Event Overview

The Thawing

a 12 hour workshop guiding participants through the expanded spiral of the Work that Reconnects offered by Sara El-Sayeh. 

Also referred to as the decolonizing spiral, the expanded spiral has a few more steps to go through than the original spiral that has been proposed by root teacher Joanna Macy. This workshop takes us through the steps of the expanded spiral, outlined below, while specifically focusing on capitalism as a system of oppression. 

Capitalism, post-capitalism and/or post-growth will be our thematic focus for our time together. I will be pulling from my economics background and the work of the Post Growth Institute, where I was a fellow in 2025. You can read my article here. 

The steps of the expanded spiral are: 

1. Gratitude 
2. Self Awareness
3. Social Awareness/Systems of Oppression
4. Honoring our Pain for the World 
5. Seeing with New and Ancient Eyes
6. Liberation 
7. Going forth 

Over six weeks, we’ll be meeting to go over one step of the spiral in relation to thawing the freeze of capitalism and exploring possibilities beyond it. 

Registration form: here (time conversion here)

Cost: $100 – $900 to be paid via PayPal 

Spread over 6 weeks, our schedule will be as follows:

Week 1:

Gratitude 

Self Awareness

Week 2:

Social Awareness

Systems of Oppression

Week 3:

Honoring our Pain for the World

Week 4: 

Seeing with New/Ancient Eyes

Week 5: 

Liberation 

Week 6: 

Going Forth

Please know that the presence of children and pets is welcomed. We welcome the wholeness of life.

How to Prepare/What to Expect:

By virtue of my background and the nature of the workshop, the following themes might come up (or rather, will): post-capitalism, post-growth, decolonization and collapse. 

I’m very passionate about surviving capitalism and making it through collapse and I believe the work that reconnects is the perfect place to start – the work also offers tools to equip us through these times.

We’ll be using tools developed by root teacher Joanna Macy as well as tools that have been developed and/or adapted by Work that Reconnects facilitators including myself. 

I’m a mother of two young children, aged 8 and 2, and hence, I value and cherish breaks. Four hours could sometimes fly by and at other times might seem too long. Please know that this is a place where you can ask for what you need. 

I would definitely prefer if you have your camera on, but if the need to be off camera arises, it is also welcomed. 

Facilitation Notes: 

You’ll need a journal or a place to take notes!
Given my training in Offers and Needs Markets facilitation, I’ll be weaving it in for our last session if our time allows for it.

More about the facilitator:

Sara is an Egyptian writer, (single) mother and facilitator roaming the fault lines of Cairo. Post-revolution and mid-collapse, her work explores what it means to belong, and at times completely refusing to, in a place that demands that she becomes convenient.  

She maps the geographies of single motherhood: the labyrinth of repair and care as resistance. Her work helps (her) navigate the freeze of capitalism while slowly weaving communities of care to nourish us through times of collapse.

Among the teachers (and books) that have inspired me are David Fleming and the book Surviving the Future, Joanna Macy, Kurt Vonnegut’s short play 2BOR02B and Starhawk’s The Fifth Sacred Thing.

Get in touch!

Email:  sara@blaqube.com or s.saye7@gmail.com 

Instagram: @sara.el.sayeh

Substack: hereYou can join my mailing list through this link.