Opening Remarks from the Design to Heal: Virtual Conference

For 228 Accelerator’s first Design to Heal: Virtual Conference, it is my humble intention that we emerge as a learning community that allows itself to learn together, work together, and design together. 

Much is at stake, especially since it feels like the world that we are left with has left us behind and left us out. This current version of the world is tearing us apart, both privately and publicly. We spend more on health care than most developing nations, yet have lower life expectancies. The sovereignty of our bodies is under siege, as are the stories we can tell and discuss in school. Disintegration, Separation, and Dysregulation are core design features and are core pillars in this current version. It is not healthy or normal. Fighting against it makes us exhausted and weary. Fighting against it creates more oppositional relationships. We need a version of a new world. But where is it? How do we respond? What do we design?  

At 228 Accelerator, we believe a new world is possible and that our own healing is not just “nice to have,” but a requirement. A body's ideas are only as healthy as the body itself. Think for a second about how well you think, dream, and imagine when you are suffering from constant stress, pain, and anxiety. I am no doctor, but it does not take a medical professional to know that the ideas of brokenness come from broken bodies. To this end, the priority of healing is now centered in our equity design work. We are releasing an updated version of the equityXdesign framework that you all will have the first look at before the public, and will spend the next chapter of our work helping others design innovations that heal and scale equity.  

We are excited to join a legacy of techniques that are both traditional and emerging in order to explore how they can help us do our work better. We know that when we do our work better, we create spaces for our community members to do their work better. We also know that when bodies are healed and are able to move differently, they think differently. And when we all have the time and space to think differently at scale, when our private bodies have the time and space to break stories that no longer serve us and write new ones, we allow the Public Body to emerge unbounded and free. There is only then one problem in equity work from our perspective. Problems can be defined as phenomena that threaten the range of motion, imagination, and flexibility of a body. We need to acknowledge the edges of our collective and personal traumas, and walk together to mend, heal, and come back to ourselves. 

But how do we do that healing work when it feels like everything is moving so fast, when moving faster, being more productive, doing more, and accumulating more seems to be the ethic of the day. New words like metaverse and Web3 have gained more and more currency lately and they are following similar generational patterns of storytelling. The most rich and powerful have the time and space to create the worlds that they want, using the tools that they want. They can define the problems they want and create the solutions to solve those problems. Our lives may become more convenient but the real problems persist. I do not want to create an us and them relationship that is oppositional in nature, because it is false. It's easy to fall into this pattern when there is incentive to numb the edges of our private pain, distance ourselves from our own suffering, and look away from the suffering of the Public Body.

But healing starts with the acknowledgment of my story and its life within a larger story that transcends space and time, and the braver acknowledgement that the bleeding edge of the margins in the Public Body exist in me also. 

That acknowledgement alone is healing and the beginning of a new story. It acknowledges that we are cosmically connected, interdependent, and each other’s cosmic complement. But how do we reach as many people as we can with our messages of equity and healing in this current environment? How do we heal at scale? And how can we use emerging technologies to help us answer that question? How do we move faster than the speed of money and power? 

These are some of the questions we are exploring together in the Design to Heal: Virtual Conference. This is designed to be an inspirational space, one that inspires becoming, emerging, and learning. We will be talking about emerging technology, so we don't have all the answers yet, but know that together we can find them. We are going to talk about money and wealth and their roles in healing. We have some experts joining us to help us establish a stable footing as learners in this emerging world. We will have to stay engaged in this beautiful space of ambiguity, and know that we can learn hard things when we are together.   

This is my hope for this learning space. It is my intention that the circle comes alive with your questions, resources you find and share, and that you’ll come back to this space often for renewal and refreshment. I am so thrilled that you have joined us for the ride. 

Reflecting for the Future

We start designing this future by building community and sharing our own intentions. Let us think about this quote and our intentions for the learning spaces.

"I am moreover a Luddite, in what I take to be the true and appropriate sense. I am not ‘against technology’ so much as I am for community. When the choice is between the health of a community and technological innovation, I choose the health of the community. I would unhesitatingly destroy a machine before I would allow the machine to destroy my community. I believe that the community-in the fullest sense: a place and all its creatures-is the smallest unit of health and that to speak of the health of an isolated individual is a contradiction in terms."

Here are some prompts for reflection:  

• What is your intention for your learning journey? How do you want to show up as a learner in this emergent space?

• When you reflect on the Wendell Berry quote, what resonates most with you? What does it mean to you? 

To get started on this healing journey, I would like to engage you in an imaginative exercise. Close your eyes, open your ears, and relax your body.

Imagine a world where all people—especially people of color, queer folk, and first generation immigrants—have the chance to connect and share their wealth, resources, and gifts across time and space effortlessly in ways that enable them to spend time on what makes them come alive. Imagine a world where everyone in America learns and works in a place that acknowledges their racial identity, prepares them to lead and participate in our economy and democracy, and repairs and restores relationships that keep us divided. Imagine a world where leaders in America co-design and co-create bespoke and equitable learning experiences with their communities. Imagine an ecosystem where networks of leaders support each other in designing innovative and equitable learning cultures and schools that enable every child to develop and share their gifts. Imagine a constellation of learning centers, established and emerging, traditional and transformational, and lifelong learners who are able to lead across lines of difference and develop the skills to heal themselves and others.

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