A Gardener’s Perspective on Mother’s Day - by Lucas Worsdell

Seeds are small and powerful things, and it takes a lot of faith and vision to be able see the potential forests that they can grow into. This Mother's Day, we want to celebrate those who have tended the seeds in our minds and in our gardens. Rockflower has been an incredible mother to our programs, a catalyser that has had the dedication and drive to support us, as well as projects all over the world. A mother that has taken us under her wing and taught us valuable lessons that highlight the strength of a holistic approach. Inspired by this, Casa Congo adapted our methods, put more power in the hands of women, mothers and children to guide our vision and impact. As the years go by we also have the pleasure of slowly getting to know many of the other organisations that share a visionary stance on empowering women and girls all over the world and transforming the future. We are so proud to be a part of this family!

Being part of the Rockflower family means believing in the power of flipping the script; having faith in fostering long-term caring relationships which combine “radical idealism and practical realism” in approaches that put the reward into the hands of those who experience risk in ways we could never imagine.

It means, looking at an abandoned degraded site, seeing a forest, and most importantly holding on to your motherly instinct to love, nurture, respect, and tend the soil to make that transformation happen. When Casa Congo began, almost 5 years ago, we understood the power of nature, the strength of forests, and the fortitude of sea turtles. Yet one thing we struggled to grasp from the beginning was the importance of nurturing an understanding of mother earth. Rockflower was a patient mother like most, and helped tend our philosophical garden, our “currency of mind”.

Why is this something that should be celebrated in the context of the ‘development’ industry which we sometimes regretfully find ourselves in? Many funding organisations are full of patriarchal contradictions. They seek to fund small-scale local initiatives yet they impose a rigorous application process, full of financial restrictions, demands, and obligations, which most small-scale initiatives never have the resources to comply with. Those working on the ground pour hours into navigating these tedious processes, valuable hours when they could be creating impact with their programs, precious hours which if they charged for them would probably amount to more than the entire grant amount they would receive! Projects become goal focused, goals defined by the archaic kafkaesque grant structures that lose sight of the entire process. Their gardens are neglected as they simply focus on the inputs and the outputs.

Rockflower’s tolerance, compassion and empathy enabled us to focus on the processes that would transform how we run our programs, allowing us to focus on the substance; how we tend our garden. Rockflower’s philosophy began to run through our work, we began to understand the power of mother earth, and the power of her mothering nature. Our own radical idealism became a reality, because it was supported and encouraged, and we stand taller as a consequence. It’s so simple and it’s the most powerful seed of them all! Does this mean that all of our efforts focus on empowering women and girls? Of course not. Yet, that thread has been woven deep within the fabric of our organisation, luckily we have Las Tejedoras, Las Flores, and all of our mothers and students to do that weaving with us.

As both the Director of Agroecology for Casa Congo and a member of the Rockflower Partner Advisory Council, I have a unique opportunity to be both on the receiving side of Rockflower’s targeted approach and to be a co-creator and collaborator with all of these other partners in the Rockflower family. The Council consists of twelve members representing a broad range of Rockflower partners, both in geography and work. We each share our work with monthly calls to The Catalyzer Collective and meet once a year virtually to share ideas and best practices.

I want to highlight five of the other partners on the Advisory Council, (Five being the Rockflower number!) by giving you a glimpse into their work and their unique talents and perspectives, as well as underline the importance of understanding the universal appreciation of what it takes to nurture and mother all of us to ensure productive and thriving communities.

Constance Mugari - Women Advocacy Project - Zimbabwe

Constance, a mother and fearless advocate for the right of girls to be educated and live free from poverty and injustice, works in four communities around Harare, Zimbabwe preventing girls from early marriage through the establishment of Women Advocacy Project and the social enterprise - Clean Girls Soap. The partnership with Rockflower began in 2016 with the ‘Give Us Books not Husbands campaign,’ and has since expanded to include yearly support to establish the Clean Girls Soap brand. By ensuring that girls have an opportunity to earn income through the sale of clean girls soap, WAP is ensuring a sustainable business model that they plan to expand in other communities around Harare, not to mention its power to ensure a cleaner and healthier environment, and more resilient local economy.

