What's on

Arrive at St Giles House and settle into your accommodation.

6pm – Gather in the Library, in the main house.

Welcome from our host, Nick Ashley-Cooper.

Introduction to the weekend with Pippa Evans and Jonathan Rowson.

Dinner

After dinner entertainment: The Realisation Players (Pippa Evans, Christopher Ash and Susan Harrison) ask us what we are arriving at the festival with, and transform it into improvised, musical vignettes. A truly spontaneous beginning to the weekend that has to be seen to be believed.

Early morning activities – yoga, running, wild swimming in the stream

Breakfast

Difference, Divisions, Diversity – Panel Discussion chaired by Mark Vernon.

Our invited speakers talk about the current landscape of polarisation and, with their distinctive perspectives, also ask us to start to think differently about difference. Drawing from life experience, historical insights and cultural analysis Linda Woodhead, Indra Adnan (tbc) and Satish Kumar will open up themes for the weekend and ground them, personally and politically.

Break

Small Groups

What were you most moved or provoked by? Discuss what’s been heard with the task of forming a shared question/comment to bring back to the whole group.

Whole group

Hear back about discussions in the small groups with further thoughts from the panel.

Lunch

A choice of workshops.

i. Holding Improvised Space
Susan Harrison takes us through the basics of improvisation as an ensemble. How do we simultaneously work together and bring our individual offerings? Using movement and physicality, we will play with the fundamental idea of ‘Yes And’ whilst considering what it is to be both in agreement and at odds with each other. (90 mins, maximum 20 people)

ii.  Live recording of The Sacred Podcast
The Sacred is a podcast about our deepest values, the stories that shape us and how we can build empathy and understanding between people who are very different. In this live recording, host Elizabeth Oldfield, talks with peace-pilgrim, life-long activist and former monk, Satish Kumar. (90 mins)

iii. It’s About Time
A workshop for awakening the temporal imagination. In this temporics workshop, Perspectiva associate director of practice and Zen Monk, Ivo Mensch, takes us on a tour through the evolution of our experience of time and why we need to care for our temporal diversity at this moment in history. Prepare for a marriage of some theory & and practices. (70 mins, maximum 30 people)

iv. Nature’s principles of harmony and learning to live differently
Richard Dunne explores nature’s universal principles of harmony and why they are so important in helping us live differently and more sustainably, into the future. The workshop includes a practical element with the chance to try out some sacred geometry. (90 mins, maximum 30 people)

v. Artificial Intelligence: the threat and subtle opportunity.
Mark Vernon discusses how the spread of AI poses tremendous risks for a society that has forgotten the potency of different types of intelligence and projects its shadow onto the AI-other. He will use the poems and imagery of William Blake in particular to ask about a freer tomorrow. (90 mins)

Tea

The Metaphysics of Difference: A Deep Dive with Iain McGilchrist

How might a half truth be more valuable than one deemed complete? Why is attention and perspective fundamental to our participation in life? What are the limits of the impulse to include and tolerate? Is there a worldview fit for contemporary challenges? Iain McGilchrist offers his distinctively thrilling take on the social, psychological and spiritual aspects of difference.

Dinner

After dinner entertainment – firepit, stargazing

Early morning activities – yoga, running, wild swimming in the stream

Breakfast

Beyond Projection, Engaging Insights. A Future for Difference.

Panel discussion chaired by Mark Vernon

Difference can be valuable. Lessons may be learnt from particular experiences that can spark the social imagination. Conversely, what errors do contemporary philosophies, politics and even the languages we speak draw us into, perhaps unawares? Might limitations and vulnerability be our friends, not enemies? Tomiwa Owolade, Kübra Gümüşay and Tom Shakespeare help us re-envision the themes and aspirations that are emerging.

Break

Small Groups

What were you most challenged or inspired by? Discuss what’s been heard with the task of forming a shared question/comment to bring back to the whole group.

Whole group

Hear back about discussions in the small groups with further thoughts from the panel.

Lunch

A choice of workshops.

i. Clashing Chords
Christopher Ash leads this exploration of the voice and song, playing with harmony, dissonance and holding notes that don’t seem to fit, culminating in the co-creation of a song drawing on the themes of the festival. All voices, whatever shape or size, welcome. (120 mins, maximum 20 people)

ii. Unlearning and Reimagining Success. 
Ed Haddon on discovering a different voice, the one that can be adaptable and courageous, positive and maverick. This inner guide can help unfold what’s uniquely and distinctively yours and, therefore, be not only personally satisfying but likely of wider benefit to society, too. (90 mins, maximum 40 people)

iii. Antidebate
with Jonathan Rowson, Indra Adnan and Ivo Mensch. How can public debate become less combative, more constructive, and possibly a transformative journey of discovery? This practical workshop, building on last year’s exploration, will involve sharing views, learning from others and tackling difficulties in novel ways. (90 mins)

iv. What do we know about free time? 
Dominique Savitri Bonarjee invites you to experience time inside the body and the materiality of time as we experience it at an imaginal and sensory level of perception. A participative inquiry using fluidity and movement, drawn from Dominique’s dance and art practice. (90 mins)

v. Ripples
This mindfulness-based workshop with Grace McIntyre uses writing and art to create a collective story with postcards. Welcoming playfulness and the unknown, it is designed to help individuals process their experiences of challenge and connection from the weekend by supporting their meaning-making. (90 mins, maximum 20 people)

Tea

Open mic
A chance to share individual thoughts and reactions, activities and aspirations. Sign up for a 5 minute platform.

Dinner

I’m With The Band 

A very serious folk band improvise very serious songs about very serious things. Please bring your very serious ideas.

followed by Dance Party

For one night only, EDM adept, DJ Nick AC, returns to deliver musical trips and journeys in the St Giles House basement nightclub. Till midnight.

Early morning activities – yoga, running, wild swimming in the stream

Breakfast

Pack up rooms and tents

Forging Links, Finding Futures

Rory Stewart, joining us remotely, in conversation with Jonathan Rowson and Indra Adnan.

Reflections, and small groups final meeting

What might we take forward from the weekend?  What might we leave behind?

Endings

We gather together and bid farewell to the weekend.

Lunch (optional)

Bus leaves for the station at 14:30.

All leave St Giles by 15:00.