3rd Spaces

3rd Space explores new perspectives beyond
 binaries, seeking diverse, dynamic outcomes

  • All
  • Capitalism and Technology
  • Perception and Consciousness
  • Imagination
  • Spirituality
  • Psychedelics
  • The More-than-Human World
  • Science and Ethics
  • The Body
  • Environment
  • Gender
  • Health and Medicine
  • Culture
  • Thinking
  • Politics
  • Poetry
  • Education
  • Gender and Sexuality
  • Mindfulness
  • Activism
  • Art and Consciousness
  • Climate Change
  • Consciousness
  • Decolonisation
Culture

The Rise and Fall of Russell Brand: An Opportunity for More-Than-Personal Redemption?

A Strange Fusion Like many others, here at 3rd Space we have been aware of the unravelling and retreat of Russell Brand in the face of familiar, but shocking
Read More →
Imagination

Imagination Activism – An Interview with Phoebe Tickell

We have been chasing an interview with Phoebe Tickell for some time. (She’s a busy lady). We hope we will manage to catch up with her soon. In the
Read More →
Consciousness

Awakening Other Capacities – Why this just might be fundamental

What are “Exiled Capacities”? Much of the time, my mind churns out the same predictable responses to things. If I tried to draw a circle around what I think
Read More →
Culture

‘Barbie’: Subversive Feminism or Subversive Corporatism?

A Faustian Bargain My granddaughter of 7 years of age is perhaps typical of a many little girls today, raised in a culture permeated by post 60’s feminist consciousness.
Read More →
Consciousness

Resonance – The Portal to Interbeing

Resonance – A Function of Relationship For many years now there has been a proliferation of sophisticated group dialogue practice exploring intersubjective field phenomena. Such phenomena have also been
Read More →
Activism

How Dare You! Ethics and the Judiciary

Part One UK Climate Trials The UK’s climate trials present a complex matrix against which the personal, political, and spiritual dimensions of British culture are being tested. “Once bitten
Read More →
Perception and Consciousness

Seeing Requires Faith

Humans are taught to see through our senses and to think through reason as the default mode of engaging life in these so-called ‘modern days’. But perhaps human ‘seeing’
Read More →
The Body

Evolving Through the Body

A conversation between Patrick Cassidy and Kirstie Simson. In progressive circles we feel comfortable with the idea of psychological, emotional, and even spiritual development. But what about evolving through
Read More →
The More-than-Human World

Practicing Animism: Back to the Future

How might we begin to experience ourselves as being inherently part of Nature? Not as some disembodied observer taking a stroll through the woods or along the riverbank, but
Read More →
Capitalism and Technology

Misalignment, AI & Moloch

Read More →
Culture

What is Mimesis and Why Does it Matter?

The Intrusion of Gaia Bruno Latour begins his book Facing Gaia by telling us that although we have known for thirty years we are facing an “ecological crisis,” we
Read More →
Culture

Re-Generation: The Beginnings of a New Culture

Part One Our shared perception of reality has become fragile. This underlies the crises we face. Just learning to see differently is a beginning. The vision and practice of
Read More →
Education

Environmental Education Is Falling Short: Activism Can Help

In an environmental studies class in a secondary school in a South African township, the teacher takes the students outside into the sunny fall morning. She shows them how
Read More →
The More-than-Human World

Walking the Path to Nowhere & Everywhere

I went for a walk in the woods recently; along easy paths through the rolling miles of Epping Forest, an ancient forest miraculously still surviving on the outskirts of
Read More →
Culture

Regeneration @ the School of Human Ecology: A Shanghai Story

Covid 19 and Returning to China 3rd Space: Welcome Lionel. So, could you give us some background about what you were doing in the UK prior to moving back
Read More →
The Body

Embodied Intelligence & Paradigm Change: In Conversation with Kirstie Simson

Dance Improvisation – Exploring the Unlimited Potential of the Body 3rd Space: Welcome, Kirstie. Your Improvisation work has always expanded the boundaries of contemporary dance. Could you start by
Read More →
Science and Ethics

Ethics and the Queer World of Quantum Mechanics

The Burden of Meaning Making Traditionally, for hundreds of years, religion was the source of ethics, the unquestioned authority on how to live and act. In the secular West
Read More →
Decolonisation

A Value System is Not a Personal Opinion

In this video, Venkatesh Rajan, a former journalist, educator, thinker, and currently organic farmer, explores the impact colonial thinking and its legacy of imitation has had and continues to
Read More →
Culture

