Circle conversation with Linnea and Tenneson

Enjoy this circly conversation between Linnea Bjorkman and Tenneson Woolf, connecting as friends, colleagues and fellow learners revisiting circle and Linnea’s work with yoga, breath, gardening, permaculture, and more.


From Tenneson Woolf’s podcast (scroll down on this page to play), and a written transcript is included below.

So glad for this conversation (49 minutes) recorded for podcast purposes. To learn. To cultivate. To animate. To create a world into being. Linnea and I go back to shared practice in The Circle Way. Lots of fun. Lots of purpose. Thanks for listens. Thx for forwards. Linnea is at www.wholerootwonder.com.

A Few Episode Notes & Times

  • 0:30 — Reclaiming heart of humanness together, refreshing the H2H Podcast

  • 1:22 — Welcome Linnea

  • 2:49 — Linneas’ Hello (mission and purpose that go with intentional process)

  • 5:26 — What’s surfacing in your work / life?

  • 6:48 — “Convercircliness”

  • 9:30 — Is there something you can’t not do? (center, underlaying kindness, the compost bin of humans connected)

  • 14:00 — Please say more of what you are up to Linnea? (Chair Yoga; Laughing Yoga; Gardening / Permaculture; 3 Communities in The Circle Way)

  • 22:45 — Being in the Doing (welcoming holistic being; “multipotentialite”; “if I offer what brings me joy, it goes well?”

  • 25:30 — Is there particular “inner Linnea code / DNA, wherever you show up? (Show up as I am. Shine my “me-ness.” Intentions toward kindness and compassion. Invitation to a narrative of kindness and clarity.”

  • 32:20 — Connection to breath, to create autonomy, belonging, and connection to something outside of self. There are “mini” ways to practice — simple, impactful, and profound ways to hold us in the moment. “Pruning the suckers.”

  • 42:30 — Don’t need to rush. Won’t cover everything. Will leave out some good stuff.

  • 43:30 — Anything else to share today Linnea? (Colleagues…, we are each others teachers. Life is teaching us.)

  • 46:30 — Post reflections from Tenneson.


Tenneson

There we go. Welcome. Hello, everyone. My name is Tenneson Woolf, and you are joining into something called the Human to Human Podcast. This is something that I created a while ago because I just wanted to have some conversations with some people that I love and people that I appreciate or people that I'm learning with. And today is a little bit of a Reboot refresh of being able to do some of that. So, I've invited a particular friend and colleague and guest to join, and we'll just say a little bit about her in a moment. But this Human to Human Podcast comes from a lot of important narratives for me. There is something about just being humans with one another and reclaiming the art of being with one another in realness or in curiosity with one another. I think there's so much to learn and be in together just in a space of thinking, feeling, learning, connecting out loud with one another. And the “human to human” narrative is one that just stands out to me in all the work and stuff that I get to do. I find that I so often come back to all of that, and maybe we're just trying to be good humans with one another.

Tenneson

So with that said, I see you on the screen, Linnea. I'm welcoming you, Linnea to the podcast episode today. I'm so glad to have you here. Thank you.

Linnea

It's so much fun. I'm excited to catch up with you.

Tenneson

Yeah. And we've just deliberately not had a big pre hello with one another so that we can be in the freshness and the liveness of our hello with one another because it's a return in some way. You and I have some association through circle work and The Circle Way. I know of some of you, like you, that means practicums and some workshops, those things. And we've remained in some connection. You reached out a few times around some of the work that you're doing in community. And what I keep remembering is just an overall orientation to wholeness with human beings. And you're someone who works in community. So there's just lots of love and connection that has me reaching out, I guess this started back in December, where you and I were in a bit of an email thread. I said, “Hey, I'm going to refresh this little podcast. Would you like to join?” What hellos would you like to say here, Linnea?

Linnea

Well, I've been thinking about you and our time together, and we'd be out with all our other folks. And Amanda Fenton. And just trying to hold on to and keep revisiting all of that wisdom that I gleaned from that time because I've been working with a few different communities around the Denver metro area who are really interested in creating this sense of shared leadership and intentional process to the way that they gather and the way that they move their mission and purpose forward. And so The Circle Way is one I really honed in on. I've done so much community organizing and Asset Based Development stuff. It's been really fun to have this more narrow focus where I get to just help people decide what tools within The Circle Way are helpful for them and then take little bits and pieces from other practices. And I find myself quoting you sometimes.

