rediscovered tools, we can reclaim our narrative from the clutches of consumerism and embrace our rightful place as citizens and stewards of the natural world. Rekindle the flame of play and innocence; embrace the simple pleasures that truly nourish our souls. Let us give ourselves permission to ask, “Can I play outside?” and answer with a resounding *Yes*—the kind of confident, curious *Yes* that our inner child knows so well! And when we do, let us play as citizens, not consumers. ### NATURE CONNECTION URL: https://www.actionism.space/nature-connection/ Last updated: 2025-06-17T20:26:48.000Z I’ve been told more than once that it’s hard to get young people interested in nature or climate change. That they’re always on their phones - disconnected, disinterested. But honestly? I think we’re asking the wrong questions - and placing the blame in the wrong place. The truth is, each of us wakes up to the world in our own time and our own way. You can’t guilt someone into caring - not with lectures, not with doom-laden stats. Tell someone to “go green” and chances are they’ll roll their eyes… or do the opposite. It’s human nature. What we’re missing is joy. We need to get so much better at showing how bloody joyful taking action can be. Connecting with nature isn’t some solemn obligation - it’s a chance to feel alive. To feel part of something bigger. To feel like we belong. Climate action doesn’t have to be all fear and sacrifice - it can be empowering, energising, even fun. That’s where the idea of ACTionism comes into view. It’s not just about preventing catastrophe - it’s about cultivating a better way to be: one that’s more connected, more just, more fun. ACTionism isn’t about being “greener than thou.” It’s about doing more of what matters. More community. More imagination. More joy. It opens up climate action not as a burden, but as an invitation to rethink how we live, work, and care for the world and each other. Whenever I’m out in communities sharing my passion for nature, I often hear the same thing: ‘Young people just don’t care - they’re glued to their screens. But maybe the issue isn’t attention spans - maybe it’s access. Take a look around your neighbourhood. How many places can kids roam free? Climb trees? Get muddy? Feel wild? The fields and woods many of us grew up with have been swallowed up by housing estates and “keep out” signs. Even the parks that remain often feel like they’re designed to keep young people out, not welcome them in. We’ve stripped nature from our lives, then blamed for not knowing it. It’s time to flip the narrative. Young people do care - deeply - when they’re given the chance, they take action for nature. They need to feel invited, not excluded. Trusted, not policed. They need wild spaces where they can be curious and free. They need adults who meet them with honesty, not judgment, and who show them that joy and climate action can walk hand in hand. If we want young people to care about the natural world, we need to start by making sure they can actually get to it. > "We are showered every day with gifts, but they are not meant for us to keep. Their life is in their movement, the inhale and the exhale of our shared breath. Our work and our joy is to pass along the gift and to trust that what we put into the universe will always come back." - Robin Wall Kimmerer, *Braiding Sweetgrass* ### UNDER THE PEAKS OF CAPITALISM, CITIZENS TAKE POWER INTO THEIR HANDS URL: https://www.actionism.space/under-the-peaks-of-capitalism-citizens-take-power-into-their-hands/ Last updated: 2025-06-17T16:13:11.000Z This is a story from the heart of the Alps – a place where ski lifts reach the highest peaks, and shopping and DJs have replaced nature. Here, real estate has become the capital, displacing the original communities. You don’t need to look hard to witness how the glitz and glamour of the ski resorts contrasts with the reality of the life of residents living in the valley bottom. It is in these valleys that you’ll find citizens taking retail spaces back into their own hands. They are working together to repurpose these spaces from blank soulless canvases, to vibrant spaces full of community. These spaces are for building, demonstrating and creating a vision of the world that local people want, that meets their needs. The inhabitants here refuse to wait for permission, they embody the spirit of adventure and just ACT. In this story, the gaze is not fixated on the power that exists up high in those peaks of capitalism, instead it is fixed on the power of the citizens and the communities of the valley bottom, and how they’re building collective action. ## **A MEETING OF MINDS** The story begins in the valleys of the Tarentaise where two women met, Elsa and Aurélie, who share a passion for cutting waste, tinkering, and humanity. Elsa comes from the North of France, the land of french fries, where human warmth compensates for the grey skies, and where laughter, friendly encounters (and beer) are easy to come by. Creative and full of enthusiasm, she wanted to become an artist and later a tourism development project manager. Aurélie is a local, with an inner compass that points to places where there’s meaning and fun, such as public benches. She’s optimistic and a jack-of-all-trades. She sees beauty and kindness everywhere, likes to tinker with ideas and in each collective initiative, sees a vision of a world in the making (and a world to be experienced). They were both project managers of ‘waste reduction and sorting’ for two different regional authorities. They met at a conference between presentations on composting bins and recycling, and later chatted over a beer. It was here that they realised they shared the same vision: they were tired of just sorting waste… they believed it was possible to do more with less. They had a desire to take concrete action, from a place they describe as “joyful frustration at the scale of waste and the infinite human potential.” This frustration is where a seed was planted, one to be sown in a corner of the Tarentaise. A region of contrasts: rich in a history linked to the mountains, winter sports, hospitality… but also marked by social inequalities, fragmented seasonal housing and sometimes isolated inhabitants. ## **THE SEED GROWS ROOTS** To turn this emerging vision from joyful frustration into reality, Elsa and Aurélie would need a venue for their emerging and ambitious vision. An unlikely venue was unearthed: a former pound shop / dollar store stocking imported household goods in the heart of Aime-la-Plagne, a small valley bottom town located on the ancient road that joins France and Italy. Since Roman times, Aime has been a crossroads of passage, exchange, and solidarity, carrying within it a tradition of hospitality and social diversity. The now cleared retail space stood as a disused warehouse, with a large almost enclosed parking lot, covering over 1000 sqm. For Elsa and Aurélie this was the venue of their wildest dreams. They saw the parking lot as the Great Outdoors, a space to host: concerts, outdoor workspaces, the distribution of vegetables, and other shared moments. *“Who knows even a collective chicken coop, solar shade structures, or a mini-potato field in the green patches?!”* said Elsa. The inside of the store was empty, the perfect blank canvas for their community to paint. It could house workshops, a bar, a communal eating space, and a ‘recyclerie’, a second-hand shop to keep objects out of landfill. They saw the venue as a powerful symbol: where once low-cost disposable items reigned, rescued goods, sharing, community, collective action and creativity could flourish. Their minds ran wild. ## **THE WORK BEGAN** Applying for loans, searching for partners, visiting similar locations, and collectively writing and rewriting the cooperatives statutes filled their days. Elsa and Aurélie would use new forms of governance to bring to life a space where objects, ideas, and people could coexist. They would take a collective approach. Antropia took root as a SCIC (Collective Interest Cooperative Society)with a statement: to build together, with local stakeholders. They began with seven founders including residents, associations, and a social enterprise. They called it Antropia (Anthropy). Anthropy comes from the Greek “anthrōpos,” meaning “human being” or “mankind.” The name blends other terms too, like “philanthropy” (love of humanity) and “anthropology” (study of humans). Anthropy resonates across disciplines, emphasising their collective pursuit of understanding and improving human life making it the perfect word to describe their approach. It was during the evenings, and weekends of work, that they formed a deep trust in each other. It was born from a shared desire, the joy of moving forward, and sometimes back, but always together even in the middle of the most fraught paperwork. They experienced a “joyful mix of seriousness, oh so much seriousness, with a touch of madness, that made the adventure somehow possible.” After many late nights, and reams of paperwork the venue was secured and in the freezing cold winter of 2022/2023, the physical work got underway. Most of the work was carried out in house, with lots of elbow grease. A salvaged bar came from the construction site opposite, a rescued spruce worktop was sanded down so it could be comfortably lent on for those all important ponderings, and miles of shelves were revived to store everything. An Alley of Arts also took shape, built from found materials. They didn’t work alone. An army of wrapped-up, highly motivated volunteers came to lend a hand, painting, sanding, plastering, and, above all, sowing ideas, sharing desires, and bursting with laughter in every corner of the place. Many of the army are still involved today. *“Their formidable and boundless energy, their unbridled creativity, and their infectious joy have carried Antropia farther than could have ever been imagined. It is this community energy that shaped the space, it is from where Antropia was born.”* says Aurélie This is when I had the privilege of becoming part of the Antropia story. In the next valley we’d launched a much smaller community space, One Tree at Time. The community space had the same ethos, it had been shaped by the community and together we’d become experts in keeping outdoor gear out of landfill. So, it was natural that One Tree, an association, joined Antropia by bringing affordable, rescued and revived outdoor gear to the space. I have very fond memories of those early days. The size of the vision and the collective approach filled me with joy. I was lucky to be there in those moments, creating and testing out new ideas. On April 30, 2023, the doors to Antropia opened and our ideas were there for the world to see.. “Butterflies in the stomach and slightly squeamish smiles at first, then, oh, relief: a large turnout and many congratulations…” Elsa ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-05-09-at-09.47.31--4-.jpeg) ## **AND TODAY?** Two years after its opening, four years after the initial planning, Antropia has 23 members including local authorities, associations, a social enterprise, and committed residents, all united to make Antropia a place that reflects the community. The organisation is stewarded by 4 full time employees, who are supported by the heroes of Antropia: the 10 or so very committed volunteers, the aces of sorting, checking games/toys, bicycles, shelving clothes and dishes. Together, they have succeeded in exceeding Antropia’s objectives: avoiding the waste of objects, materials, clothes, and creating connections. In 2024 alone, they saved 38 tonnes of items from landfill, and hosted 222 community workshops and activities. Antropia has been described as a space that is “so well organised, it doesn’t look like secondhand!” But, it is much more than a second-hand store. Antropia hosts a community canteen where you can eat healthy, local food without breaking the bank, a bar where local beers meet community-minded ideas. There’s a cobbler who gives new life to the community’s shoes. It makes the outdoors more accessible by selling rescued and patched technical outdoor gear from association partner One Tree at a Time. There’s a ceramics and mosaic room where you can create and clear your mind. The Arts Alley connects to a Micro-Folie, so visitors can view local artists’ work alongside artwork from France’s greatest museums. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-16-at-20.21.05.png) And, the parking lot is an ever evolving project. Community graffiti adorns the once grey walls. The bollards have been yarn-bombed with crocheted designs, and the store is announced with a knitted Antropia sign. During community events the parking lot comes to life with anti-fast fashion shows, patching, screen printing, break dancing workshops, and children racing balance bikes around a track. This is a space to laugh, share, learn and to find your community. The parking lot now serves as a place where you find the others, and where we hatch plans for even bigger projects. The collective chicken coop, solar shade structures, and mini-potato field, are still a dream but you trust that with time Elsa and Aurélie will make the dream a reality. These two citizens with a shared passion for cutting waste, tinkering, and humanity have got us this far. Now that they have an army of committed citizens by their side, “WE” are unstoppable. Antropia has become a refuge for volunteers, seasonal workers, families, DIY enthusiasts, and people who just want to say hello. A place to dream below the peaks of capitalism. A living example of what ‘WE’ can build together. It demonstrates the power of not seeking permission and how, if we put trust in our fellow citizens and start with structures that foster collective action, ‘WE’ can create a vision of the world we want. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/AMIS_OneTree_2021116_--12-of-16-.jpg) ## **A SEED THAT WANTS TO SPREAD** The project doesn’t end in these valleys. From the outset, Elsa and Aurélie wanted Antropia to be a springboard for other initiatives. They describe it as “a joyful and imperfect laboratory that inspires and supports.” It is a space where big ideas are born, fostered and shared. Some of that sharing is done through the Re-Action Collective movement. A global collective of organisations reimagining the outdoors, through citizen-led projects. Working together across 8 countries, and nearly 70 organisations, they share ways to rescue products, and revive them through repair, rebranding and repurposing. They then redistribute items through resale, rental and donation, reallocating profits to regenerate the outdoors. Antropia, as part of the Re-Action Collective, plays a big role in the emergence of a new human story. It helps spread a new vision. One where we can do more with less, through global collaboration, and *“led by people who, like us, have decided to reinvent their corner of the mountains, plains, or seaside.”* Aurélie ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-16-at-20.22.12.png) ## **HOW CAN YOU GET INVOLVED?