Ep 47 Doing things differently with Jane Charlesworth
Today I'm in conversation with Jane Charlesworth an anticapitalist coach who supports people to recognise and unlearn their patterning, without shame, to build flourishing lives rooted in sufficiency.
Jane and I talk about redefining success, navigating the straddling of changing and existing in the system at the same time, permaculture and ecosystems.
So much good stuff!
Let's dive in.
Links, resources & mentions
Jane Charlesworth website & instagram
White Supremacy Culture Characteristics Tema Okun
Milkwood permaculture living course
Episode Transcript
Laura Jean 0:01
Hello hello and welcome to this week's episode, and today, we have a guest joining me in conversation, I'm in conversation today with Jane Charlesworth, and Jane is an anti capitalist coach located in Birmingham, England, who supports people to learn about their patterning or to unlearn their patterning without shame and build flourishing lives rooted in sufficiency. which I really love around the work that Jane does, hence why I've invited them to come and have a chat. So welcome, Jane, thanks so much for agreeing to be in conversation with me today.
Jane Charlesworth 1:17
Thank you, I'm really excited to be here.
Laura Jean 1:21
Thanks. And it's Jane's very first podcast, so I'm very feel very honoured also, that I get to have the inaugural interview with Jane, and share, share their words with you. So Jane, if you'd like to tell me, obviously, I just did a little quick bio, but could you maybe, if you'd like to, just chat a little bit in your own words about your work, where you are, what you're up to. And what's really lighting you up at the moment?
Jane Charlesworth 1:49
Yeah, sure. So I call myself an anti capitalist life coach, which sometimes feels a little bit confrontational. And what I really mean by that is, I want to be a coach for people who want to do things differently. So we live on a planet, which is heading into more and more into climate chaos. And where the economic systems that many of us live in, ie capitalist economic systems, really seem to be working for fewer and fewer people. And there's more and more inequality. And so what I wanted to do as a coach is to think about how we can do things differently. And that's really hard when we don't know, when we're trying to move into a future and we don't know what that future will look like. And so this is where I think life coaching tools, kind of combine with social change in a really interesting way. So that's, that's really what lights me up at the moment. And it's why I do this work. I come from a background of being an academic research scientist, I was an evolutionary microbiologist for 15 years studying outbreaks of bacterial disease, and family trees of bacteria and a little bit of social interactions of bacteria, which really lights me up the idea that bacteria have social interactions. And then I decided to switch into coaching last year. Just because I got more and more interested in it.
Laura Jean 3:42
Yeah, I feel like the, you know, I think life coaches, and you're probably pretty familiar with this, you know, can get a bit of schtick as far as like, you know, what happens in that space, but I really feel like that whole goal, doing things differently, but just there overlaying it with that anti capitalist piece. And I know you just kind of hinted at it there about sometimes that can be a little bit confrontational. And many of the people listening or a lot of people listening might identify as, you know, anti diet dietitians or non diet dietitians, so they're kind of used to that, being in that kind of space, but I would love if you're, if you would like to speak to it a little bit like what does being anticapitalist mean to you or what does that look like in the work that you do?
Jane Charlesworth 4:37
Sure, have. This is my favourite thing to talk about. So please cut me off if I keep going.
Laura Jean 4:42
I absolutely will not you keep going.
Jane Charlesworth 4:47
So I think you kind of named it with what you said about anti diet dietitians I think. I think it's important to name, my coach Kelly Diels calls it naming our villain and I think that's really = important because it's taking a stand. And it's taking a stand to say 'I stand for this, I stand for this thing'. And part of that is to stand against something else. So where this came up for me with coaching was really, when I got coached, I got some coaching from a big name coach who I'm not going to name because it's not about them, it's never about the person, it's always about the patterns. And I wanted some coaching on starting my business. And one thing that I was committed to in my business is developing an anti capitalist business. So creating economic justice in my business and not having a business, which is just about making money for me personally. And this person was really like, oh, but you need to be making millions of dollars, otherwise you won't be successful. And you're holding yourself back. If you're not doing that. And you're participating in the oppression of women and other marginalised people, if you don't want to make as much money as possible for yourself. The way to change the world is for more women to be millionaires and billionaires. And that really cemented it for me that actually no, I do need to say, I'm an anti capitalist, and I'm wanting to do things differently. And it doesn't mean not making money. I think being anti capitalist means more money for most people.