Metamodernism’s Noisy Cousin & the Art of Subverting Normalcy

The Illusion of Normalcy Soup on the Sunflowers, milk on the floor of Harrods, orange paint on the storefront of an exclusive Aston Martin showroom. Acts of anarchy, transgressive
Read More →
Spirituality

The New Prophets: Spirituality in a Metamodern World

Looking at how the progressive world is responding to the meta-crisis, it is encouraging to see an accelerating awareness that we are not in only in a desperate climate
Read More →
Decolonisation

A Process of Learning and Unlearning: A dialogue with Boaventura de Sousa Santos

Part One Beginnings 3rd Space: I’d like to start with a background question about your life and work. You’re a distinguished legal scholar from the University of Madison and
Read More →
Thinking

Imagination of the Unthought Within the Thought of our Times

Our imagination operates, to start with, within epistemic bounds. This means there is an unthought to our thought which we take for granted, just as a fish may imagine
Read More →
Culture

The Reluctant Activist: Exploring the Inner/Outer Divide

In May 2021 contemporary thinker and writer Jonathan Rowson wrote, “To be metamodern is to be caught up in the co-arising of hope and despair, credulity and incredulity, progress and
Read More →
The More-than-Human World

Frankenstein Apples

Using stories from her father Gregory Bateson’s work on ecology, Nora Bateson speaks to our obsession with growth, and how singling out specific organisms for development creates a perilous
Read More →
The More-than-Human World

A Nightingale Pilgrimage

So it was that after almost three weeks of recovering from the fatigue and coughing of a mild, but nevertheless very unpleasant covid infection, following right on the heels
Read More →
Politics

The Ukraine War: Challenging a Binary Lens

“As a person who believes in democracy, it’s disappointing to read from your comments that you are ideologically opposed to western values“.  My heart sank a little as I
Read More →
Culture

Examining the Sensitive Self

In 2004, the psychologist Michael Eigen wrote a book called, “The Sensitive Self”. He examines sensitivity as our essential humanness, and ultimately as constituting the basis of humane ethics.
Read More →
Environment

Ceiba – The Future of Carbonless Shipping

3rd Space: Welcome, Dani. It’s good to see you again. From our brief tour, it’s clear a lot of development has occurred with Ceiba over the past two years, especially
Read More →
Decolonisation

Racial Justice, Climate Activism, Self-Repair: building a new paradigm with Esther Stanford-Xosei

Planet Repair – Pre-Figuring a New World 3rd Space: Welcome to 3rd Space, Esther. I am going to dive straight in. (Smiles) Given the current systemic and existential crisis we’re facing
Read More →
Decolonisation

Moving Beyond Empire

Sitting in the garden here in Cupar, drinking in this late September warmth, a familiar sound draws my gaze to the flight path above – not of aeroplanes, but
Read More →
Culture

Contemplating the Illusions of Corporate Culture

Early morning and we have porridge on the stove, the sun is struggling to come to terms with the clouds and we can sense it’s going to be a
Read More →
Climate Change

Why Climate Change is a Social Justice Issue

Another COP is over. Despite the rhetoric to keep global warming to 1.5˚C, national pledges to address the climate crisis put us instead on track for an alarming global
Read More →
Activism

Disobedience and the State

“Disobedience, in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is man’s original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion.” Oscar
Read More →
Activism

What is Insulate Britain? The call for radical nonviolent civil disobedience

A Letter to my friends Dearest friends, We have shared many significant moments in our lives. Because of this, I wanted to share now with you another moment, particularly
Read More →
Culture

3rd Space unplugged – Patriarchy, identity and monotheism

Patriarchy, identity and monotheism. How they function in the relationship between coloniser and colonised. In the fifth of our unplugged cross-cultural discussions, 3rd Space continues the conversation with Mumbaikers,
Read More →
Culture

3rd Space unplugged -Truth and Reconciliation

Truth and Reconciliation – Reconciliation between the global north and south must be the foundation for a new world culture to emerge. In the fourth of our unplugged global
Read More →
Culture

3rd Space unplugged – Spiral Dynamics through an Indic Lens

Raghu Ananthanarayanan speaks with Abhishek Thakore: understanding the developmental model of Spiral Dynamics through an Indic lens. Raghu Ananthanarayanan has a Postgraduate Degree in Bio-Medical Engineering from IIT Madras.
Read More →
Culture

3rd Space unplugged -Is the Future Black and Brown?