** If you’re local then join one of the 222 annual Antropia community workshops, attend a parking lot event, or join the team for a healthy meal at the community canteen. If you live further afield, look out for community events in your own area. These are the spaces where you find the others, where you discover your very own Elsa or Aurélie. In these spaces, you can share your feelings, your concerns, and then work out how you can act together. Importantly, when you’ve found the others, follow Elsa and Aurélie’s lead – don’t wait for permission. ## **A CAMPAIGN TO SUSTAIN THE ADVENTURE** Today, Antropia continues to grow, but to ensure the organisation survives the uncertain winds of self-financing, a permanent support campaign has been launched on [Ulule.](https://fr.ulule.com/antropia/?ref=actionism.space) This isn’t a traditional campaign, but a vibrant appeal to all those who believe that another world is possible. Supporting Antropia means: - Reducing waste differently - Creating social connections where they can be prone to crumble - Defending a simpler, more local, more joyful way of life - Giving life to a place that profoundly changes the landscape - Writing a new human story, as part of a movement - Funding leaders that see their role as doers, and creators, in partnership with their community - ACTion You can join this epic adventure, and become a piece of Antropia, too. Antropia – a mountain of resources. Where the motto is “we do it together.” [Support Antropia](https://fr.ulule.com/antropia/?ref=actionism.space) A call to ACTion - Get to know the citizens in your community by joining events, clubs and workshops. To build resiliency in the future we're going to need strong communities. Let's get building them. ### NOTES FROM AN OUTDOOR APPAREL DESIGNER… URL: https://www.actionism.space/notes-from-an-outdoor-apparel-designer/ Last updated: 2025-06-17T19:49:53.000Z I’ve spent the last 20 years of my career designing functional clothing – mostly for the outdoor industry. More recently I’ve also been working in education; helping upcoming generations of designers get to grips with designing for function and purpose. I’ve learned a lot and seen many changes in the outdoor and performance apparel world. Now, being involved with the Re-Action Collective, I’ve taken some time to really consider how I want to work and interact with the system, and if it is even a system I really believe in. Designing gear for the outdoors is different to designing fashion. But designing kit for outdoor professionals is not the same as designing gear for the general public. Most people who enjoy outdoor sports are generalists. Within that ‘generalist’ description, there are many ways to differentiate between different end users. Many authentic outdoor brands began because an individual wanted to create gear to meet their own specific needs. It’s why some brands are associated with mountains, some with trails, some with travel and some with the ocean. Somewhere along the way I think ‘we’ have lost sight of what’s important. We are caught up in chasing higher performance stats, whilst brands create impressive or novel innovations for the sake of marketing and profit. Creating product that meets genuine functional needs and really helps a person get out into nature in a safe and comfortable way has gone by the by. There will always be a need to cater for the the experts, for those professionals who are out (often working) in extreme environments. I see that as its own sector. But what if we address the majority user, the generalist citizen? What if we were to take a different approach to the outdoor clothing we create for them? What if we asked… - What motivates you to get outdoors? - What do you want to experience? - How do you want or hope to feel? I wonder what garments and products we would end up with and what materials we would choose. If you live in the UK it’s pretty customary to talk about and complain about the weather, but personally, I actually quite like the weather, and I mean all the weather! I’m not keen on days on end of howling wind and rain, or dreary grey skies, but with the exception of those conditions that tip into the extreme and the potentially life threatening, I can, for the most part appreciate all the elements. Like most people I love to feel the warm sun on my skin. But also I like to immerse myself in cool water. Sometimes I even like to immerse myself in cold water – I love the tingling skin feeling it gives me and how alive that makes me feel, even better if that water is salty! I also like to feel the breeze, to feel air moving around me. I really enjoy that feeling of being in open space and leaning into powerful wind and the experience of a blustery coastal path and getting just a bit blown about. I enjoy running in the rain. Even more if it’s an out-of-the-blue downpour where you literally have no hope of sheltering or staying dry. I don’t mind rain generally, at least not when I’m out in nature. I love the smell of a rain soaked forest. I also like cold crisp air on my face. Cold, warmth, wind, rain, snow – all of the weathers. Being able to actually experience them all makes me feel alive. So I wonder why so much of the gear we are sold to help us ‘get outdoors’ is concerned with shielding us from the weather, drastically reducing our experience of it. In the race to create the kit with the highest of performance and protection levels we’ve found ourselves using a myriad of synthetic materials, chemical treatments and technologies. This, despite the fact we now know them to be harmful to the environments we set out to enjoy. We are also in a situation where people’s expectations of what their clothing can and should do for them have reached considerable heights. They are not necessarily linked with any realistic view of how they are used out in the environment or how they could, or should interact with other garments and equipment. Obviously I don’t want to spend long periods of time being very cold or very soggy. Equally I don’t want to be out in blazing heat without protection or shade. So I’m not suggesting for a minute we should head out to climb Ben Nevis in flip flops and swim shorts in winter. Nor should we ditch all we know and have created to this point just to start again. But things are different now, and we shouldn’t just do things one way because that’s how they’ve always been done. We know so much more, we have access to a whole host of research and information. We are developing new technologies and have an extensive selection of materials and potential solutions to explore and use. So perhaps, moving forward, we can adopt a more realistic view of the levels of activity we will undertake and the weather conditions we’re genuinely likely to experience. Perhaps we can consider how we want to feel in the outdoors and dress accordingly. Perhaps that will mean that we can and will embrace some of the elements rather than just armouring up against them. Perhaps that can be part of [Outdoors 2.0](https://re-action-collective.org/outdoors-v2/?ref=actionism.space)? Call to ACTion - Next time you head off into the outdoors - focus on what you see, and feel and the joy you get from being active in nature... regardless of what you're wearing! ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.38-1.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.37--2--1.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.37--1--1.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.36--2--1.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.36--1--1.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.36.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.35--1--2.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.35-1.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.33.jpeg) ### ØUTDOORS 2.0: RE-IMAGINING THE OUTDOOR INDUSTRY URL: https://www.actionism.space/outdoors-2-0-re-imagining-the-outdoor-industry/ Last updated: 2025-06-16T20:28:21.000Z Founded by outdoor enthusiasts to meet a need, many outdoor businesses came from humble beginnings. Yvon Chouinard founded Patagonia after teaching himself blacksmithing to make climbing pitons for himself and his friends that would leave no trace on the rocks he climbed. Doug Tompkins, founder of The North Face was a ski racer and rock climber. He created a brand that, at its origins, served the outdoor community, revolutionising tent design with the introduction of flexible rods threaded through exterior sleeves. Outdoor sports started as subcultures. They were ours, they represented our identity, a space for self-expression. The companies founded had a purpose – to help us access the outdoors in ways that minimised our impact on the areas we explored. ### GROWTH AT ALL COSTS But times have changed. Companies now refer to climbers, hikers and skiers as consumers. Outdoor companies are owned by large multinationals or venture capitalist firms. The North Face, for example, is owned by the VF Corporation which also owns Eastpak, JanSport and Timberland. Maximising profits in order to provide a financial return to shareholders is the main objective. Marketing practices tell us that without the latest or most technical gear, we’re not fulfilling our potential. Now, the industry reflects a story that is out of control, one of growth at all costs, that creates waste on an unimaginable scale whilst dispersing chemicals across the very places we love. How has the outdoor industry arrived here when it was founded on the premise of enabling people to enjoy outdoor environments without damaging them? ### TIME FOR CHANGE: ENTER ØUTDOORS 2.0 At Re-Action, we’re calling time on current practices. Øutdoors 2.0 re-imagines our relationship with the outdoors, an outdoors that is fit for both people and planet. It has a citizen-centric rather than consumer-centric approach. And the great thing is, it comes with a healthy dose of joy and optimism. Across the Re-Action Collective, members have been collecting pre-loved gear. They repair it, resell it, rent it and repurpose it in a variety of creative ways. There are sharing platforms, talented seamstresses and seamsters, creatives, community groups and more, all working their magic to keep outdoor gear in action for longer. Together we’ve learned A LOT about circular solutions and the power of citizenING and community. From this we’ve started building a vision for Outdoors 2.0 – a version of the outdoor industry that’s human-sized and future-fit for all. We’ve had a lot of fun immersing ourselves in this process, but the even better news is that **you can get involved too**. We’ve collected a bunch of ideas into statements that we’ve put into a voting platform called Pol.is. ### PARTICIPATE! This vision is founded on collective action which means we need your opinion and voice. We want to test and evolve Øutdoors 2.0 with your ideas too, because all of us are smarter than any one of us. We need a collective awakening to the situation at hand and your help to demonstrate what is possible. To participate: 1. Go to [https://re-action-collective.org/outdoors-v2/](https://re-action-collective.org/outdoors-v2/?ref=actionism.space) 2. Agree with, disagree with or pass on each statement as they pop up 3. If you don’t see any statements that represent your view, add your own statement below 4. SHARE the message below with your friends and contacts: *I’ve just contributed my views and ideas to a new vision for the outdoor industry. It only took a couple of minutes. I thought you might be interested to take part too. The more people that get involved the better. Together we can create an outdoors that flourishes, one full of joy and life that is accessible to all, and lasts for generations to come.* [*Contribute your views and ideas to a new vision for the outdoor industry here*](https://re-action-collective.org/outdoors-v2/?ref=actionism.space)*.* Join the Rebellion ### DON’T SHOP, BE A CITIZEN! URL: https://www.actionism.space/dont-shop-be-a-citizen/ Last updated: 2025-06-16T20:21:32.000Z ## THE BACKGROUND TO THE #CITIZENFRIDAY CAMPAIGN Re-Action’s anti Black Friday #CitizenFriday campaign would never have come to life if the founders of Re-Action, Gavin and Heather, hadn’t read Jon Alexander’s book Citizens: Why the key to fixing everything is all of us. Jon’s theory is that there are three stories: 1. The subject story (where the pre-ordained few tell the rest of us what to do) 2. The consumer story (where our governments encourage us to buy things and support the economy to be good citizens) 3. The citizen story He argues that when institutions treat people as citizens rather than consumers, everything changes and that unleashing the power of everyone better equips us to face the challenges of economic insecurity, climate crisis, public health threats, and polarisation. Jon very kindly agreed to answer a few questions so we could provide you with some context around our Citizen Friday campaign. > 1\. HOW DO YOU DEFINE CITIZENSHIP? I see citizenship as a practice, a way of being in the world, rather than a legal status. I really like the way Baratunde Thurston in the US talks about citizen-ing. He hosts a podcast called [How To Citizen](https://www.howtocitizen.com/?ref=actionism.space), where he talks about making citizen into a verb rather than a noun. I also love the fact that I discovered in the research for my book, that the literal derivation of the word “citizen” actually means “together people”. Citizening is about committing to the communities you’re part of. It’s coming together with others to find your collective agency, and choosing to see the world as a work in progress, there to be shaped and moulded for the better. When you think in this way, you start to see that the true opposite of a citizen isn’t a non-citizen – it’s a consumer. As a consumer, you’re limited to being a narrowly defined individual, whose role in the world is to buy stuff and “contribute” to the economy. Even when you try to be good, the best you can do is consume less harmfully. But as citizens, we’re part of something bigger, and the contribution we can make isn’t just to the economy, it’s to society. As citizens, we make and remake the world; we don’t just buy stuff. > 2\. CAN YOU GIVE AN EXAMPLE OF CITIZENSHIP IN ACTION? There’s two kinds of example that I think really matter. One kind is when people come together in community, find agency together, and make something happen. One of my favourite examples is the Liege Food Belt (the Ceinture Alimentaire de Liege in French). It is a cooperative of food producers, owned and run by local people on land all around the city. They have come together to produce their own food, without waiting for permission from anyone. Or East Marsh United, a community organisation in Grimsby which started with litter picks a few years ago. It has since evolved to run an arts festival, a community magazine, and raise £500k through community shares. With the money, they bought ten houses in the town and refitted them using local tradespeople. They now let them out as a social landlord, using the revenue to finance the rest of their work. The other kind of example comes when institutions shift to see people as citizens not just consumers. I’m really proud to have been part of an evolving project called the People’s Plan for Nature. This has seen the National Trust, WWF and RSPB come together to hold the space for a big participatory democratic process. Together they crowdsourced recommendations for what national and local governments, businesses and community groups could do for nature on a local level and put a load of money behind the communities who are doing it. When institutions like these shift role, people can come in behind their action, rather than just asking them for money, and huge things happen. > 3\. WHAT STEPS CAN PEOPLE FOLLOW TO UNLOCK THEIR AGENCY? I’ve got 3 steps for you… First, decide where you’re going to citizen. That might be your street, your neighbourhood, your workplace, whatever. Then find the others. Who’s already doing stuff you could join in with? Who isn’t, but like you, really wants to? How can you meet one another? Finally, decide what to do first, together. It might be something small, like the litter picks East Marsh United began with. It doesn’t matter as long as everyone’s got energy for it, because the next things will flow from there as others join in with you too. Thanks Jon! We hope Jon’s ideas and examples have inspired you too. If you want to know more, check out [Jon’s book](https://www.jonalexander.net/?ref=actionism.space) and keep following us and the #CitizenFriday movement to find out more. Don’t forget to use the hashtag #CitizenFriday if you’re taking steps to unlock your agency. ### WORSE THINGS HAPPEN AT SEA URL: https://www.actionism.space/worse-things-happen-at-sea/ Last updated: 2025-06-17T19:58:09.000Z ### WHY I QUIT MY JOB TO SAVE THE WORLD BY SIMON DONOVAN They say "worse things happen at sea," but watching Seaspiracy on Netflix in the spring of 2021 made me realise just how dire the state of the fishing industry really was. Fishing clearly had critical sustainability issues, and if fish wasn’t a viable alternative to meat then I had to question continuing to eat either. Deciding to become vegetarian was the first of several course changes along my journey into sustainability. Roll forward a year, and ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) considerations seemed to become an increasingly central focus for businesses. The company I worked for introduced the opportunity for employees to become "Sustainability Champions" alongside their existing roles and I jumped at the chance. While most of my work to date had been in digital technology and e-commerce, I had been heavily involved in systems that captured product data. I knew this was becoming increasingly relevant as businesses focused more on emissions reporting and I figured I had experience and insights that could help. Around the same time, I actively started to re-engineer my LinkedIn feed to start following top sustainability voices. ### Heading into the storm I’d had a copy of Doughnut Economics sitting on my shelf for a while, but I never got around to reading it then, on the journey home from holiday in the summer of 2023, I listened to Kate Raworth talking about Donella Meadows (BBC) and her contribution to systems thinking and the book, Limits to Growth. That these concepts had been around since before I was born was enlightening and somewhat shocking at the same time.. Amongst the other unread books on my shelf, I finally got around to reading How the World Really Works by Vaclav Smil, which outlined the scale of the challenges we face from a resource and energy perspective. This was quickly followed by Cascades by Greg Satell, which presented the idea that what's needed to drive transformational change is the power of small groups that are loosely connected but united by a common purpose. Shortly afterwards I attended my first People, Planet, Pint meet up in Leeds; It was a fantastic way to connect with like-minded people from the local region in real life. The early shoots of my future network sprung from that and future meet-ups. Then towards the end of 2023, I picked up a recommendation for Jem Bendell's Breaking Together which introduced me to the concept of collapse awareness—the understanding that systemic breakdowns in our environment, economy, and society are not just possible