Seeds of a Second Renaissance Issue 6 (July 2025) – Thích Nhất Hạnh on Interbeing
A short introduction to "interbeing" and how recognising life as radically interconnected can lead towards more compassionate ways of living. Plus, events & opportunities for inner-led change.
Welcome to Seeds of a Second Renaissance* – a monthly newsletter for explorers of inner-led change towards radically wiser societies. For both seasoned travellers and those new to these shores, each edition offers a bite-sized exploration of keystone ideas, and thinkers whose work you may wish to know more deeply.
This month, a brief introduction to Thích Nhất Hạnh’s teaching on interbeing: how recognising life as radically interconnected can lead towards more compassionate ways of living.
Below, you’ll also find curated events, opportunities, and resources.
As we prepare the current issue, we’re absorbing the news that Joanna Macy, a devoted elder in this space and beloved teacher to many, died peacefully on 19th July 2025. Joanna’s vision has supported countless souls to restore a sense of connection with all life, nourishing activism and sacralising care in a wounded world. Read more about her work here.
Thích Nhất Hạnh on Interbeing: recognising radical interconnectedness with all life
Faced with breakdown across multiple dimensions of society, many agree that we’re overdue a reckoning with the deep, collective worldviews* that underpin dysfunctional modern life. Some advocates for cultural transition identify a particular shift necessary to transform rivalry and exploitation towards a wiser, life-respecting future: from a worldview of separateness to one of interbeing.
*(roughly, core beliefs about what reality is and what it means to be human)
Zen Buddhist monk Thích Nhất Hạnh (1926-2022) was a revered peace activist and spiritual leader. Exiled from Vietnam, he founded Plum Village monastery in France. Among his many gifts to contemplative activism, the term “interbeing” points to the fundamental truth of interdependence: all that exists does so by virtue of relationship with everything else. “There is no such thing as an individual separate self,” he wrote:
“A flower is made only of non-flower elements, such as chlorophyll, sunlight, and water. If we were to remove all the non-flower elements from the flower, there would be no flower left. A flower cannot be by herself alone. A flower can only inter-be with all of us. It’s much closer to the truth. Humans are like this too. We can’t exist by ourselves alone. We can only inter-be. I am made only of non-me elements, such as the Earth, the sun, parents, and ancestors.” (Thích Nhất Hạnh, How to Love)
Reflecting upon a troubled modern society founded on destructive individualism, Thích Nhất Hạnh saw a profound need to reorient the sense of human identity from self to world. Inescapably, to be is to inter-be: clouds, people and blades of grass are equally dependent on all else that is. Realising this, we may begin to see that another’s suffering is our suffering, and likewise that our wellbeing is inseparable from that of others, and of our world. Thus we might behave with greater care towards everything around us: not only other humans, but animals, rivers, forests…
Interbeing is a way of seeing that must be practiced. Thích Nhất Hạnh’s teaching emphasises mindfulness of relationship, embedding a felt sense of shared existence. For example, when we walk with attention to the ground that supports us, eat with gratitude to the people, plants and elements that nourish us, or breathe with conscious awareness of the fragile atmosphere that sustains us, we encounter directly our own continuity with the living world. Through mindful inquiry, we can gradually dissolve the illusion of separateness and inhabit the living web that connects all life. The more we cultivate this awareness, the more naturally compassion arises—not because we are told to care, but because we experience the truth of our interbeing. The food on our plate as sun and rain; the body arising from Earth and ancestry, reflected in the stranger we meet outside.
Interbeing is a core insight of Engaged Buddhism, a movement likewise founded by Thích Nhất Hạnh. During the Vietnam war, as Buddhist renunciates questioned whether to attend to practice or to the suffering beyond the monastery walls, he perceived both as a single path - turning not only inwards but outwards, responding actively to the suffering of the world.
“Meditation is not to escape from society, but to come back to ourselves and see what is going on. Once there is seeing, there must be acting.” (Thích Nhất Hạnh)
Engaged Buddhism is the living practice of interbeing—encompassing everything from courageous activism to small acts of kindness and conscious consumption. Above all, practitioners recognise that personal awakening and social transformation are not separate paths, but interdependent; two expressions of a single truth. Interbeing is not merely a spiritual insight but a revolutionary ethic: a way of seeing and being that draws us towards a more compassionate, life-sustaining future.
Explore the field of inner-led change…
A selection of events, opportunities, and resources recommended by readers, friends, and allies in the arena of inner-led regeneration.
👋 Help us to showcase the best opportunities and resources: please suggest items to include in the Events, Offers & Links or Jobs Board WhatsApp channels.
Upcoming Events
Second Renaissance Festival
📍Life Itself Farmhouse Hub, Thénac, France 📅 5-7 September 2025 💸 €175-800, depending on type of accommodation
“Join us … for an intimate gathering celebrating creativity and connection. Experience music, dance, storytelling, and self-organized offerings designed to inspire joy and co-creation during times of change. At the Second Renaissance Festival, you can be whoever you are and follow what you love.”
New Economies Gathering: Hope in a Time of Collapse
📍Lyon, France 📅 1-2 October 2025 💸 The gathering is funded by P4NE and free to attend.
“Hosted by Partners for a New Economy, [this] is a global gathering bringing together 250 people committed to fundamentally transforming our economic system. Now in its fourth year, P4NE’s gathering builds connection for strategic action across geographies, disciplines and sectors. It provides the opportunity to explore and exchange the new economic ideas, practices and strategies that will equip us to support one another, build power and respond with the urgency required as we navigate these complex and challenging times.”