Roseline Kamden - African Youth Alliance, Cameroon

Roseline, a mother of five children, runs the African Youth Alliance in Cameroon, and understands only too well the importance of the Five Key framework of Rockflower’s strategy to improve the lives and wellbeing of the women in rural communities of Cameroon. AYA began with the ‘Empowering Women and Girls through Mentorship and Training’ project and her team have recently been working on a two year Five Key, Five Villages project. She shares my love for the joy that gardens can bring to a community and has shared stories of the propagator they built recently with the support of Rockflower. “ We taught our mothers how to use local materials and technology to build a covered heated container filled with earth or compost, used for germinating, or raising seedlings. It improves their gardening. They have better seedlings for their gardens and raise income from the sale of garden seedlings. We are also preparing them for tree planting activities, they will be trained how to multiply trees and produce tree seedlings in the propagator.”

Somto Ugwu - Society for the Improvement of Rural People, Nigeria

Somto is a lawyer and a dedicated gender advocate. His work for the Society for the Improvement of Rural People (SIRP), focuses on dealing with the challenges of FGM, Child marriage and menstrual poverty. The ‘End Female Genital Mutilation and Keep Girls In School’ project with Rockflower has led to an increased awareness of the extraordinary work of this critical civil society organization in Northern Nigeria. He wanted to celebrate the work of women like Mrs Faith Obioma, reputed to be one of Nigeria’s foremost promoters of Girl Child Education, who engages the media to advocate for girl child education in Nigeria. On a personal level, she is a heroine of his, and one of the many reasons why he continues to do this work.

Siddique Hussain - Community Services Program, Pakistan

Siddique has decades of experience in understanding the importance of community development and spends every waking minute, ensuring that he is doing everything in his power to ensure that all of the mothers he works with every single day are respected for the tenacity and resiliency that they employ to keep going through the most devastating of times. One of Rockflower’s very first partners, the Community Services Program (CSP), works with Rockflower on Maternal Health, Education and Economic Empowerment.

Pakistan has been particularly hard hit by the pandemic and is fearful of another surge as it watches the devastation in nearby India. On a recent partner call, Siddique mentioned that receiving cash from Rockflower at the beginning of the pandemic for immediate Covid Relief last year was “like much needed oxygen to keep us going”. The COVID-19 Relief in Pakistan and AJK prompted recognition of their extraordinary work, with a best performance certificate in the health sector, AJ &K, from the Honorable Mr. Shehryar Khan Afridi - chairman of the Parliamentary special Committee on Kashmir and member of the National Assembly of Pakistan.

Haja Tallaway - Foundation for Women and Children Empowerment, Liberia

Haja has developed The Foundation for Women and Children Empowerment (FOWACE) into a force of determination and positivity for so many women who lost their husbands after the Ebola outbreak in 2014. The partnership with Rockflower first began with the ‘Food Security for Ebola Widows’ and has since grown to two more projects, including ‘The Sustainable Livelihood Empowerment Program’ and most recently the ‘Village Savings and Loan, Soap Making and Access to Justice Program’. Haja works to ensure that every single woman knows her rights and is supported in believing that she can support herself and her family without fear of violence or intimidation.

And it takes a whole village to raise a child, that is the Rockflower family. The incredible organisations all over the world which Rockflower supports, are part of something bigger and like us are in a constant dialogue with Tine at Rockflower which is always so refreshingly open, honest and trusting. Everyday, even though each organisation may not be in close contact, we work together, tending our gardens and growing new futures for the generations to come, and today we want to celebrate that. Happy Mother's Day!

Sharing the Love on Mother’s Day with India Hicks

Rockflower was founded on the premise that we need a new economic paradigm, one based on the logic of mothering. You do not need to be a woman or a mother to practice the art of mothering, but you must understand and carry out it’s basic tenets: tolerance, compassion, empathy, and a nuanced approach to risk and reward. A mother recognizes what qualities and talents already exist in her children and works to build on these and elevate their potential.

