From Visioning to Co-creating
2025 marked a clear transition for the Mindful Researchers community: we moved from visioning to co-creating – together!
With curiosity and attention to where we started, where we stand, and where we are heading, we stepped into a generative phase grounded in presence, coordinated effort and shared responsibility.
Over the year, new members joined the wider community, new collaborators stepped into the Inner Circle, and our Stewards group grew bigger! We launched working groups (which we playfully named “workout groups”), revitalised formats that have supported us in the past, and introduced new gatherings, weaving continuity and novelty together.
Beginning with Our Voices
In early March 2025, we launched a community-wide poll inviting our members to reflect on what truly matters to them, both individually and collectively.
Detailed Structure of the Poll
The themes and structure of the poll emerged from a longer collective process initiated in 2023, shaped through a series of workshops that helped surface shared questions, needs and aspirations.
As poll responses came in, clear patterns began to take shape. Three themes emerged as especially vital:
- the need for mutual and personal support,
- the wish to share and learn through contemplative practice and inquiry,
- the call for professional support to nurture new projects and research pathways.
From Insight to Collaboration
We took time to carefully and thoroughly examine the poll results, working through the responses together.
From this process, three thematic “Work-out” Groups were formed as generative engines of the co-creation phase. Over the course of two months, each group engaged in reflection, dialogue, and collaborative design, guided by a Theory of Change approach.
Emergence of Initiatives and Action Plans
The co-creation process gave rise to a constellation of initiatives – distinct within each group, yet deeply interconnected – and together we developed a series of action plans.
Across the groups, shared directions became visible. We identified a cross-cutting need that resonated throughout the process: a community-led platform to support ongoing co-creation while serving as a tool to implement and sustain community initiatives.
Paving the Way Forward at ESRI 2025
At ESRI 2025, we presented the outcomes of our collective process. The exchange that followed – thoughtful questions, enthusiasm, and honest conversations about funding and practical realisation – highlighted both the resonance with and importance of this work. It also reaffirmed a shared understanding that developing sustainable approaches to resourcing is essential for bringing these initiatives into being!
Holding the Space Together
We have started building an online space for the MR Community on Hylo, a community-led, open-source platform that serves as a hub for connection, coordination, and collective sense-making. It will become the backbone of our collective work, enable peer-to-peer networking, and support community-led bottom-up initiatives, holding both what already exists and what is yet to emerge.
We are currently working with a small pilot group, learning together how this space can best support our evolving initiatives, as well as our needs for communication and collaboration, before launching it for the wider MR community.
In parallel, we have resumed our Regular Meetings – spaces dedicated to shared practice, exchange and reflection. We have relaunched the Mindful Presentations format and introduced the Contemplative Café.
Regular Meetings Details
The Mindful Presentations format is an online space for community members and newcomers to share their work, research, projects, ideas, interests, practices and questions! These sessions go beyond conventional academic or formal presentation formats, inviting a more authentic, reflective and participatory exchange. The format is co-facilitated by our Inner Circle members Rocío and Vani.
The Contemplative Café is an online welcoming, drop-in space for connection, re-connection, friendship and fun! Lightly facilitated by our Inner Circle members Elaine and Heena, and held with no fixed agenda, the gathering allows conversations to unfold with wonder.
Looking Ahead
As the year draws to a close, we say thank you to each and everyone of you – for reading our newsletters and blog posts, for being present and practicing together at our gatherings, for contributing to our work-out groups, and for reaching out along the way!
Here is what we are planning for early next year:
- launch the MR Community space on Hylo for the wider community,
- resume the work of our Work-out Groups to begin implementing the action plans,
- continue and expand our regular meetings and gatherings,
… and much more!
2025 reminded us that when we listen deeply — to ourselves, to one another, and to what is emerging — action arises. We step into the coming year with gratitude, trust, and a shared sense of possibility!
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