I Want to Hear From You!!
Hello friends, fellow conspirators, fellow mapmakers,
I have started this Memory of the Future conversation as a way to engage and activate our collective dreaming, and hence, our collective reality-creating.
I’ve begun a list of topics I will post about, and have ideas about how to tag and categorize the posts. I’m interested in finding potent language that has a poetic or alchemical quality of evoking the desired future. The site content will be pretty broad, as creating a healthy future means creating health and well-being in every area; as humans living interdependently with each other and with all life on this planet, and all other life (that we may not have met yet), co-existing in this intimately connected universe.
I’d love to hear any ideas you have about the way I’ve started setting up the site, any thoughts you have about what the Memory of the Future means to you, any examples of healthy futures that you know about in literature, music, the arts or film, any examples of working models that are out there now being implemented, and any ideas you might have for how to make this site more interactive and collaborative….
Thank you and I look forward to brainstorming and heartstorming!
Peace,
Sara
List of Planned Topics
Maps —Examples of Healthy Futures in the Arts
Mapmakers—Innovators, Artists, Visionaries
Destinations—Examples of Working Models out in the World
Music, Memory, Beauty, Community
“I am a part of all that I have met.”
–Alfred Tennyson
I turned on the Sundance channel last night, ready with my take-out Indian dinner, and discovered this beautiful documentary from Icelandic rock band Sigur Ros called Heima.
The band has received worldwide attention, playing large sold out concerts all over the globe. They decided to go back to their country and put on shows in small local villages as a way of giving back and connecting with their fellow Icelanders. Heima is Icelandic for “at home” or “homeland” and the visual imagery of the landscape with the minimalist, orchestral soundtrack of their eight piece, (and sometimes larger) ensemble, and with Jónsi Birgisson’s haunting falsetto floating over the top is breathtaking.
They played in a small café, in community centers, at an abandoned fish factory, outdoors with interesting folk art, and there was an amazing ten or twelve foot long marimba made out of pieces of rock, that four of them played in a cave…along with concerts held out in the middle of the highland wilderness. I was captivated by the music, the exquisite visuals and by the story of these four bandmembers, the other string musicians that traveled with them for this tour, and the townspeople who came to see their shows.
Partway into the film, keyboardist/guitarist Kjartan Sveinsson was describing what they were discovering of their homeland’s history: “In every village there was a choir, and some people say it’s because there were no other instruments, but I don’t really buy that, I’m sure there were some instruments around…”
New York Times ‘Special Edition’ Headline, “IRAQ WAR ENDS”
On Wednesday, November 12, 2008, in an elaborate symbolic summoning; active dreamers created and distributed 1.2 million free copies of a parody edition of The New York Times. Thousands of volunteers passed the paper out at busy subway stations around the city, including Grand Central Terminal, Washington and Union Squares, the 14th and 23rd Street stations along Eighth Avenue, and Pacific Street in Brooklyn, among others.
The 16-page paper, that looked and felt identical to the real NYTimes — with the headline “IRAQ WAR ENDS” — surprised commuters, many of whom took the free copies thinking they were the real thing. Dated July 9, 2009, the paper was filled with articles describing the end of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the implementation of a national health care system, a rebuilt economy, caps on CEO salaries, a national oil fund to study climate change, and other goals of a healthy near future. The paper covered national news, international, New York, and business sections as well as having editorials, advertisements and a corrections page. And in the upper left corner of the front page was this twist on the Times’ motto: ”All the News we Hope to Print.” The online edition is viewable at www.nytimes-se.com. The “Fine Print” section on the far left menu describes the mission and purpose of this wildly ambitious, creative action, complete with a very comprehensive list of actions people can take by getting involved with any one of numerous organizations named who are working for change. And check out the online flash advertisements on each page, and also the video page with two videos that captured the reactions of people on the street to this news that day. The Video News Release has comments from people including, “I knew change was coming to America, I just didn’t expect it so fast—it’s incredible.” And “this could really expand our idea of what is possible.” And from actress Lily Taylor, “this is a deep, positive, potential thing happening here, and so I’ll take the prank for that, and I think the Times should too. We have to exercise some muscles we either don’t have or that have atrophied, or something: a civic muscle, a thrifty muscle, a generous muscle…”
Welcome to the Memory of the Future Project!
What if we remember the future?
What does a healthy, thriving future look like?
What if we create the roadmaps to get there?
What if we become mapmakers?
The idea for the Memory of the Future Project came about as I realized I did not know of very many examples in literature, arts or film that portrayed healthy, working futures for human beings and Planet Earth. I was able to think of many examples of dismal future visions in books and film, and I believe those examples become a kind of path of least resistance that draws us toward them like a magnet, if we are not consciously steering ourselves. So we need a new map. We need to become mapmakers.
I was talking with my two friends Peggy Taylor and Charlie Murphy about this dearth of healthy future models. Peggy and Charlie co-founded an amazing youth empowerment through the arts program called Power of Hope. Peggy spoke about a “future history” writing exercise she had done in a workshop. The premise was that it was 500 years into the future and it was working well. They were instructed to describe it in detail and then work backward to create an account of how we got there. And Charlie said, “I know what we can call this—we can call it the Memory Of The Future Project!”
I’m creating this blog site/gathering place at this time because I believe there is an enormous window of opportunity that has opened since Barack Obama was elected President of the United States on Nov. 4th, 2008. What many people had previously thought impossible, (or had long since abandoned hope for) is now possible, and with that comes an expanded universe of potential for the world.