but already underway. This shift in perspective and adopting a "when, not if" worldview threw already existing problems into much sharper focus. ### Deciding to jump ship As my awareness of the world’s wider problems continued to grow, progress on sustainability in my professional career seemed to be not just at a standstill but actually sliding backwards. It became increasingly apparent that the gap between what was needed and what was actually happening in the business was becoming a chasm. By February 2024, I came to the conclusion that every additional day in the office was another day not maximising the impact I felt I could be making elsewhere. A three-month notice period later, I jumped with both feet into the world of self-employment. I left the corporate business world on good terms, but not without some honest critiques of the "sustainability by incrementalism" approaches being adopted. After 30 years of full-time work, I had planned a short break—but there was too much to explore. The sheer number of opportunities and the urgency of the challenges I had been exploring made it impossible to sit back. When you have full control over your working hours and are focussed only on projects you truly care about, work can quickly take on a life of its own. ### Navigating New Waters In the nine months since I left the corporate world, I’ve explored almost every avenue that presented itself. Joining the Association of Sustainability Practitioners has been a fantastic gateway into the wider community, leading me to attend the Yorkshire Sustainability Festival, which provided even more sources of inspiration. September saw me diving headlong into a three- month accelerator program for Sustainability as the World Needs, based on the excellent work of Alice Kalro and the team at ArkH3\. Within an international cohort, we explored the radical transformations businesses need to undertake to become truly sustainable in light of the unfolding meta-crisis, along with strategies and tools to drive that change. > BUT WE DON’T HAVE TO FIND ALL THE ANSWERS OR FIX ALL THE PROBLEMS ON OUR OWN. A RECURRING THEME ACROSS THE COMMUNITIES AND NETWORKS I’VE JOINED OVER THE PAST YEAR IS THE VALUE OF SAFE SPACES —PLACES WHERE PEOPLE CAN OPENLY DISCUSS THEIR FEELINGS AND FEARS. More recently, after finally finishing Citizens by Jon Alexander, I joined the Citizen Collective to see where my experience and skills could best support this growing movement. ### Finding safe harbour and setting sail again I guess no journey into the unknown is complete without some periods of doubt on the direction of travel. Despite telling myself to trust that the right path would become clear in time, I still struggled with uncertainty. But if I've taken one thing away from some of the bigger projects I've worked on previously it's that you can't jump to the solution without first taking a look at the wider context. The only problem with that was the more you explore these issues, the easier it is to become overwhelmed by the scale of the challenge. Anxiety over the future for the world can also compound any personal fears of failure. But we don’t have to find all the answers or fix all the problems on our own. A recurring theme across the communities and networks I’ve joined over the past year is the value of safe spaces—places where people can openly discuss their feelings and fears. Through that support and the many conversations I’ve had, I’ve gone from a blank page titled “What can I do?” to defining three clear areas of personal focus where I believe I can help others: - Supporting Individuals: Developing a holistic approach to help individuals assess where they are on their sustainability journey and signposting the most impactful actions they can take next. - Transforming Businesses: Engaging with and supporting businesses to move beyond regulatory-led carbon accounting and Sustainability-as-Usual into adopting Sustainability as the World Needs (SWoN) principles - Building Connections: Identifying and fostering active connections between individuals and networks to accelerate collective momentum toward the future we need rather than the future we are currently headed toward. I now have a purpose and a roadmap for delivering on it, which includes actively working with individuals, businesses, and networks to drive meaningful change. By focusing on direct engagement, knowledge sharing, and strategic collaboration, I can help others take actionable steps towards sustainability and systemic transformation. In practical terms what does that look like? Well as one example I'm actively looking to make time for one-to-one chats with new connections where I can, sharing resources and exchanging insights. Building on each other’s existing efforts and experiences unlocks the door to more rapid and greater collective achievements. 2025 has got off to a strong start; this week I delivered my first-ever leadership strategy workshop for a local environmental non-profit. Next week, I have a call with a Chief Sustainability Officer to explore how I can help a company go beyond just meeting its ESG compliance obligations. Beyond that where the currents and tides of self employment take me remains to be seen but I do know that adventure and self fulfilment await. ### AHA! URL: https://www.actionism.space/aha/ Last updated: 2025-06-17T20:29:20.000Z Growing up, my nickname was ‘20 Questions’ because I was always curious, always asking “why?” I felt a deep sensitivity to the systems and ‘norms’ around me. There was a quiet, persistent unease, a sense that something wasn’t quite right. I didn’t realise that what I was experiencing wasn’t universal. I assumed everyone shared the same gut instinct, the same knowing when something didn’t align with a deeper sense of truth. It was the feeling that the way things were done didn’t make sense, and the confusion of why others didn’t question it too. There was an unease that nobody seemed to care enough to raise those questions. As I grew older, this sensitivity morphed from curiosity into frustration. The weight of societal expectations, the rigid identities I was being forced into, became harder to ignore. As children, we’re free from much of the social conditioning that shapes adult life. We’re allowed to question. But with age comes categorisation, you’re told what to do, who to be, and what success looks like. You’re handed a roadmap for life, but it feels more like a treadmill, endless, mechanical, uninspired. Suddenly, these questions are no longer tolerated. It was during this frustrating time that I began to realise the system I was navigating wasn’t just some benign framework holding back the curious. It was a series of reinforcing loops pushing everyone along a path that didn’t feel right, a race to the bottom, a linear track that runs counter to how life actually works. It felt like we were told to all run the same race, but the finish line was hollow. Those who “won” didn’t seem any more fulfilled than those who didn’t. The idea of competing for a better life than others never appealed to me. It felt unhinged, perverted, and wrong. As I struggled with these systems, the expectations, the constant flow of one-sided information, I started to see how binary and bleak the ‘modern world’ had become. I retreated into nature to feel full and to avoid feeling trapped in a machine, endlessly consuming but growing emptier with each mouthful. The more we consumed, the less satisfied we became. And the more we tried to fit into the system, the more the system consumed us. Conformity felt life-sucking, all while exploiting people and draining the life out of everything, including ourselves. For what? Security, comfort, health, wellness? I think not. Look around, nothing is robust. People are sick, life is hard, and times are dark. Asking questions feels prohibited. Only in nature and real relationships do I see a way out, a way to real security, comfort, health, and wellness. What have our young people got to look forward to? We’ve squeezed the joy out of everything and replaced nature’s abundance with artificial scarcity. We’re living in an era of anxiety, surrounded by incomprehensible scales of man-made crises, a deep uncertainty we dare not discuss. We are taught not to question, to believe we are too small to prioritise systemic injustice, planetary collapse, and the rewriting of old stories. But as I gained more experience and broadened my perspective, I began to realise something bigger: It wasn’t just me who felt this discomfort. Most people, whether they were aware of it or not, were stuck on the same treadmill, many having the same realisations I had. They too were feeling trapped by their roles in the larger machine. Even the richest and most powerful are starting to realise it: It’s all broken. This is where the unraveling began. My personal “Aha!” moments started to pile up, slowly and then rapidly revealing layers of untruths and hidden myths that shaped our world. These were moments of “unlearning,” when things I once accepted without question began to lose their shine. Innovations I once hailed as progress started to feel like elaborate traps. Technologies that promised to save us only seemed to make things worse. Stories to be rewritten. The metaphor of any reckless monkey being able to pick up a gun no longer felt distant, it became painfully real. The traps seemed more and more inevitable. The system compounding. The end nearing. A state of being and a systems thinking perspective I now recognise as “collapse awareness” emerged. One key ‘Aha’ moment came when I worked with a company dedicated to designing products that put people and the planet first. We didn’t start with consumer demand or market forces. Instead, we began by deeply understanding the real needs of our customers. We studied them, worked alongside them, not as ‘consumers,’ but as real people, and designed products that addressed their true needs, not their superficial wants. I was immensely proud of the work we did. It felt like a new way of doing things, one that could actually make the world better. We coupled this non-market-centric design approach with circular economics, zero-waste manufacturing, regenerative material sourcing, and hyper-localised production. It was pioneering. To this day, I’m proud of the role I played in shaping it. Off the back of this, I was invited to set the sustainability brief for my former university’s final-year design projects. At the end of the programme, one of the students I was mentoring said something that stuck with me: “Jamie, it’s cruel to show us this new way of working. We want to make a difference, we want to do what you’ve shown us, but nowhere is this going to give us that job. No one will hire us to do this. You can’t take us all, nor should you have to. Where do we go?” It hit deep. It was the same lack of “a place to do this work” that led me to create something of my own with others. It had been many years since I’d been at university, and while we were pioneering new ground, there were very few places to actually build a career around this. Despite our success, the core team was hardly paying ourselves, and every hour and penny went into holding up this good work. It was hard to do good, yet doing things badly is not just easy but default, incentivised and standardised as ‘best’ practice. It was a brutal truth. She was right. The system we were part of wasn’t designed to support this kind of work. It wanted to tear us down. We were swimming against the current of a machine built to perpetuate itself. A few months later, our company was sold to a manufacturer, and the process we had pioneered dissolved into the very system I had hoped to change. At this point, I had a profound “Aha!” moment. Our work was never about creating a better product or even a better company. The real change wouldn’t come from isolated, individual efforts. We had to change the system together. And that’s when it clicked: the “Aha!” moments I was experiencing weren’t just personal realisations. They were invitations to see how, as a society, we needed to break free from these self-perpetuating systems. Until we realise this, every well-meaning innovation will only compound the problems. The truth hit me: We can’t wait for a better product, a better company, or a better leader. We need a paradigm shift. We need a collective “Aha!” moment, where everyone begins to see the systems that bind us. Unlike products or businesses, these moments are free and plentiful, they occur in our minds, not the physical world. All it takes is openness to experience them. No effort, money, or permission required. Only then can we shift away from what doesn’t truly serve us. We need to recognise the cruelty of a system that doesn’t allow us to make the world better, where the system serves itself at our expense. And as that system collapses around us, it’s clear: this way of life is no longer viable. So, we adapt and change. From that day forward, only systems in service to life will thrive, while extractive systems that serve their own self-interest will fade into the past. Aha! This is where the real work begins… ### IDENTITY CONSUMERISM URL: https://www.actionism.space/identity-consumerism/ Last updated: 2025-06-19T19:09:29.000Z ### PLUG-AND-PLAY AESTHETICS AND THE LONELINESS EPIDEMIC Hey guys look at this photo of me and tell me what I could change to improve my face? What surgery would make me look prettier? I’m not fishing for compliments, I really want people on the internet to tell me how to improve my physical beauty, I do not think this will end badly at all. Do you think I have a high or low face weight? Do you think I suit gold or silver jewellery better? Do you think I have doe eyes or fox eyes? What colours suit me best? Am I a soft summer or a warm autumn? Can you help me figure out what kibbe body type I am? What aesthetic would suit me best? These are all things people have genuinely asked strangers for answers on TikTok. We’ve been concerned with their looks and asking people for opinions about the way we present ourselves for a long time but to me this feels different. In less than two decades we’ve jumped from reading magazine articles on the best eyeshadow for our eye colours to posting cutesy videos of ourselves welcoming strangers to give the harshest advice on our looks. Asking them to aid us in forming some of the deepest parts of our identities. I think this goes deeper than thinking about our looks and worrying about how others perceive us. (Did people used to worry about being PERCEIVED so much before the internet?) Clearly, these minor obsessions about our looks are distractions. Whether it be a distraction we give ourselves from the major problems going on in the world, or a distraction fed to us so we don’t peer too deeply into the bigger fucked-up things going on. Now I feel the reason we're so obsessed with this is because we lack any personal identity anymore. We don't know who we are or where we fit so we find solace and 'community' in these places, in the way we look, in our comparisons with others who look similar. In the clean girl, cottagecore, hygge, art hoe aesthetic. We crave an identity so badly that we build one around the tone of jewellery we prefer to wear and the shape of our bloody eyes. It’s not just the way we dress that is influenced by these aesthetics, they seem to spread across whole lifestyles. The classic clean girl aesthetic had a deluge of videos across TikTok and YouTube giving guidance on how to be a ‘clean girl’–we seem to cling onto these identities as a guide on how to live our entire lives. This is something I find especially interesting because in the 21st century, the majority of us lack clear guidance on how to live our lives. These aesthetics provide a compass–albeit a shallow one–for creating an identity in an increasingly lost society. In Tyson Yunkaporta’s new book Right Story, Wrong Story he writes about how in his Indigenous culture, they find their identity in relation to other people. “In our Aboriginal communities, when people first meet you they will often ask ‘Who owns you?’ That doesn’t signify a property relation–it is all about what groups, pairs and lands you belong to in your relationship, which are governed collectively. Belonging and ownership mean something completely different from possession in our world. It means being in relation to family and community and place. Your belongings are not your property, but your connections.” In the Western world, it seems our identities are nothing but our belongings. Even if we look at the types of identities we used to form around us in the 60s, 70s, and 80s, they feel different. Though these were often still based around clothing, music, and cultural moments, they were more hard-earned, taking time to build upon and grow. Now it doesn’t take months and years to build these identities up anymore, you simply fill your cart on Shein with the right clothes, find a fitting Spotify playlist, make some friends on TikTok and suddenly you are THAT person, part of this new identity group. Something some have achieved in mere days. Our clothes, jewellery, and makeup are so disposable that visual identities that meant something powerful in the past are now plug-and-play. I’ve come across countless punk rockers who are dressed head to toe in fast-fashion, slave labour clothing, or those who don hippy, new-age clothing but are not-so-secretly part of the alt-right. Our identities–and how we present ourselves to the world–are so easy to buy and shift that it's almost as if we struggle to have any sort of identity at all. I really hate criticising teenagers having fun–there is way too much of this online. I am not writing this from a place of shitting down on these people. I have been in their exact position. I have been swallowed by fandoms and aesthetics and found friendships, inside jokes, and community inside of these places. A community I struggled to find anywhere else. But, it’s not harmless fun anymore–which is where the problems begin. These disposable, pick-and-choose, swap-in-and-out aesthetics celebrate an eye-watering amount of consumption. There are TikToks posting hundreds of dollars Shein hauls for the aesthetic of the moment, aesthetics that cycle in and out on a weekly basis. Our consumption of clothing from fast fashion brands like Shein is choking the planet. Investigators found Shein added between 2,000 and 10,000 individual styles to its app each day between July and December of 2021. It’s well documented that fast-fashion clothing is of incredibly low quality, and most end up in landfills across the Global South, taking over 200 years for the materials to decompose. We can see mountains of textile waste from space–and it’s only getting bigger. And if we’re talking fun... are those who are buying this clothing at such a rapid pace actually having fun? Because 40% of British teenagers say images on social media have caused them to worry about body image, and 61% of 10 to 17-year-old girls have low self-esteem. Our identities form our communities, and we’re clinging on because loneliness is currently a global health concern. It’s hard to quantify ‘loneliness’ but surveys that have tried found globally 1 in 4 young people feel guilty, and in the US 52% of people regularly experience loneliness. How can we unhook the claws that the industrial consumer society has wrapped around us? I believe it goes beyond simply being happy in the way you look. Of course, contentment in our lives and appearances means we will consume less, but this goes a little further, we must discover different ways for people–especially young people–to find connection, identity, self-worth, and even joy in non-consumerist ways. What does this look like? I can’t tell you because I have yet to find the full answer myself. But in my experience of trying to slowly piece together a life of contentment and connection, a life of joy outside of consumption, it’s about collecting little moments in the cracks of daily life. I find a sense of self-worth in my hobbies. Identity in the things I create from my hands, in how I treat others. Community in group sports or activities with friends, in showing up when no one else is. Joy in nature and stories and laughter. I’d love to say none of this ‘identity consumption’ pulls me in anymore, but it’d be far from the truth. From time to time I still find my fingers twitching towards my old Pinterest boards, I will drown in a spiral of ‘find your colour season’ and ‘the best clothes for your body type’ videos, I stare at the product page of a mascara that promising life-changing results and contemplate whether £80 is really that expensive. These are beliefs and pressures we have to realise, understand, and unpick one day at a time. ### Watch the Trailer and Read the Story of ACTionism URL: https://www.actionism.space/watch-the-trailer-and-read-the-story-of-actionism/ Last updated: 2025-06-17T16:14:34.000Z ### ACTionism - The Story ACTionism, the film, follows Ellie Meredith’s journey. A journey of discovery, told through the [Re-Action Collective](https://re-action-collective.org/?ref=actionism.space). The collective is a group of organisations and Citizens that are re-imaging our relationship with clothing, equipment and the outdoors. Together they’re co-creating, sharing, building and demonstrating a different future. The work is emergent, not defined by rules and hierarchies, in essence they’re free to play, share, connect and find a new way. As Ellie the star of ACTionism recently described “we lay the flagstones as we walk the path.” And, that’s also evident in the way we created and launched the film ACTionism. To describe the process of creating the film, we would talk about trust, about how we followed our feelings, how we let the story emerge, and how it’s OK to not have all the answers. The film exists thanks to funding from Inghams and support from their team, especially [Prue](https://www.linkedin.com/in/prue-stone-1b6258112/?ref=actionism.space) and [Krissy](https://www.linkedin.com/in/krissy-roe/?ref=actionism.space). I think the key to the success of ACTionism lies with the fact that in the early stages they gave us the invitation to just go tell our story. Now, I’m not going to lie, that freedom did come with a little bit of anxiety. There was a real sense that we wanted to honour their support and funding, and that we felt that we needed to create a great film. This is the first film we’ve made, and giving consideration to how we would share the film and reach an audience was another also another first. To create the film, we already knew who to turn to. The year before we’d met [Michael Shaw](https://www.two-step.co.uk/actionism?ref=actionism.space), a young filmmaker. Re-Action had featured in a documentary film called “[Green Mountain Pioneers](https://www.two-step.co.uk/green-mountain-pioneers?ref=actionism.space).” The film told the story of citizens and businesses taking action in the French Alps, through a journey travelling a walking route that tours Mont Blanc. Michael shot and edited the film, carrying tens of kilos of equipment across the Alps. The storytelling was fantastic and as a viewer you went on a journey. That’s exactly the way we wanted to tell the ACTionism story. We wanted it to be a human story, a demonstration of a journey we could go on together. So, just as Prue and Krissy had given us freedom, we too did the same with Michael. Sure, there was a one page brief about what story that we wanted to tell, which really boiled down to a story of a young person moving from anxiety to collective action. Michael deserves a massive shout out here. From this point on, he organised everything. The film was shot in locations across the UK and the French Alps. Michael organised all the transport and accommodation, and liaised with the cast. Essentially, he handled it all, which is no small feat on a vision of this size, and with our budget. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-17-at-10.00.35.png) ## AN EMERGING STORY The way the story evolved in the film was through an emergent process. There was no shot list, no script. We left Ellie and Michael to it. We put our trust in them. Creating the film turned out to be a journey, in itself, for both Ellie and Michael. We watched Ellie grow through the process. Telling your personal story can be hard, sharing your deepest thoughts, your anxieties challenging. On top of that there was the meeting of new people, travelling to new places, and firsts like climbing mountains. Having a camera pointed in your direction, and being the centre of a story, whilst on those journeys is an unusual experience. It’s a lot. There were times that Ellie found tough but she worked through them, and grew from the process. > “Filming ACTionism was a properly bizarre process, but I feel like I’ve really metamorphosed through it. It was so special getting to meet people who care about the same stuff I do. I needed to know I’m not alone in that. > In the process there have been so many firsts for me – challenging moments that took me miles out of my comfort zone. > As the weeks went by, I stopped worrying – about how I looked, how I sounded, or how I might come across on film. The camera stopped focusing solely on my story. Instead, it captured something much bigger, a collective narrative unfolding together. > This wild adventure began for me from a place of longing – to find something bigger than myself, something to care for. I felt like I cared about the planet, at a frequency that didn’t seem to match those around me. I remember this deep sense of betrayal, when the grownups promised it would all be okay. But it wasn’t. It isn’t. The world felt like it was falling apart, and no one wanted to name it. Finding these others, though – has changed everything.” Michael also changed, sharing the following. > “My perspective and my values have changed, and with that, so has the impact on people around me. It sounds like a very short length of time to be so significant, but my experience during filming introduced me to an alternative future that revolves around better connections with people.” They became the story as they lived through the process of making the film. The story embodied their journey. After filming for a few months Michael sent over a draft edit, and in the first instance the story didn’t hold together. Michael, who’s been through this process a few times, asked for constructive feedback to improve the film. We still had a bit of budget for a few more days of filming, and over the next couple of edits the story emerged. I remember the joyful feeling, of realising that we had a film, and that the story would speak to a broad audience. I also felt excitement from the realisation that the film would help us find more of our people, so we could take more collective action. ## HOW TO GET THIS OUT IN THE WORLD? It was around this time that our thoughts flipped to another question, how are we going to get this out in the world? I’m a bit vague on how we arrived at an answer to this question, but it went something like this. Much of the good stuff work we do is a result of asking questions, and the fact that we’re happy with not having all the answers. We didn’t have a ready-made answer for how to get ACTionism out in the world. We’d shared a couple of short films before through social media platforms and had next to no success. We knew that just putting the film on an online platform, with crossed fingers wasn’t going to work. At some point the conversation drifted back to thoughts from a chance meeting the year before. I had met Alex Fish from 99p Films, a social cinema CIC, at the Goodfest event in Cornwall. Alex was sleeping in a shed, I was camping in a field, and we bumped into each other on our walk to the venue on the first morning. "99p Films is a revolutionary community interest cinema that goes beyond traditional film screenings. We create a transformative experience by incorporating mindful breathing, engaging discussions and communal feasts.” We hit it off, spending most of the event together. So much so, a few months later, Alex came to visit me in the Alps. We can chat... and found plenty of opportunities to do so on ski lifts. Alex’s approach to bringing citizens together around film screenings fascinated me. ACTionism is a film about moving from passive consumers to active citizens. So, we started asking ourselves what are the outcomes we want from the film. We soon realised that the metrics we’re interested in are based around connecting citizens, changing stories and creating action. We realised that we are not interested in download numbers, and that we didn’t want citizens to passively consume this film in their homes, we wanted the film to be watched actively with others. What started emerging is thoughts about how we could launch the film through community screenings. We started asking, could the film be a tool to bring citizens together? As all these thoughts were going on we were suddenly offered the opportunity to premier the film at the Better Business Summit, in less than a month. Michael got to work finishing the editing, and created a trailer, Ellie started sharing little bits about the story and promoting the event. At this point, we still didn’t have a name but that soon changed when Michael sent an edit with the word ACTionism as a title placeholder. We chucked a few ideas around amongst us as to what the definition of that term would be and what it meant to us, settling on, the art of finding your people and taking collective action. > "I think we’ll look back one day and realise that in that moment a movement was born." ### Launch Day The Better Business Summit screening was confirmed, and my thoughts had turned to what I could do, to help, from France. I decided I wanted to do something creative, something that added a bit more context to ACTionism. I also wanted to give a platform to some of my favourite writers and creative citizens. Within a week I’d created ACTionism, an 80 page handbook. Designed to inspire, connect and present citizens with a first step into action. Including stories of action, art, beautiful photos, a guide from Alex about how to host social cinema events in your community, ways for citizens to get involved, and brilliant bits of writing from friends. In the days running up to the event, I’d freely shared a digital version of the handbook to create interest, and Andy Davies had pulled together website pages and a request form to host community screenings. The premier screening was a huge success. Off the back of that one screening within just 2 weeks we’d had over 60 requests from communities to screen the film. We also received funding, thanks to Jon Alexander, to print 2,000 copies of the handbook. ACTionism was suddenly alive. The film has now screened in New Zealand, London, Kendal, the Hope Valley, Sallanches, Manchester, and last night, in Bourg St Maurice, plus more. I was lucky to have a front row seat to last night’s screening. At the event Zelia from One Tree at Time ran a [La Patchographie](https://www.instagram.com/lapatchographie/?ref=actionism.space) space, patching and repairing clothing. Re-Action co-founder Heather and Zelia, recorded an interview for a Youtube channel, and hosted a conversation after the film. I watched the film alongside some of the citizens involved in both creating the film, and some of those that starred in it, which was a lovely experience. The conversation that followed the screening was incredible, and I loved seeing the community come together to discuss the issues we face, to talk about the action we can take and sharing ideas and feelings of support. It reinforced something I already know. There is something special emerging out of these valleys, which is citizen-led and powerful. And it’s not just these valleys, ACTionism the film demonstrates that it is happening everywhere. After we’d wrapped up the screening, someone said to Heather, “acknowledging climate anxiety is brilliant – no one is doing this. Everyone is anxious but no one’s talking about it – she thought this was a really good way to tell a positive story about how you can use negative feelings to take positive action – hurray!!!!” Hurray, indeed. ‘WE’ did it. This has been some journey, one where we’ve truly laid the flagstones as we’ve travelled, one that is only just beginning. Thank you to all those citizens that have made it possible, “WE’RE’ doing it. Call to ACTion - We need to write a new story. One where we re-imagine our values and systems. To do that we'll need all of OUR creativity. We'll need to collaborate, and we'll need to exist in a space of possibilities. We can unlock our creativity collectively, so find the others that care, and let's start ACTing on what matters in our communities together. ### POL.IS LEARNINGS URL: https://www.actionism.space/pol-is-learnings/ Last updated: 2025-06-17T10:21:46.000Z ### (FROM RE-ACTION’S ØUTDOORS 2.0 PROJECT) Pol.is is a great tool for understanding how large groups feel about a topic. It is also great at finding consensus on what should be done in response to a problem. ### Set-up Topic - Give it a catchy subject (we used ‘re-imagining....) ### Description - Set your stall out with a short description. Include the fact it is anonymous (we used this sentence: Vote anonymously and submit your own relevant statements.) ### Seed comments - Add 15-20 statements to get things started. - Make the statements varied with some polarising views in there to get engagement from people. - Use a few qualifying statements to understand which segment your audience belong to (we used ones like ‘I regularly practice outdoor sports’) ### **How to moderate** - Reject any comments that: - Are questions rather than statements - Identify a person / business - Are defamatory, hostile offensive or unlawful - Off-topic - Are too similar to existing statements - Overly targeted at an individual ### Other things to do - Customise the user interface like this so people don’t have to log in to participate and so you can moderate their comments ### Gav’s thought on Pol.is What we create is what we become. The outdoor industry is playing a role in creating a separation from nature. That might sound like a crazy statement but, advertising products for “uncompromising adventurers” with “impenetrable barriers” to “charge up and down vertical terrain” made of “waterproof, windproof and breathable textiles that offer fully protective environmental shelter”, builds a story of danger, individualism, othering, and consumption. The result is a pitching of us against nature itself, in a story of separation and individual achievements. Valuing nature as something to consume, for our benefit. We’re creating a world, where we run through nature, rather than into nature. The very place that our survival depends on, and the place from where we came. Using Pol.is has helped take a step towards writing a new story. Which I believe can only be written from a starting place of participation. A re-imagining of our relationship with the outdoors can only happen together. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/2c46ade8-9b09-4888-80b8-464aaf772ecd.jpg) An image from ACTionism magazine that includes information on how to get involved in #CitizenFriday ### ENDINGS AND BEGINNINGS URL: https://www.actionism.space/endings-and-beginnings/ Last updated: 2025-07-28T08:31:34.000Z My Dad broke his neck and entered a coma on the 14th October, my Birthday. Endings and beginnings. At the time I was on the other side of the world, about to make the longest journey of my life. Days later, we would take the decision to switch off his life support. I cannot tell you if that was a hard, or easy decision. My Dad's body left him on the 14th, was he still there? I don't know, I couldn't sense him in that body, yet, I could feel him in mine. The days in between those endings, a blur, like my first memories, neither true or false. Uncertain, so uncertain. It’s in that space that I now recognise, my stories crumbled. From then on, nothing could ever quite be the same again. Whole chapters of beliefs vanished. In an instant and yet somehow not. In that passage of uncertainty, the illusion of certainty disappeared. A story collapsing, itself a trauma to deal with. Has there ever been a place with a sense of more certainty, than in the body of a white man, born in the second half of the twentieth century? What happened next was the embodiment of my grief. I held onto it, cared for it, learned to live around it. And began to build a new illusion, one that helped me make sense of what had become the un-sensible. At endings the ‘aha’ moments come thick and fast. There’s grief, lots of it. I grieved for the old self, for my old family. There will forever be a before and after. I felt that as the certainty and illusion of my story faded, there were two ways to act. Act quickly to try and patch up the story, with a focus on my individual needs, a place of dead ends. Or, act slower with others, letting our new story emerge, a place of possibilities. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.34--1--1.jpeg) I grew up in the Peak District in an outdoor activity centre with two brothers, outside was our happy space. It was freedom, boundary-less. At uni I painted and drew on blank canvases, the limit, my imagination. In the end, it was natural for me to choose freedom, to choose possibilities. In many ways my Dad’s last act was to set me free. What manifested? Well, the Re-Action Collective. I don’t have a word for grief, at times it’s everything, fierce, raw, and at others numb and senseless. If there was anything that works as a metaphor, maybe, compost? It’s messy, entangled, complex, interconnected with everything, and over time, when cared for, it becomes nourishing. It is both the end and the beginning. And so I created compost. I built connections, sort commune, put my hand up and found the others. Those that are having the ‘aha’ moments, often gentler moments, less traumatic but still just as important. I’ve had many of these since my Dad’s passing and if you treat them from a place of uncertainty, they can be delightful, they can take us towards freedom. When feared, the opposite happens. One such moment was reading the book ‘Citizens’ by Jon Alexander. Jon put words to what I was feeling, the consumer story of acting independently, where my value and purpose showed up in ownership, and material possessions was the illusion that had vanished. I needed a new illusion to make sense, a new story. The word for that? ‘Citizen’ the framing? Togetherness, creation, acting with others. A story to be written collectively. That is what I wanted. That is what ‘WE’ created. I put my hand up, others quickly joined, and trusted me. And from then every single connection and action we took was critical. All our contributions suddenly mattered. I can’t tell you if there is a hierarchy to compost, I have a sense that things happen when they need to, and that over time there is balance. So, it’s not surprising that Re-Action is like compost, ruleless, democratic, a shared space...messy. To get involved, you turn up when you need to, and as you feel, there is no obligation to act, yet we do collectively. The collective isn’t exactly clarified. Reimagining the Outdoors, is a vague enough purpose to keep us in a space of possibilities. I have the title of steward and citizen, also vague. Ask me what those jobs look like, and I couldn’t tell you. Not because I’m trying to be awkward, but because I’m happiest in uncertainty. Give me a defined title and I see a closing of doors to my future self. My grief shifted my perspective, and that is what we do at Re-Action. We learn to love the things that exist, we attach new stories to them, we care for them, we give them new life, new meaning. We change perspectives about our separation from nature, change perspectives around the value of art, storytelling, creating, sharing that has become our currency. Re-Action is the embodiment of my grief, it was born from my Dad, his final act wasn’t to set me free. His story carried on, through us all, he is here in everything we create. My nephew was born a year to the day after we switched off the life support. Endings and beginnings, make of that what you will. Why do I offer this all up now? Our stories are ending, and new ones need writing. I have been here before. We can only arrive somewhere desirable, if we act collectively and from a place of possibility. As we each have more and more ‘aha’ moments, it feels right to demonstrate that there are others, acting together, figuring out what comes next. That, we have open arms, offering softer landings, where we have a need for all of us to nourish the new illusion. Call to ACTion - Life is full of complexity, and we need to relearn to be comfortable in uncertainty. There's no place better than nature to experience how entangled we are, let us get outside and reconnect. > "The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing that stands in the way. Some see nature all ridicule and deformity...and some scarce see nature at all. But to the eyes of the man of imagination, nature is imagination itself." -William Blake ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.38.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.37--2-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.37--1-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.36--2-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.36--1-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.35--1--1.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.35.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.34--1-.jpeg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.34.jpeg) ### Meet the Graphic Designer Behind the Movement URL: https://www.actionism.space/meet-the-graphic-designer-behind-the-movement/ Last updated: 2025-06-19T19:42:25.000Z ### [Courtney Flannagan](https://www.courtneyflannagan.com/?ref=actionism.space) "Living in Cornwall provides me with a deep well of inspiration for designs. The rugged coastline, the rolling hills, and the vibrant art scene all combine to create a unique and inspiring environment. I am constantly drawing from all aspects of life in Cornwall, from the colours of the sea to the textures of the rocks. (When I’m not at my desk you’ll find me out on the beaches, in the water, immersing myself in Cornish life!)" Courtney was there at the start of the ACTionism movement. It wasn't called ACTionism back then, it was called 'Fix It'. "Fix It' was a outdoor clothing gear repair day hosted in the French Alps. Courtney worked at the event and has been the creativity, for the graphics, behind the movement ever since. "For the ACTionism typemark, I wanted the letterforms to feel natural and hand-drawn, with a bit of imperfection to make them more human. I focused on putting the strongest emphasis on ‘act’ because it’s the act of doing and making change that shifts us from passive consumers to active citizens. Framing it in a container made it punchier and gave it a vibe that connects to activism and protest signs." ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/instagram-portrait_mountains.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/instagram-portrait_train--1-.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/2c46ade8-9b09-4888-80b8-464aaf772ecd--1-.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/instagram-square_-logo--2-.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/instagram-square_-logo-copy--1-.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/5.png) ‘’The [Outdoors 2.0](https://www.actionism.space/outdoors-2-0-re-imagining-the-outdoor-industry/) graphic reimagines the classic alpine scene of mountains, trees, and waterfalls, transforming it into a bold silhouette that symbolises unity and the need for change. It’s designed to inspire action and rally people to join this new rebellion for a re-imagined future.’ Watch this space as we're working on something special for [#citizenfriday](https://www.actionism.space/citizen-friday/). ### Creating Ripples URL: https://www.actionism.space/creating-ripples/ Last updated: 2025-06-17T12:41:32.000Z This toolkit is designed for everyone who has set up a community-led project which aims to make a positive impact for both people and the planet. Setting up your project is a great achievement, but to be successful we need people to not just know about it, but engage with it. Whether your project is a repair workshop, a sharing library, or a community garden, the goal remains the same: to empower those leading the project to connect with more people in the local community, inspire engagement with these initiatives, and support successful projects— creating a ripple effect of positive impact. This toolkit offers practical, actionable ideas to help you build community connections, spread awareness about your initiative, and inspire others to get involved and take meaningful action. This guide was written by Isabel Mack, founder of the [Party Kit Network](https://www.partykitnetwork.org/?ref=actionism.space). > **Make it joyful: Focus on the positive outcomes of your project, such as saving money, fostering connections, and creating joy.** [Download Guide](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kgzgzLjP45fh4Qq0wA8IBo8%5FZ9FeL2E4/view?usp=sharing&ref=actionism.space) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-16-at-22.04.49.png) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-16-at-22.05.56.png) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-16-at-22.06.44.png) ### Stop Waiting, Start Acting: It's time to find your people and the joy in taking collective action URL: https://www.actionism.space/stop-waiting-start-acting-its-time-to-find-your-people-and-the-joy-in-taking-collective-action/ Last updated: 2025-06-18T10:35:20.000Z Yesterday (May 19) was Earth Overshoot Day in the UK. In short, if everyone on Earth lived like we do in Britain, we'd have already exhausted all the natural resources our planet can regenerate in an entire year - and we're only in May. But hold up - this isn't just another doom-and-gloom statistic. For me, it's an invitation to create meaningful change. While it's easy to feel powerless against such enormous challenges, I've discovered something beautiful: when we take local, regenerative action together, we not only reduce our ecological footprint - we find community, purpose, and joy. The most meaningful change you can make isn't waiting for politicians or big business (although, of course, that would be nice)—it's happening right now in communities across the UK, and now is your time to join in and take ACTion. Here are some examples: [Tentshare](https://www.linkedin.com/company/tentshare/?ref=actionism.space) is building a lending marketplace for camping gear that works just like Airbnb but for tents. They're reducing waste, building community, and making nature accessible to all while keeping 1000's of tents out of landfill.[The Edinburgh Tool Library (Charity Reg - SC045162)](https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-edinburgh-tool-library/?ref=actionism.space) allows people to borrow everyday items rather than buying them. With affordable access to tools and equipment, they're reducing consumption while bringing communities in Edinburgh together. [Re-Action Collective](https://www.linkedin.com/company/re-action-collective/?ref=actionism.space) brings together outdoor businesses committed to circular models, extending the life of gear through repair, reuse, and sharing.@vickybalfour runs Vicky Bikes and teaches "Mindful Mechanics," helping people overcome fears about fixing their own bicycles. These workshops build confidence, extend the life of bikes, and create community around sustainable transport. [](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ACoAAADW%5FRsBmEJnkWhDPHSgX0tFGhZicbIsoD0?ref=actionism.space)[Isabel Mack](https://www.linkedin.com/in/isabeljmack/?ref=actionism.space) runs The Party Kit Network, which supports locally run boxes of reusable tableware and decorations that are lent within the community for events and returned to be used again. What strikes me most about these initiatives isn't just their environmental impact - it's the community they create. People discover their tribes, build meaningful connections, and experience the deep satisfaction of creating positive change together. > When we shift from passive consumers to active Citizens, something remarkable happens. We reclaim our agency. We discover that we can take joyful action beyond just choosing who we vote for or how we 'buy better'. Yes, Earth Overshoot Day is sobering, but it also offers perspective. Every day beyond May 20th is a day we're borrowing from future generations. So let's use that borrowed time wisely—not in despair but in creative, joyful ACTion. What regenerative initiatives are happening in your community? Add them 👇🏽 And if you're not yet involved, what's one small step you will take today toward more regenerative living? ### Citizen Friday URL: https://www.actionism.space/citizen-friday-4/ Last updated: 2026-09-11T11:33:43.000Z **AN interview with Gav by Miriam Habte Sellasie, Communications Manager, London national Park city** ***CAN YOU REMEMBER THE MOMENT THAT THE CONCEPT OF CITIZEN FRIDAY FIRST CAME INTO YOUR MIND?*** Ha, yep. In October last year Rebecca from Tentshare sent a message to our community Discord channel at the Re-Action collective. The message was about building a campaign to challenge Black Friday. My first response was that I couldn’t really be bothered as I already felt Black Friday would collapse and that it is an example of consumerism in the process of eating itself. Which was the wrong reply! At first, I honestly just didn’t want to give the day any headspace. It embodies everything that is wrong with our modern lives. Later that night at around 3am I was giving a bottle of milk to my youngest boy Kai. At that moment I kind of thought, what do we have to lose running an anti Black Friday campaign? There’s certainly everything to lose if we don’t start demonstrating an alternative. As one of the stewards of Re-Action my role is to help facilitate action, to connect the dots between people and organisations. I’m generally the ‘YES’ person, so as I sat there in a sleepless state my head started whirring. The following day I had a chat through my ideas with Heather the co-founder of Re-Action. The ones I’d come up with for a campaign were all a bit rubbish, and Heather posed the question ‘what do we want people to do?’ If there is an alternative to the act of shopping, what would it look like? If not Black Friday, what else? We knew where to go to answer those questions. The Re-Action Collective was formed after reading the book Citizens written by Jon Alexander. “ Today, we are living deep inside the Consumer Story, a foundational story of humans as inherently self-interested and competitive. This story has shaped not just individual behaviour but organisational design, economic theory, the role of government, morality — all of culture and society. But this is not as inevitable and inescapable as it feels, for stories do change. Indeed, the Consumer Story has been in place for less than a century. Before this, we lived inside the Subject Story — as in “subjects of the king” — which lasted centuries, casting the majority of us as infant-like and dependent, with just a superior few capable of deciding and leading. And now? Now the Consumer Story is failing. The Subject Story is resurgent. But at the same time, a new story — the Citizen Story — is taking shape across the world, and in every aspect of society. In the Citizen Story, we see ourselves as the creative, capable, caring creatures we are. We realise that all of us are smarter than any of us. We get involved." The answer was that we wanted to see the energy that is piled into Black Friday, used to build the Citizen Story. To help us coalesce and connect, to create spaces for creativity, routes to involvement and a way to demonstrate that we care. So, we settled on the campaign slogan #CitizenFriday – Repair, Share and Get Some Fresh Air. I can’t put any claim to the great campaign name and slogan, that was all Heather’s work, I just brought a bit of energy to the conversation. The reason we settled on the slogan of Repair, Share and Get Some Fresh Air, is that we wanted to offer a meaningful alternative to Black Friday. Not to just call it out but to suggest that we could all get involved and try something different. The act of repairing is a great way to slow down but also a way of rebelling. It is a conscious effort to be part of creating and repairing things in a throw-away society. Sharing can mean many things, physically swapping things with friends and your community, sharing your time at a workshop or on a group walk, or volunteering. And getting out in the fresh air is a great way to stimulate your body to produce dopamine. But better than that, being outdoors also makes your body produce serotonin (a hormone associated with happiness, focus and calmness), and oxytocin (the love and connection hormone). In addition to producing these lovely feelings in us, we can also increase our vitamin D levels and reduce our exposure to toxins too. All a great antidote to those urges to shop. Repair gets the creative juices flowing, sharing is a way to turn up and care within our communities, and getting Fresh Air is not only good for us but a way to rebuild human separation from nature. A key building block towards caring for all living things. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/ACTionism--19-.png) ***ON YOUR WEBSITE YOU SAY THAT THE CITIZEN FRIDAY APPROACH PROMOTES AGENCY, BENEFITS BODY AND SOUL AND LIMITS OUR IMPACT ON THE ENVIRONMENT. HOW HAS THAT SHOWN UP IN YOUR OWN LIFE SINCE DOING A WEEKLY CITIZEN FRIDAY?*** Hugely. For the last year each Citizen Friday I’ve been on a very internal and personal journey. I spend much more time outside, and I’ve reevaluated the things that are important to me. It’s helped me turn up refreshed to my work at Re-Action. Which is a global collective of organisations creating citizen-centred organisations within the outdoor industry. The idea of Re-Action was born out of One Tree at a Time, a community hub I founded in our local French village. Both of these organisations give agency. They provide real options for citizens in communities. Such as repair facilities, workshops for skill sharing, peer-to-peer lending, and access to affordable outdoor gear. True agency is always collective, and Citizen Friday is playing a role in building collaboration. Citizen Friday makes me think about what I need in my community to have real choice. It encourages me to think about what is important, and what makes me truly happy. The outcome of doing that weekly, as some kind of ritual, is that I realise that being happy has little to nothing to do with consuming. As a result I have more friends, spend more quality time with my family and community, and feel like I have a new purpose. ***HOW CAN THE #CITIZENFRIDAY APPROACH APPLY TO PEOPLE WHO ARE TIME POOR/NATURE DEPRIVED?*** I think being time poor is one of the main reasons we’ve disconnected from nature. We seem to always be rushing somewhere and even when we have the opportunity we often rush through nature. Who is more connected to the natural world, someone who sits in a small patch of city woodland listening to the birds, staring at the insect on the ground and watching the trees, or the trail running, skier, or mountaineer that is racing to the top of a peak? Citizen Friday has made me slow down when I’m outdoors, it’s made me leave my phone at home, and it’s encouraged me to hug trees. If we shed our urges to consume we’re effectively buying ourselves time. In both a monetary sense and a moments sense. The game at play, which is used to trick us into consuming, is extremely effective. If we refuse to play the game, to think about a citizen led future we become less time poor. I don’t search the internet for the next thing to buy, or spend my time at the shops. You can take part in #CitizenFriday, even if you’re time poor and nature deprived. To begin with, take some time to sit in a park, repair something whilst watching the TV, maybe see if there’s a local shared allotment, or community space you can volunteer at for an hour. Commit to doing something each Friday for a month to start, even if it’s only 10 mins of laying on a piece of grass. There’s every likelihood that you’ll enjoy yourself and that it will become a bit addictive. ***SOME PEOPLE, MYSELF INCLUDED, FEEL THERE’S A LOT OF FOCUS ON INDIVIDUALS TO ENACT CHANGE WHEN SYSTEMS CHANGE IS REALLY WHAT’S NEEDED. WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON THIS?*** I think this system is already in collapse, and therefore the system will change. Cracks are appearing. If that is the case we should be putting energy into reimagining our future. That can begin with the individual, and I think it starts with an internal conversation. Questioning all of the things we have told ourselves, and sitting with questions rather than answers. That has probably been the most profound impact of CitizenFriday on me. Each week I think about what it means to be a citizen not a consumer. The repair part of Citizen Friday is where I add fuel to my creativity. Sharing is where I spend my time with my community, getting involved and building collective agency. And being outdoors is where I find I self reflect the best. I think system change starts with an internal awakening, building into a collective awakening. It starts with refusing to accept the stories we have told ourselves. > **I think system change starts with an internal awakening, building into a collective awakening. It starts with refusing to accept the stories we have told ourselves.** The dominant one of the moment is that success is shown in accumulation of things like, our house, cars, clothes etc. These things don’t count their externalised costs; like emissions, nature depletion and waste, this is a dead end for humanity. Some stats state that 80% of all purchases brought on Black Friday will be disposed of before, or after one use. This consumerism comes with heavy costs. We’re eating away at the very things that give us life, our planetary life support systems for very short lived gratitude. We need to find new measures of success. For me that’s to do with joy, relationships, time, healthy food and community. Citizen Friday has led me to realise that we’ve all collectively been living lies, we’re all implicated, and entangled in this system. We are the system. Our stories of progress and the othering, of each other and of the natural world are deeply flawed. Taking that first step in refusing to accept these stories begins with a single action. Then it builds to collective action as more of us awake. Realising this can feel daunting. How can I play a role in changing the system if everything I do is entangled within it? To help deal with this I tend to think in stories. I’m a collection of stories, I can write stories, and I can co-write stories. Citizen Friday helps me break those stories down through contemplation, and then it helps me begin to rewrite a different story. Stepping out into the natural world is a great way to begin to understand complexity. I’m lucky to have a bit of land which I enjoy spending my time growing fruit and vegetables on, I also allow a chunk of it to rewild. Watching nature achieve a balance in this rewilded section has been an important learning space. Working with the land and nature to grow food is a massive eye opener to complexity. **WHAT DO YOU HOPE CITIZEN FRIDAY WILL LOOK LIKE IN FIVE YEARS TIME?** By repairing stuff, I’ve come to understand more about the resources that go into making something. By not thinking of things as single use, I’ve written a new story about care. And the sharing part of Citizen Friday has helped me find my people, and to begin to build that collective action. I can change my own story but that will only matter when I begin to write it with others. Collectively we can write a new story. And that is a big part of the work we need to do at this moment. That’s why after last year’s Citizen Friday, we decided that rather than act once a year in response to Black Friday, we would do it each Friday. What if Citizen Friday had replaced Black Friday? So in five years time we were all doing something with our community on what was formerly known as Black Friday. That could be spending time with friends and new connections, sharing skills or even enjoying the great outdoors. But it’s not a defined thing, it’s an open debate. That’s the thing about Citizen Friday and all the work we do at Re-Action Collective. It’s all about about creating spaces for people to be creative and shape it in their own way. About building containers for community. That’s how I see Citizen Friday as a space for us to collectively learn and change. ****Call to ACTion** - Share - Repair - Get out in the Fresh Air ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/WhatsApp-Image-2025-06-17-at-08.26.31-1.jpeg) --- Read the [**full article**](https://nationalparkcity.london/citizen-friday-profile-gavin?ref=actionism.space) at London park city rangers And get involved. In our world every friday is #citizenfriday - repair, share and get some fresh air ### Suggest someone for a future Spotlight URL: https://www.actionism.space/suggest-someone-for-a-future-spotlight/ Last updated: 2025-06-24T09:03:14.000Z We're super keen to hear about the amazing individuals, groups and ideas happening all over the world, so we can shine a light on them and use their work as a way to inspire others. If you want to suggest an individual, organisation or idea for a future spotlight call, please fill in this form and we'll see if we can add them to the mix. **Criteria for Spotlights:** 1\. They are an individual, group, or idea/tool that is working towards a Citizen Future. 2\. They can be based anywhere in the world 3\. Ideally they can talk about their work, but are also happy to find ways in which we can inspire action at a grassroots level too! ### Citizen Spotlight: Smart School Council - Building a Citizen future in schools URL: https://www.actionism.space/citizen-spotlight-smart-school-council-building-a-citizen-future-in-schools/ Last updated: 2025-06-16T19:18:58.000Z **Building a citizen future in schools** **Citizen Collective Spotlight Summary: Smart School Councils (SSC)** **Recorded March 2025 with Greg Sanderson - Founder of SSC and Rachel Gray - Primary Teacher and SSC user, Gateshead.** **The problem SCC are trying to solve:** Too often, only the loudest or most confident children are heard in schools, leaving many without the chance to develop vital skills such as empathy, collective problem-solving, and critical thinking—all essential skills for thriving as adults. Traditional school councils reinforce this problem. **The solution:** Smart School Councils are a charity that changes that by making every pupil part of the conversation and giving all children equal opportunities to lead and contribute by introducing a simple, affordable platform that helps schools provide every pupil, not just a select few, a voice. **What are Smart School Councils (SSC)?** - A platform helping schools make every pupil part of decision-making. It’s like a fancy set of PowerPoint slides that supports kids from age five and up to run their own meeting without adult help.” - Greg Sanderson - Moves away from traditional “one-child-per-class” school councils. - Empowers children as young as four to lead class meetings and make their voices heard. **How it works in schools (example: Gateshead Primary)** - Weekly 30-minute class meetings, run by two pupils each time. - Questions range from fun (World Book Day themes) to serious (community responses to riots). - Pupil feedback is gathered, discussed by the communications team, and acted on. - Regular “We asked — You said — We did” assemblies show pupils their voice matters. **Discussion topics include:** - School improvements (e.g., girls-only sports days). Health and well-being (importance of sleep). Real-world issues (riots, community clean-ups). **The SSC platform** - Supports teachers with a bank of over 2,000 child-friendly discussion questions. - Works for primary, secondary, special schools, and pupil referral units. - Affordable (£300–£400 per year), simple to use, and cited positively in Ofsted reports. **Skills SSC helps build in every child:** - Supporting British Values, Personal Development, Oracy and SMSC - Leadership and facilitation - Confidence in public speaking - Active listening - Critical thinking and respectful debate - Empathy and community awareness - Responsibility and collaborative problem-solving **The founder's story (Greg Sanderson)** - Inspired by inequalities in who gets heard in education and beyond. - Started as Google Slides shared between schools in Tottenham. - Now, working with over 600 schools and the charity isfocused on democratic participation for every pupil, so spread the word! **A teacher’s view -** **(Rachel Gray - Primary Teacher)** Rachel talked passionately about how much the platform has become an easy and valuable part of life at her school. “In all of the years that we’ve done this, there’s never been a glitch... As someone who sets the questions, it’s so easy — and over time, the children just take ownership. It’s become part of our school culture, and I absolutely love seeing them lead.” **Citizen Collective community MEMBERS’ reflections from the call** - Schools should model collective learning, not just top-down teaching. - Huge potential for pupils to influence larger policy issues (e.g., AI in education). - Importance of safeguarding inclusion and ensuring all voices are heard, especially marginalised groups. **Future aspirations** - Enable collective discussions across whole cities and regions. - Feed young people’s voices into policymaking and local government. Connect schools with local mayors, councils, and national conversations. If you would like to hear a [parent's view on SSC take a look here](https://www.actionism.space/empowering-children-to-take-collective-action-smart-school-councils/) **Inspired to take ACTion toady?** Download this one pager on how the tool works to give to a teacher or parent/grandparent to see get this tool adopted by as many schools as possible! [Teacher one pager - Smart School Council (1)Teacher one pager - Smart School Council (1).pdf1 MBdownload-circle](https://www.actionism.space/content/files/2025/04/Teacher-one-pager---Smart-School-Council---1--1.pdf "Download") ### Empowering Children to take collective action - Smart School Councils URL: https://www.actionism.space/empowering-children-to-take-collective-action-smart-school-councils/ Last updated: 2025-04-28T11:58:49.000Z # By Tamasine McCaig I’m a parent to three noisy, opinionated, passionate children. At home, they feel free to speak their minds, share their opinions, and ask hard questions. I’m lucky - because I know this sense of empowerment is precious (even if sometimes I just want a quiet life!) But when they walk through the school gates, something shifts. They often tell me they feel **disempowered**, **insignificant**, and sometimes even **"too much."** As someone who has spent the last year helping to build **Citizen Collective**, and now giving my energy to shaping **ACTionism** \- a space to inspire collective action - I know this matters deeply. **If we want a future built on empathy, courage, and real change, we have to teach our children now that their voices matter, and that their actions can shape their communities.** That’s why, when Citizen Collective spoke with **Greg Sanderson** and teacher **Rachel Gray** about **Smart School Councils (SSC)**, I was genuinely excited. Because SSC isn’t just another school initiative. It is a movement - a brilliant, affordable way to bring **democracy, leadership, and action into every classroom**. ## The Problem: Who Gets Heard? **Too often in schools, only the loudest, most confident children are heard.