I’ve been exploring the economic forces that shape our world for a few years now and the more I learn, the clearer it becomes that underneath the many layers of economic and environmental crises is a kind of crisis of spirituality and of how we conceive of ourselves as human.

I feel deeply honoured and excited to share this conversation with Pip Ranby, who is, among many other things, one of my favourite people in the world.

Pip is both a spiritual teacher and a friend. I first came across her as my partner Rachel’s teacher in creative arts therapy. I got to know her when we asked her to be our marriage celebrant. She was an incredible comfort and guide as we navigated the difficult territory of working out what marriage meant to us as a queer couple and organising our love festival, which was amazing but stressful. Since then I’ve been seeing her regularly for what we call “spiritual accompaniment” sessions. She helps me make sense of life when I lose my way and has been an enormous support through the grief of losing my Dad and accompanying my Mum through her journey with dementia. I’ve attended many of Pip’s workshops, retreats and gatherings, and find them an enormous source of nourishment and peace in my life.

I first had the idea to invite Pip for this conversation in 2023 at a workshop she facilitated on trauma and spirituality, which I attended straight after the annual conference of Wellbeing Economy Alliance Aotearoa. I was struck by how the wisdom and presence Pip was sharing spoke to the heart of the economic problems we’d been circling at the conference.

I was struck by the way Pip dignified the struggle of trying to live within our economic system. She spoke about “industrial scale forces” that we experience intimately through our bodies. These forces are delivered through pervasive messaging which reduces women’s physicality to appearance, justifies sexual violence and silences voices of emotion and spirit.

In this conversation Pip tells her personal story of trauma, loss and healing with incredible vividness and generosity. She shares her experiences of disordered eating, sexual violence and being helped out of the CTV building when it collapsed in the Christchurch earthquake. She speaks to the way these experiences of wounding and trauma opened her to the healing power of spirit and greater perception. Her story tenderly points to a pathway of healing that I believe lies at the heart of our economic regeneration. It reveals a more noble and generous idea of what it could mean to be human and the possibility of rebuilding practices, culture and economies from this more generous interconnected point of view.

I hope you enjoy it.

Links

To find out more about Pip’s offerings visit her website: https://www.philipparanby.co.nz/

She also mentioned the following people who have been inspirations and guides:

* Cynthia Bourgeault: https://www.cynthiabourgeault.org/

* Gabrielle Roth’s 5Rhythms dance: https://www.5rhythms.com/gabrielle-roths-5rhythms/

Music

The music I’ve used in the interview is a glimpse of a song written by my wife Rachel (with a little contribution from me) and performed by the two of us. We haven’t shared the verses here, just the chorus. It’s called “Rising and Falling”. It feels special to share it in the context of this conversation with someone we both love and admire.

Kia ora!

It’s been a while since I’ve shared a podcast - partly because this one has taken ages to make! I’ve been reflecting on my interviews and learnings over the last year as I’ve been exploring the economics of homes and kāinga. I’ve pulled together snippets of interviews, passages from books and my own reflections of the subtle and profound ways this journey has shaped my life.

I’m hoping that through this show I can share with you the blessings I’ve received from the beautiful people and ideas I’ve met. I’d love to give permission and hospitality to all the complex feelings we have while searching for home and belonging. I’d particularly like to open up a dialogue for Pākehā, searching for ways to belong in this whenua and to offer some of the pathways I’ve discovered in this exploration.

My hope is to create more connections and contribute to a sense of possibility and togetherness as we all navigate these fractured times where it’s so easy to shut down and let our differences separate us.

Lots of love,

Loo

This conversation was just what I needed to lift my spirits after a year of overwhelmingly depressing news. Talking to Rebecca felt like meeting a slightly older and more illustrious version of myself. It gave me hope that it’s possible to live in a more intuitive and connected way without disengaging from the institutions and systems of society.

Like me, Rebecca found it hard to choose between subjects at school and university because it was the connections between them that intrigued her most. Her instinct for finding unexpected connections has led her on a fascinating career path, starting with a degree in Chemistry and Maths and moving into architecture where she was captivated by discourses around feminism, art and Te Ao Māori. For several years she has played leadership roles in Massey University’s College of Creative Arts. She recently stepped down as Deputy Pro Vice Chancellor to dedicate more time to The Pākehā Project and other creative acts of decolonisation.