I live in work in the UK, but I grew up in the US. And in the UK, we have healthcare, we have healthcare through the state, which is free and accessible. I just want to highlight that it's not free and accessible to everyone anymore. It is now only free and accessible to UK citizens. If you are an immigrant here, you have to pay. And I think that's terrible. But in the US, healthcare is wildly inaccessible to many people, if not most people. And even as a child, I really noticed that inequality. And when I go back to the US I notice in my body how I carry myself differently, because I am afraid of getting sick in case I don't have the money to pay for it. And I don't have that worry at home. And having something like health care covered is a massive privilege for me in terms of deciding what I've done with my life, like, I could afford to do a PhD, I could afford to leave my relatively well paid career and try something else. Because I didn't have that financial worry. And so for me, anti capitalist means thinking of ways of being where we're providing for everybody's needs. I'm also an anarchist. So for me, anti capitalism is about exploring non hierarchical ways of living and being and that's really important. So organising in Co Op, like worker owned co ops, and consensus decision making democratic process, I'm a nerd about democratic process and things like that as well. And, but essentially, it's, I really feel like it's about being against this idea that we're constantly producing more we're constantly pursuing, quote, unquote, economic growth. Because when we look at the cost that that is currently taking on the planet, and on many people's lives for me, like nothing seems to justify that.
Laura Jean 8:38
Yeah, and I think sometimes it's really, maybe not obvious for everyone, but like, we have these conversations around here a bit, but I think sometimes that big picture stuffscan be quite obvious, but I think even to the impact it has on people who look to be, you know, quote, unquote, thriving in capitalism, you know, the impact on us and on how we are, you know the extraction and exploitation of even people. Yeah, who aren't the most marginalised. I mean, obviously. Yeah, I find that that's something that I tend to talk to in my work because I work with people, you know, that clusters professional, so definitely would be people who are considered, you know, have the ability to, to kind of, you know, as I say, quote, unquote, thrive incapitalism, however, it takes away that opportunity to have, I suppose. I think you've talked about being rooting in sufficiency. And I think it's even that feeling like having a meaningful life and not as in having to have a big purpose, but having a life that feels meaningful to you as an individual.
Jane Charlesworth 9:49
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And in fact, that's the kind of work that I end up doing, that I end up doing with people and yeah, so yeah, I sort of went on a rant and didn't talk about that at all. So thank you for bringing it back to that.
Laura Jean 10:03
Well, no, I think exactly what you're talking about, like, that's what we all have in the back of our minds, I think is like, you know, we want to see, we want just like, you know, we want fairness and justice in our culture and our society and our systems. And there's like, there's the real big picture pieces of it. And then there's also, yeah for all of us, like, I think sometimes we can forget how we're all individually impacted by it even when we aren't, as obviously so.
Jane Charlesworth 10:33
Yeah, and that's kind of what brought me to this to this work, in terms of my own story, actually. So if I maybe say a few words about that, so I was a scientist, I was working in like, top UK universities, if you want to call them that. So Edinburgh University, Oxford University, Cambridge University, Warwick University. I, I was relatively successful as a postdoc scientist, but the toll that that would was taking was required working all the time. So I had to move every three years for work, really, to get another job contract, sort of pursuing the piece of the kind of research that I wanted to do. And that cost me a lot of relationships. So I ended up not feeling very rooted in one place, because I've moved around a lot. And I was working a lot. So I just didn't put energy into things that I would have liked to put energy into that weren't work. And so it's really only the last couple of years that I've been recalibrating that for myself. And that's sort of the work that I end up doing with people. So I've worked with people who are earning a lot of money, but they don't know how to put down their work. And one of them wanted to spend time at the river with her family, like swimming, and canoeing and boating. And she just couldn't, was finding it very difficult to put down her work, and do the other things that she really wanted to do. And you're absolutely right, that you don't think of you don't think of these systems as impacting, quote unquote, successful people in the same way. But they absolutely do.
Laura Jean 12:29
Yeah, and we can have a lot of privilege within those systems. And still, there's that impact. And yeah, I mean, thank you for sharing that piece of your story. I think that a lot of people listening would resonate. Some people listening are probably in that academia, and even within health system, there's a there's a lot of that very similar hierarchical stuff. And yeah, that kind of stuff that goes on that, where we're really taught to associate our worth, and associate our identity even, with the work we do and the status that we hold within those systems. Yeah. And what I really love, obviously I follow you on Instagram, you know that, we've chatted about that, and I'm often commenting on your posts, because I just really love and probably because it's a bit of confirmation bias for me, how you challenge a lot of those accepted thoughts and norms around how we be, how we exist. And when we are stepping away from those traditional approaches to work and maybe stepping out into entrepreneurship. I love how you really, like challenge some of those norms. I know you did a post not that long ago about why would we want to be our own boss. And you know, and you spoke talk before about those kind of traditional trappings of success when you were chatting before. But I'd love to sort of hear more about that if you're open to chatting a little bit about that, like, what are some of the things either for you personally, that you've been doing or what are some of the other kind of traditional kind of entrepreneurship norms that you've been noodling over that you've been thinking about how we challenge or how we step away from?
