In July 2023, I had the privilege to participate in an Erasmus+ program called FEASY: Facilitation Empowerment and Sustainability for Youth.
The venue of the training was at the Eco-village: Molino de Guadalmesi, in the heart a Natural Park in southern Spain. A magnificent and luxuriant subtropical vegetation was surrounding us whilst we were following the course. The River of Women: Guad-al-mesí in Arabic, flows through the Eco-village. On the horizon, the Strait of Gibraltar, with Africa only 14 km away. The beauty of the place contributed to the amazing experience we all had.
Goretti Muñoz
The training program has been inspiring, rich and the content incredibly useful, particularly for eco-villages where communication and people dynamics are at the core of a healthy, long lasting community. The training content is also targeted to the world of education: educators, teachers, facilitators, mentors, who are interested in having a direct experience of group facilitation techniques and tools for education and collaborative learning.
Johnny, group facilitator, trainer, multidisciplinary artist and Goretti, group facilitator, biologist and yoga teacher, both facilitated the training with all their experience and passion, and I thank them again for their talent and all the knowledge they shared with us.
The 25 participants come from all over Europe, from eco-villages, eco-initiatives, alternative education, cooperatives, and environmental projects. We all connected relatively quickly over the activities and the discussions at the dinner table. The default communication was like music to my ears: at least 3 or 4 different languages and world music in the kitchen! What unites us all is the desire for harmony, respect of nature and humans, curiosity, pass on knowledge and learn how to draw joyful and creative solutions for the future together.
Johnny Azpilicueta
During the training program, participants have been able to discover and practice tools that are fondamental in any collective project. How to be conscious and aware of oneself and others? How to keep our goal in mind and consider people at the same time?
Facilitating with a mind of paradoxe, a balance between the material: us, the land, material resources and the immaterial: thoughts, ideas, dreams, planning..
How to balance the voices of extraverts and intraverts? What are each person’s talents, senses? How to find the place and role of each member of the collective? What are the most common mistakes in feedback? What is trust? How to build trust? In other words, how do we play the most beautiful music as an orchestra taking into consideration human complexities? Johnny and Goretti navigated us through all these questions by introducing the right tool that could help heal each difficulty that collective initiatives face.
Dragon Dreaming, Deep Ecology with the council of beings, Systems thinking, Flowinout, Spiral dynamic, Dance and Creativity: art and music, Visual Facilitation, Dynamic Governance, Reflection and mindfulness.
It has been fascinating and I am incredibly grateful for what I learnt at the FEASY program. The members of my Eco-village are going to feel my over enthusiasm for a while!
With all the training participants, we are in the process of harvesting our notes, photos and videos and currently co-writing an open source manual. I will share it with you all once it’s ready.
What is Erasmus+ ?
Erasmus+ is the educational, training, youth and sports program of the European Union. The current program budget for 2021-2027 is 26.2 billion euros, which is almost double the previous period, which lasted from 2014 to 2020.
The Erasmus+ program pays great attention to social inclusion, a turn toward green technologies, as well as the participation of young people in promoting democratic values. Erasmus+ supports the priorities and activities defined in the European education area, the digital learning program and the European Skills Development Program. Erasmus+ offers opportunities for mobility and cooperation in the field of preschool, school, higher and vocational education, training, adult education, youth and sports. The activities described in the projects can be aimed at both young people and specialists working with young people. The European Commission allocates funds to local agencies, and they spend it based on local targeted needs. Agencies also offer assistance to grant applicants from the time of submission of a project application to the end of the project term and work closely with other organisations. The official representative of the program in France is Agence Erasmus+ France Jeunesse et Sport.
This learning experience in the middle of subtropical nature, along with the most wonderful class mates and facilitators, will remain a wonderful memory and is already growing into many more projects and co-creativity for Grain&Sens. Thank you Johnny and Goretti!
Astrid
Join us at Lavenant from the 20th to the 27th of September for the next Erasmus+ training program:
Yes to Sustainability- Creating Youth Exchanges. APPLY HERE
Call for Participants