Transition Culture

12 Jan 2007

10 First Steps for a Transition Town Initiative #3. The Official Unleashing.

Despite one overexcitable Transition Culture reader writing that “‘Organising the great unleashing’ …has the added bonus of sounding totally filthy”, it is, perhaps disappointingly, nothing of the sort. We use the term ‘Unleashing’ because that is the sense that this event should embody. Through the first 2 stages, ideally you now have a groundswell of people fired up about peak oil and climate change and eager to start doing something. The aim of this event is to generate a momentum which will propel your initiative forward for the next period of its work.

The Official Unleashing of Transition Town Totnes was held last September, and had been proceeded by about 10 months of talks, film screenings and so on. By the time of the Unleashing, we felt that there was sufficient energy in the town to do this. This was based, entirely unsubjectively, on the fact that numbers at events were steadily increasing, more people wanted to stop us in the street to talk about it, and also the fact that we were getting impatient to kick it all off. How you judge when to do yours is entirely a matter of personal judgement.

Some groups, such as Transition Penwith, started pretty much from cold with an Unleashing, because they had the opportunity of having Richard Heinberg present it, a rare enough possibility. The ideal though, as I see it, is a bit like one of those toy volcanoes that children like; you gradually add a bit of vinegar, a bit of baking powder, a bit more vinegar, a bit more baking powder, until the pressure inside builds to an unbearable point, and then BAM, there is the Unleashing. It marks the arrival of the project, and it is a celebration of the community’s desire to act.

At the Totnes Unleashing, we began with a welcome by the Mayor of Totnes, who welcomed everyone and gave the project her blessing. Then I spoke, giving the case for peak oil and climate change, and that the two offer the great incentive to act and to build a world that could be preferable to the present. Then Chris Johnstone, author of ‘Find Your Power’ spoke. In his talk he said,

“Totnes has an opportunity here to be ground breaking internationally. Maybe in 400 years time… they will look back to this time at the beginning of the 21st century as a crucial time, as the last decades of the Oil Age, the time of the Great Turning. Maybe they will tell stories about what happened in Totnes. Maybe this evening will be something that is the beginning of one of those stories. If you look ahead at the future, there are gloomy possibilities, but there are also inspiring possibilities, and you are part of an inspiring possibility by being here tonight�.

I think it is important to stress, as Chris did, that this is an historic evening, the beginning of the great change, the evening people will look back to as the evening where it all started. There is a balance between it being perceived as too flaky for the serious environmentalists, and too dry for those who like to be more emotional about things. It is a balance Chris strikes perfectly, and I’m sure others can too. His angle is that, as observed in his addictions work, once we decide to act, we find our power, that in seemingly impossible situations, it is by doing it that we find qualities and strengths we never knew we had.

Other things we did at the Totnes Unleashing were getting people talking to each other in pairs about their concerns and fears about peak oil and climate change, as well as their visions for the future. They were invited to write these up on post-it notes and put them on the wall. These were subsequently typed up and emailed out to everyone who attended. As many opportunities for people to meet each other and to talk were built in as possible. It should be a memorable and historic occasion. How you do that will be different in each community.

It will inevitably be different from the usual peak oil presentation. It is not about bad news, gloom and doom and passing on to people the information about just how precarious our situation is. An Unleashing is a celebration of the possibilities that lie ahead of us if we act together with imagination and having harnessed our collective genius. Certainly the Totnes one created a huge amount of energy and goodwill that has driven it forward ever since. One thing we should have done and which I would recommend is to draw up a list of people to invite, councillors, planners, politicians, local movers and shakers, try and get them all in.

To close, an Unleashing is not something to be organised lightly. It is a once off opportunity to bring all those people together and to launch it. If you get it right, peoples’ lasting impressions are that this is a dynamic project which is going to do great things. A poorly organised, ill-attended, half-hearted Unleashing will make the next phase of your work an uphill struggle. I would think that 6 months to a year after your first End of Suburbia screening is about right, but clearly that depends on your situation. It should be a powerful, passionate, informative, and inspirational evening that people will remember for many years to come.

Monday’s Post will be: #4. Form Groups.