By Roz Savage I didn’t used to have any sense of my power to make a difference. None. For many years I was just a corporate drone, doing my thing, usually not very well. To the extent that I was interested in world affairs, it was as a bystander. If something needed fixing, “somebody” would surely fix it. Then something ...

By Manda Scott Science tells us that evolution happens under moments of intense pressure in any species. Also that any complex system reaches a maximal point of complexity after which it either collapses into chaos and extinction OR it shifts to a whole new level of complexity, which was impossible to predict from the previous state. Given both of these ...

By Ben Mali Macfadyen - Catalyst course facilitator “The apocalypse is always easier to imagine than the strange circuitous routes to what actually comes next.” - Rebecca Solnit, Hope in the Dark. I arrived at Embercombe as a 19 year old activist. I was full of passion but completely burnt out by the scale of the crises in the world, ...

By Mac Macartney - Founder of Embercombe The origins of The Journey and its follow up programme The Descent emerged from one of the many challenging experiences I received at the hands of my Native American mentors. It went something like this. “To discover the spirit that moves in all things and seek to align with this power is a ...

By Robert Holtom It is a four-bar gate with carved insignia, like ivy creeper, and through the bars you look, you hesitate, because the train was slow and now you’re late. But it doesn’t matter, and you know that too, so enter and walk the pocked tarmac road, go quick or go slow, just know you are home, and all ...

A message from Mac It is in knowing myself to be wild that I find the deepest sense of belonging. Like the bramble that spears the footpath, lurching the divide, wildness simply is and will not be gainsaid. This year the Oaks of Embercombe lay their seed upon the ground and invite all-comers to harvest, store, and move airborne to ...

By Fiona Barnes We have just held a powerful, joyful, inspirational weekend, welcoming alumni and new individuals and families to the land. The equinoxial weather brought the change of the season to the valley; winds, rain and sunshine.The apple trees bowed down with the bounty of the summer filled boxes and pockets with juicy fruit, to eat, cook or store ...

Manda Scott tells us a little more about the SPIRIT OF ACTIVISM course we’re running at Embercombe in November. 3 full bursary places are being offered - apply before 25th October This is the bringing together of my years’ work - and probably the bulk of my life’s work going on from here.  It’s one part of my answer to ...

Awakening the Wild Cook WithinBy Sophia Young - Cook in residence for Women Rising Rooted I think it would be fair to say that the bowels of the earth have a question for us and their voice is undoubtedly growing louder and louder, yet in a peculiar, quietly-understated way. I wonder if you have heard it too? Yes, the persistent, ...

By – Mac Macartney This time of year, ten years ago, I lived in a frozen world of ice, snow, tiny fires, and long, long nights. Unsighted, with no map or compass, I would look to the stars for guidance as I made my uncertain way from the place of my birth in Malvern to the island that shocked me …