Confronting the reality of Western global dominance In the second of our unplugged cross-cultural discussions, 3rd Space continues the conversation with Mumbaikers, Abhishek Thakore of the Blue Ribbon Movement,
Read More →
Culture

3rd Space unplugged – global discussions on a new cosmopolitanism

Exploring the potential of a true global citizenry In the first of a series of cross-cultural conversations, Steve Brett of 3rd Space in London talks with Abhishek Thakore, co-founder
Read More →
Culture

Nothing Exists In Isolation

Part One Developing Faith I grew up as a non-believer, an atheist. However, when I started working in the rural area in India, and developed some sort of relationship
Read More →
Mindfulness

Living on purpose – Jamie Bristow and the Mindfulness Initiative

Mindfulness joins the political mainstream 3rd Space: Welcome Jamie. You have been doing ground-breaking work for some years to bring mindfulness into the political mainstream. You are also trying to
Read More →
Activism

The Entangled Activist-talking with Anthea Lawson

From Newspapers to Campaigning 3rd Space: Welcome to 3rd Space, Anthea. Could you begin by telling us about how you came to be concerned about some of the underlying issues in
Read More →
Gender and Sexuality

The Problem That Never Goes Away – The frightening normality of sexual violence

In 2018, while working on a writing project, my home for several months was a small cottage on the banks of the Periyar river in rural South India. In
Read More →
Culture

Some thoughts on the work of Daniel Schmachtenberger

It may seem strange to dedicate a blog to the thinking of somebody else, but Daniel Schmachtenberger just might be one of the best and brightest minds around at
Read More →
Culture

Awakening from the Meaning Crisis with John Vervaeke

Introduction This past summer, a colleague from the US sent me a video featuring John Vervaeke in conversation with Nora Bateson. “Do you know him? He seems to be
Read More →
Environment

Rethinking Conservation – A Holistic Approach in Botswana

3rd Space: Welcome Tempe. You’ve been working in Africa for almost nine years as a conservation scientist, a critical area for the survival of our global ecosystem; but it’s
Read More →
Culture

David Choquehuanca – A New Pachakuti in Bolivia

December 1st, 2020 After a decade as Chancellor of Evo Morales, David Choquehuanca was the leader chosen by the Pacto de Unidad to represent indigenous, native and peasant peoples
Read More →
Culture

The Future Begins Today – Boaventura De Sousa Santos

Watch the video here: For further information on the work of Boaventura De Sousa Santos, visit and also
Read More →
Culture

On Choice and Love – an incident above the Bay of Bengal

To me, being able to exercise real choice or freewill was always tied to a sense of being ‘right’ – of knowing. At a certain point in my life
Read More →
Education

Why are we here? Getting to grips with the QUESTion Project

3rd Space:  Welcome Gerard and Francesca! Could you start by telling us what the QUESTion Project is, what are its aims and vision, and who it serves. Gerard: It’s a semester or
Read More →
Culture

The Social Unreality

About six weeks ago, we had three days of very heavy rains and thunderstorms in my region in India which led to trees falling on electric transmission lines, and
Read More →
Spirituality

Mindfulness and Meditation – a secular hijack?

The practice of Mindfulness, as everyone knows, has taken off in a big way in the western hemisphere. It is the most successful ‘non-religious’, awareness-based, self-help practice to establish
Read More →
Spirituality

A Spiritual Revolution to Meet Today’s Global Crises

In the face of a lack of existential meaning and coherence, Western civilization is currently struggling to stave off devouring itself through ever deepening fragmentation. Meanwhile, small pockets of
Read More →
Politics

The Opposite of a Cynic: David Graeber, 1961-2020

What is the opposite of a cynic? I have been wondering about this question since I heard the news of David Graeber’s death yesterday. I haven’t quite been able
Read More →
Culture

Reflections on the Culture Wars

Why are identity politics so dominating the public discourse? They are certainly drowning out not only any attempt at sensemaking as the world grows ever more complex and uncertain,
Read More →
Politics

The Need For A New Politics

In 1991 India changed. We opened up. We started becoming part of the global economy. Globalisation finally engulfed us. Slowly some disturbing signs started emerging. In 1996 we at SIDH (“Society for the Integrated
Read More →
Spirituality

Filmmaker Renate Keller on her documentary of Indian mystic and social activist, Vimala Thakar

