This exercise is carried out outdoors and is suitable for groups of approx. 10-40 people. Participants stand in a circle on an open and flat surface. They then pick up a sturdy rope, which they hold in a circle, initially behind their back with both hands next to their body. The rope is then tightened by slowly leaning back so that the participants can let go of their hands and lean against the rope with their pelvis or hips. This is the starting position.
A sensory exercise is added at this point to really arrive at the location and get comfortable in the new situation. First, each person in the rope circle collects sensory impressions on their own and without speaking. These are then briefly discussed. The participants are then asked to do the same exercise again, but with their eyes closed. In addition to collecting sensory impressions under different conditions, the participants should also pay attention to their sensations when standing or leaning in the rope circle and to possible movements of the rope itself.
The debriefing of sensory perception in the variant with eyes closed makes it clear that without using the eyes, the other senses are intensified and activated in a compensatory manner. In this step of the exercise, for example, not only are more sounds perceived with the help of hearing than with the eyes open, but the directions from which the sounds come and where they are moving are usually also communicated. More in-depth explanations of sensory perception are described in the “With all senses” method.
In addition to the sensory exercise within the “rope circle ecosystem”, closing your eyes usually also leads to a more intensive and conscious perception of your own posture and sensations in the rope circle. Do you lean against the rope in a relaxed and comfortable way or are you a little unsteady or tense? How do you react to movements of the rope? Such movements are now carefully initiated by the trainer. How do the other people in the rope circle react to these movements? Then, one by one, individual people are asked to perform slight movements. This makes it clear that even small changes have an immediate effect and larger changes can even lead to uncertainty among the other participants. Accordingly, it becomes clear that large changes can jeopardize the stability of the entire system.
At this point, the analogy to natural ecosystems becomes the topic. In principle, these also represent more or less stable systems. However, due to constantly changing framework conditions and external influences, e.g. climate change-related heat waves or flooding, pesticide use or development, it is important and vital that these systems are plastic and dynamic and have the highest possible resilience. In order to concretize the situation in the forest ecosystem, some of the changes that occur there are now played through as examples. To do this, each participant is given the name of an animal, plant or element when called out by the trainer. And now the “rope circle ecosystem” comes alive, specifically it moves. For example, the spruce leaves the rope circle due to bark beetle infestation. The pine marten then eats the squirrel and the deer eats the young fir tree, so that these two also have to leave the circle. Perhaps three wild boars also enter the rope circle. How does the system change in each case, how can it stabilize again?
This exercise leads to an examination of various subject areas, each of which corresponds to the topic of sustainable development in different ways:
1. in the rope circle: dealing with and feeling stability and change as an individual and as a group
2. transfer discussion of the processes and interactions in the “rope circle ecosystem” to the situation of the forest ecosystem and to one’s own life reality
Specifically, it is about
- Getting involved in a new, mostly unknown format
- Finding your way physically in an unfamiliar situation
- Gaining trust in the other participants
- Sharpen senses and sensory perception
- Search for stability, durability
- Dealing with change, dynamics, agility
- Adjustment and compensation
- Interaction, cooperation and synergies
- Exit and reorientation, ecological niche
- Recognizing the parallelism between the “rope circle ecosystem” and the “forest ecosystem”
- Perceiving and analyzing cause-and-effect relationships
- Recognizing interrelationships and processes in ecosystems
- Thinking and acting in ecosystems