Jane Charlesworth 14:14
Sure. I love thinking about these things. So I'm really new to the whole entrepreneurship thing. I'm not even sure I would call myself an entrepreneur, or that I want to, I am still trying to figure that one out. But essentially, I think because I'm really new to it. They don't feel like norms to me. They just look very clearly like, sort of sets of human thoughts. And I think that gives me the privilege of being able to go 'do I like this thing? Do I not like this thing'. I can take this one over here that feels really good and really helpful to me. And this one doesn't feel so good. So I'm just going to leave that one be and do something a little bit differently. But with building my coaching, practice or business, I, first and foremost, in my mind the whole time was really how do I do this in a way that's supportive to my body and my brain. And sorry, my brain is part of my body, I don't like that division either, that's supportive to me, and that isn't extractive and isn't burning me out, and I'm not drowning in work in the way that I was in my previous job. And so part of that came with like, well, I don't want to be my own boss, because to me, at least, the conception of a boss is typically someone who's telling you what to do, who's sort of policing what you're doing. And that's really what I want to get away from. I'd rather be my own, like friend or mentor or guide, something that feels less emotionally charged to me, I guess. But it's, it's the big one, for me that I'm really annoyed with at the moment is the idea that we have to be making certain amounts of money in order to count as successful. And that we should be doing that as quickly as possible as well.
Laura Jean 16:09
Yes, that one, that one gets me too, I think just that cookie cutter idea of that there is only one way to be successful. You know, I mean, I talk about it sometimes, and I know you've talked about it in your work or refer to. you know, there's that real erasure of difference. And it's even to the point of how we define success, you know, that it can't even be different, that it has to be this one thing and you have to want that otherwise, there's something wrong with you, if you don't want to make eleventy billion dollars in a month. Yeah, yes, I'm with you on that one. I could rant on it with you all day.
Jane Charlesworth 16:46
I mean, I think what's happening with people who say that, a lot of it I think, is people justifying their own choices, which they're completely entitled to do. And I'm not saying if you want to make millions of dollars, I want to stop you from doing that. I'm really just trying to carve out a space for people who don't want to do that. And I also want to preface that, especially for people in US, North America, they probably do need to make more money because of things like having to pay for health care. Like, I know that even if you're a millionaire in the US, if you have a health crisis, you could end up with nothing. And that's a very real threat that's hanging over people's heads. I know that other people have more dependents than I do, for example, and therefore need to make more money. I think it's like you said, the problem is when everyone is supposed to be making the same amount. And that's sort of presented as a norm.
Laura Jean 17:52
Yeah, I think I'd agree. Like, I think it doesn't mean that, it's not about money per se, It's about the idea that success looks one way. And all these things are one thing, you know, and if and also that making individuals feel like there's, you know, wrong or different. Because, well being different. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that. But like that there's something that's not okay about wanting something that's different within that system.
Jane Charlesworth 18:27
Yeah and it's presented as like having a limited mindset or something like that or playing small, which, I want to reclaim that one. Because I, as a microbiologist, I spent my whole career playing with small things.
Laura Jean 18:42
Yeah, what's wrong with playing small?
Jane Charlesworth 18:44
I love tiny, tiny things. There's like nothing wrong with being small.
Laura Jean 18:50
No, no, but of course, in our culture, it's all about the bigger and better.Oh, you know, unless in some instances, and some of the listeners will you know agree as far as like for for bodies, bodies aren't supposed to be big, bodies are allowed to play small. But not success goals, quote, unquote. But something you mentioned in there was when you started looking towards building your own business and looking towards stepping outside of the traditional kind of model of employment, was you were really looking at it through that lens of what would feel supportive to me. That's not something that everyone does. And so where does that come from for you do you think?
Jane Charlesworth 19:34
It comes from being really burned out. After being in academia for 15 years. And when I say burned out, I mean, I was struggling to get out like for the last six months of my job, at least, probably longer struggling to get out of bed. Feeling like my brain wasn't working properly. Because I felt like I just had been working so much. And feeling like I didn't have the relationships in my life that I wanted to have, primarily that that was a big thing. Like, I just don't know how many times I would not do things with friends, for example, because I had work and work was more important and work was always more important. And also struggling with my family, for them to see that my work was important because their work was always more important than my work. That's, I just realised that, but it was really, for me making work part of my life, but not the whole purpose of my life. If that makes any sense.
Laura Jean 20:49
Absolutely makes sense. It's exactly the kind of stuff that I hope to support people around too is really around that, and I come at it from, getting clear on our values, and using those as like a guide, you know, as a kind of like guidepost, or a compass, or whatever you want to think of, I don't know why there's so many navigational terms related to values, but there are, but yeah, like, to really think about what's important. It sounds like that was something that you brought with you through that, as a response to burnout, or as a response to wanting something different. And what sometimes I see is sometimes people get burnt out in a traditional system, and they want something different. So maybe jump into running their own business or private practice or entrepreneurship, whichever label feels like the better fit. And then inadvertently end up creating the same environment or falling into the same system. What do you feel like has been the thing that's prevented or the things that you're putting in place or are putting in place because I know it feels new to you, to to sort of avoid getting back into that default patterning? I mean, it's the work you do but what are the, what are the things that support you around that?