Tenneson

Oh, boy. Yeah.

I remember back to that, too. That's definitely a key point in the association that I have with you is those circle practicums, and I think an advanced practicum you came to also when we were on Whidbey Island, that was work with Amanda. That was such a sweet period, all in a pre-COVID way of life and the connections and things that we had. And that is such a key body for me also. I have such a love and respect for Christina Baldwin and Ann Linnea. They are the core central circle peeps for me, and dear friends, and dear elders, and then some others along the way also that I just feel like I've been able to work and live with. Quanita Roberson is one, Penny Hamilton in Australia is another, some key men, Bob Stilger, Toke Moeller, Phil Cass that have shown up as people are so devoted to not just a methodology, but gosh, how do we create connection and sweet learning amongst each other? I wonder how you relate to all of that or what's surfacing in your in your continued work in this way?

Linnea

Yeah. Well, as you were just mentioning people, I'm thinking about my mentor, Mike Green, who's all about Asset Based Community Development, but he's been my role, like, cheerleader around what I'm doing with the whole in The Circle Way. And to quote you.

Tenneson

Hey, oh, my gosh. Here we are again.

Linnea

You like to say that there's a way that we can be circly in any moment of our lives. And I think about that a lot because I find myself saying in all aspects of my life, I want to be intentional. I want to be intentional about this. I want to be intentional about that. And even just in moments like this, Okay, so how am I truly listening while you're speaking? And then how am I speaking intentionally when it's my turn to contribute? And so that's another thing that was bubbling up for me is just being circly in all of the lessons of my life.

Tenneson

Can I throw a new word into that? Yeah. Wait, let me think. The playfulness of combining words together because this came to me, I think, just like yesterday as I was thinking about you and us having this conversation and realizing that we do have some formal circling in us and some of what you're naming around what it means to listen in a deliberate circle setting and what it means to speak or contribute in a deliberate setting. And I realize in this podcast mode that it's not quite so strongly circled, but it is conversation and it's still circly. I hold that as a background. So the new word that came to me was “convercircliness”. Just wanting to be like, ‘Welcome the spirit of converse circly’. I don't think I can do things without some background of circle intent and possibility in me, and sometimes it's like, we do get to be a little more conversational. It's one of the things that we name within The Circle Way. Not all circles are a ‘pass the piece’ thing. Some are talking piece councils, and some are silent councils, and some are popcorns. We've got a lot going on.

Linnea

And don't you find that conversation, convercircliness, is the most challenging because you are ping pong back and forth, and that's the point of it. But there's less space in between the two people contributing. So it's like, how do we create that space while we're having this dialogue? I think it's something that's happening in the background. Like, internally, I'm maintaining that awareness of everything you're saying while I'm still figuring out how I want to contribute.

Tenneson

Well, gosh, darn it. This is pretty darn circly stuff, but I know for me, this is over the years. So in an over the years noticing way, there's some things about connecting and being with others that I have found I can't not do anymore. And one of those, I love the double negative of that, one of the ‘can't not do's’ for me is some level of just baseline center. There is a center here. You and I are looking at each other on a screen right now and for Zoom and all of that. But there's a ‘can't not’ imagine some space that lives between us or between the eight of us or 12 of us or 37 of us when we gather together that is what we're feeding and what I find I'm trying to feed or I'm oriented to. And I'm trying to listen from also in a way that is so much more than conversational banter or clever remarking together. This is like the deep learning thread to me also. I wonder if you've got some ‘can’t not’ news?

Linnea

Well, as part of my intention, at least, of course, I mess up because I'm human. This underlying kindness and just trying to be... It's so hard because we never know when we're going to say something that might don't rub someone the wrong way. But if I have an intention of kindness, then people know that even if I do say something that perhaps does create friction. They know, oh, my intention was kindness. That's one thing I'm thinking.

