It is high time for a system stop. My life theme as an organizational developer, pilot project manager and social entrepreneur is “paradigm shift”. As a personal contribution, I have founded an educational platform, guided social organizations in Central Europe, built up the knowledge center Ecotopia in Österlen and written a book. I grew up on a farm in the soil of Skåne, and as a returnee I now live in Österlen but have spent my professional life in the heart of Europe. My task has been to guide social organizations in a paradigm shift in the public, private and church sectors. The educational platform was located in Austria and was the starting point that led me to Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and Switzerland. It was a fantastic professional life with clients, politicians and civil servants who, like me, were passionate about a shift with new working methods and tools based on a completely new set of values. After this vision was realized and the platform was handed over to a young generation, I returned home to Skåne. Here I gained the insight to put my previous profession on the shelf and seek a new vision.
This new vision, today's pension vision, turned out to be a knowledge center for co-creating a sustainable future. Nowadays, I am also trained in permaculture design, sustainable construction and housing. In this holistic knowledge center Ecotopia without profit, where I live in a straw bale house, since 2012, mainly Swedish but also international course leaders and lecturers have been teaching. This in subjects that I believe constitute the cornerstones of tomorrow's social system in a new paradigm: ecological construction and energy efficiency, ecological farming and permaculture, sustainable health and natural medicine, vegan and raw food as well as cooking with wild edible plants, sustainable economy with social benefit, personal development with mindfulness and yoga for increased awareness and social sustainability. Course participants have been involved in the construction of the knowledge center, which consists of a meeting place, future workshop, five eco-cottages, an environmental cottage as well as a single-family house and a stable in straw bale technology. Ecotopia is best known for its future workshop inspired by anthroposophy, cooking with wild edible plants, its health retreats and courses in straw bale house construction.
It was certainly interesting to build a sustainable lifestyle and a holistic knowledge center, administer, take care of the economy, cook and clean, but was that really all I was supposed to do as a returnee? My life is characterized by two very different European cultures. Nothing here is the same as it was there and vice versa. Today I live in a free zone on the edge of this social system that I fundamentally question. Imagine, when I was sitting and writing the book, it happened. Covid-19 initiated a system shutdown and the paradigm shift both here and in Austria. This happened at the same time as I was writing the final chapter of my first book. What a gift after four decades of longing. Nothing else is as important to me as this evolutionary leap in human history.
www.ecotopia.se
