top of page

What Is WTR?

The Work That Reconnects (WTR) is a practice. It is best experienced in groups, and facilitators of the work convene groups to experience WTR with each other, using time-tested activities that foster insight, compassion and connection.

​

The premise of the Work that Reconnects is that we humans have lost connection to each other and to the natural world. We have dis-connected from the birthright reciprocity that allows humans and nature to flourish together and through each other. The Work That Reconnects (WTR) reweaves reciprocity, the reconnection we need. WTR’s web is woven by thousands of people around the world. Through learning the vocabularies and practices in this evolving web, we can convert the helplessness and fear brought on by these disconnected times into courage, compassion and action on behalf of All Life.

 

Origins of the Work That Reconnects

In development since the 1970s, WTR manifests worldwide as interactive group workshops, study circles, international web-based seminars, books, journals, songs and more. The founding teacher of this work, Joanna Macy, laid the pattern for WTR with fellow activists in the anti-nuclear movement. The anti-nuclear stance advocates for peace, social justice, and environmental justice – and Macy’s studies in buddhism, systems theory and deep ecology established in WTR complex thinking, complex feeling, and a deep belief in the potential for all beings to independently co-arise.

​

Twin Cities Work That Reconnects (TC WTR)

TC WTR is a community of facilitators, affiliate presenters, supporters and participants who constitute a community of practice. This community is always open to new explorers of this work – benefits of the Work That Reconnects deepen through repetition and over time.  TC WTR offers a variety of ways to stay engaged with the Work That Reconnects:  book groups, workshops that vary from 90 minutes to weekend immersions, monthly practice groups.

​

TC WTR is grateful for the support and partnership with Unity Church Unitarian in St. Paul, MN.  The Steering Committee members for TC WTR for 2025 - 26 are Jean Hammink (jeanhammink@gmail.com), Beth Cleary (cleary@macalester.edu), and Roberta Cassidy (cassidy.roberta1@gmail.com). 

 

TC WTR is a registered community of practice with the Work That Reconnects Network, an international nongovernmental organization whose mission is “to nurture a regenerative and thriving world for all beings by providing support, connection and inspiration to the global Work That Reconnects community.”

​​

Active Hope

When you are drawn to explore further – through a Twin Cities WTR workshop or study circle – you will experience what WTR calls the “Spiral of Active Hope.” The Spiral, like a web, expands outward and holds the explorer. Through the Spiral Journey, participants connect to:

  • Gratitude, for our life, for the love we feel for the earth and all dwellers here, including animals, trees, waters, air, all humans – this gratitude is an inexhaustible source of strength;

  • Honoring our Pain for the World, by facing, naming and grieving the ways we powerful humans ignore, abuse and destroy the gifts of this life;

  • Seeing with Ancient and New Eyes, cleansed by speaking our love for the earth we gain perspective on our inheritance of Deep Time, and our responsibility to live in mutuality with all life;

  • Going Forth, fortified by the strength of like-minded, open-hearted collaborators, and motivated to take action, at whatever scale we are called, on behalf of Life on this magnificent planet.

bottom of page