Tenneson

Because they feel it. That's something that I really count on. And yet as part of the imperfect human club, and it seems even weird to say that. I know that I'm going to mess it up sometimes with the best of intentions. And yet I find I don't want to lead with a fear of messing up. I do want to lead with an invitation for me and the rest of us to be in the... Kindness is an important word to me, but be in a, you know, in a, kind to self, kind to other, kind to circumstance way of being temporarily in this deliberateness of connection and listening together.

Linnea

Yeah. And actually, these two things I feel like, you know, your contribution of the image of the center, the analogy that I like to use when I'm facilitating workshops around it is the compost bin and how we're all contributing our unique things to the compost bin, and then it's transforming it into what we actually need as a whole group. And so all the things that are going in there, some of the things seem like, oh, they don't have a use anymore. But then when we put them in the center, then they bring forth what we do need. So maybe we can use that analogy too with things that we might contribute that do create that, like what feels like conflict or friction or whatever. But it's in the center, and then it gets to become something more productive.

Tenneson

Yeah. What people wouldn't have seen that I just did with you is I'm shaking my hands in that way that's like, oh, yeah, speak it. You got it. You're nailing it. I so appreciate that metaphor. I'm a person that needs metaphor. I need visual reality and visual... Just the reality, all of that. You know that I'm a person that often references soup and the stew and the spices we bring and all of that. But I really appreciate the compost metaphor because I think compost of some of it needs to sit for a while and some of it needs a little heat for a while. Some of it needs a spin. It feels like what a promising and kind way to try to be human beings with one another.

Tenneson

Can you share a little how's the Whole Root Wonder going?

Linnea

Oh, man.

Tenneson

What are you up to?

Linnea

Well, one fun thing that I'm doing on the regular is I'm teaching chair yoga classes in the Marine Care Facilities. 

Tenneson

And…

Linnea

It's such a refreshing part of my day when I get to do that because I've always adored being around elders. I always leave feeling better than when I arrived when I'm teaching that. And it's a way that I can bring an energy of self-care and self-nurturing. And they get to participate in the way that feels good for them. So I do that.

Tenneson

Wait, wait, wait. What goes into chair yoga? And you're talking about elders and maybe some elders, like some combo of some people got a few years behind them. What goes into chair yoga?

Linnea

Well, for me, I found that each home that I visit is unique in what resonates for them. And so I create this recipe for each group of people because some people... So through doing the chair yoga, I got into laughing yoga as well. And so some of the groups really love the laughing and other groups don't at all. But if I do incorporate that, it is what it sounds like. It's basically just finding ways to laugh. And that stimulates so much joy. And it gets the abdominal all which I think contributes to working on your balance and stability throughout the day. But I always do breathing and movement and specifically like moving with the breath. I mean, I do simple movements as just... I know you can't see my hands tapping my thigh, but tapping down on your thigh and then exhale and inhale, tap the shoulders. Just the most simple things. But as we're synchronizing the breath with the movement, it's so therapeutic. But then we do some things that are strengthening options for both meditation and breath work and visualization.

Tenneson

Yeah. Well, I'm excited about everything that you're saying, and I'm excited with the bias of knowing some of you, but also just remembering quirkier language, but still relevant. It's something about your vibration, like who you are as a being from these circle encounters that we've had. And so somewhere between actually being in the same room with you together in those contexts that we were describing and some of the continued periodic connections along the way, I guess I'm a person who remembers feeling that way. I might lose some of the data, but I remember the feeling. And so as you describe these kinds of things that you're doing in the centers, it just feels exciting to me and encouraging. I think there's something about the simple things that any of us can practice or just invite at whatever level you're at thing, or come along for the ride on this one. There's something about just inviting the simple that might contribute a little overarching health and well being. That's cool. Yeah. Do you find yourself... Are you busy? How does your busyness layer these days with any of those things?

Linnea

Yeah. So the chair yoga has been one piece. And then I do some gardening and teaching of gardening and permaculture classes, too. And so this is my slow season in that capacity. I do have three communities that I'm working with on The Circle Way, and I help connect them to grants so that they can. Because most of them, are actually all of them, are non-profits. So I help connect them to grant opportunities to actually then be able to work with me. So I'm at a bit of a holding pattern with some of the things right now because the new grant cycle is coming up, but I'm in anticipation of working with. Well, I'll just tell you a little bit about the communities because it's helpful and fascinating. One of them is called the African Wisdom Connections organization, and they're working on getting their 501 and they're out in Aurora, Colorado. And they are a group of primarily women and they're from various countries in Africa, and some of them are refugees. And they are working on creating an educational opportunity that would help equip folks to work in, actually elder care facilities, which is a neat tie-in with the fact that I spend a lot of time in them. 