** Traditional school councils unintentionally reinforce this, offering leadership experiences to a select few while leaving many without the chance to develop essential skills like empathy, collaboration, and critical thinking. My own daughter sat on her Primary School Council and reported back that even when her and her classmate would take ideas forward, things rarely changed - it felt like lip service\* to an idea (my words not hers) ## The Solution: Every Child a Voice, Every Child an Actionist **Smart School Councils** change that. They're a charity offering a simple, affordable platform that ensures **every pupil**, not just a chosen few, gets a voice. Through **pupil-led, weekly meetings**, even four-year-olds learn to: - **Speak up** - **Feel valued and listened to** - **Take collective action** They are not just "preparing for one day." They are practising democracy, leadership, and teamwork now — shaping school life, making real choices, and seeing the direct impact of their actions. ## Why It Matters to Me — and to All of Us As parents, carers, and educators, we have the power to raise a generation who believe that **change is possible** \- because they have experienced it first-hand. **Smart School Councils** make that real, every week, in ways that children love and understand. If we truly believe in nurturing young **Citizens**, not just future voters - if we believe in growing engaged Citizens - we need to start here. ## Ready to Help Your School Take the First Step? Here’s how you can find out more: **One-pager for Teachers** — explains how the tool works, how it fits into the school day and curriculum, and costs (around **£300 a year** — affordable for most schools). [Teacher one pager - Smart School Council (1)Teacher one pager - Smart School Council (1).pdf1 MBdownload-circle](https://www.actionism.space/content/files/2025/04/Teacher-one-pager---Smart-School-Council---1-.pdf "Download") [Learn more about Smart School Councils ](https://www.smartschoolcouncils.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space)on thier website here or download the Citizen Collection Call summary notes here. Because the world does not change by us sitting around and waiting for someone else. It changes when people (even four-year-olds) **step up together**. ### CanTeam URL: https://www.actionism.space/canteam/ Last updated: 2025-06-16T15:16:09.000Z [CanTeam](https://www.future-foundations.co.uk/canteam/?ref=actionism.space): Turning School Canteens into Community Hubs CanTeam is an after-school social dining initiative co-designed with young people to bring families and local communities together over nutritious food and engaging activities. By transforming school canteens into vibrant community hubs, CanTeam creates space for connection, wellbeing, and shared experiences. Founded by Jonathan Harper, CEO of Future Foundations, with funding from Big Change, CanTeam is a proud winner of the Big Education Challenge and has been supported to pilot at scale across the UK. With over 3,000 diners so far, we are proving the potential of schools to become thriving community spaces. Our mission? To launch more hubs than McDonald's by 2030. CanTeam is a founding member of the Canteen Culture Coalition, driven by a simple belief: Nobody should have to eat alone. We imagine a future where eating out, eating well, and eating together isn’t a privilege, but a shared ritual—an affordable, accessible part of everyday life. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Not-everyone-wants-a-shortcut-to-mending-1.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/Not-everyone-wants-a-shortcut-to-mending--1-.jpg) > **The incredible food, and amazing music, the warm and welcome community feeling (plus games outside). Have lived here 4 years but now feel part of the community. Cost of living makes me anxious about eating out. This was so helpful. I’m grateful to you for this.** ### The Power of the Campfire URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-power-of-the-campfire/ Last updated: 2025-06-16T15:27:51.000Z ### **By** [**Jamie Prow**](https://substack.com/@jamieprow?ref=actionism.space)**, Regenerative steward** ### Why are we so captivated by the campfire? Is it her warmth? Her flicker? Or perhaps it stirs a primal memory, where fire once offered protection from predators? Maybe it’s the purity of her flame. But no, I believe it’s more than that. We can’t view fire through such a reductionist lens, for this is not the lesson she longs for us to hear. We cannot break this masterpiece into its individual components. To truly understand it, we must experience fire as a symphony. We must learn to listen deeply. When we explore the systems of fire, we realise she is much more than the sum of her parts. The light and heat we feel are simply the release of stored sunlight. Fire is not merely warmth; it is the very sunlight that sustains all life—an offering from the burning branch to those who stand to benefit from its light. It’s magic, really. When a tree absorbs sunlight, it stores that energy in its trunk. Fire, then, is simply the release of that stored energy. It is the tree’s way of passing on the gift of life. This is the same energy that fuels the food we eat and everything that nourishes us. A campfire, therefore, is a miracle. Just as all of life proves to be. It is a shining light, a manifestation of life itself. It flickers with the warmth of everything that serves life—an energy we, too, can call upon, even in the darkest of times. A gift to hold in gratitude, to honour, and to pass on. A moment of abundance and reciprocity to share with those around us. Fire is the beating heart of life. When we gaze into its depths, we are not merely mesmerised by the hypnotic embers and sparks; we are gazing inward, reflecting on ourselves. Fire becomes a portal into the essence of life. In this moment, we realise that we are not staring at ‘fire’—we are staring at ourselves, and at all other living beings, staring right back at us. Fire teaches us a profound lesson in balance and reciprocity. It is both a gift and a responsibility. We gather the wood, we nurture the flame, and in return, it offers us its stored warmth, light, and comfort. This exchange mirrors the larger cycles of life, where every act of giving creates the conditions for receiving, and every moment of receiving calls for an act of giving in return. Fire helps us feel alive and connected. It brings a rich context to the world within its glow, making us feel less alone, more secure, and more at home. I believe that a fire like this creates the conditions for us to be our best selves—and as social beings, that best self always emerges in moments of togetherness, where the acts of sharing and reciprocity are at the heart of our experience. So, where there is fire, you’ll find gatherings. Where there are campfires, you’ll find people who, if they choose, can come together to be the best of themselves. To be at one with life. --- > **We discern that the urge of the times is not to fix a broken system, but to acknowledge our inherent power to summon other worlds.** [**BAYO AKOMOLAFE**](https://www.bayoakomolafe.net/author/bayo-akomolafe?ref=actionism.space) ### What is the world we’re giving up? URL: https://www.actionism.space/what-is-the-world-were-giving-up/ Last updated: 2025-06-17T20:06:28.000Z Society is like an out of control house party, and the house is about to collapse. Many of us feel trapped inside, blaring music making it impossible for us to think, while we watch the rich dudes doing lines and pouring gasoline over everything. The ceiling crumbles, smoke fills the air, and there are cracks in the walls. But, if you peer out of the window, you’ll see a field where campfires burn. And around those campfires are citizens drinking hot chocolate and planning how we can collectively build a multitude of new homes once this old one falls. Carers, doers, sharers, repairers…. citizens. Moving from campfire to campfire, lending thoughts and ideas, sharing, listening and acting. Working in their communities of place, or practice, and bringing their thoughts and feelings to help build the new homes. The air is filled with bright fiery sparks born from creativity and action, each combining with others to seed new fires. The field is set within a deep glow of art, music, and nature, steeped in context. A context where some can sit and rest, while others play and inspire. It comes to life with bright sparks, fire tenders, communities of ember carriers, ushers, storytellers and creatures.... all the creatures. As the new homes can not be built alone, we cannot design them from within a story of separation. We will need all wisdom, and abundance. There are campfires for reimagining everything. We will need new foundations, doors, windows, colours, and no home need be the same. The tools we use to build, are trust, creativity, and togetherness. Those of us round the campfires know that we might not actually get to live in the homes we collectively design. But we also know that we'd much rather spend the time we've got sitting round the fires, planning for those who will get to live there. At times we all have to return to the house party, the old story clings on, it pulls at our wrists, trying to consume us, dragging us back indoors. But, the longer we sit at a fire, even in silence, staring into the flames, our old story fades and our new collective story is forged. It is time for us to leave the old house. It is time for 'US' to write 'OUR' new støry. Come sit, sing, dance, discuss, rest, drink, and feast. As 'WE' are many, yet there is room for us all. What are we waiting for? **Olivia, Jamie and Gav** **Fire tenders, Ember Carriers and Storytellers** > **“We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are.” Anais Nin** ### The tree had felt it URL: https://www.actionism.space/the-tree-had-felt-it/ Last updated: 2025-06-16T16:12:19.000Z ### **An article by Tash Acres** [**earthruns**](https://www.earthruns.com/?ref=actionism.space) ### The tree had felt it. She could feel the disease taking hold. Water, once free-flowing from her roots to her shoots, was becoming harder to pump around her vast trunk. She couldn’t put a word to it – she was, after all, a tree, but she felt less ‘alive’. The usual zap wasn’t in her sap. Cankers formed on her once proud branches. To the humans that walked past the old Maple, it was hardly noticeable. Their lives are too busy with the mounting minutiae of life to notice the pain she masked with her golden display of autumn. Had they looked up from their phones, they’d have seen her bloom gold just a bit earlier than the other trees. But the surrounding trees knew well. They’d seen the tell-tale signs in her abundance of samaras – the fabulous helicopter seeds the kids love to chase. So many, so early in the season, the forest knew then that she was struggling. They knew that some trees, when facing stress, would put everything they’d got into the next generation. She was living for a future she may not see. She’d sent out distress messages warning the others of the Anthracnose, the fungal disease that was weakening her, and they, in turn, had been supporting her where they could – sharing their nutrients through the mycorrhizal network deep underground whilst shading young trees and boosting their own immune systems—a community effort to face tough times. Whether the Maple had known through the wisdom passed down from the ancient forest fellowship or whether it was pure instinct intrinsic to survival, her efforts – from reaching out and asking for help to the early shedding of leaves she couldn’t support – would not be in vain. As winter approached, the fungus’s advances slowed to a standstill – unable to withstand the cold. All the while, the rich nutrients being shared by her friends fed her soul. Slowly but surely, giving her strength. Whilst she rested. Took her time. Winter is vital to a forest’s soul—a chance to recharge. Readying for the spring, when the Maple could grow again. Create new, healthier shoots, free from the fungus, and she’d shine. Oh my, she’d shine. Stand tall. Reach for the skies. The Maple would see another summer. ### Every child deserves a voice – Here’s how you can help them find it. URL: https://www.actionism.space/every-child-deserves-a-voice-heres-how-you-can-help-them-find-it/ Last updated: 2026-06-23T20:23:25.000Z At a moment when division feels overwhelming, empowering every young person to speak out has never mattered more. Yet, too often, we limit leadership to those pupils who already have confidence, or who grow up in the 'right' postcode. But what if there was a way for every child – yes, every single child – to be heard, valued, and to play an active role in shaping their school and community? Smart School Councils (SSC) is exactly that: a revolutionary UK initiative turning traditional school councils into genuinely inclusive spaces. Instead of a small, elected few, SSC uses innovative technology and classroom-based discussions to ensure **every pupil’s voice counts**. Pupils across the country are suggesting ideas, voting on projects, and forming dynamic action teams. The results? Real, measurable change, built from the ground up. In the recent Citizen Collective Spotlight call, SSC Co-Founder Greg Sanderson, along with Rachel Webb, a passionate primary school teacher and SMT member from the North East, shared how this approach has transformed her school, empowering pupils and energising teachers. Rachel calls it "life-changing" for pupils, teachers and the entire school community. ****So what's the ACTion you can take today?** ****Why not share this inspiring one-pager with a parent or teacher you know?** It explains: 1\. How SSC works 2\. What it costs (roughly £300 a year) 3\. What simple steps teachers can take to get it up and running. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/04/Teacher-one-pager---Smart-School-Council--1.jpg) Let's give our young people the tools and confidence to speak up, act, and lead. Because democracy and active citizenship start in our classrooms. 👉 [Discover more about Smart School Councils and how you can get involved](https://home.smartschoolcouncils.org.uk/?ref=actionism.space). ### Connection URL: https://www.actionism.space/connection/ Last updated: 2025-06-18T20:29:53.000Z ### **An article by Elis Parry** Over a year ago, I joined the Green Runners due to my concerns for the environment crossing paths with my love for running. Having ran for a couple of years, I started slowly seeing myself falling into the trap of consumerism and metrics. This pushed me away from the true reasons as to why I ran, but luckily, I began to question whether all this fancy kit, and stats, were needed. In an attempt to find a running club that was focused on making running a greener sport, I came across the Green Runners, who's motto of 'a community making changes for a fitter planet' seemed cool! So, having looked into their mission a bit more, I decided to become a member. When joining the Green Runners, each member is required to put forward at least one pledge that aligns with one of the four pillars, these being how you move, how you kit-up, how you fuel, and how you speak out. These pledges aim to give individuals an opportunity to help to create a fitter planet, by making small, personal changes, which help to catalyse greater systemic change. A lot of these changes are low hanging fruit - things that we can change in our day to day lives to try to create a better world. But the last pillar, how we speak out, is the most important. I like the saying, “if you can’t be part of the solution, at least don’t be part of the problem”. But here’s the truth - I don’t believe that what is needed, nor what will appear, is a story of individualism and ‘solutions’. Instead, I feel an overwhelming sense of urgency for us to act together to help shift the narrative towards a more equal society. A society where people realise that material possessions and financial wealth do not constitute a fulfilling life, one in which people work together, as part of a community, to help mobilise greater change. What we need are steps in the right direction, and to be happy accepting the unknown. It’s a time for questions not answers. For me, how I feel is not only related to the climate emergency that we currently face, but also deeply relates to showing that the outdoors are not out of reach for anyone. We do not need all this new kit to get outside and have fun. Aggressive marketing by the outdoor companies creates a sense of need, which only causes a greater discontentment and disconnect to the things that matter. Connection to nature, to ourselves, and to others. Everything is interconnected and, without communities, individual ideas often go under the rug. This is why I love groups such as The Green Runners and the Re-Action Collective. They allow humans to connect, to share, and to co-create a better society. It’s about being resourceful and responsible as a collective, appreciating the little things around us - connecting, not chasing. This year, I pledge to increase my work with the Green Runners and wear my badge more often! People are often very busy and find excuses to push various things to the side and ignore them - myself included. However, as other Green Runners keep saying, we are running out of time. Ignore the statistics. Just picture the next generation - your children - not being able to experience the outdoors as you are. The facts are scary, however, we should not let this stop us from acting. It is vital that we communicate and vocalise our opinions and spread the message about systemic issues that are destroying the world that we live in. As I wrote this article, I couldn't help but realise that all of the Green Runners’ pledges are strongly linked to the word 'connection'. With how I move, using my body instead of a car allows me to be more connected to nature. With how I kit up, I am becoming more connected to the gear that I use, appreciating its true origin and impact. With how I eat, I wish to be more connected to the food that I buy, I’d love to be involved in growing it. And finally, with speaking out, I wish to form a connection with others with a similar drive to create a fitter, greener, and more just world. **Community. Connection.