Integral Bristol

The large global challenges (climate change, other envrionmental issues and the financial system) require an understanding of the world very different to the one that was taught to us in the current education system.

Systems thinking is the first level of understanding this complexity but it doesn't go nearly far enough. 

Integral theory is the most comprehensive and all encompassing guiding map to view the world and allows us to grasp problems that have been created by other worldviews during the industrial and scientific ages.

Thus everyone working on any complex or interdiscplinary problem should have a basic grasp and understanding of integral theory.

Integral Bristol would help promote and develop this and also create a community centre where practitioners can develop and grow their integral worldview through integral life practice creating Bristol as one of the first places in the UK as an integral hub.

The community centre would be using the pilot model of the  Integral Center in Boulder, Colorado to start up.

More and more people are becoming aware of the big issues and they're stacking up in front of us and yet most of the solutions are based on the same level of thinking that created the problems in the first place. 

In 2015 Bristol is European Green Capital but how does it compare to a truelly sustainable city or an ecovillage? Where Bristol is and where it needs to be are on completely different pages when thinking about environmentally sustainable cities.

Questions such as how do you mesh together the needs of large corporations like Imperial Tobacco and BAE with national security needs of the Ministry of Defence whilst creating a socially just, environmentally sound and spiritually fulfilling future and what is my role within that, just aren't asked. We don't have the level of understanding to comprehend them and even begin to tackle them at the moment.

Integral theory is used by people from Bill Clinton to Mikhael Gorbachev (State of the World Forum) and has inspired the development of ecovillages such as Auroville in India via Aurobindo & the Mother, business, edcuation, ecology, education to start tackling some of the big issues in the world to create more of the world we do want to see.

Bristol is a good city to start in. It's a city of extremes from slavery to Green Capital. Worst traffic congestion in the country to Cycling City. Home of Soil Assocation, Sustrans and Triodos Bank as well as Imperial Tobacco's global HQ, MOD and BAE. A city where the rich are rich and the poor are poor. What a perfect place for Integral thinking to get stuck in.