Linnea

And so they wanted a way of creating shared leadership because so often in non-profits and community groups, it ends up that the leadership gets taken on by two or three people, and those people are really overwhelmed, and then everyone else is sitting back a little bit. And so it's been a way for them to notice the gifts and skills and abilities of everybody involved and work in that direction. And they've been used to gathering in circle as a part of their traditions as well. So it's not foreign to them necessarily. But it's interesting to tie in The Circle Way, principles, and practices to compliment. It's already really rich experience that they always create. There's always music and dancing and food, the food, oh, my God. And then this other group I'm working with in Lakewood, they have housing communities for folks who are previously houseless and unaccompanied refugee and immigrant youth. And they do a beautiful job of already gathering intentionally and having traditions that bring people into the fold. Even just simple things like before they eat a meal, everybody goes like this and they go, Blessings on the meal.

Tenneson

And you're flapping your arms there.

Linnea

Yes. That's good. Yeah. And then I'm just starting to work with Colectivo De Paz, which is a non-profit that's doing a lot of... man, it just seems like they're doing so much to bring the community together and provide services. Because my work has these three different aspects of my business, and then it's this ebb and flow of throughout the year. I don't feel very busy right now. Getting back to your original question.

I don't feel very busy right now, but it's like this building up toward all the things I will be doing.

Tenneson

Yeah, I remember from some of the emails. I'm on your list. I get your emails, it seems, and notices and a few photos and things that go with it. And the impression I have whenever I sit at my counter, which is where I am now and often am for in a working way, and that includes emails and all that stuff. When I get your emails, there's a part of me that I don't know what, just cheers a little extra and appreciates the range of what you're up to because of the being that you are and the human that you are. The things that we offer to people, I feel like they are most potent when we live them ourselves. Our practices become invitations with others. And sometimes that's in a communal setting and lots of other things also. But there's a part of me that I remember in seeing your emails cheering for the, oh, gosh, yeah. And now the gardening and the permaculture piece of it, like health and well being at so many different layers there. So that's just like a little bit of gush of appreciation towards you for your version of how to welcome yourself and others into a holistic practice, holistic being, something like that.

Linnea

Yeah. There's a new term going aroundmultipotentialite”. I officially identify as a multipotentialite. And some people, I think they end up feeling like they're dabbling so much and so many different things that they're not becoming really good at any one thing. But it's been cool for me to take these three main passions and really hone in my skills on those things and highlight areas in my skills. Well, one thing I'm doing is I'm back to teaching some yoga classes in Spanish as well. And I have my program, Alas de Yoga, that over the years has offered Spanish yoga. And then so just finding those ways to really offer things that bring me joy. And like you're saying, if I'm offering what brings me joy, then what I'm offering is going to feel good to the people that are being it.

Tenneson

Multipotentialite. I tripped a little bit right at the last part. I think I lost the last two syllables.

Linnea

Multipotentialite.

Tenneson

There's a lot that can happen. There are many of us that have things to offer, multiple potentials. Being the person, that's beautiful. You might be speaking to some of that right now about the joy. Is there some inner Linnea code that guides you? Code, I don't know, the essence pattern, the DNA in that code language that feels more a direction that I don't like to go myself, but an operating code, something like that. Is there something that you have discovered at the core that is just like Linnea code, wherever you show up?

Linnea

Wow, that's a good question. Well, I think like most of us who are flawed humans, there's always a bit of...

Tenneson

Flawed, beautiful humans.

Linnea

Yeah. There's always a bit of insecurity and lack of confidence that lingers in the background. But I think that since I'm able to, in most cases show up as I am in any given space, maybe it's that just shining my me-ness.

Tenneson

My “me-ness” is what you said, M E, right?

Linnea

Yeah. And then beyond that, I think that intention toward kindness and compassion. And I can feel when my... And then speaking to the non-core part of me, but I can feel when one of the judgments and criticism of others comes up. But then I tune back in with what I know to be true, which is that if we are primarily focused on kindness and connection, that we can experience. My favorite, I'm looking at my book, Braiding Sweetgrass, by Robin Wall Kimmerer.  

