Presencing Series 1 - Separation of Self
✨ A Bigger Self, beyond our Illusion of Insignificance
We are living, most of us, under an illusion of insignificance. What if this very moment we have been born for. And if this is true, what is ours to do?
Hello everyone, and a warm welcome to our new readers. This article is part 1 of a muti-part series, offering my sensemaking and reflections on the recent Presencing Series led by Otto Scharmer and the Presencing Institute[1].
This is not a summary or retelling; it is an invitation to cultivate a different relationship with ourselves, with each other, and with our capacity to shape the world we’re in.
I invite not only your awareness, but also active participation. If you feel moved to get involved, please do contact me. The intention is to begin more collective experiments in the coming months, after the summer.
🔍 Why This Series, Why Now?
The Presencing Series was created as a global space for shared sensemaking — to help participants lean into this moment in history, co-sensemaking of where we are headed. To start a move towards a new understanding of how we can co-create in service to this challenge, and to begin creating a new shared story of possibility.
“We are living, most of us, under an illusion of insignificance. What if this very moment we have been born for. And if this is true, what is ours to do?” — Otto Scharmer
This is a constant thread throughout the series. What do we do when the systems that govern our lives no longer reflect the aspirations of most of the people in it?
The series was created to address this tension, and to offer not just tools or ideas, but practices and spaces for remembering what is possible. What we are capable of.
“It’s not just about changing the world. It’s about remembering that we can.”
⚖️ The Current Narratives and the Polarities of Humanity
Throughout the sessions, we explored the tension between two co-existing narratives:
The story of destruction and decline.
The story of emergence — something new being born.
“Something is being burned to the ground. And something else is being born. That second element is the least well-told story of our time.” — Otto Scharmer
A clear objective of the sessions was to enable people to start leaning more into the second narrative now.
To come more into the awareness of who we really are as humans, and to start to share and to create islands of coherence for global change.
🌊 Reflection
I reflected on this challenge over the past few weeks.
Asking myself - “why is it that we do not seem to have the time to consider our part in change”.
As a famous Buddhist scholar described it ,
“We are all skating on thin ice. But what if we say yes, I am willing to experience this moment?” — Ezra Bayda
The reality is that “business as usual”, is the world in which we spend most of our time. This is the third, hidden narrative. Here, we typically remain closed to any other narrative; separated from the bigger part of our inner selves and from possibility.
This separation from our “bigger self” is contributing to the systemic challenge. We collectively create the world the way it currently is.
🌻 Joanna Macy and Active Hope
I take this moment to honour the recent passing of Joanna Macy — Buddhist scholar, systems thinker, and co-founder of the Active Hope movement[3].
In the book, she named the three major narratives shaping our era:
Business as Usual
Collapse
The Great Turning
“If the world is to be healed through human efforts, I am convinced it will be by ordinary people — people whose love for this life is even greater than their fear.” — Joanna Macy
Active Hope is a practice of becoming available to the future that wants to be born through us. It is about shifting from "power over" to "power with," and cultivating the kind of hope that is connected and co-created through presence, action, and collective becoming.
You can still join the community and join the free courses online. [3]
🧭 Our Separation from our Bigger Self
In many ways the key message of the sessions and a vital building block of our agency within the Great Turning, is to start by work our own separation from our Bigger Self. That is, to become present to who we really are.
“You will never know your own heart until you let it speak.” — Nova[4]
Everything begins with the inner terrain. Before new systems, structures, or collaborations can take root, we must first cultivate inner coherence.
The quality of our presence determines the possibilities we can participate in.
In the “business and usual” world, we are often stuck in headspace, disconnected from the deeper knowing of the body. The body as a sensing organ. Not just of survival, but of relational wisdom of whole-body intelligence and sensing.
Being present is the moment when we decide that we will step out of any narrative we are supporting, the stories we use to create our many identities, provide safety and control; and move inward to meet our deeper selves. A deeper coherence and knowing of who we are beyond our hopes and fears.
🌀 Inner Coherence and Our Agency for Change
During each of the six sessions, presencing practices and tools were introduced. I personally found the “attending” sessions led by Arawani Hayashi as such a pleasure. These were profound and shared moments where one could move into a simple but powerful inner coherence.
Arawani spoke often and with soft care and clarity about our own body intelligence, the social body intelligence and the earth body that we are all an integral part of.
Inner coherence isn’t about perfection. It’s about presence and asking:
Who am I, really — beyond plans, fears, or goals? Who am I when I’m not just chasing what I think I want?
🕊️ A Living Invitation
Please consider this article as perhaps a threshold. One you may feel invited to cross and discover more for yourself in your own time. One where you start to believe in change and to let go of any illusion of insignificance.
“We are not part of the whole — we are each the whole in part.”
Reach out if you feel the stirrings of shared action. Pause, if you feel called to listen more deeply. And above all, trust that the future we long for is not a fantasy, it is a possibility we can learn to presence, together.
🪴 Questions for Ongoing Reflection in Presencing
What does life want from me now?
Where am I numbed or disconnected. What would it take to bring presence there?
What new capacities are being asked of me when I let go of the noise?
What is my life Intention? What roots it?
Who do I need to be to midwife to this intention?
These are not questions to provide answers but rather to stir change.
📚 References
[1] Otto Scharmer & Presencing Institute – https://www.presencing.org/
[2] UNDP Human Development Report (2022) – https://hdr.undp.org/
[3] Macy, Joanna & Johnstone, Chris (2012). Active Hope: How to Face the Mess We’re in Without Going Crazy
[4] Nova’s quote from Presencing Series dialogue (2024)