Axel McGown
Axel has a degree in Women’s Studies and is engaged in support work, community building, and has facilitated workshops on consent, anti-oppression, sexual health and relationships.
Axel is a pragmatic dreamer who loves tea and stories. She is a poet, a middle child, and spends a lot of time staring at the sky. An unschooler for life, Axel has a degree in Women’s Studies, which means they love to talk about how everything is a social construct. Axel is engaged in support work, community building, and has facilitated workshops on consent, anti-oppression, sexual health and relationships. They are passionate about holding spaces for LGBTQ2S+ youth, feminist book lovers, and white folks unlearning racism. Axel works, lives, learns, and plays on unceded Sinixt tum xula7xw (territory) in Nelson, BC.
Educator organizational theorist specializing in complex social processes, collective intelligence, and post-traumatic community resilience
Christopher Horsethief is an educator organizational theorist specializing in complex social processes, collective intelligence, and post-traumatic community resilience. For 20 years Christopher has been facilitating field analysis of the relationship between culture and communication, documenting the dynamics that pose challenges to Indigenous leaders and organizational resilience that drives language revitalization. His research interest include social network architectures, and their role in post-crisis cultural network fragmentation and alignment processes.
Devon Caron
Peace Studies Student
New dad, husband, brother, friend, student, caregiver, cook, dog owner.
Independent Film Maker
Raised between the mountains of Northern India and British Columbia, Eva Anandi Brownstein has always had a love for wild places and the people that inhabit them. With a bachelor’s degree in Anthropology and a graduate degree in Communications, her filmmaking practice has evolved through curiosity, determination, and saying yes.
Her diverse interests have lead her through a wide range of media landscapes – from corporate shoots to naked ski segments to International Non-Profits. She finds inspiration in giving voice to underrepresented peoples and issues, and communicating stories of resilience. She often works alone creating short documentaries for environmental education and journalism, and also contributes to teams as a researcher, shooter, and producer. Eva currently lives in Nelson, BC, where she pursues freelance filmmaking and runs educational programs for youth.
Mark McGivern
Teacher and Writer
Mark McGivern is a teacher and writer living in Nelson BC. He has lived and worked in Japan, Nicaragua and the Persian Gulf. The creative process has been a central concern of his work in both teaching and creative writing. The mysteries of this process, the way in which true creativity is a conversation, has been a subject of interest, research and reflection. Mark is intrigued by the possibilities of this reality and has seen it appear in his own novel-writing experience, poetry and music.
Michael Wilson
All kinds of things.
For over twenty-five years Michael has struggled with social anxiety and depression. His journey has been an interesting one, trying many different ways to find inner peace and happiness through everything from travelling to selling vacuums to running anxiety and depression support groups. During his worst times Michael struggled just to leave his house and despite still living with high amounts of anxiety has travelled solo around S.E. Asia, operated a train across Canada, spoke in front of hundreds of people at a time and continually pushes his comfort zone.
Ray Stothers
Ray Stothers was formally educated in Economics and Physical Education but the School of Life has been full of it's own instruction. After completing his Masters degree at UBC he found himself travelling as a storyteller and practicing his craft in an oral tradition that would befit the old ways of indigenous culture. It was the exploration of storytelling as a powerful healing modality for our modern society, experience with shamanic ritual and exposure to diverse cultures around the world that gave birth to Ray's gift to build community and help people remember who they are. He practices and mentors others in the Art of Knowing - that internal sense of utter alignment between head, heart and Spirit. The Art of Knowing is powerful - but is preceded by the Art of Being Awkward! Awkwardness is a powerful gift, as we question our perceptions and open to the opportunity to grow into greater awareness. Ray is masterful with his ability to name the awkwardness that is in the room while creating safety for people to explore their way through and out the other side to that place of Knowing.
Sarah Graeme
Artist, life learner
Sarah Graeme was born in Nelson, BC and is currently living in Halifax NS and studying Ceramics. She shares a close connection to both her siblings who contributed and co-created An Exploration in Vulnerability. The community of her friends and family that she grew up with are an incredible support system for her in exploring and expanding through awkward spaces, such as vulnerability.