Jane Charlesworth 22:07
Being in community with other people who are trying to do similar things like that is the number one thing. I was really lucky when I started. So when I started trying to make a website for my coaching, I decided I wanted to find a web host that shared my values, partly because like GoDaddy was one of the big ones. And I was like, Oh, that name sounds creepy. I don't want to give them any money. So I started looking around and I found a company called Query it, which I think they sadly closed because they were amazing, based in Montreal, run by a lovely human called Rowan Woodmass, who everyone should follow on Instagram if they're not, because they're delightful human being and they hosted my website and also introduced me to a space called Business For the People hosted facilitated by Toi Smith, and at the time Aja Imani, and this is a space for people who are thinking through business and how to do business differently. And it's just a very nurturing thoughtful space and has been. And through that I met some other wonderful humans. Jen Lemen is someone who has been sort of unhooking from systems and doing work around unhooking from systems for a long time. And they, she facilitates a group called The Nest, where we practice collective care, and practice, kind of asking and receiving and supporting each other. And witnessing, and being part of those spaces has really made me feel like I'm part of something part of a movement, not just trying to do something on my own, like a little weirdo in my own corner.
Laura Jean 24:11
Weirdos unite!
Jane Charlesworth 24:13
Yeah, and the other one for me has been getting a part, like a low key part time job that will pay my bills to fund what I'm doing. Like that, for me is really important to make sure that I'm able to, I'm not worrying about money with my coaching work. Does that make sense?
Laura Jean 24:37
Perfect sense, Jane, and I think it's, I'm really glad you brought that up and I think us talking about that kind of thing. And normalising that in this space when we're trying to build businesses, particularly build businesses with a difference,it's so important because I really believe, and I've talked about this before, but you know, if we, if we don't remove that urgency, particularly the urgency around finances, because we live in a, you know, we live in the system as it is. And so I think if we don't, if we can't remove that, then it's very hard to have a space where we can ground in our values. And we can show up in these different ways. Because the pressure is there to survive, to cover bills, to make money, and that so I really, I really appreciate you talking to that. Well, and just to normalise it.
Jane Charlesworth 25:33
It's one that I see people saying a lot that they don't want to do. So in coaching spaces, and I don't know if this is the same for, for the dietitians that you work with who are maybe making a similar move, but in coaching spaces, I see people say a lot of well, getting a part time job, we're giving up on my dream, and things like that. And I just need to be making money with this specific work that I want to do.
Laura Jean 25:59
It goes back to that idea that there's only one way to be successful, to me, that the only way can be a successful business owner if you're in business. And that's the only way you earn money. But I'm a big believer and a big supporter of and a big advocate that to be able to create that space to make choices we need to be financially, have the financial basis covered. Absolutely. Yes. So that one I think is so important, and also community, being in community and connection. Because I know you sort of talked about it, initially when you were talking about one of the pieces that when you were working all the time that actually, the system, one of the kind of fallouts for that for you was disconnecting from humans, undermining your relationships and creating an environment where that's not even possible to be in connection with other humans and cultivate that sense of belonging. And I yeah, I think when we're doing work, doing things differently, and wanting to show up in our values, or show up in ways that the system is not really supportive of, having community having like minded people, and having connection is so important.
Jane Charlesworth 27:19
Yeah, and I, I just think back to one time when a partner split up with me really unexpectedly, and I felt really devastated by this. And my boss at the time said, 'Well, this is great, you've got more time to focus on work now'. Which felt like the most supportive thing that anyone could have said frankly.
Laura Jean 27:43
Yeah, like the the kind of like, embodiment of not seeing you as a human being. But just as a piece of that, you know, that workplace system, isn't it? Yeah.
Jane Charlesworth 27:58
Yeah. And then I want, I just want to say that I went into academia, because of being curious about the world, curious about microbes and evolution and wanting to study. wanting to study and wanting to interact with students and young people. And not because I thought it was about getting funding or making money. And increasingly, it's become dependent on your ability to make money, get money from funders and universities have become more and more hierarchical, and brought in managers based in business. And like the last two years of my time in academia, I probably spent about four months in total on picket lines, because we were striking over pensions and job cuts. And that's the kind of resistance that I don't, I know it's necessary, but I don't really want to spend time fighting, just to exist within the system, I really want to focus on thinking about what we can do differently, and how we can do things, in ways that work for more people and support more people in doing the things that they love and want to do.