Sensemaking Summer School: Exploring the Metacrisis and a Second Renaissance
📍Life Itself Riverside Hub, Bergerac, France 📅 17-24 September 2025 💸 Sliding scale between €250-€750. Includes food, accommodation and curriculum.
Join us for a week-long gathering of inquiry, learning and connection. The school will bring together 20 participants — researchers, practitioners and changemakers —to inquire into the roots of the metacrisis and share new perspectives on catastrophic risk, collective action, and governance. It will draw on concepts like the Metacrisis and a Second Renaissance, as well as Complex Systems, Integral Theory, Effective Altruism, Metamodernism.
Schumacher Wild Summer School on Commons, Conviviality, and Community
📍Kleine Aarde, Boxtel, Netherlands 📅 19-22 August 2025 💸 £500-800, depending on type of accommodation
“We’ll explore the themes of commons, conviviality, and community, grounded in nature connection, relational governance, and phenomenological approaches. We’ll discover more questions along the way - how can we develop our intuitions about ‘community’ and bringing people together for common purpose? We’ll call upon some useful wisdom from Elinor Ostrom and EF Schumacher, as well as dozens of other thinkers. And we’ll experience an embodied, holistic approach to learning that will, in itself, become an important part of our living inquiry. This course is an exciting collaboration of Schumacher Action Labs (NL), Schumacher Center for New Economics (USA), and Schumacher Wild, the ‘regeneration phase’ of world renowned Schumacher College (UK).”
Second Renaissance Oasis: Experiments in Spiritual Spaceholding (Special Event)
📍Online 📅 29 July 2025, 18:00-19:30 CEST 💸 Free
“Together we're exploring spirituality inside a Second Renaissance. This special event edition of The Oasis is open to all who feel called, an experimental space held by Danielle and James including meditation, movement, song, and playful interaction. Our purpose is to relate, together and individually, to that particular connection we've found in whatever variety of spiritual backgrounds we bring with us — something like the transcendent wholeness of the universe.”
Social Permaculture Mountain Retreat
📍Lutruwita (Tasmania), Australia 📅 17-19 October 2025 💸 $300
“Join us for a weekend tour into the social gardens of Permaculture and Cultural Emergence to explore individual and collective purpose, and transformative practice for inner and outer flourishing. Come away with meaning and purpose relevant to the times we inhabit; a network of collaborators, new friends, support, and a community of practice for dreaming, learning, growing, creating and BEING in.” Contact Vari Gleeson ([email protected]) or Liana Guegan ([email protected]).
Jobs & Opportunities
European Solidarity Corps Volunteer Positions at Blivande
📍Stockholm, Sweden 📅 January 2026 to January 2027. Apply by 15 August 2025.
“We are looking for four participants to join us for a full year of cultural and community-focused work. There are four different roles to choose from, each offering a unique opportunity to grow, contribute, and learn tailored to different talents and intersts.” The volunteer positions available are: The Structured Culture Lover; The Social Media Hero; The Practical Builder; and The Artistic Green Thumb.
Call for participation: New Youth Network on Beyond GDP
📍Global 📅 Application deadline not stated
“The global call to join the Youth Network on Beyond GDP is now open. We invite young changemakers from all regions to join and lead the way to rethink economic systems and move beyond GDP. … The Youth Network will serve as a sounding board for stakeholders shaping new Beyond GDP frameworks, including the UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Expert Group on Beyond GDP.”
Mending Earth: A Learning Journey for Climate Resilience Leaders
📍Online 📅 16 September 2025-13 January 2026.
“We are offering a deep learning journey for aspiring leaders in climate resilience and regeneration. Online learning will take place from September 2025 to January 2026, and is open to 200 committed humans between 18 and 35 years of age. … This learning journey was co-designed by One Resilient Earth, in close collaboration with 8 youth co-designers. The Learning Journey is being offered thanks to the generous support of the Deutsche Postcode Lottery.”
Regenerative Communities Fund: Open Call for Demonstrators
📍Croatia, Finland, France, Portugal, Spain 📅 Apply before 30 September 2025
“If you are part of an existing, innovative, community-led initiative (CLI) working on climate action, regeneration, or just transition, this is your opportunity to connect, share, and amplify your impact across Europe. We invite you to carefully read the Call for Proposals, where you’ll find all the key information, registration documents, and application links. Apply now!”
Second Renaissance
*“Second Renaissance” is one way of framing current times as a period of civilisational crisis and potential renewal – and of pointing to an ecosystem of people and organisations working to catalyse the emergence of a new, regenerative, cultural paradigm. If you recognise terms like metacrisis, Metamodern, Regenerative, Liminal Web, Game B, Integral, conscious evolution and so on, then you’re on familiar ground. Explore the core thesis and theory of change in more detail here.
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Finally, we leave you with some —
Art to nourish the soul…
This month, a poem by Thích Nhất Hạnh about how to handle anger — written around 1965 after hearing the news that the Vietnamese city of Ben Tre had been bombed, and an American army officer had declared that he had to destroy the town in order to save the town.
FOR WARMTH
by Thích Nhất HạnhI hold my face between my hands.
No, I am not crying.
I hold my face between my hands
to keep my loneliness warm —
two hands protecting,
two hands nourishing,
two hands to prevent
my soul from leaving me
in anger.You can listen to the poem read in Vietnamese by Thích Nhất Hạnh and in English by Krista Tippett, host of the On Being podcast here.
Thank you for reading the sixth issue of Seeds of a Second Renaissance.