** That’s where it starts. ### PermissiØn URL: https://www.actionism.space/permission/ Last updated: 2025-06-17T13:47:15.000Z **An article by Scott Johnson** **It’s a funny old thing.** From school age, we’re trained to ask for permission. To conform, and to comply. To do as we’re told, and not to rock the boat. That training makes us good, obedient, easy (ish!) to control little humans. Some might say it also prepares us for entry into the workforce. For many of us, a need to get permission before we do something stays with us as we grow up, and it can become a limiting belief. **Birds just… fly.** Before we continue, a small observation from nature. Baby birds hang about in their nest, and shout, squawk and holler for food. Until they don’t. One day they crawl to the edge of the nest, and fall out. At which point they discover they can fly! They don’t seem to lack belief - they trust their wings to work, they trust gravity and the air and their eyes. They trust themselves, their abilities, their nature. Birds don’t need permission to fly. They just… fly. **And that’s a curious lesson for us humans.** We apes with big brains, who second-guess things, have come to trust data rather than our intuition, have been taught to ask for permission to express ourselves, instead of just expressing ourselves. We follow along with the status quo, in life and in business, so we don’t rock the boat. So we don’t get rejected by the tribe. **‘Business as usual’** This is conformity, writ large. And many generally accepted business behaviours are damaging for people and planet. Company directors get paid the most, despite not doing much of the actual work. Shareholders get most of the reward, despite doing very little to generate those rewards. And the pursuit of profit is the primary motivator for every activity. We have pyramids and hierarchies, where those at the top benefit most from the efforts of those at the bottom, and where the natural world has been seen as a free resource to be exploited. And many of us so far have generally accepted that as fact. But it needn’t be that way. **(Almost) everything is a choice** Just because those things are the established status quo, it doesn’t mean we have to follow them. Shareholders don’t have to receive dividends, it’s only a business convention. Directors don’t have to be paid more than every other employee. Companies don’t have to make profits and hoard cash. These things are aspects of ‘business as usual’, but they are choices. And when we acknowledge that, we learn that we have the power to make different choices. **Mother Teresa** Another diversion, if you don’t mind?! There’s a quote attributed to Mother Teresa which says, “If you want to change the world, go home and love your family”. I love this, it’s a great question. What does “loving your family” look like? And, if we zoom out a little, what does “loving your community” look like? Then, a curious follow up question; what is the business version of “going home and loving your family”? That’s a question we at Kung Fu Accounting asked at the beginning of 2024\. And our answer lies in our new mission. **We’re making our home town a wonderful place to live.** That simple statement drives every decision we make. We ask ourselves how we can demonstrate a positive benefit to our home town, with every choice. Here are a few examples; We offer part time jobs for people who live in Stroud. We create employment for our home town, keeping money locally. We strive to walk or take public transport as much as possible, removing ourselves from the rush hour traffic, and reducing the environmental impacts of our work journeys. We prioritise local businesses for as much of our spending as possible, again keeping money in the town. **Better than business as usual.** Maintaining the status quo, doing what everyone else is doing, because it’s always been done that way, is a choice. Doing things differently is therefore also a choice. That’s incredibly empowering for those of us who think differently. Companies don’t have to pay dividends. Directors don’t need to be paid many, many times more than the lowest paid employees. Profit needn’t be the only motive in business. **So, back to the theme; permission.** Things are done the way they have always been done, until someone challenges them. You are someone. So am I. What are we waiting for? Whose permission do we need to do things differently? Maybe, it’s time to trust ourselves more. Maybe it’s time to fly. --- **Scott** is the founder of [Counting change](https://www.linkedin.com/company/countingchange/posts/?feedView=all&ref=actionism.space), helping bookkeepers and accountants be the change we need in the world ### Social Cinema URL: https://www.actionism.space/social-cinema/ Last updated: 2025-06-16T16:22:01.000Z ### **Facilitation guide for hosting a 99p films social cinema night** **By Alex Fish** **Hosting a 99p Films Social Cinema Night is a powerful way to foster community connections, inspire action, and encourage meaningful discussion. Here is a step-by-step guide to facilitate a respectful thought provoking audience-led discussion.** **1\. Breathe** Start with a short mindful breathing exercise, such as closing your eyes and breathing through your nose for a few minutes. This will put everyone in a better frame of mindset for an open and respectful discussion. **2\. Watch** Depending on the film you watch, it can be good to come up with a few slides with questions. Especially if you’re wanting to achieve a certain goal or direction with the discussion. If led by the film makers this can be a good chance to hear direct feedback too! **3\. Discuss** **Explain how the discussion will work and the intention behind it** \-There is no right or wrong answer. This is a place to share ideas, thoughts and feelings with your community in a respectful way. Expect disagreement! **Establish ground rules for the discussion** \-No personal attacks, racism, sexism or interrupting of speakers. **Ice (cream) breaker** \- What are your general thoughts? Ask the audience to look to their left or right, in front or behind, to find someone to chat to, that they ideally didn’t arrive with. Starting small and encouraging everyone to chat 1-on-1 with an open question allowing the audience to share their initial thoughts and feelings, about what they have just watched in a more intimate and less intimidating way. **Useful hand signals to teach at the start** \- **Raising your hand** to silence the room after the ice breaker. When the audience sees this they should follow suit, raising their hand and staying silent. **Circle your hands** if someone is rambling on or hogging the conversation, use a circular hand gesture to wrap up. If they continue cut them off by using a phrase such as “Let’s hear what someone else has to say.” **Now open it up to the room** \- It’s common for there to be a pause before the first hand goes up, embrace the silence. A silent room does not mean a silent mind. Allow the audience a moment to collect their thoughts and to think about what they wish to say. Once the first person begins, the discussion will naturally gain momentum. **Things to remember as a facilitator** - remain neutral and control your bias. This is not the facilitators show, it is a space where everyone has a voice with collective ownership of the space. The facilitator is a guide and the mediator to making this a smooth process. - Refrain from giving direct views and instead turn everything into a question directed back at the audience. - “Question everything!” - Value audience members insight - “Thank you for sharing that” - If someone has already spoken, ensure someone who hasn’t spoken yet gets a chance to contribute. **4\. Eat** Continue the conversation around a communal **FEAST!** “Let’s eat part of the solution” ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/04/ACTionism--6-.png) > **Community is at our core, which is why we've incorporated as a C.I.C. Our mission is not only to inspire and provide a wholesome evening for our audiences but to benefit several stakeholders: Including Filmmakers, students, local farmers, chefs, wellness practitioners and others all using their unique skills to cultivate positive change.** ### Changing the way we engage with our clothes - Rebel Patch URL: https://www.actionism.space/changing-the-way-we-engage-with-our-clothes-rebel-patch/ Last updated: 2025-06-17T20:04:41.000Z ## **An interview with Lisa Matzi** **What were the triggers for starting down this journey?** Leading up to starting Rebel Patch I had been working on expanding my knowledge around sustainability around solutions for the climate crisis. I co-founded a community called ‘And the Future?’ We ran a monthly book club, focusing on books that expanded our knowledge. The books were as varied as the solutions - we dove deep into every topic from alternative economic models to regenerating land to queer ecological thinking. The topics that always stuck with me the most were usually about fashion activism. We read ‘Loved clothes last’ by Orsola De Castro and it was one of the books that had the most profound impact on me. She talks a lot about how to take responsibility for your own consumption and clothing repair was one of the suggestions in it. I took a mental note, and darned one pair of socks and sewed on a loose button. It was the first time I actually mended my clothes myself. That was 2018. The book also inspired me to spend an entire year only buying clothes second hand after I learnt about fashion (over)production. **How did you identify that there was a need for Rebel Patch?** I properly started my visible mending journey when I lived in my little van in Portugal and simply had to mend the clothes I had with me. I had so little space I didn’t buy anything and I also wanted to find a simple, low equipment way to be creative. So when I stumbled across an online course for visible mending I felt like this was the perfect combination of being creative whilst also learning a useful skill that helped me maintain my wardrobe. I got so hooked on darning that I darned things that didn’t even need to be darned, just to add pops of colour or texture or simply to practice my skill. I asked people around me if they had anything for me to fix and soon after I got asked by someone in town to host a darning workshop and this is really where it all began. A few people who attended told me afterwards how much they enjoyed working with their hands, that they felt so relaxed and focused and most of all that they experienced a deeper sense of connection to the item of clothing they had mended, a newfound love and appreciation – not just for the piece of clothing but also for their own skill, care and time that they had just dedicated to it. And that is what I wanted to see more of. This to me felt like the antidote to mindless consumerism and disconnection. After I taught my first darning workshop I set out to find a way to make mending more accessible. Darning is an amazing skill that is considered easy to learn (if it comes easy to you) but I quickly realised that not everyone has the time, capacity or ability to learn it. To reach as many people as I could, I looked into current solutions for clothing repair and quickly landed on iron on patches. Iron on patches are easy to use, quick to apply and you don't require being taught how to use them - the perfect solution. But the ones I came across were mostly your classic rainbows and smiley faces (nothing wrong with those btw!) and I felt there was a lack of different aesthetics and variety in sizes. On top of that, most of them were produced using plastic based materials and had travelled a long way to sit in my local haberdashery. I wanted to re-invent the iron patch. I thought of all of my talented friends who are artists, photographers, writers - surely there must be a way to get their art onto a patch? > **I wanted to start a movement. I wanted as many people as possible to experience the joy, the creativity and the connectedness that comes with mending. Especially mending when done in community.** **What did you find difficult when starting out?** You need a lot of patience in a world that tells you everything is supposed to happen quickly. We’re sold this idea that if you aren’t successful instantly you’re doing it wrong. When the reality is so much more layered and complex. It takes time to find your audience, build community, perfect your skills and spread the word. That is in fact the natural way of change. And getting people to mend their clothing in a world that is selling them fast fashion at every corner is a huge behaviour and mindset shift that simply takes time and many many interactions before it takes root in public consciousness. **What have you now learnt that you wish you’d known before starting?** Not everyone wants a shortcut to mending. There are people who happily learn a skill and spend time refining it. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/06/ACTionism--5--1.png) I wish I had trusted my gut instinct a bit more and not followed the capitalist notion of ‘if it’s not easy or convenient people won’t buy it’. There is so much more to mending than making something useful again. The fact that you are giving a piece of clothing another lease of life is wonderful but also just one of the many positive things that come from it. Many people have said they felt more creatively empowered, less scared of trying things, calmer and more relaxed working with their hands and more connected to the things they own. It turns out that the people who care don’t mind giving their time and they don’t mind to be ‘inconvenienced’ when learning a new skill. They want to spend time on their clothes, make mistakes and learn in the process. **What role has the community played in your journey?** Community has been a cornerstone of Rebel Patch and it is one of the core values I have built this project on. I wanted to start a movement. I wanted as many people as possible to experience the joy, the creativity and the connectedness that comes with mending. Especially mending when done in community. What kept me going when things got tough was the community, the people that came to my workshops, bought patches at markets and sent me pictures and messages about their mended items. I would have never been able to even manufacture these patches had I not met Rachel Kan, founder of the Ecosystem Incubator who was my mentor for nearly a year. She helped me find my suppliers, materials and set up my entire business. Also the Bristol Textile Quarter whose community welcomed me with open arms despite having zero knowledge or experience working in textiles and that lead me to finding my amazing local manufacturer. Also, obviously, the Re-Action Collective has been an absolute anchor to everything I do - having a community around you of like minded people who just get it is so vital when starting a business. It’s what gets you through the hard days and in my opinion, everything is better when done in community. --- **Lisa** is the founder of [Rebel Patch](https://www.rebelpatch.com/?ref=actionism.space), changing the way we engage with our clothes. Giving rarely worn, stained or damaged clothing deserves a second lease on life. ### ACTionism - (Ak-shun-iz-um) URL: https://www.actionism.space/actionism-ak-shun-iz-um/ Last updated: 2025-06-17T20:07:47.000Z WE act towards something. Sometimes with purpose, at other times accepting uncertainty. Like stones skipping on a pond, we break the tension with creativity and joy. Questioning, re-imagining and getting lost in the possibilities, until the stories we’ve told ourselves no longer hold our weight. We sink. Drifting through the unknown to the depths, to settle amongst the shit. Resting and letting go, as we grieve the collapse of our beliefs. Squinting through the murkiness in search of a new story. Replenishing, so we can skip again. ACTionism is about the power of all of us acting towards something, whilst leaving no-one behind. Some stand on the shore skimming the stones, helping citizens start a journey and carving open space. Communities skip across the tension colliding and feeding off of each others energy with joy. Others search for the deepest part of the pond to face into hard work. All of this is done with an acceptance that each of our states is important, and valuable. We will need to skim, skip, and sink many times. Until the ACTing causes the tension of our collective stories to collapse. Our collective actions are beginning to pierce through, underneath the tension something lurks. We can't and shouldn't try to know what that something is, we just need to give it space to rise. Right now, I can feel the ripples of many citizens. Like, truly feel it. Come and reimagine, create and build with our community. There's plenty of work for us all to do. [Re-Action Collective Citizen](https://re-action-collective.org/?ref=actionism.space) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/62/be/62be9196-9a65-4831-81a9-71e1c2b2f527/content/images/2025/04/ACTionism--1-.png)