Interview with Be the Earth Foundation, published on October 14, 2024
“Dona is one of our Aura Fellows, having completed our holistic nine-module programme designed to nurture and empower female leaders. In this Aura Spotlight interview, we delve into Dona's experience.
Read the full blog post here: https://www.betheearth.foundation/post/activism-is-a-daily-practice-dona-geagea-on-working-with-glitches-in-the-system
Snippet
“Something that you now know to be true, which you didn't know before Aura?
Before, I didn’t have as much confidence in recognising and owning feminine principles, or in being able to speak about them. It’s something you might experience personally, but feel uncomfortable bringing out in spaces that may not understand or welcome them. Aura has helped me stand strong in these principles — bringing them into spaces that truly need them, including my own research and work.
Maybe that’s the truth: there’s a growing need for feminine principles in our workplaces and personal relationships; working with the invisible and subtle.
Something Eve Annecke, one of our Aura midwives shared once, that forever stuck with me, is the idea of noticing the “glitches” in the system. Working with and reflecting on those glitches. Now I speak of it as working with the cracks in the system. Staying aware of those inconsistencies and asking: “How can I add some light here?”
I hate to accept the idea that we are living in a world that has lost moral leadership. What we need is a revolution that builds life-giving systems, ones that create and nourish life (not death) and that limit aggression, exploitation, colonisation and harm, allowing living systems (people and nature) to thrive – this to me is what feminine leadership is about. This is a world we can co-create, even if the only way to start this revolution is in small circles in our living rooms or workspaces. It is an act of daily activism that is not ascribed to be the care work of women only; all genders can (and should) participate.
Those were the moments I learnt the most: when some of the women pushed the edge even further within our circles.
Challenging us to go deeper, stretch further, read black feminist scholars’ work, question colonial premises in our own process, recognise what diversity means and how to ensure equitable, just and transformative processes do no unintentional harm to others.
These deep inquiries are part of the daily activism we engage with to create systemic shifts where there are cracks in the system. Sometimes they are subtle, and start in small circles.
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Dona Geagea is a Lebanese-Canadian senior facilitator and researcher with a decade of experience in the water sector, specialising in stakeholder engagement. Her journey has taken her from Lebanon, where she grew up in the aftermath of civil war, to Canada, where she quickly learned the value of resilience and adaptability.
Having facilitated over 100 workshops across community and corporate contexts globally, Dona has recently returned to academia. She is doing postdoctoral research in groundwater drought governance and water risk governance at Wageningen University in the Netherlands.