We are experiencing a paradigm crisis that is having profound impacts on people and nature. What is often referred to as a polycrisis, a megacrisis, a metacrisis, or a permacrisis leaves little room for a sense of individual and collective agency. To respond to a paradigm crisis, we need to be open to different ways of thinking about our individual and collective agency and our capacities to generate rapid social change. Taking wholeness as a point of departure, this talk focuses on fractal approaches to scaling just and sustainable transformations. Fractal approaches integrate the practical, political, and personal spheres of transformation to generate patterns that contribute to whole-systems change. I will draw on insights from Ken Wilber’s integral theory, Monica Sharma’s radical transformational leadership, Paolo Freire’s approach to pedagogy, and my own work on quantum social change. I’ll conclude by reflecting on what this means in practice and why practice matters – and not the least why you matter – when it comes to global sustainability.