Rebecca talks about how we’ve based our society and our entire approach to the world on the completely wrong assumption that we are separate and that our problems can be solved by pulling things apart and analysing the pieces. She calls this a “traumatised logic” - a way of thinking that has broken the world up into pieces and left us disconnected and at odds with each other.

The Pākehā Project, is about becoming aware of these underlying assumptions and opening to other ways of seeing the world. It’s about learning how to listen and step back as well as using our privileges and positions of power to shift the systems we operate within.

I love the way she describes this work as a joyful creative act. It reconnects us to our own vitality and opens us up to other beings and the living world.

Links and references

In the interview Rebecca names some of her heroes and influences. Here are some links to follow up:

* Sarah Treadwell - artist, architect and academic

* Báyò Akómoláfé - author, speaker, teacher

* Nora Bateson - filmmaker, writer, educator and creator of Warm Data

* Veronica Tawhai - scholar and educator operating from an ethic of love

* Louise Marra - Rebecca’s tuakana and co-founder of The Pākehā Project

The guitar music you’ll hear at the end of the conversation is by Rebecca’s brother Ben. It was the accompaniment to a song they sang together at their father’s funeral.

Jessica is a kaupapa Māori researcher, author and advocate as well as being a farmer. She is the director and founding trustee of the Papawhakaritorito Charitable Trust which is all about decolonising our food systems and restoring indigenous food sovereignty. She lives with her wife Jo Smith (Waitaha, Kāti Māmoe, Kāi Tahu) on twelve acres of beautiful whenua in the foothills of the Tararua with the Remutaka and Orongorongo behind and Pākuratahi Forest Park nearby.

Jessica was involved in establishing Hua ParaKore, a kaupapa Māori system and framework for growing kai. It’s sometimes referred to as Māori organics, but it’s much more than just looking after the soil and our health. Hua Parakore is about reweaving the intricate web of relationships that connect us with each other and with our cultural and spiritual landscapes.

“When I think about Māori food sovereignty,” Jessica says, "I think about food as whanaunga. Food is our relation. It comes from our cultural and spiritual landscapes, from the deities, Tāne Mahuta of the forest, Haumia-tiketike, Hineahuone, deity of soil, Papatūānuku and Ranginui. We are connected to those landscapes through our whakapapa of being the younger sibling, the youngest in the order.”

Jessica and Jo are storytellers, activists, researchers and gardeners. Through their work with the Trust they connect dots across the food system, hold hui and bring growers together to amplify those spaces. At their farm they put the ideas into practice, growing food and restoring the native forest to re-cloak Papatūānuku.

Over the past decade, Jessica has also worked extensively in the Māori housing sector, leading the Building Better Homes, Towns and Cities National Science Challenge, as their Director Māori and helping to build Māori research and capability in the Māori housing area. Along with Jo, she edited the book Kāinga tahi, Kāinga rua, which gathers together Māori experiences and aspirations for housing.

In our conversation, Jessica weaves together the kaupapa of housing and food sovereignty, showing how deeply connected they are. She talks about how colonial capitalism not only separated Māori from their ancestral kāinga, it has broken up family units, destroyed indigenous foodways and waterways and dismanteled the fabric of communities. She speaks about how current policy-settings create impossible barriers for Māori wanting to live intergenerationally and the pain of watching our current government pull out supports for papakāinga among many other things. Her hope and aspiration lies in Māori being empowered to take the lead in finding solutions. Her vision is for food to be the hub and heart of our communities - how we grow it and our relationship with the soil and seed.

“I have a vision for indigenous food systems in Aotearoa”, she says, “that are thriving, intergenerational, connected to people in place, that are hua parakore, and that are creating a wellbeing of mauri-rich, abundant kai for people… My vision is for beautiful, healthy people, lands and soils, where we have sovereignty over ourselves.”

Some helpful links:

https://www.papawhakaritorito.com/

https://jessicahutchings.org/