3rd Space: Welcome Renata. You recently completed a documentary on the life and message of Vimala Thakar, called The Fire of Dancing Stillness – Reflections with Vimala Thakar. Could you tell
Read More →
Environment

Requiem for Nature in Britain – Devastation in our Green and Pleasant Land

Our hearts go out when we see one of those awful pictures of a disoriented, lost orangutan in the debris of clear-cut rainforest somewhere in Indonesia, which up to
Read More →
Spirituality

Being at Home in the World

There is a very long history in the western world to our experience of being a separate individual, atomised from the world; a world that right now, as a
Read More →
Culture

Post-Pandemic Ladhaki Perspective

A week before the announcement of the Janata [public] Curfew slated for March 22, 2020, I spoke with a 43-year-old close relative in her village in Leh, Ladakh, by
Read More →
Culture

What is in a name?

In eastern and African cultures, the name we are given at birth means a lot. In our names, the hopes, dreams and aspirations of our parents are borne. There
Read More →
Psychedelics

Psychedelic Communities, Social Justice, and Kinship in the Capitalocene

Is therapy and “self-help” the best or only paradigm for psychedelic culture to flourish? Alnoor Ladha and Martin Kirk offer a critical assessment of humanity and suggest how psychedelic
Read More →
Poetry

Decoding Darkness – a poem

Darkness isoften, not the absencebut the blinding presence of light.The colours of creation consolidatedand gifted to night,that heals the marks, the scars,the injuries, the wounds,Gathered through time.  There, reside
Read More →
Culture

My inner quest: west to east

At 16, I went to India for a visit with my parents and sisters. I was a rebel, wanted to dye my hair purple, wore tight jeans and had
Read More →
Culture

A Civilisational Pause – What Will Follow ‘Normal’?

No one could have imagined the behemoth of neoliberal capitalism – the god and engine of modern life – brought to its knees literally within a mere blink in
Read More →
Culture

Tu Weiming: Spiritual Humanism: An Emerging Global Discourse

Watch the video here: In this video, Professor Tu Weiming, versed in eastern and western thought, gives a beautifully articulate and cogent talk on the need for Spiritual Humanism,
Read More →
Environment

Ceiba – Revolutionising the Shipping Industry

In February 2020 Antarctica hit an unthinkable record temperature of 20.75 degrees Celsius, rivalling that of an average (summer) June day in London. Brazilian scientists conducting research from Seymour
Read More →
Culture

Gandhi in the 21st Century

“I hope the fragrance of the non-violence of India would permeate the whole world. I often wonder if that hope will materialize.” Mohandas Gandhi For all of us, there
Read More →
Thinking

Pressing ‘Reset’ in the Anthropocene: Global Social Witnessing as an Awareness-Based Practice for Global Citizenship

You swipe through your favourite news site while sitting in a train, and you enter the typical bombardment of information – “four degrees climate change temperature rise possible”,“rainforest burning”,
Read More →
Culture

From Seniors to Elders

Senior citizens, OAPs, retirees. Doesn’t sound so inspiring, in the way this vast and growing segment of our population is sometimes referred to, does it? Now of course I
Read More →
Culture

A Question of Progress (One)

Part One: Positive Disintegration – are we willing?   “Something ancient asks us to give account of our centrality. To heed is to die. And there in lies our
Read More →
Culture

A Question of Progress (2)

Part Two: Breaking the Cycle – conscious uncivilising “Its very difficult to ask people to give up the assumptions by which they have always lived, and yet that is
Read More →
Poetry

Poems of Sushri Sangita Mishra

The Poems:   Truth  I have walked very long  on the rocky bed of time  In my effort to excavate truth many times, I have fallen  into the pit 
Read More →
Thinking

Why ‘3rd Space’?

J L Mehta, an Indian philosopher and admirer of the German philosopher Martin Heidegger once wrote , “So long as we live encapsulated within one tradition, our own, and
Read More →
Thinking

The Problem with Western Universalism (long read)

Part 1. The Sabarimala Temple Controversy In January 2019, I read two related articles in the media that immediately caught my attention, being a regular visitor to India. The
Read More →
Environment

Extinction Rebellion & the Climate Emergency – The Case for Civil Disruption

Alexandria Villsenor, 13, has spent every Friday since December wrapped in a winter coat outside the United Nations headquarters in New York City, protesting the glacial response to climate
Read More →
Culture

Century of the Self part 1: “Happiness Machines” (video)

