Do you sense, understand and/or feel the enormity of our global situation? Do you recognise the very real possibility of some kind of collapse, be it societal collapse, systemic breakdown or ecological unraveling?
And do you aspire to live your best life within that context, to live into your potential and seize a chance to make the situation somewhat better?
Would you appreciate having tools, concepts and insights to help you build resilience and enhance your adaptive capacity? And do you see the need to make sure all this work contributes to a saner, more ecologically sensitive culture and world system?
If this is the case, you likely know that you are on a long journey. There are no short paths to meet this kind of aspiration. But there are principles and practices that can transform the structures of your life, iteration by iteration, so that you might live well and joyously along the way, and make your life an expression of your deep care for life on Earth.
LET OUT THE HUMANS—a Design Journey is a multi-media exploration of how certain design practices and methods of thinking might empower and transform us in all these ways.
The Design Journey uses design art and illustration, photography and audio to express its ideas and observations, but the heart of the Design Journey is a series of long-form, thoughtful essays by We Are Humans Project Founder, Andy Wildman, offering his best discoveries and insights in the overlapping fields of regenerative design, living systems theory, cultural evolution, and the ever-messy process of being human.
Its accessible, raw, vulnerable and real. It draws on scholarly realms and deep research. It asks hard questions and works hard for useful insight. And it stays firmly planted on real ground, Andy's home in Southern Tasmania, Australia, ever-connected to the realities of living an ordinary human life.
The essays are also available in audio version, read by the author, when you subscribe to our accompanying premium podcast, GOING HOME NOW—Recovering Humans.
Already a subscriber? Go straight to content:
Here for the first time?
Let me introduce myself. I'm Andy Wildman. I'm the Founder of We Are Humans Project and the writer of LET OUT THE HUMANS. Thank you so much for your interest.
I thought it might be useful to make this introduction and talk about this offering that is so close to my heart, in both audio and written form:
It is entirely possible to respond to the deteriorating state of the world with sensitivity and genuine agency, and to design our way to more resilient, adaptive lives.
It is possible in this way, to have robust and beautiful households that are true refuges in a time of climate chaos. We can have networks of mutually supportive folk that take care of each other in tough moments and in peaceful times. And we can have responsive, creative minds, able to read the winds of change and adapt to anything with determination and fierce joy.
It is entirely possible to do all that, and in the process, begin flourishing as never before and finding our fullest potential. Better, more deeply human livelihoods. Closer connection with our communities. Daily connection with the country upon which we live and the creatures we share it with.
And I believe it is possible, as we get ever more graceful with design processes, to find ways to make our lives truly sensitive to our ecological settings, despite the cultures we live in. Ways to look after our watersheds and our home grounds as part of our working lives, not as occasional weekend endeavours. Ways for our homes and our systems of living to be a part of our landscapes, contributing to the ecological health of our bioregions.
But clearly, in order to harness the gentle power of human-scale, sensitive and creative design practice, we need to think differently about design—very differently to the practices we are taught by our cultures. It can be a long unlearning, and a steep re-learning curve, but it's an exciting journey.
I have been on a journey of discovery with all of this for many years now, but I feel I have barely begun. I see so much potential, and many times I have run face-first into deep and beautiful truths about what the human mind can do with it's design impulse. I feel I have come a long way, but there is a vast world ahead of me. There is just so much to learn here.
And I don't want to do it alone. Indeed I can't. I want and need fellow travellers.
And I've come to recognise also that I can't do it un-resourced, or on the side. Which is one reason I decided to build a social enterprise, and create within it premium offerings such as this. To make this journey with my full self I need it to also be a livelihood. And that livelihood needs to be a community-building endeavour, as one and the same thing as an income.
And if you've come this far into my world—investigated my website, listened maybe to a podcast episode, and found your way here—then I'm guessing you hold similar desires. Perhaps you would love to build, or you are building, a resilient life for yourself and a right livelihood and an ecologically sensitive place in the world.
If so, and wherever you are at in the journey, perhaps we can do it together. Come on this design journey with me and we'll experience what it has to offer together. See if these places I'm going are places you'd also like to visit.
Even though this is a premium offering and part of my livelihood-building project, I won't make a sales pitch to you. I won't try to draw in doubting passers-by. I only want on the journey with me those for whom these endeavours deeply matter.
And I'm not pretending to want a relationship where there's only a subscription on offer. It's just a subscription right now, but as this project deepens and becomes better resourced, there will be more and more opportunities to connect properly. Because I am deeply interested in anyone who subscribes here. I want to know you. Perhaps we'll end up working directly together—who knows?
LET OUT THE HUMANS—a design journey, is my best and fullest offering to the world. It is so far quite a small offering, but I believe it has a far horizon and a deep territory of potential to explore. It will likely be a long journey, and perhaps difficult at times, but I know already that it will hold tremendous joy and revelation.
I hope to see you on the trail.
—Andy.
While I'm in the early days of inviting people along, a subscription to LET OUT THE HUMANS—a design journey is $12 USD* per month, and includes:
—A free 21-day trial; try it out and see.
—Long form essays; my best writing on the journey to true resilience, adaptive capacity, and an an earth-regenerative life. I'll be exploring what we can do in our homes and our intimate systems for living, what might be possible in our watersheds and on our home ground, and also wider, future-changing possibilities for bioregional culture. And of course, coming right back to home, the essays touch on what we can do in our minds, our hearts and tender souls, and in our relationships. Approximately 3000 words. Delivered to your inbox. (Also available as one-off downloads.)
—Design art; my exploration of how we can have a visual language to convey designs and life-patterns that are alive, evolving all the time, complexly relational, interconnected, sometimes physical, sometimes intangible.
—Access to my Lutruwita/Tasmania content map; I often make content out on the land I live in. It is, as you'll see, integral to how I think. Such content will be added to an interactive map of my home territory, according to wherever I've made it. Onto the map will go audio files tracking what I've discovered lately, ideas, report-backs, breakthroughs, latest insights. Photography from stunning Lutruwita/Tasmania. Drawings, perhaps. Whatever I feel moved to make for you...
—Access to an emerging community; a small but growing community of design-thinkers and collapse-aware folk, gathering on Hylo to get to know each other.
You can also subscribe to both LET OUT THE HUMANS—a Design Journey, and the premium podcast offering GOING HOME NOW—Recovering Humans, together. The bundle is a lower total price than subscribing to each separately. The bundle is $15 USD per month, with one month free. It includes:
—Everything in LET OUT THE HUMANS—a Design Journey.
—All the exclusive podcast content, including GOING HOME NOW—Recovering Humans episodes, the SOUTHERLY INSIGHTS interview series, and audio versions of the Design Journey essays.
—All the same community access as other plans.
—A free 30-day trial.
*My apologies to all outside the US, for the USD pricing. It's tricky to run an international business without it. I am investigating how to do Purchasing Power Parity and will bring it on board asap.
—Lutruwita night sky image by Ken Cheung.
—Night sky ridgeline image by Sharon Tay