On this Mother’s Day, we are honored to share some thoughts from a long time friend and believer in Rockflower, India Hicks, on how her mothering has taken on a renewed focus in light of this global pandemic. In asking India to share the rhythms of her family at this moment, we felt strong correlations with the nurturing work of Rockflower. You don't necessarily need to have the answers, you don't even need to know what the questions are, but you have to continue to look ahead "to fertilize their potential". We continue to listen, to learn, and to ask what is needed right now from all those we work with who are hoping to get through another day against unprecedented odds.

“Nurturing their creative side, fertilizing their potential. ”

— India Hicks

“I have never taken my role as a mother more seriously than I am now. Although admittedly I have been living rather like a fuzzy teenager for a while, eating Doritos out of the packet, dressed in yesterday’s tee-shirt, whilst watching the ninety seventh episode of Community. But my mothering antenna is on high alert. Unprecedented times bring with it unprecedented emotions. I am watching carefully as each kid adjusts. They have responded to this global pandemic differently. Understandably, as they are very different people. Some jog on through their daily lives, others have stumbled a little along the way, some are exhausted by anxiety. It sounds like I have an army of children, and in this moment, I feel like I do.  Many questions are asked but few are answered because we don’t have any answers. We try to focus on firm ambitions rather than hard plans. Nurturing their creative side, fertilizing their potential. 

With my youngest, I have been sure not to miss a bedtime, every night as she settles, we hold each other tightly, skin to skin, and I whisper, “I love you”. And this perhaps, is all they need to hear right now.”

India Hicks

Rockflower continues to work on a big vision, one of radical idealism, practically realized, but this Mother’s Day, and every day, we appreciate the basic requirements needed by those we serve. Whether it’s the connection found in the words, “I love you”, that India whispers to her daughter every night, or the fundamentals of food and medicine that can be given through the practical assistance of our Emergency Fund, every single act matters.

Please say “I love you” this Mother’s Day by contributing to our Emergency Fund.

Mother's Day 2019

Mother Earth is the greatest expression of the potential for a regenerative and reparative economy. The skill of mothering is in knowing just how far you can stretch to accommodate your children’s needs before recognizing that you are beyond your limit. Humanity has indeed pushed Mother Earth to her limit, and we need to apologize and make reparations before it is too late.  

Rockflower was founded on the premise that we need a new economic paradigm – one based on the logic of mothering. You do not need to be a woman or a mother to practice the art of mothering, but you must understand and carry out it’s basic tenets. Tolerance, compassion, empathy and a nuanced approach to risk and reward. 

Rockflower works with those who weed, nurture, till and fertilize agents of change, who will reimagine a new earth, one of shared abundance and prosperity.

At the center of the Rockflower Wheel is the word “integrity”.  By focussing on this central principle of wholeness and truth, and propelling that dynamism and energy outwards for the increase and exponential reward of others, our partners engage with all five principles of trust, compassion, clarity, equality and dignity, in order to proceed through the five keys and systems to ensure the desired outcomes. 

This Mother’s Day, we would like to recognize the extraordinary work of all of our partners, for their continued resolve, patience and determination to birth a new inclusive economy. However, by choosing to highlight the appropriately named Mamas for Burundi, we honor an organization working against the backdrop of 30 years of conflict, who are continually redrawing the lines to find new ways in addressing the screaming inequity of poverty and violence. 

Mamas for Burundi shares the holistic Five Key approach of Rockflower in seeking interconnected and multi-layered approaches to ensure progress for future generations. They work on traditional approaches to education, reading and writing proficiency at grade level, whilst exploring new approaches to vocational training. They tackle the dire consequences of child marriage, unwanted pregnancies and an archaic approach to women’s health and wellbeing with modern approaches to contraception and a reassessment of rights. Above all they recognize that in order to achieve long lasting socio-economic recovery, the foundation must be the inclusion of female leadership in all civic and government positions. To develop a culture of peace and stability, women and mothers must be at the forefront of change. To address solutions to climate change, you must start by asking those most adversely affected by it – those in need of food, water and shelter for their families. 

On May 12th, 2019, and every day forward, we celebrate all who understand that it will be through the radical acceptance of the art of mothering, that we will see the practical realization of an economy that feeds and nurtures every individual human being in the knowledge that everyone deserves that kind of Mother Love.