She talks a lot about mutual reciprocity. And I think that's something that I'm just slowly is becoming a part of. The core part of who I am is just recognizing that... And it ties in so well with the work that I do that everyone is coming to the table with their own person, their own background, and we're all functioning in a way that feels good to us, and we're all contributing in the way that feels best to us. And so appreciating that and finding the ways that we do connect as to focusing on the differences.

Tenneson

Which has grown... I feel like I got something on my face. Which has grown to be so patterned or ingrained. It just feels like there's a lot of spaces where I don't think we're trying to get to the complaint of it all, but it's so deeply ingrained, or maybe traumatized, or maybe dramatized also. We're working so many layers these days. It's one of the things that I relate to also, Linnea, of without being bullshitty about anything, it matters to invite, maybe sometimes invoke a narrative, like a purpose narrative or a possibility narrative, a potential narrative, even in to say, Here's what I think we might be able to do today. And I'm finding that the more I back up in that narrative, it's less about, We're going to get this, this, and this done, and we're going to solve this problem. I rely on those narratives that we might find a little more kindness together, or we might find a little more clarity together to go with all of these things that we care about so much. We might back up enough to remember some of that deep humanness that we hold and that has been stripped out institutionally in so many places.

I am so appreciative of that invitation from the heart and from the belly. And I find people want to hear that too. Skewed a little bit by, I guess, the folks that I hang out with and get to continue working with or start a new working with. But boy, I find people hungry to hear that.

Linnea

Yeah. It's one thing I've noticed about myself in most circumstances, unless it's a certain time of the month and I'm more irritable than other dates. But a lot of people tell me that when I'm in their space that it's a calming and nurturing.

Tenneson

I know that with you.

Linnea

And people are really be hungry for... I know sometimes people don't see the three aspects of my business as tied together, but it's so interesting. The more that I do it, the more I see, for instance, in yoga, I think I'm with my practice and my meditation, and I think I'm able to hold that space of the connection to my breath can just be this reminder in a social situation that, Oh, yeah, I'm here and you're there. And you can create this nice sense of autonomy, but then appreciation of the connection. And then same thing with the Earth and being in the dirt and this connection that we can feel when we're cultivating something out of seemingly nothing. And people are really energized by that sense of just connection to something outside of themselves. And when you're in the dirt and you see this worm or this microorganism, or you know that the microorganisms are there, you can't necessarily see them. Yeah. I don't know if I answered the original question.

Tenneson

Yeah. We'll just keep following it here. Do you find that there are some many ways that you invite people into that relationship with earth, ground, dirt, fingernails, any of that. Are there some mini ways that you find yourself doing that when it's not a permaculture and a gardening thing that you're offering?

Linnea

Yeah. The first thing I thought of when you were saying that is sometimes when I'm teaching yoga, I'll do a visualization of… that the weight of your body is being held and supported by the Earth. Because usually the classes I'm teaching are indoors. And so the connection through the actual Earth is limited by a bunch of concrete. But that visualization is one way that I do it. It's like, okay, just imagine the Earth rising up to meet you and support your whole body.

Tenneson

Yeah, that's beautiful. I was saying before, my primary work partner over the last seven years is a woman named Quanita Roberson. We've just done some really cool things and quite a body of work together. Rite of Passage program, Circle Workshop, we just completed in December. And as part of the Rite of Passage program in that particular structure, we had three physical in person gatherings that got buried in COVID, but back to being able to meet in person now. And in the last retreat that we do with folks at this beautiful retreat center called Hope Springs in Ohio, we dedicated really 90 minutes to two hours as a way to give back to the institute and the land and its place. And the first time that we did this, it was just like a huge weeding project of a little garden that had been overrun and all of that stuff. And they have got some really keen people there also that lead with an environmental message invitation and platform. They want to be in right relations with the land. But my point was, here we're inviting these, in that case, I think it was 20 people to come out and let's be in relationship with the land.