Laura Jean 29:04
Yeah, I'm with you, I think we definitely need both. Both things happening as far as not necessarily, like, you know, people are existing in the system. And we need that to be the space to be, you know, to be shifting and changing. And I would much prefer also working in this space to think about how do we do it differently. But on that note, like, how do you personally or professionally navigate it or, like, if even if you'd like to speak to how you support the humans you work with, to kind of navigate that, that piece of like existing in the current system while also working towards, you know, in lieu of burning it all down, just establishing something different for themselves?
Jane Charlesworth 29:47
Sure. And I think you do something similar, so I'd really love to hear what you do as well. So I'll try and keep this one really brief. So the kind of coaching that I do is based around looking at thoughts. And the basic premise is that when we take action or don't take action on something, we do that because of a combination of thoughts and feelings. And so I work with people to kind of unearth the thoughts that are driving their actions and the results that they see in their life, and, or the results that they want to see in their life. So, if somebody wants to create more space for ease and pleasure in their life, we really kind of look through how they might do that, and what's going on for them right now, which is meaning that that's not the result that they see. And a big part of that, for me, is to kind of dissolve the shame that people feel around not doing the things that they want to do by looking at the ways that the systems we live within, kind of set us up to fail, so to speak, because I don't think it's failing, I think it's often we're protecting ourselves against things. I hate the framing of positive and negative thoughts as well. I really they're all thought. And so it's really looking at what we need to do to meet our needs, and what we want to be different, and where we can sort of scaffold from where we are right now. And what's the next little step that we can take in building that bridge towards doing things differently. So it might be implementing a sliding scale in our business. And we might have felt, we might have felt crunchy about that, because we're worried that everyone is going to pay the bottom price, and we're not going to make enough money to pay our bills. So we sort of would then look through all the thoughts that person is having about that. Or, yeah, that's probably the most recent example of something that I've worked on with somebody.
Laura Jean 32:04
Yeah, so really that like looking at that overarching piece, but really bringing it down into what's the next, in lieu of a better word, like best step or next, next step that takes you towards where you want to go. In your vision for the world. You want to see yeah,
Jane Charlesworth 32:21
yeah, and because often people, and also, like you said, kind of unhooking from that urgency. Because people always come wanting to take more action and wanting to know the right action to take or the right thing to think. And there's often that kind of, I feel that myself so much, so often, it's, I think it's just a product of the conditioning that we all have that sort of urgency, and needing for things to be done, like right now. And I do this work with activists as well, because in activist spaces where people are sort of really working for social change, it's so easy to replicate the patterns of the wider society, like the hierarchies and the urgency.
Laura Jean 33:02
Absolutely, yeah, we can be doing things or trying to do things completely differently. But if we're not really, for me it comes down to that examining the values behind what's going on, then we will replicate the same, the same system behind it or the same values. And I see it a lot in the non diet space, the Health at Every Size, that the anti diet, whichever pet thing people kind of align with more is that people see it and jump into the space but without the pause and the opportunity to ground in the values that we want in this space or the values that we want to show up as as professionals, that we want to be different, or at least having a look at the values we don't want to bring with it, we often end up doing something differently in the same set of values, which ends up being the same end result. Yeah, definitely. Yes. Yeah. And it's it's tricky. I mean, for me, when I work with the humans I work with the piece that I often come back with around this is, is centering our humanity and bringing it back to relating so like, how can we make those changes where we can show up and honour our humanity? And while still holding the humanity of the, of the people that we're working with? And how do we do that? What's the, based on what choice we have in this time in this next moment, what's the choice that honours and centre centres, everyone's the humanity of everyone involved? And that's kind of what I bring it back to. I think when we're looking at navigating that stuff.
Jane Charlesworth 34:42
Yeah, I love the Health at Every Size idea. Like, I just it feels so that when I first came across that it felt so good and so supportive to me,
Laura Jean 34:57
yeah, I mean, it's an amazing movement and an amazing start. And I think the roots of it and the starting point, I think there is there is a bit of like, just that problematic, I think, replication of the system within the new system. And I think that comes from that. Yeah, maybe not always. But I think it comes from us bringing as individuals, and then when we're setting new things up bringing some of the values of the old system with us. And, which isn't to say that we throw things out. But like, you know, it doesn't mean like, once we realise that, oh, no, the non diet space has gotten a bit toxic that we throw it out. But it's like, well, how can we actually like, what do we need to make it actually to be different to truly be different rather than just the lip speak of different? Oh, yeah, I don't always have the answers of it. But I always have lots of questions around those things.
Jane Charlesworth 35:59
Yeah. And I think like one example that I can think of was, I think it was, was it last year that I think Lizzo, the singer posted about eating smoothies or something. And then a whole bunch of people attacked her saying that she was trying to lose weight. I might be very vague on the specifics, but I hope it was, like, you're meant to be this like fat positive icon. Why are you posting about smoothies or something?