This documentary series is a deeply insightful study of how the consumerist driven, capitalist, liberal democracies of the modern world were formed in the early 20th century.
Read More →
Health and Medicine

“This is not a University subject, this is a universal subject” – Dr. Vasudevan speaking on Ayurveda

Western medicine, like the worldview that sustains it, for all its incredible achievements, and there are many, has a profound inbuilt limitation.
Read More →
Culture

Reinterpreting Vaastu

Sashikala Ananth is a leading exponent in India of Vaastu, the traditional architecture of the Indic civilisation.
Read More →
Culture

Dialogue with Alnoor Ladha – in nine short podcasts

We met Alnoor Ladha at his home in Tierra Valiente, the community he helped create in 2016 in Costa Rica. We talked about The Rules, Community, Capitalism, his Sufism,
Read More →
Gender

#’Me-too’ to ‘We-too’

This essay looks specifically at the unresolved issue of gender relations, and its cross-cultural intersections as highlighted by the #MeToo movement.

Read More →
Culture

Tradition through the Looking-Glass

In India, my experience of tradition (and just about everything else) was like going down the rabbit hole.

Read More →
Thinking

Spaces of Transformation – Epistemologies of the South

To Boaventura de Sousa Santos, understanding of the world far exceeds Western understanding of the world. Even though there is a growing recognition in the west of the cultural
Read More →
  • All
  • Capitalism and Technology
  • Perception and Consciousness
  • Imagination
  • Spirituality
  • Psychedelics
  • The More-than-Human World
  • Science and Ethics
  • The Body
  • Environment
  • Gender
  • Health and Medicine
  • Culture
  • Thinking
  • Politics
  • Poetry
  • Education
  • Gender and Sexuality
  • Mindfulness
  • Activism
  • Art and Consciousness
  • Climate Change
  • Consciousness
  • Decolonisation
Culture

The Rise and Fall of Russell Brand: An Opportunity for More-Than-Personal Redemption?

A Strange Fusion Like many others, here at 3rd Space we have been aware of the unravelling and retreat of Russell Brand in the face of familiar, but shocking
Read More →
Imagination

Imagination Activism – An Interview with Phoebe Tickell

We have been chasing an interview with Phoebe Tickell for some time. (She’s a busy lady). We hope we will manage to catch up with her soon. In the
Read More →
Consciousness

Awakening Other Capacities – Why this just might be fundamental

What are “Exiled Capacities”? Much of the time, my mind churns out the same predictable responses to things. If I tried to draw a circle around what I think
Read More →
Culture

‘Barbie’: Subversive Feminism or Subversive Corporatism?

A Faustian Bargain My granddaughter of 7 years of age is perhaps typical of a many little girls today, raised in a culture permeated by post 60’s feminist consciousness.
Read More →
Consciousness

Resonance – The Portal to Interbeing

Resonance – A Function of Relationship For many years now there has been a proliferation of sophisticated group dialogue practice exploring intersubjective field phenomena. Such phenomena have also been
Read More →
Activism

How Dare You! Ethics and the Judiciary

Part One UK Climate Trials The UK’s climate trials present a complex matrix against which the personal, political, and spiritual dimensions of British culture are being tested. “Once bitten
Read More →
Perception and Consciousness

Seeing Requires Faith

Humans are taught to see through our senses and to think through reason as the default mode of engaging life in these so-called ‘modern days’. But perhaps human ‘seeing’
Read More →
The Body

Evolving Through the Body

A conversation between Patrick Cassidy and Kirstie Simson. In progressive circles we feel comfortable with the idea of psychological, emotional, and even spiritual development. But what about evolving through
Read More →
The More-than-Human World

Practicing Animism: Back to the Future

How might we begin to experience ourselves as being inherently part of Nature? Not as some disembodied observer taking a stroll through the woods or along the riverbank, but
Read More →
Capitalism and Technology

Misalignment, AI & Moloch

Read More →
Culture

What is Mimesis and Why Does it Matter?