Tenneson

Bring some clothes that you're not worried about getting dirty, and then the institute had its shovels and spades and all of those things. Well, I should probably qualify. It may not have been the same satisfaction for everybody. There were choices of how to be involved in that. I found it so deeply satisfying. Let us just come and little less of the head and in whatever way heart and belly shows up to be yummy in the dirt. And then the satisfaction of we 20 people putting in 90 minutes-ish of that communal attention with the land. Gosh, that was satisfying. That was something so beautiful about that. When I hear you speak about even just the small ways, and I asked the question of the small ways, you naming the meditation, this Earth beneath us, just the invitation to feel it, it seems like that. I love the simple yet impactful, profound ways that the tiniest of things can just even hold us there for a moment. And again, I'll circle back all in the name of, oh, gosh, let us do our best to be healthy, whole, communal, all of it.

Linnea

Yeah. And I find that I also do it the other way around, too, where I have a Patreon page, and the people who are members of that get my meditations and gardening content that helps support their gardening journey and yoga, both chair yoga and floor yoga and laughing yoga. But anyway, one of the things that I intentionally do with that content is I do incorporate the gardening in with the yoga and vice versa. So for instance, when I did a piece on how to trellis and prune your tomatoes, I talked about there's this process that you do called you prune off what are called the suckers of the plant. And the suckers are essentially they're coming off of the main stem and they're trying to become a whole another tomato plant. And so they're called suckers because they suck energy from the main stem. And so you prune them off so that the plant can keep growing up and produce more fruit, even though it feels like you're taking up something that it should be growing. And so I talk about... There's a phrase that's used quite widely in yoga where you say you're letting go of things that no longer serve you.

Linnea

Right. Yeah. I think about that when I'm gardening to your weeding project that you're doing community weeding or pruning, we're cutting away or taking out the things that are sucking energy from the main stem. And so I like to think about that as a meditation when I'm out in the garden because I think that the tendency can be to feel like, I get this weed out of here. And like, oh, there's so many suckers. Turn them off. But if we reframe it and think about it, therapeutic letting go and off of this stuff that we don't need anymore. And then it can go in the compost pile and it can be transformed into energy. 

Tenneson

There's something potent in that. I definitely have become a person that, again, back to the narrative, which sounds way too fancy, fancy, the way that I mean it. I'm just trying to invite and name what might be our real story here or another one of our real stories here. And so to be involved in any reframe, I find this is the human being that I am right now, and I love being able to connect it. But the reframing is, what if this were an act of love? Sometimes love looks like pruning off the suckers, and sometimes love looks like fill in the blank with a lot of here, but to bring us back to an energy of love, I am listening to... There's an International Peace Education Day, something like that that was going on yesterday. And I joined in for a little bit. It's another one of the story lines that is compelling to me, a practice for peace and how do we contribute in such ways. But there were a series of speakers and I listened and one of the, I think he's a former general director or something of UNESCO. And he said, Look, love is the solution. 

Tenneson

And I love coming back to that and inviting myself, others, of course, to be in even just that energy. What if love were the solution? And what does it look like in this situation, this community, this wicked journey, all of those things? I am the human that just has to come back to that these days. Something in my poetic heart has to come back to that also.

Linnea

Yeah. If I had a bell right now.

Tenneson

I could ring the Bell. And I love the symbol. That's beautiful.

Tenneson

Linnea, when I invited you into this, I popped out an email that was some of my refreshing intent to refresh, what is this podcast thing? And I gave you the informality of language. And I said some things like, looking back at the email now, don't need to rush, we won't cover everything. We'll leave out some good stuff. And I invited, you can swear, you can laugh, you can stumble, you can cry, you can get serious, you can get silly. And something about being able to offer a tone of, in this case, the two of us connecting reconnecting with just a few of the things that matter in this part of human journey. Is that now, wicked, unfair question. Is there anything else that you would like to add in the spirit of we're here on a... Well, we're recording on a Wednesday morning, but that you would like to share?

Linnea

Well, I guess the main thing I'm feeling is just gratitude for staying in communication with you. And I think one thing that feels nice about our friendship and collegiate relationship is this a sense that we're both each other's teacher. And that feels really nice because I think I started out as workshops with you is that feeling, this sense of just awe for what you bring to the circle. So I guess I'm just expressing my appreciation that you bring me into this sense of how am I offering my wisdom too.

Tenneson

And.

