Catch up… CSA’s, Stuff and Leaders in the Field

Fantastic to finally be kicking off the Open Platform blog, lots to catch up on so let’s start with a whirlwind tour of recent(ish) happenings in our Tuesday night sessions

A few weeks back our own OP’er Lynne Davis facilitated a discussion on local food.

We were treated to a talk from (among others) Tim Lawrence of Sims Hill Shared Harvest who took us through the CSA (community supported agriculture) farming model, creating community based food growing.

In this way, the local community can get more involved in/gain control of the production of their food by investing in the farm and then literally sharing in the fruits (and veg!) of the harvest.  Have a look at their website/blog to find out more http://simshillsharedharvest.wordpress.com (http://simshillsharedharvest NULL.wordpress NULL.com/)

The land is located on Frenchay holdings and historically is one of the patches of land that provided Bristol with its grub in (what feels like) the very distant supermarket- free past.

We will be organising an OP trip joining one of their Saturday volunteer work days in the very near future, we’ll keep you posted…

Another OP’er led event explored the ‘consumerism treadmill’ as Max Fyfe encouraged us to look at our own consumer habits, assumptions and attachments. The Story of Stuff is a short film that clearly and simply illustrates our global production and consumption patterns and is well worth checking out http://www.storyofstuff.org/ (http://www NULL.storyofstuff NULL.org/)

Next up, we had a visit from Embercombe (http://www NULL.embercombe NULL.co NULL.uk/) founder Mac Macartney with a talk entitled ‘How do we meet the uncertainty of these turbulent times with authenticity, creativity and resilience?’ Mac spoke about finding your path, defining personal leadership and its importance in achieving transformative change.

Those who stayed to participate in group discussions after Mac’s talk explored ‘stepping into the field’ (owning our leadership and taking action). The ensuing activity hopefully allowed people the opportunity to examine their own journey to stand up and be counted.

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who took part and we will be putting some of the thoughts that came out of this exercise in some form or another on the blog.

The end of the ‘Embercombe’ evening culminated in a very large sharing circle so it seems like a good time to extend that same spirit of participation and invite people in the OP community to arrange/facilitate a Tuesday evening session of their own. Whether you were fired up by the content of Mac Macartney’s talk or a completely different thread of inspiration, take the opportunity to step into your field…

Similarly if you have an idea/subject you’d like the OP Committee to include in a future Tuesday session please drop us an email.

Part of the strength of the OP community lies in the Tuesday sessions reflecting what you care about and what you’d like to see more of – so tell us!