The Intrusion of Gaia Bruno Latour begins his book Facing Gaia by telling us that although we have known for thirty years we are facing an “ecological crisis,” we
Read More →
Culture

Re-Generation: The Beginnings of a New Culture

Part One Our shared perception of reality has become fragile. This underlies the crises we face. Just learning to see differently is a beginning. The vision and practice of
Read More →
Education

Environmental Education Is Falling Short: Activism Can Help

In an environmental studies class in a secondary school in a South African township, the teacher takes the students outside into the sunny fall morning. She shows them how
Read More →
The More-than-Human World

Walking the Path to Nowhere & Everywhere

I went for a walk in the woods recently; along easy paths through the rolling miles of Epping Forest, an ancient forest miraculously still surviving on the outskirts of
Read More →
Culture

Regeneration @ the School of Human Ecology: A Shanghai Story

Covid 19 and Returning to China 3rd Space: Welcome Lionel. So, could you give us some background about what you were doing in the UK prior to moving back
Read More →
The Body

Embodied Intelligence & Paradigm Change: In Conversation with Kirstie Simson

Dance Improvisation – Exploring the Unlimited Potential of the Body 3rd Space: Welcome, Kirstie. Your Improvisation work has always expanded the boundaries of contemporary dance. Could you start by
Read More →
Science and Ethics

Ethics and the Queer World of Quantum Mechanics

The Burden of Meaning Making Traditionally, for hundreds of years, religion was the source of ethics, the unquestioned authority on how to live and act. In the secular West
Read More →
Decolonisation

A Value System is Not a Personal Opinion

In this video, Venkatesh Rajan, a former journalist, educator, thinker, and currently organic farmer, explores the impact colonial thinking and its legacy of imitation has had and continues to
Read More →
Culture

Metamodernism’s Noisy Cousin & the Art of Subverting Normalcy

The Illusion of Normalcy Soup on the Sunflowers, milk on the floor of Harrods, orange paint on the storefront of an exclusive Aston Martin showroom. Acts of anarchy, transgressive
Read More →
Spirituality

The New Prophets: Spirituality in a Metamodern World

Looking at how the progressive world is responding to the meta-crisis, it is encouraging to see an accelerating awareness that we are not in only in a desperate climate
Read More →
Decolonisation

A Process of Learning and Unlearning: A dialogue with Boaventura de Sousa Santos

Part One Beginnings 3rd Space: I’d like to start with a background question about your life and work. You’re a distinguished legal scholar from the University of Madison and
Read More →
Thinking

Imagination of the Unthought Within the Thought of our Times

Our imagination operates, to start with, within epistemic bounds. This means there is an unthought to our thought which we take for granted, just as a fish may imagine
Read More →
Culture

The Reluctant Activist: Exploring the Inner/Outer Divide

In May 2021 contemporary thinker and writer Jonathan Rowson wrote, “To be metamodern is to be caught up in the co-arising of hope and despair, credulity and incredulity, progress and
Read More →
The More-than-Human World

Frankenstein Apples

Using stories from her father Gregory Bateson’s work on ecology, Nora Bateson speaks to our obsession with growth, and how singling out specific organisms for development creates a perilous
Read More →
The More-than-Human World

A Nightingale Pilgrimage

So it was that after almost three weeks of recovering from the fatigue and coughing of a mild, but nevertheless very unpleasant covid infection, following right on the heels
Read More →
Politics

The Ukraine War: Challenging a Binary Lens

“As a person who believes in democracy, it’s disappointing to read from your comments that you are ideologically opposed to western values“.  My heart sank a little as I
Read More →
Culture

Examining the Sensitive Self

In 2004, the psychologist Michael Eigen wrote a book called, “The Sensitive Self”. He examines sensitivity as our essential humanness, and ultimately as constituting the basis of humane ethics.
Read More →
Environment

Ceiba – The Future of Carbonless Shipping

3rd Space: Welcome, Dani. It’s good to see you again. From our brief tour, it’s clear a lot of development has occurred with Ceiba over the past two years, especially
Read More →
Decolonisation

Racial Justice, Climate Activism, Self-Repair: building a new paradigm with Esther Stanford-Xosei

Planet Repair – Pre-Figuring a New World 3rd Space: Welcome to 3rd Space, Esther. I am going to dive straight in. (Smiles) Given the current systemic and existential crisis we’re facing
Read More →
Decolonisation

Moving Beyond Empire

Sitting in the garden here in Cupar, drinking in this late September warmth, a familiar sound draws my gaze to the flight path above – not of aeroplanes, but
Read More →
Culture

Contemplating the Illusions of Corporate Culture

Early morning and we have porridge on the stove, the sun is struggling to come to terms with the clouds and we can sense it’s going to be a
Read More →
Climate Change

Why Climate Change is a Social Justice Issue

Another COP is over. Despite the rhetoric to keep global warming to 1.5˚C, national pledges to address the climate crisis put us instead on track for an alarming global
Read More →
Activism

