Are we trying to digitise indigeneity?
This question found me this weekend during a multisensory adventure I'd planned for my partner Ricardo's birthday. We started at Kew Gardens, sitting under a red oak, drinking wine, catching up on our respective life stories. Later, we lay on the grass marvelling at dappled leaves and watching the movement and expansiveness of clouds.
When we experienced Marshmallow Laser Feast's digital artwork "Of the Oak," we met one of Kew's most majestic trees - the Lucombe oak. The piece allowed us to see beneath the bark and hear the rhythm of this living, breathing tree, witnessing its entire ecosystem. Ricardo asked what word represented this stunning piece. I said "aliveness," he said "flow."
What followed was a fascinating conversation about our different relationships with the word flow. His encompasses everything in life - including his choice to train as a marine biologist and work in water conservation. Mine, sadly, has been tainted by corporate commodification - the word's use to seem 'on brand' with performative workplace initiatives that don't fix the actual blockage: the system itself.
But something beautiful happened at Kew. A robin came to join us, sitting so close I could almost touch it, cocking its head as if trying to read my soul. Later, a flock of geese walked between and around us as we lay still, gently inspecting us in a beautiful moment of true 'flow.'
This experience of natural flow - watching clouds move, birds approach, geese navigate around us - brought me back to something I've been reflecting on: we need to look up to the sky, we need to look down to the earth and the soil and what happens beneath the soil. Water keeps teaching me about timing, patience, and the intelligence of allowing rather than forcing. These aren't soft ideals - they're elemental principles that have reshaped how I approach strategic decision-making.
As I've been developing what's becoming the TERRA Methodâ„¢ - emerging from the five elemental frameworks in my upcoming book - this paradox about digitising indigeneity has become central to how we navigate technological consciousness. Water shows me the difference between extracting wisdom and commodifying it, versus letting it flow through us, shaping who we become without force.
We've productised and strategised something innate in all of nature, including us. We're losing the aliveness of the word flow.
Since submitting my manuscript for "Leadership Legacy: A Manifesto to Create a Mindful Future and a Thriving Planet" (Wiley, January 2026), I've been intentionally meditating morning, noon, and night. The seemingly serendipitous moments remind me that lasting transformation doesn't come from someone else's strategy. It comes when we learn to flow with complexity ourselves, guided by principles that have steered conscious evolution for millennia.
#TERRA #DigitiseIndigeneity #Flow #Aliveness #CyborgShamanism #ElementalLeadership #TechnologicalConsciousness