Laura Jean 36:28
Yes, yeah, definitely, you can see there's examples like that, or like even more recent examples, where go when people's, which has so many pieces of the kind of supremacy, you know, there's the whole certain people being put on pedestals versus, again, recognising their full humanity that these people, you know, as, you know, placed those positions of like you said, like that kind of quote, unquote, poster child of the movement, but actually, they're just humans living their lives. And that whole piece of expecting perfectionism or whatever, or even that it's even our business what that person's doing. Yeah, it's interesting. Yeah, I've been working through with another dietitian, we meet once a month, with two other dietitians. And we look at the I don't know, if you've come across, you probably have like Tema Okun's work around those supremacy characteristics. Yeah, and we've been digging into those. And that's been super helpful to look at it through that lens of like, what are the actual values of supremacy culture? Because obviously, I talk about values a lot. And, how do we, you know, be conscious of them? And not? How do we get rid of them within ourselves because we're kind of like, very, you know, they're in us, but how do we not take action through them? Or how do we challenge action that's been taken through them? Or how do we do things differently and reground in our own values away from those. But yeah, I think it's that constant questioning and constant being just being aware of it. You know, it doesn't like you were saying before, like recognising those thoughts, and those that default patterning, and then giving ourselves the opportunity to make a different choice if it's available to us.
Jane Charlesworth 38:17
Yeah, this, this is what I've really got from life coaching. So, I mean, the coach school that I trained at is super capitalist, it's the Life Coach School in the US. And it I don't agree with everything that my teacher was saying. But I got, also got an awful lot from the tools that they've developed. And it's that awareness. So for example, now when I feel that urgency in myself, I feel I notice that urgency, it comes up, it doesn't stop, it doesn't go away, like you said, but I can let it go. Now, when I feel that kind of urgency, I should be doing more, I need to be doing this faster and more. I sort of say to myself, Okay, now I know that I need to rest. Instead, I need to slow down. So the Nigerian scholar Bayo Akomolafe says so beautifully 'the times are urgent, let us slow down'. And I just come back, I just hear Bayo saying thisin my head and come back to that. When I feel urgency coming up in myself around work or social change or getting our terrible Prime Minister out of office.
Laura Jean 39:31
We can match you on a terrible Prime Minister over here too. I love that quote. I've shared that over on Instagram too, because I just think it's exactly, it is just the epitome I've shared one of my own where it's like I think I think it was a little bit less eloquent. It was a bit more like Slow the fuck down and think critically. But I think that that, yes, the Times urgent. Let us slow down is yes, it captures that both and piece as well. And that the way we make change isn't necessarily by doing more of that same thing, but yes, slowing down, doing things differently. Like you said, you know, resting instead of pushing through. And yeah, challenging. Yes. Another thing, which is like a little bit of a left turn from where we've been chatting, but I would love to talk about because people that follow along with me on Instagram know that I'm a bit of a passionate gardener, and we've talked about it about permaculture and things like that. And I really love when I'm reading some of your posts that you share. You often and clearly you have a strong link or background around nature and systems and, you know, little microbes, but I'm always drawn to the links that you make between like the relationships that we see in the natural world, and the possibilities, and then even the lessons, whichever way we want to look at it, that are available to us when we can like slow down and do that observing. And it really reminds me of some of the permaculture principles like observe and interact, and some of those ways of really looking at the system, and doing things differently. But I'd love it if you would like to share a little bit for you around how permaculture or how that connection that you have to nature shapes your work and your thinking around this stuff.
Jane Charlesworth 41:30
Sure. I've just always loved being in nature. So it's funny because I was raised very not religious, and I'm now more practising as a Jew, than I was when I was younger. But I practised earth based form of Judaism, which is all about connection to nature and the seasons. And that, it just kind of ties in and feels like I've always been doing that. But I think it's, I just love looking at, I just love being outside looking at things, like looking at the tiniest details on a leaf, or like looking at tree bark really up close. It just feels like I don't know, it feels like comforting to my nervous system. If that makes any sense.
Laura Jean 42:19
Absolutely. And I think there's many cultures that have practised like specific practices around that, possibly, unfortunately as more, you know, English or English settler based cultures for us, you know, we we kind of have lost that a little bit.
Jane Charlesworth 42:41
Yeah. And I think a lot of that, I mean, to put his like a history nerd hat on, I think a lot of that came about because of European, the European enclosure movements, which then led to settler colonialism as we see it today. If you look at the kind of even the sort of church calendar that the mediaeval peasants were practising, a lot of that was based around seasons, and seasonal events, because people were living in a close relationship to the land, and many people still are today, around the world. I mean, even like the guys that work on my boat here in the UK, I live on a boat, by the way, sorry, I didn't say that before. But the guys who work on my boat, they work long hours in the summer and short hours in the winter, because they need daylight to do their work. It's very seasonal, they probably wouldn't even think of it that way. But it is like the guy that works on my engine grows a beard in the winter to keep his face warm and then shaves in the summer. I can't think of anything more seasonal than than that. To go back to permaculture. I'm quite new to learning about permaculture, but I absolutely love it. And I really try to structure everything I do around these permaculture principles because they they're just, I find them like, very helpful. I don't know how familiar your audience are with them.