Linnea

I think that's what a really great mentoring friendship does is it encouraged to be more of who we are and recognize that and be in this, like the Robin Wall Kimmerer, this reciprocal to relationship. Thank you.

Tenneson

Oh, my gosh. I receive that in my heart. Thank you for that. I so relate to we are each other's teachers as a general way of living. Or we have medicine for that matter, and also to the notion of that life itself is a teacher here, or maybe the teacher for that matter. So just grateful for your spirit, your energy, and all of that. People may have some curiosity about how to track down Linnea. Can you offer a central place where they might do such?

Linnea

Yeah. Well, Whole Root Wonder.

Tenneson

Com. Whole, W, H, O, L, E.

Linnea

Yes. That's where you can link up with the social media, too, which is usually I'm posting events and special workshops and things, but also where you can message me and also just see everything that I'm offering. And yeah, hopefully people want to connect in some way, shape or form. And sometimes it's interesting. Sometimes it's all of the... I actually had one person become a patron. It was like, I was specifically looking for someone who was doing yoga and gardening stuff.

Tenneson

Well, you've landed in the right place. Hello.

Linnea

That's right.

Tenneson

Beautiful. I'm going to pause our recording. You and I can have a proper goodbye or another layer of proper goodbye off of the recording. Thank you so much for being here today.

Linnea

Thank you.

Tenneson

Okay, so now it's just me, Tenneson, back. I've said goodbye to Linnea and thanked her and just going to talk a little bit about her, excuse me, and some of what was coming out of that space. Gosh, I love Linnea’s... There is a groundedness and she spoke to it. It's so palpable to me. So there's something in her as a person that I so appreciate in her whatever that life is, whatever that integration and practice that she's in. It just makes me feel very appreciative. I love the combos. Oh, my gosh. The bringing together the world of yoga, the world of breath and different kinds of yogas, the world of gardening. And I know some of the just like and circle the communal conversation stuff that she does. So there's a way that I think I leave from this conversation with her just feeling renewed by all of that and what she's sharing. So that's pretty good. Not to forget some of the just catchy words that are in there, multipotentialite, multipotentialite, the me-ness. Oh, my gosh. I love words like that and find myself using them. And then some of the narratives that Linnea was talking about.

Tenneson

So by way of kindness and connection and even a little bit of reciprocity in that. So all of those things feel really yummy. I hope this is something that you enjoy. Listeners, going to be settling into some more conversations like this. And chose, by the way, to make this one a little longer. When I started out the podcast, I was really looking more at 20 minute episodes. And I know that serves in a lot of ways. But I am giving myself a bit of permission to be in the longer form of these. So the 45 minutes to an hour version. And to use that as a way to reclaim or maybe restore another realness together. I know I have that in my heart and it's in so many of the hearts of others that I'm with, all in the name of trying to be some good humans with one another. So thank you for joining today and listening. My website is tennesonwoolf.com. It's all there. And are there any other words to share for right now? Just thank you. Thanks for being in touch and for sharing the podcast today if you feel inspired to do so.

Thanks. Bye bye.


Linnea Bjorkman (pronounced Lin NAY uh) (pronouns: she/they/ella/elle) is an ever-evolving human. I’m curious, kind, do my best, smile often, cry often, make mistakes, and need at least 8 hours of sleep per night. I'm queer, bilingual (Spanish/English), and a Colorado Native. I've been told I am heartful and possess gentle wisdom. Whole Root Wonder is my small business. I support individuals and communities who are looking to deepen their experience of delight, harmony and well-being through yoga, meditation, food gardening, permaculture, and intentional heart-centered group practices. www.wholerootwonder.com

Tenneson Woolf is a facilitator, workshop leader, teacher, and writer. He designs and leads meetings in participative formats. To help people be smart together. To get people interacting with each other — learning together, building relationships, and focused on projects. Tenneson is a poet — Most Mornings is his most recent publication of poems. He also posts a daily blog, Human to Human, in which he offers insights, musings, and questions on everything from group facilitation to poetic heart and living within mystery. Tenneson has been a practitioner of Circle and other participative forms for 25+ years. His lineages include The Berkana Institute, The Circle Way, and The Art of Hosting. Learn more about him at tennesonwoolf.com.