Purpose Conference

60,000 years of adaptation: How well are we integrating our history into the way we design our future? In their Purpose Stream session at the AdaptNSW Forum Paul Girrawah House shared how storytelling from First Nations perspectives can inform sustainable solutions, while Chris Andrew highlighted the importance of integrating cultural understanding into future designs. Bruce Chapman, architect of the HECS scheme, offered a compelling vision for designing systems to finance adaptation, encouraging us to think long-term and invest in our collective future. Key insights: - The power of storytelling to bridge past and future. - How cultural knowledge can guide us toward sustainable adaptation. - Creative financial models as tools for resilience and growth. A thought-provoking session reminding us that the best solutions often lie at the intersection of history and innovation.

'Liminal Landscapes’ by Melissa Gilbert of UnitePlayPerform is an 8-minute immersive experience blending biophilic design and sci-fi aesthetics to reflect on nature’s critical role in addressing the climate crisis. Through soft sculptures, inflatable orbs, and layered textures inspired by the Australian landscape, this multi-sensory artwork featured as part of the Purpose Conference Stream of the AdaptNSW Forum guided participants from eco-anxiety to empowerment. Featuring field recordings and AI-generated visuals, Liminal Landscapes symbolises cultural adaptation and transformation, offering a unique space for decompression, creativity, and healing. Using the UPP Methodology, the journey fosters personal activism—inviting participants to envision solutions for environmental challenges while exploring a profound sense of connection and renewal. Artist Melissa Gilbert Audio Production & Mastering Daniel Bourne Visual Production Timothy Seller Event Curator & Creative Director Kate Hurst AV AV1 Event Management Frank Wild

Storytelling is the ultimate bridge for collaboration and understanding. In her powerful session at the AdaptNsw Forum - Kaylene Langford, creative storytelling expert and proud First Nations woman, shared her wisdom on using stories to inspire change and connection across sectors.

We recently wrapped up two inspiring days presenting the Purpose Curated Sessions at the AdaptNSW Forum, and we're still feeling the energy and connection. A big thank you to the event partners, presenters and everyone who joined us for these uplifting conversations, sparky connections and important truths. Purpose Stream Presenters | Paul Girrawah House, Chris Andrew, Arielle Breit, Bruce Chapman, Andy Marks, Lee Schofield, Nathan Robertson-Ball, Katherine Trebeck, Kaylene Langford, Reece Proudfoot, Melissa Gilbert, Satyajit Das, Kate Leury Nielsen, Moragh Mackay, The Bowerbird Collective. Purpose Team | Sally Hill, Kate Hurst, Holly Horne, Natasha Ritz, Edwina Meade Event Team | Frank Wild, AV1 AdaptNSW team | Catherine Kerr, Ciska White, Brianna Barwise, Melanie De Gioia, Stephanie Clark

Last week, I was invited to be a presenter to the AdaptNSW Forum 2024 as part of the Purpose Conference stream. The session I facilitated alongside Arielle Breit and Andy Marks, was “Co-creating Symbiotic Futures with Generative AI” - a collaboration of Future For Now and the Symbiocene Institute. For me, this session offered an exciting glimpse into how we might use generative AI in workshops to build out our preferred futures. It was a live AI experiment (we had never done it before!), where we had 60 participants ideating around the future of food systems and the built environment, grounded in Symbiocene principles (they came up with 270 in about 20 minutes of ideation time!). To be able to collect someones idea, and within minutes have a visual representation of that idea was so thrilling. The experience of seeing participants absolutely beaming as their idea came on to screen was a special moment for me. We also managed to uplift optimism about the future by 36% in just 2 hours. This represents an important element of this workshop - that we need to start telling better stories about the future in which we want to live. By showing a possible (preferred) destination, we can start taking steps and actions towards making it a reality. In this video I go into the process of the workshop and showcase some of the AI-generated scenarios and concepts that were built live-time. A huge thanks to all the participants that helped collaborate on these ideas, as well as the Purpose Conference crew (Sally Hill, Natasha Ritz, Holly Horne, Kate Hurst), and AdaptNSW crew (Melanie De Gioia, Catherine Kerr, Catherine Naum, MSc). Shoutout to Elin Bandmann for her wonderful photography during the session, Abigail Thomas for her help and Glenn Albrecht for his Symbiocene principles. If this workshop design has sparked your interest, and you think it might be something you want your organisation or team to get involved in, please do reach out. Whilst we used the food system and built environment in this instance, the workshop could be designed around any system or industry. #generativeAI #speculativedesign #symbiocene #futuresthinking

Just coming down from the high of running our 'Co-creating Symbiotic Futures with Generative AI' workshop at the Adapt NSW Forum Purpose Conference yesterday, it was awesome! This was a bit of an experiment in how to bring together Symbiocene principles, futures thinking and generative AI, and guide a group of people to co-create ideas and bring them to life with the help of Gen AI - all in less than 2 hours. Thanks to a lot of intricate planning and an incredible group of people in the room who generated 270 ideas in 20 mins, it all came together fairly seamlessly. In a world where there’s a lot of despair about the future, we wanted to give people a chance to dream up futures they actually want to be part of and feel hopeful. And ideally also inspire them to think more about how they can integrate this thinking into their work. Keep an eye out—we’ll be sharing the results soon! Big thanks to my amazing co-hosts, Lee Schofield and Andy Marks, the Purpose team Sally Hill Kate Hurst Holly Horne Natasha Ritz for trusting us and and the Symbiocene Institute & Glenn Albrecht for giving us a framework to design better futures in partnership with the natural world.