Laura Jean 44:06
I'd say they'd be a bit of a mix. I'd say there'd be some people listening who would be familiar and possibly practising through the principles and then probably this could be the first time some people are hearing about it. So I'd say we'd have a pretty big spectrum.
Jane Charlesworth 44:20
Okay, so I read a little bit about permaculture and then I did a online course last year with milkwood permaculture who are based in Australia. I think a lot of it's based in Australia, right?
Laura Jean 44:33
Yeah, it came originally. Yes, Bill Mollison and David Holmgren. Yes in Australia.
Jane Charlesworth 44:43
But essentially, there's like this set of principles which are all about how to how to live sustainably and in community. I would say sort of sums it up, and in community with the land as well as with with other humans and so it's a lot of it. A lot of the stuff that permaculture talks about, sustainability and regulation, and kind of evaluating, I find really important, but it also makes it important that you're sustaining yourself. So one of the principles is obtain a yield. And I think that's really important. Because when we're trying to do things differently, and make things financially accessible, I think we often come from the sort of wider dominator culture with that charity model of like I should be giving, I should be giving away my resources, like I shouldn't have these resources. And so I find the permaculture reminder that we all need to be sustained within the system. A really useful one.
Laura Jean 45:52
Yeah, there's that sort of made me think, that pendulum swing isn't it, it's like, well, if I'm not in the capitalist system, then I've got to like, swing all the way over to giving it all away. And it creates that, that permaculture principle, creates that space for discernment in the middle, where we look at well, how do we sustain ourselves? How do we also sustain the system, the ecosystem, the environment, the community, the humans, we support with our work, and create a space where we all can flourish?
Jane Charlesworth 46:22
Yeah, and it's one thing that the I, again, the permaculture really helps me in thinking around is, how can I incorporate like non monetary forms of exchange in the work that I do? Like, can I swap what I'm doing with somebody else? How can I use the library more so that I cut down on my expenses? And just thinking of these ways of doing things more relationally and less transactionally? It really brings me back to that.
Laura Jean 46:57
Yep, I like I talk to that a little bit too around, yeah, removing that, like bringing it away from that transactional into the relational. And I think I've sort of talked about that, like, I was hinting that before a little bit. Yeah. How can we centre our humanity and how can we centre our relating, in our business, and in all those areas of our business so that we create a space for that versus that very traditional, more transactional, extractive exploitative kind of piece. But yeah, I really enjoy the permaculture stuff. And I know we've spoken about it, as well ourselves together. But I think, I think there's so much like learning from that, like the way that they really look at, at the functioning and at the whole ecosystem, and thinking of it as an ecosystem, and that interrelationship and the community aspect.
Jane Charlesworth 47:54
You just said that so much better than I did. So it's like, what I tell people that I work with is that like, we are in ecosystems. So our life could be, we could think of our life as an ecosystem. And we're sort of living within a broader ecosystem, in our relationships with other humans and other beings and the land.
Laura Jean 48:16
I think it really sums up really how we are, because I think sometimes we think of it as being in community, which we can be, but we can also be part of an ecosystem without the community aspect as well. It could be a healthy or, you know, it could be a thriving or non thriving ecosystem, of course, as well, with imbalances and stuff. And I think sometimes I feel like that word, even though it can not feel as transferable for everyone, when we think about our current like, you know, in business and things, but I think ecosystem really kind of sums it up to me, it's that interrelationship without necessarily being in direct relationship with people or things all the time, but we're still impacting on each other. The choices we make.
Jane Charlesworth 49:03
yes, and again, I think that's what the permaculture really comes back to. And I just find it a really useful structure. And I want to read more about it. I just found a book which is about kind of permaculture and people and using it and organising and organisations, which i i haven't bought yet because I'm trying to not buy books.
Laura Jean 49:28
Something Happy, happy people. Is that is that a French one?
Jane Charlesworth 49:32
I don't know. I think it's English. But the author had maybe a French sounding name. I can look it up and send it to you.
Laura Jean 49:40
Yeah, I came across a book that I think they have an English based website for UK, but it like is it was like a French lady in France who was doing a lot of corporate and organisational stuff around, applying permaculture principles into organisations.
Jane Charlesworth 49:58
Oh, it's probably, it's probably the same person So I can, I can look it up and send it to you anyway. Yeah, cool, we can do that. And there's also, if you want a resource for your audience that people might want to check out, there's a really short article, which is called 'my businesses is a garden not a line'. And it's by someone called Beth maiden who runs a Tarot shop, a tarot card shop in the UK. Yeah, and that's, again, that's something that I come back to over and over again, as a reminder that we can. When we talk about scaling, it's often in business, it's often like this thing about growing bigger and bigger and bigger. But it can be about deepening those connections sort of more horizontally as well.