Disobedience and the State

“Disobedience, in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is man’s original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion.” Oscar
Read More →
Activism

What is Insulate Britain? The call for radical nonviolent civil disobedience

A Letter to my friends Dearest friends, We have shared many significant moments in our lives. Because of this, I wanted to share now with you another moment, particularly
Read More →
Culture

3rd Space unplugged – Patriarchy, identity and monotheism

Patriarchy, identity and monotheism. How they function in the relationship between coloniser and colonised. In the fifth of our unplugged cross-cultural discussions, 3rd Space continues the conversation with Mumbaikers,
Read More →
Culture

3rd Space unplugged -Truth and Reconciliation

Truth and Reconciliation – Reconciliation between the global north and south must be the foundation for a new world culture to emerge. In the fourth of our unplugged global
Read More →
Culture

3rd Space unplugged – Spiral Dynamics through an Indic Lens

Raghu Ananthanarayanan speaks with Abhishek Thakore: understanding the developmental model of Spiral Dynamics through an Indic lens. Raghu Ananthanarayanan has a Postgraduate Degree in Bio-Medical Engineering from IIT Madras.
Read More →
Culture

3rd Space unplugged -Is the Future Black and Brown?

Confronting the reality of Western global dominance In the second of our unplugged cross-cultural discussions, 3rd Space continues the conversation with Mumbaikers, Abhishek Thakore of the Blue Ribbon Movement,
Read More →
Culture

3rd Space unplugged – global discussions on a new cosmopolitanism

Exploring the potential of a true global citizenry In the first of a series of cross-cultural conversations, Steve Brett of 3rd Space in London talks with Abhishek Thakore, co-founder
Read More →
Culture

Nothing Exists In Isolation

Part One Developing Faith I grew up as a non-believer, an atheist. However, when I started working in the rural area in India, and developed some sort of relationship
Read More →
Mindfulness

Living on purpose – Jamie Bristow and the Mindfulness Initiative

Mindfulness joins the political mainstream 3rd Space: Welcome Jamie. You have been doing ground-breaking work for some years to bring mindfulness into the political mainstream. You are also trying to
Read More →
Activism

The Entangled Activist-talking with Anthea Lawson

From Newspapers to Campaigning 3rd Space: Welcome to 3rd Space, Anthea. Could you begin by telling us about how you came to be concerned about some of the underlying issues in
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Gender and Sexuality

The Problem That Never Goes Away – The frightening normality of sexual violence

In 2018, while working on a writing project, my home for several months was a small cottage on the banks of the Periyar river in rural South India. In
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Culture

Some thoughts on the work of Daniel Schmachtenberger

It may seem strange to dedicate a blog to the thinking of somebody else, but Daniel Schmachtenberger just might be one of the best and brightest minds around at
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Culture

Awakening from the Meaning Crisis with John Vervaeke

Introduction This past summer, a colleague from the US sent me a video featuring John Vervaeke in conversation with Nora Bateson. “Do you know him? He seems to be
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Environment

Rethinking Conservation – A Holistic Approach in Botswana

3rd Space: Welcome Tempe. You’ve been working in Africa for almost nine years as a conservation scientist, a critical area for the survival of our global ecosystem; but it’s
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Culture

David Choquehuanca – A New Pachakuti in Bolivia

December 1st, 2020 After a decade as Chancellor of Evo Morales, David Choquehuanca was the leader chosen by the Pacto de Unidad to represent indigenous, native and peasant peoples
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Culture

The Future Begins Today – Boaventura De Sousa Santos

Watch the video here: For further information on the work of Boaventura De Sousa Santos, visit and also
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Culture

On Choice and Love – an incident above the Bay of Bengal

To me, being able to exercise real choice or freewill was always tied to a sense of being ‘right’ – of knowing. At a certain point in my life
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Education

Why are we here? Getting to grips with the QUESTion Project

3rd Space:  Welcome Gerard and Francesca! Could you start by telling us what the QUESTion Project is, what are its aims and vision, and who it serves. Gerard: It’s a semester or
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Contribute your findings by clicking the “contact” button in the upper right-hand corner, and emailing us at: info@3rd-space.org

"Insight …is the depth of understanding that comes by setting experiences, yours and mine, familiar and exotic, new and old, side by side, learning by letting them speak to one another."

- MARY CATHERINE BATESON -