The Origins of Samara

The first official cohort of the SEEDS Ambassador Academy was just getting warmed up when it became clear, towards the end of 2020, that a new DHO within the SEEDS ecosystem was germinating within some ripe soil.

Drawn to the potential of SEEDS and seeing the possibility for more full time roles, several Ambassadors and Drigo began exploring joining Hypha and the draft plans for Ambassador compensation. Looking into the future, we wondered if Hypha would be the right place for us, and then hundreds, and then thousands of Ambassadors to join.

In the spirit of decentralization, and with the desire to create a home for Ambassadors and leaders of the regenerative renaissance, the idea emerged to create a new organization that would complement Hypha, bridging the tools and technology to towns, cities, and organizations around the world.

Having studied the sustainability movement and witnessed the rise and fall of many spirited attempts to unify regenerators globally, Drigo felt very strongly the need for this new organization to be built to last. The strong sense he got at the time was that this organization would have a feminine, gentle, inclusive energy that could truly serve as a home for diverse leaders across different cultures, industries, and ages.

On the 14th December 2020 Rieki and Drigo were chatting on the Discord SEEDS server about a possible new DHO, and it went something like this...

Rieki: "Yes, definitely see the (X) DHO (I'm loving Embassy DHO right now) be run, designed, launched and guided by the Ambassadors and other Seedizens that have shown up and wanting to find their place to play. I think Hypha could be very hands off - giving a bit of guidance and support (only if requested) but otherwise letting it take on a life of its own... I see the work you're doing as essential to helping co-create the roadmap for this new DHO... Whereas Hypha is a very explicit roadmap for product launches (Hypha is for building tools) this Embassy is for growing the movement and would have a much different roadmap - this would be a potent tool for unearthing and co-creating that roadmap."

[03:19] Then we can merge any of the movement building activities Hypha has been doing into this new DHO and leave Hypha focused on the products and this new DHO on movement building (steering, growing, nurturing the Renaissance) - I see this new DHO being much larger in membership and direct impact than Hypha...

[03:20] Just thinking out loud."

Drigo: "Thank you for sharing your thoughts @rieki and @SanjayRajan I would also really love to hear from folks in the MBC and from some of the original / core team of Hypha. Maybe the best way to do this is to get on a call? Since all of the incoming Ambassadors are relatively new, many of us are not familiar with the concept of the DHO, the long term vision for Hypha, and how SEEDS was envisioned by the core team to work / self govern in the future. It would be great to build this DHO with the next 1 yr, 3 yrs, 5 yrs in mind. What is Hypha's role going to be over that time frame? If we were to create the internal DHO for SEEDS, how might that evolve over the coming years? What organizations do we need to run / steward / host / build our movement over the coming 1 yr, 3 yrs, 5 yrs? I believe as we explore these questions, we might get insight on how to build this new DHO.

It feels clearer to me after further thought and reading your comments above that this new DHO should simply be the new SEEDS DHO. And that Ambassadors can / should play a role within this new DHO, and that everyone else is invited too! (ok, maybe citizens only?) Within the DHO we can have the ambassador circle, the movement building circle, and other circles with roles as we see fit. I can also envision Rieki and other core members of Hypha being within that DHO.

Again, I think for those of us interested in setting this up, and for all incoming Ambassadors, the natural start is to get on a call with some of the 'core team' to have a debrief and to share ideas about the future so we can build this new DHO with all the info and input we need (edited)

[06:58] P.S. on the name of the new DHO, I do like the idea of the Embassy (being the office of the Ambassadors), but I'm also thinking that Embassy and Ambassador are kind of old paradigm concepts / words? Maybe Emissary? And a new paradigm equivalent to Embassy?"

And thus began the search for a name.

A few minutes later, Roz chimed in with a truly terrible idea (HartigNet), which thankfully everybody ignored:

Roz: "Following this emergent discussion with interest, and would love to be on the initiating call. @drigo and @rieki, I'm fine with Embassy, as being the place where Ambassadors reside. Another suggestion, looking to nature for inspiration, and following on from the Hypha theme, could be HartigNet: according to Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hartig_net), the Hartig net is a network of inward growing hyphae, that extends into the root, penetrating between the epidermis and cortex of ectomycorrhizal plants. This network is a site of nutrient exchange between the fungus and the host plant. Seems appropriate!"

But a few more minutes and a few more Google searches later....

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... which thankfully received a much more enthusiastic response.

Drigo and Roz duly hopped on a call, and Drigo invited Irina too. The trio seemed to click, and this being called Samara started to emerge.

And then all these other beautiful souls started showing up, and it seemed that Samara was acquiring a life all of her own.

Video: Roz's reflections on the new DHO of Samara, recorded one week after the discovery/naming of Samara, on 21st December 2020.

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