Laura Jean 50:37
I, that really resonates for me really deeply, because for me, the scaling that I want to extend is that those connections and that deeply versus, you know, the thought of, for me toyou know, in the traditional sense of being bigger and scaling and you know, hiring coaches or anything like that just is not, No, nowhere where I want to go, But I really look forward to checking that article out myself. And I'll link to that in the show notes for anyone who is listening along and is interested. And the other one, I'll send you this link too Jane, but it's a permaculture, management systems podcast that actually another somebody sent me, because it sounded like the work that I do, and it does really align, there was some, there was a particular episode I'll link to in the show notes around using values and using permaculture. I can't remember what that thing that he does within like, we're looking at our systems and stuff. So I'll definitely send that to you. And I'll add it to the show notes. And I'll also include all of the little pieces, bits and pieces and people that Jane has mentioned, because there's a real, yeah there's some really, some people I mean, I share some of the work of, of Toi Smith and Jen lemon and Kelly diels through my Instagram because I feel like their work is very much yes, in the same kind of space. So people might be familiar with some of those. But I'll link to all of the ones that you have mentioned. And I'll also link to you which I'll ask you to mention in a sec. But before we do that, I'm just curious if you had, before we wrap up, like is there anything that you have, a thought, a question, an invitation, a tip, anything that you'd like to leave the people who have graced us with their time over this little chat that you would love to kind of leave or a seed you would like to plant shall I say, with the permaculture gardening reference?
Jane Charlesworth 52:44
Oh, that's thank you for the invitation, Laura. I guess my question, I like asking questions. That's okay to ask questions. So I guess my question to you, dear listeners is what is the seed you could plant or a step that you can take right now that feels like the right sized next little thing that you can do in your work or your life, to bring you closer to feeling like you're living your life based on the values that you hold?
Laura Jean 53:23
I love that, Jane. I love that piece the words that you used there. Because everyone listening, and maybe you've picked up for me too, I'm big into words, and I like that, but I like the right sized next step. So I love that individual piece of that not necessarily, you know the one right way or the only way but the right sized next step for you. I really like that. I love it. Well, when I pop this episode up, that is going to be a little little post that I will put with this episode as well to give people to to, to nut over. It's a beautiful question. Thank you so much, Jane. I really appreciate being in conversation but before we wrap up. I just would also say too, if people want to connect with you, or dig a little bit deeper into your work, where's the best place or places for them to go? Or to reach out?
Jane Charlesworth 54:17
Sure, thank you. Thank you so much, Laura, for inviting me into this conversation. I don't know about you, but I've had a really enjoyable hour talking with you. I write on Instagram mostly at the moment. I also write a little bit on Patreon and I'm thinking of moving more over there because I'm aware that I'm doing a lot of uncompensated labour with my writing. But at the moment, probably the best place to find me is on James Charles with on Instagram. And I would love to meet some of you if you feel called
Laura Jean 54:56
Well, I would absolutely put the link to your Instagram, in my bio, in my bio far out, in the shownotes. And I can not highly recommend enough for people to go and share. Follow along with Jane. Like I know I've shared some if anyone who's listening follows me on Instagram, I've shared this. I'll also chuck your website on too for anyone who listens. I know at least one person who listens to the podcast who isn't on Instagram. So I'll definitely put your website in the show notes as well. Yeah, so that people can check out your work because I really think I just really value the lens that you lay over this work. And while like I said, like, I feel there's probably a confirmation bias because I feel like we are sort of in th same sort of space around it. Yeah, we're sharing an ecosystem, a thought ecosystem, I feel like, I just really appreciate the angle and the way the lens and the way you bring in nature and bring in those natural connections. They really speak to me, but they also often add a little bit of extra nuance for me personally. So I really appreciate your work, and all that you do and share. Thank you. And it's so valuable. So I would definitely encourage everyone listening to go check out Jane's work either over on Instagram, or via their website, which I will pop in the show notes. So thanks so much, Jane, I truly appreciate your time. And it's been an absolute pleasure to be in conversation with you.
Jane Charlesworth 56:43
Like likewise, Laura. Thank you. So like I said, Thank you so much for inviting me on.
Laura Jean 56:49
Thank you. And for those listening along. Thank you for honouring us with your time and sharing in this conversation too. And being part about the ecosystem of our conversation today. Like I said, I'll drop all the links in the show notes of the people who Jane mentioned. And of course, Jane's, I was gonna say bio again, Jane's Instagram and Jane's website so you can reach out and connect and follow along. And until next time, I hope that you enjoy the rest of your day, week, wherever this finds you and we'll chat again soon.