Day two of AdaptNSW Forum was filled with conversations from the realities and consequences of our inaction on climate to future-thinking and real-world solutions from revenue contingent loans to a wellbeing economy. Here are some of our highlights from the day: - A banquet of consequences: Implications of inaction in the decisive decade. A poetic opening to the day with Nathan Robertson-Ball (Finding Nature) and Satyajit Das who boldly provoked us with the reality of our inaction. - Paul Girrawah House, Chris Andrew and Bruce Chapman brought us a session called, 60,000 years of adaptation: How well are we integrating our history into the way we design our future? “Non indigenous people are the problem our failures to adapt have caused real and irreversible harm.” Chris Andrews. - Bruce Chapman is the architect of HECs who aptly presented the idea that revenue contingent loans could be the answer for other types of lending, where people only pay back when it’s possible to do so. A great use case for these kinds of loans he shared was supporting climate adapted and regenerative farming. “Contingent loans mean: pay when you can. Pay more when you really can. Don’t pay anything when you really can’t. Capacity defines contingent debt.” - Co-creating Symbiotic Futures with Generative AI with Andy Marks (Symbiocene Institute), Arielle Breit and Lee Schofield (Future For Now) which took participants on an immersive journey into Glenn Albrecht's Symbiocene and put it into practice using AI in the session to create a new future together. “If you want people to go along the journey, we need to envision a better future and show people not just tell them. I was excited about the future and technology to dream up this better future together.” Arielle Breit - Nathan Robertson-Ball & Chris Andrew ran a session on Adaptive Finance - how do we pay for the impending transition? "The way we finance heavily influences our behaviour. We need to change our finance to encourage positive behaviour," Chris Andrew. - The auditorium was entranced with the musical beauty of The Bowerbird Collective’s, Anthony Albrecht and Simone Slattery, “we're an organisation that believes deeply in the power of art to tackle climate change,” Anthony Albrecht.  - The closing plenary left us considering the wellbeing economy and the case for economic systems change by the inspiring Katherine Trebeck who said, "we are spending a hell of a lot of money downstream because of the destruction we've made... We need to raise our gaze upstream and ask why." The day was closed by the wonder, Catherine Kerr from the AdaptNSW team, whose words were left humming around our minds as we went back out into the world: “Human consciousness emerged creating two opposing forces: entropy pulls us towards disconnection, greed and isolation. Emergence where collaboration and care drive us forward shaping new patterns of growth.” NSW Government #ClimateAdaptation #Symbiocene

AdaptNSW Forum (NSW Government) day one was packed with rich conversations around the challenge of climate adaption. Themes of truth, trust, justice, cohesion, regeneration, story and internal work were threaded throughout the day to build towards action around an adaptive future.  Some of the highlights from day one were:  - The opening panel by The Net Zero Commission with Cristien Hickey, Dr Paul Grimes, Oliver Costello and Meg McDonald. Where Oliver challenged us to listen to: “The rivers in our veins, and fire in our bellies if we look after our body, country can look after us, it’s good way to learn how to adapt and respond through change.” - The surprising mega trends shaping NSW and the world by Luke Heilbuth where he echoed Olivers thinking: “drawing on the the experience of the worlds oldest living culture, we have the chance to redefine prosperity. - Practical Sense-making and change-making through storytelling by Kaylene Langford. - A panel talk hosted by Reece Proudfoot who opened the discussion of; What on Earth is Regenerative Business? Discussing businesses that heal not steal. -  ⁠A panel hosted by Regen Labs’ Reece Proudfoot asked: What on Earth is Regenerative Business? Discussing how to design business models that are about ‘healing not stealing’.  •⁠ ⁠Melissa Gilbert ‘Missy’ Liminal Landscapes artworks were peppered throughout the venue. Missy and our very own Kate Hurst hosted an artist Q&A and discussed: “How to find places to process and integrate eco-grief so we can move forward and face the future.” Day one: truth, trust, self-work and storytelling. Looking forward to day two!

We are thrilled to announce that next weeks AdaptNSW Forum at The Roundhouse UNSW - has officially SOLD OUT!! For those of you lucky enough to get tickets the Purpose Conference team including Sally Hill, Holly Horne, Kate Hurst & Natasha Ritz are looking forward to seeing you there alongside the Purpose Stream presenters. Paul Girrawah House, Dr Dimity Podger, Arielle Breit , Bruce Chapman, Andy Marks, Lee Schofield, Nathan Robertson-Ball, Katherine Trebeck, Kaylene Langford, Reece Proudfoot, Melissa Gilbert, Chris Andrew, Satyajit Das, Moragh Mackay, The Bowerbird Collective. Thanks to the entire AdaptNSW team at NSW Government Catherine Kerr, Ciska White, Brianna Barwise, Melanie De Gioia, Stephanie Clark. Thanks also to the incredible Frank Wild & AV1 for bringing the event to life. https://lnkd.in/gE8XGrnu

Purpose Presents: What on Earth is Regenerative Business? Day 1 | 2:15pm | AdaptNSW Forum The Roundhouse, UNSW 29-30 Oct 2024 Regenerative businesses are emerging across Australia’s regions, building community resilience while creating positive social, environmental, and economic impacts. This thought-provoking session will dive into regenerative principles, showcase pioneering businesses, and uncover what it takes for them to thrive. Get ready for some inspiring stories of local innovation and community vitality. Presenters Reece Proudfoot – Regen Labs Dr Dimity Podger – Regen Labs Moragh Mackay – Mycelia Energy Collective Kate Leury Nielsen – Yambulla Find out more https://lnkd.in/g4N3bnEN #AdaptNSW #RegenerativeBusiness #ClimateAction #SustainableFuture #CommunityResilience