WHAT IS PERENNIS?
Our mission is to engage, educate and encourage our communities to implement lifestyle practices which respect nature and lead to a more sustainable, circular life for all of us.
Perennis is a female-led community interest project (CIC), funded by the National Lottery Community Fund.
OUR MISSION
Our mission is to engage, educate and encourage our communities to implement lifestyle practices which respect nature and lead to a more sustainable, circular life for all of us. Most of us live in the city and it is hard to keep a low-impact, holistic, zero-waste lifestyle. We can all agree that our modern urban lifestyles are not compatible with our environmental ideals. And this is a burden on our conscience. At Perennis, we want to help lift that burden. But we will not be telling you to overhaul your life, quit everything you know, and become a vegan overnight. Instead, we will ask you to look at your life and where you are. Start from the core circle: What grows in my climate? What produce is in season now? The food and products in my household, where are they from? And, what will happen to the waste generated from it?
Perennis:
Timeless, eternal, or ageless wisdom;
also known as sofia perennis,
cosmologia perennis,
philosophia perennis et universalis,
religio perennis;
Lex aeterna, Hagia Sophia,
Din al-Haqq, Akalika Dhamma,
Sanatana Dharma;
and theosophy of the Divine Wisdom
Our team has spent years observing some of the most sustainable practices around the world. What we found is that they are everywhere. The most sustainable practices are the ones that have been through the test of time and that are practiced by people who live traditional lifestyles. There is collected wisdom from people who didn’t or don’t have supermarkets to source their food from. This wisdom is perennial.
Every culture sits on a wealth of perennial practices. And we want our multicultural, beautiful communities to resuscitate these goldmines of knowledge. Eat seasonally and locally. Support your local agriculture. Instead of spending time on your phone or at the gym, learn about growing food. It is a basic necessity for survival. Instead of placing a new order from Zara or PLT, learn to repair your clothes.
Nothing good needs to be wasted.
What we teach is simple.
In fact, "in a world that is increasingly complex, the solutions are embarrassingly simple"
- Bill Mollison, founder of the permaculture movement
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A simple example: we encourage people to consume food seasonally. A pillar of sustainability. Fresh fruit is not available in northern Europe during the winter, if it is not imported from a far distance. There is a natural order here which can be beautifully observed by learning from our traditional healers; eating raw fruit in the cold of winter creates an imbalance of coldness in the body. Traditionally, people of seasonal climates spend late summer and autumn days preserving fruits in different forms, to be consumed during winter. These are the type of practices that we teach in our workshops and events.
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All religions and ancient traditions in their deepest teachings relate the order of nature to the order within human beings. They are tied. This is where we believe mainstream environmentalism has failed so far. Without a spiritual view, nature is viewed in a mechanical way. Sustainability at its core requires us to respect the natural order through ethics. Religious - or perennial - environmentalism recognises that transgressing nature means also destroying our own moral and spiritual qualities. Perennial philosophy observes that the religions of the world have different definitions of the sacred, but that they share the perspective of sacredness, particularly of nature. Many shores, one ocean.
The believer is like a bee which eats that which is pure and wholesome and lays that which is pure and wholesome.
When it lands on something, it doesn’t break or ruin it.
[Prophet Muhammad (saw) narrated by Imam Aḥmad on the authority of Abdullah bin Amr]
CONTACT
Want to learn more? Get in touch with us or check out our upcoming events
