Benjamin

 

 

 For me, the definition of Permaculture is always changing and evolving, just like nature....

 

 

"Permaculture is a whole design science that pulls from natural patterns and promotes mutually beneficial relationships. Permaculture’s ethological intention of Earth Care, People Care and Fair Share helps employ ecological principles that are rooted in Indigenous wisdom. Through this powerful system, we are lead to a place of remembering our true nature and purpose within the environment and cosmos." 

 

I am the co-founder and Program director of the Permaculture First Responder Educational Initiative. I sit on the advisor Board of The Urban Permaculture Guild and am a registered teacher in Permaculture Design from the Permaculture Research Institute in Australia. Currently I am teaching with The Solar Living Institute, The Occidental Arts and Ecology Center  The Esalen Institute, as well as in partnership with a handful of other localized organizations.

FLow Forms ~ Water Restoration

As a main organizer for the Bay Area Regional Permaculture Convergence since 2003, We have helped build networks and strengthen relationship within the Permaculture community throughout the West Coast.

Check out our newly formed groups here on WISER Earth

 

Life takes us on amzing and profound journies and in 2006 I was selected as one of the 112 visionaries for The Table of Free Voices held in Berlin, Germany on September 9th 2006. A innovative project of Dropping Knowledge in which the likes of Jerry Mander, Cornel West, Helena Nordeberg-Hodge, Anthony Arnove, Steve Earle, Jodi Evans, Bianca Jagger, Anuradha Mittal, myself and others answered some of the most pressing questions of our time set forth by the global populous. The answers archived on the web, copyleft, a 100 questions and 11,200 answers to ignite a global dialog.

 

Table of Free Voices, Berlin, Germany September 2006

 

 

Celebrating the pleasures of the table as a 'Gastronome' and as a food producer my wife and I were selected as delegates to represent our food community at the Slow Food Summit, Terra Madre, in Turin Italy in October of 2006. We represented in part the Mayan Corn Motherseed project from Schools for Chiapas, in which we helped facilitate a living Seed bank of GE-Free indigenious corn throughout North America from the Oceansong Farm in West Sonoma County. By connecting and strengthening relations with food communities from around the world at this amazing gathering, we see that as farmers we all speak the same language; that of the soil. the water, the air and of the spirit.

 

Vadanda Shiva @ Terra Madre on the Future of the Seeds

Currently I am a  Resident Land Steward, on the coastal bluffs of Big Sur in Central California. My current projects are dealing with strengthening the local communities food relationships by helping to create a model for a regenerative harvest for local food security. Ideas are through a Farming collective and CSA Co-op. I am also very involved in facilitating learning for people and communities on the immensely importance of using Permaculture principles and practices to prepare and respond in times of Peak Oil and Natural Disasters.

As an educator and promoter of responsible land stewardship I am nourished by my involvment in cultivating the edge of educational modalities. I place a strong emphasis on what it takes to be human and live in balance with the earth. I am committed to this life long work and pull strength from Buddhist teachings and a daily yoga practice; believing that in order to purify the body and mind one must give.