Welcome to Growing Good Lives
Growing Good Lives seeks to reclaim economics as the ‘Art of Living Well’. Working in collaboration with community groups, organisations and institutions. We deliver training, talks and events which aim to upend conventional notions of economic value, to open our imaginations to ways of living that meet human needs in harmony with all of life.
the back story
For as long as I can remember I have been interested in what brings out the best – and the worst – in us and how we can create a world in which humans can thrive in harmony with each other and the living Earth. Thirteen years ago that interest led me to the work of Chilean economist Manfred Max-Neef and for the last decade I have been sharing his Human Scale Development (HSD) approach with people of all ages and walks of life – from students to community groups to business leaders.
It is becoming clear to most of us that all our systems need rethinking. The financial crises, Corona virus and the climate emergency are demanding that we do things differently from now on.
My experience as an artist, storyteller and improvisation teacher tells me that we need to address not only the physical practicalities of changing our systems, but actively cultivate our ‘radical collective imagination’. This vital capacity will allow us to vision a socially, ecologically and economically just future together. Educating ourselves about the myriad regenerative social and economic alternatives, existing and emerging, will give us the tools to make it happen.
Growing Good Lives is my contribution to this radical collective re-imagining.
Inez Aponte – Founder
MEDIA
Tedx Stroud 2021 – Reclaiming the art of living well – and why our future depends on it
Interview with upstream
Totnes street games festival
Sunday 23rd April 2017 was the day of the Totnes Street Games Festival. In the recently-renovated Rotherfold square, parents and children gathered to remember, relearn and encounter street games. The square was filled with laughter, children dashing around, skipping ropes, bouncing balls, chalk drawings. In this podcast, I speak to the organisers, children and parents to capture a sense of the day and why it matters.
Totnes futures – Totnes Pound report, 2018
https://growinggoodlives.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Totnes-Pound-report.pdf
The Totnes Pound was one of the first local currencies in the UK and has inspired similar initiatives across the nation. It was started to help keep money flowing locally and has succeeded in educating and inspiring people from around the world. It has however come to a cross roads: after years of hard work the volunteers who have been carrying it forward are ready to take a step back. Aware of this ‘change or die’ moment, in February this year I offered to research possible ways for the Totnes Pound to be re-envisioned.
A land conference – totnes, devon 2015
On 21st March 2015 130 people attended a one-day conference in Totnes to explore ‘How can we grow a proper relationship between people and place?’
We made a seven minute film and conference report, which provides links to audio recordings of the presentations that were given.