No
Let’s go
If you
answered yes
biribili
is for you!
If you answered yes, but in reality you’re actually rather resistant to change, easily lose motivation and revert to old habits in your daily routine… If it’s hard to initiate change in the organisations and groups you’re involved in…
If you want to reflect and ask transformative questions that encourage progressive changes to habits and behaviours… If you want to play an active role in your organisation to create a more circular and regenerative future, then…
p r i n c i p l e s
Changing how we think and do
An invitation to reconnect with nature
biribili is rooted in permaculture, a comprehensive system of design that learns from patterns and relationships found in nature. It puts forward 12 complementary principles centred around three interrelated ethical concepts: 1) care for the earth; 2) care for people; and 3) the fair redistribution of energy, resources and surplus.
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2
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3
ADOPT SLOW AND SMALL-SCALE SOLUTIONS
Fewer things, more care. Start with something that is attainable and maintainable. Curb your expectations, timelines and scale. Understand the rhythm of things, without rushing, without trying to take on too much. Lower the intensity (except at rare opportune moments).
Pay attention to the details.
What is our minimum viable project? What can we do away with without affecting our goal? What details are crucial? What is the tipping point if we end up going too fast?
OBSERVE AND INTERACT
Pay attention. Cultivate curiosity. Listen to yourself and those around you. Use all your senses. Experience things first hand and take nothing for granted. Be transparent and porous. Blend in with the environment.
How are you going to practise observation? What evidence have you gathered during your last exploration? What questions are you going to ask others? What do you think, what do you feel, what is your intuition telling you?
PAY ATTENTION TO PATTERNS AND DETAILS
Understand the system and appreciate what makes it different. Identify patterns of behaviour, thought and communication. Travel back and forth between general ideas and specifics. Make plans but address everything new that pops up. Adapt and contextualise.
What are the key structural elements? Are there patterns that repeat? What details would you like to give more attention to? What contextual factors affect you the most? Have you made a detailed list of tasks?
MAXIMISE DIVERSITY
Value difference and multiple forms of intelligence. Integrate rather than segregate (think “and” instead of “or”). Be inclusive and welcoming. Add new classification systems and explore alternatives. Diversify your approach to increasing resilience and minimising vulnerability.
What types of diversity need to be prioritised? What are the benefits of increased diversity? How do we attract those who are missing? What types of conflict might need to be tended to after an increase in diversity?
TENDING TO THE FRINGES AND MARGINS
Broaden your horizons beyond established conventions, norms and routine habits. Transcend blurred, dynamic and flexible boundaries. Create spaces to meet, exchange, interact and generate friction. Occupy liminal space.
What is happening in the margins and in informal spaces? What physical and psychological boundaries are you willing to cross? What combinations and tensions might generate new ideas?
CONNECT ELEMENTS AND STRUCTURES
CEvery element fulfils many functions, and every function is sustained by various elements. Add value by combining complementary elements, profiles and abilities. Form open and distributed networks. Encourage different roles and levels of involvement.
What elements and functions protect and strengthen? What connections can generate more value? What could be opened up and shared? How can people participate?
THE PROBLEM IS THE SOLUTION
Pay attention to the symptoms and address the causes. Find opportunities in threats and turn weaknesses into strengths. Accept criticism and learn from your mistakes. Be more aware of the (sometimes invisible) consequences of your actions. Make extensive use of your imagination.
Where do the main problems and conflicts arise? What causes them? What errors do you repeat most often? What would be the most reasonable solution? And the most disruptive?
MOBILISE AND STORE UP ENERGY
Identify the different types of energy available. Take advantage of biorhythms and natural cycles. Harvest in times of abundance in order to use in times of scarcity. Passion, having clear goals and connecting to what we do can all be ways to generate positive energy.
What types of energy and resources do you have at your disposal? Do you know your own biorhythms and do they help you to make plans? What energises you? What blocks your energy?
SELF-REGULATION AND FEEDBACK
Minimise effort and maximise output. Continuously learn and improve. Set partial goals and specific attainable milestones. Give and receive, encouraging reciprocity. Facilitate (take steps to reduce conflict). Generate beneficial and lasting bonds.
What works well? What can you improve on or stop doing? What specific goals are coming up next? What or whom do you need in order to reach these goals? How can you improve on the relationships you already maintain?
GET RESULTS
Look for helpful incentives and rewards of various kinds. Enjoy the process as much as the result. Give equal attention to the short and long term. Take care of your own individual interests as well as those of the group.
What results do you expect in the short and long term? Do you know how to gather and capitalise on them? How do your own interests balance out with those of other partners? Do you manage the surplus?
BE OPEN TO CHANGE
Understand change as something positive and inevitable. Foster gradual transitions and learn to manage them. Think about how things are and what could be – use your memory but not nostalgia. Draw up a wishlist of changes.
What do you need to change? What are the first steps to take? What do you stand to lose or gain? In what ways do you resist change? What did you learn in your last significant process of transformation?
PRACTISE THE PRINCIPLE OF RE-
Think about new uses and cycles of regeneration. Use renewable resources and services. Take advantage of what you already have and what is available around you. Minimise negative external factors. Reduce, reuse, recycle, repair, rethink, reevaluate, reeducate, restructure, redistribute.
What RE- principles can you apply to your project? How do you envision continuity or a second life for the different elements of your project? Where are you wasting resources?
S o u r c e c o d e t e
Should we get biribilified?
Possibility is revolutionary