Let’s Go Differently: The Joys and Wisdom of Co-facilitating

By Esmé Joy McAvoy

Aaaand, we did it!!

Recently Anna Maria Stone, Natasha Fearnley and I (Esmé Joy McAvoy) guided our first in-person, full-day Spiral of The Work that Reconnects!

While this small yet significant rite of passage was months in the making, our planning over cups of tea and hot chocolate didn’t happen in a cosy local café or around a kitchen table: it happened online via Zoom, oftentimes across three different time zones. We only met IRL (In Real Life) just a few days before we would finally get to host our in person event and meet our participants. There was a touch of both magic and madness in the unfolding of our process. Systems thinker Joanna Macy is no stranger to that ‘magick-madness’ and she likens it to grace: “Grace happens when we act with others on behalf of our world.”

While Anna Maria and Natasha are close friends, I only got to know Anna online last September. As experienced WTR facilitator, Kathleen Rude, guided us on her five-week ‘Roots of Resilience’ course, Anna and I became course buddies and we scheduled an online chat over tea, each from our respective homes: Anna from her permaculture garden and home on Vancouver Island, Canada, and me from my little red house in the foothills of the Andean mountains in Colombia.

During that early chat, I learned that Anna and her partner Chris would be in England the following summer as part of an intentional ancestry trip, travelling across Europe to places where their family lineages had roots…a true journey of ‘Deep Time’. When we compared diaries and realised we’d be in England at the same time, Anna jokingly suggested we guide a WTR workshop together.

We shared equally the tasks – searching for a venue that felt aligned, creating flyers and social media posts, and finding the words to express in simple terms what this deep work is all about. Things flowed easily with the spirit of co-creation. On my own, the ‘to do’ list would have felt daunting. I’d have retreated from the idea, found a hundred and one reasons not to go ahead with it, telling myself I wasn’t ready. But together? It felt possible. Meaningful. Playful, even. We supported each other through the crises of confidence, the disheartening moments and setbacks. And we got to celebrate the baby steps of progress too – that first ticket sale, our arrivals in England one by one, and the palpable excitement that our vision was coming to life.

We were excited to finally meet in person, coming together in time to celebrate the Summer Solstice. We enjoyed time preparing for the workshop and exploring Amesbury, a magical piece of pagan England and home to Stonehenge, before travelling to The Community Farm outside Bristol, the setting for our workshop, where we were met by the full moon of midsummer.

That magical flow or grace is known in systems thinking as synergy. The way we become more than the sum of our parts when we offer our gifts and talents in service to the whole in ways that feel both brave and humble. Most of us have been raised in places where the Industrial Growth Society dominates, a story laser-focused on our individualism – that small ‘skin-encapsulated self’ – and peddles the myth of independence. A story that defines success along the lines of ‘I did it all by myself!’. The Great Turning, by contrast, is a collective story. One that returns us to the truth of our interconnectedness, to sense our more expansive, ecological self…where we each have a place, and a role to play in service to the wider web of life. In choosing to co-create, collaborate, and co-facilitate our workshop, and finding so much joy in it, I’m reminded of Nora Bateson’s words: “We’re going to a different place, let’s go differently.”

After our experience together, I invite facilitators to consider co-facilitating. There are so many pieces to hold in planning and leading a workshop, especially given the emotional depths of this work. Sharing those pieces between you can lighten the load, create a sense of spaciousness, and invite greater spontaneity, too.

There’s this activity in the Spiral of The Work that Reconnects where you present the different dimensions of The Great Turning: the holding actions, the creation of new systems, the shift in perceptions and values, and, now, right in the centre, the nurturing of all life. You then gather in small groups and share the things you are already doing in these different dimensions. Each sharing is then followed with a celebratory ‘Well, that’s how it goes in The Great Turning!’ as if we’re raising our glasses in a toast. As Anna, Natasha and I hugged the last of our participants goodbye at the end of our workshop, we caught each other’s eyes, and that joyful little refrain came back to me: ‘Well, that’s how it goes in The Great Turning!’ And I think it is.

Esmé Joy McAvoy : Originally from London with Scottish-English roots, I’ve been living in the foothills of the Andes mountains in Colombia for many years. I came across Joanna Macy’s work when I started creating workshops for teens in schools on ecological and social issues. I was struggling with how much to share. How tragic and despairing the realities seemed! It’s been such a blessing to find this clear-eyed view of our current juncture. One that spoke to its complexity and contradictions, that didn’t shy away from the multiple unravellings and our attendant sorrow, but also offered us another story, also true, that we could get behind. The story of the Great Turning transformed my workshops for teens – a story celebrating the countless people already dedicated to the work of our times: the reorientation towards a fairer, kinder, truly life-sustaining society. I’m excited to offer this work supported by mindfulness practices for students and teachers in person, and online in a five-session course over five weeks. Reach out and let me know if I can support your projects, community or organisation!