The Story of Restoration

This is a story about stories. Or, to be more precise, this is a story about the most important stories we tell each other right now.

By GRID-Arendal

August 27^th, 2024

By Karen Landmark, Managing Director at GRID-Arendal

Originally published on Agderposten in Norwegian. Translated into English using ChatGPT and copyedited by a human.

This is a story about stories. Or, to be more precise, this is a story about the most important stories we tell each other right now.

And – about a new story that I believe many of us, if we pause and reflect, can sense is emerging. For now, it can mostly be felt and perceived, as small glimpses of something resembling hope. Something that stirs in the mind and warms the heart. As invigorating as a cold bath and as gentle as a summer breeze. An expanded awareness, perhaps. And if that sounds unfamiliar, let’s call this story “the story of restoration.” I will try to explain why I believe we both long for and need this new story right now.

Since the dawn of our existence as a species, we humans have told each other stories. We have told stories to understand ourselves and to try to grasp our existence, our surroundings, and above all, to chart some kind of moral compass. These stories have bound us together and united us, and they have broken us down and separated us. They have shaped and continue to shape our identity, our understanding of connections, and at the deepest level, our societies.

Stories can be so powerful that they can remarkably build up and tear down entire civilizations. At their most constructive, they can inspire action, change societal norms, and even spark revolutions. But they can also conserve, prevent change, create fear, establish heavy power structures, and control entire populations. Stories can maintain structures and systems that no longer serve us as societies or as individuals, but which persist – precisely because the stories are strong, told again and again until we no longer remember what came before or are capable of seeing what could come after. Stories can pacify us so gradually that we don't even notice it.

So, what stories are we telling each other today, and what are these stories doing to us?

According to the German thinker, academic, professor, and yes, storyteller, Otto Scharmer, there are, and this is my simplification, two major narratives dominating the world today.

One, and this is the stronger of the two, is a narrative of destruction and devastation, of climate and nature crises, food crises, polarization, rearmament, war, insecurity, fear, scarcity, and a struggle over resources. At best, this story frightens us. At worst, it hinders and pacifies us. This story has roots far back in time and found many of its building blocks during the so-called Enlightenment, where the thinking was characterized by a desire to reduce complexity, to understand the world in categories, and as a non-living machine. And in the shadow of fantastic scientific and technological discoveries and innovations, something was also lost. The most important thing we forgot was perhaps that there was still so much we did not understand. The story has grown large and powerful, gaining strength along the way and enabling political ideologies and related governance systems and societal norms of various kinds. And it maintains these.

Today, this story partly reflects the world accurately. For it is true that, in just the past five years, much around us has gone from bad to worse. We have more active wars in the world today than we have had since World War II, and the climate and nature crisis is now so evident that it can be physically felt and experienced. We see democracies under pressure, increased polarization, and a lack of dialogue. We see the marginalization of vulnerable groups and more, not less, social inequality. This story does one thing to us more than anything else: it creates unrest and fear. It is the story that underpins separation, from ourselves, from each other, and from nature. It is the story of the individual over the collective, of every person for themselves. This story is partly true. But only partly.

Tvedestrand Kommune by boat. Photo: Guendalina De Luigi

For something else is also true. This is told in another story. The story we called "the story of restoration." "Restoration" is a beautiful and hopeful word, I think. And viewed philosophically, restoration can be understood as a process or state in which something is brought back to its original condition or improved after some form of damage or disruption.

This story, which is currently whispered more than it is loudly told, is sensed and felt perhaps more as fragments or passages than as a cohesive and complete narrative. But it is there and is being shaped right now, in our time and under our watch. This is the story of all we can do differently, the story of our need for each other, for deep connection to nature, for community, for shared and universal values, and for the desire that something is and should always be more important than anything else. It is the story that peace always bears more than war, that time is a valuable gift, and that love builds bridges. It is the story that we as a species, as part of nature, thrive best when the ecosystems we depend on are not degraded and destroyed but are maintained, restored, and cared for.

This is the story that, despite our anxiety, fear, and despair, we still feel connected to and touched by. And perhaps we feel it most strongly when we are close to each other in joy, or when we are quiet enough, long enough, to notice the gentle buzzing of insects in the garden and the birds singing in the morning, or the waves crashing against the shore at Spornes while the wind moves the weather-beaten pine trees. We catch glimpses then, even if we may not yet see that in those very moments we are co-authors of this new story, which carries within it our collective longing for quality in our relationships, with ourselves, with each other, and with nature. And for the need for deep connection and meaning.

This story carries within it a powerful manifestation of what can and must come. Of all that is and can be good. It is a hopeful story of community, of new ideas, and of the courage to abandon old habits and discard old ideas that no longer support us or the Earth.

Many of us long for something else. And we are also many more than we think. Every year, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) releases a report called the Human Development Report. The report tells us how we are doing in terms of distribution, poverty, gender differences, and our resource base. This year's report gave us the most hopeful number I have come across in a very long time. The number is 69 and can be fed with strength directly into the story of restoration. The report states that 69% of us are willing to accept lower wages, give up benefits, and change our lifestyle to help solve major global challenges such as the climate and nature crisis. In other words, we are willing to give up something to create something better. To let go to make room. Here we have potentially the world's largest social movement that does not yet know itself. And if there is anything that world history has shown us, it is that social movements create change.

The story of restoration is created and told by us. By the media, journalists, politicians, leaders, teachers, healthcare workers, store employees, parents. By everyone. By us. Who we are, what we choose, how we treat ourselves and each other, nature and our fellow creatures, what values we hold, and what intentions we have, matter. We matter.

I am not advocating here for turning away or covering our ears and humming. I know that our most dominant story is partly true. We have a climate and nature crisis, that is beyond any doubt – and we live in a time with ongoing gruesome wars and conflicts, and with increased polarization and marginalization. There is so much to fear, and there is so much in the world today that is so terribly painful to witness. But precisely because of that, I hold the banner high for us to together give strength to a new story that can help us move forward. We must seek out, create, and notice all that is good. I am not an optimist, and I am not naïve, but I still choose to be hopeful.

Karen Landmark is the Managing Director of the environmental foundation GRID-Arendal. She has a PhD in sustainable transformation and has worked for many years in the private sector. Karen is passionate about a more just and peaceful world where we humans truly understand that everything we do to nature, we do to ourselves.