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About Us

Founded by two teenagers in California, USA, 1990, YES! has evolved into a vibrant and dynamic organization working towards providing co-creative brave spaces for changemakers like you. People gifted with compassion and a desire to make a difference. People looking for healing, learning, and connecting at the personal, interpersonal, and systemic level.

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YES! Is a vibrant and dynamic body of people – staff, board, global program partners, alumni, and supporters – on a learning journey, seeking to live and work more consciously in alignment with our values. Our organization focuses on restoring balance sustainably and creating partnerships across historic divides. YES! brings these core elements into social change movements worldwide by creating transformational gatherings called Jams and building lasting partnerships with diverse social entrepreneurs to create intentional space for the role of love and spirit.

What we do?

We seek to facilitate growth and positive change on three simultaneous and deeply interconnected levels: the internal, the interpersonal, and the systemic. We ignite the power of self-awareness and of beloved community, recognizing how inner work and relational shifts can lead to healing and liberation. We nurture vision and collaboration to co-create possibilities for our lives, our families, our work and our communities

Internal

We value rigorous attention to spiritual, emotional and physical health and wellbeing, using whatever paths and forms support each unique person in gradually becoming more aware, compassionate and courageous. Our experience is that we are all deeply impacted by our personal, family and cultural histories; in order to transform fears, unhealthy habits and reactive impulses, we work to nurture self-awareness, steadfast commitment and loving support for ourselves and each other.

Interpersonal

We strive towards relationships built with respect, generosity of spirit, and a commitment to one another’s growth and well-being. We seek to practice deep listening and speaking our truth with compassion and insight, taking the time to hear and understand one another across differences, and honoring each other’s unique perspectives and gifts. We approach conflict as an opportunity for greater clarity, authenticity and transformation, and provide transformative tools and practices to shift interpersonal dynamics in meaningful ways and co-create living examples of beloved communities.

Systemic

We are committed to helping build thriving, just and sustainable ways of life for all, and to supporting those efforts on local, regional, national and global levels. Rarely do movements or organizations have the opportunity to come together with others and clarify a shared vision, much less connect the dots between their diverse and special forms of work. Often, social change efforts are pulling each other down, due to misunderstanding, a perceived sense of scarcity of resources, time, money, or public support. We support vision development and cross-pollination at all levels, so that the interconnections and interdependence of social change efforts can be understood and leadership can better weave webs of cohesive transformation.

Values and Strategies

Our Mission

YES! connects, inspires and collaborates with change-makers to build thriving, just and regenerative ways of life for all. We primarily work with people ages 20-40, though many of our programs are multigenerational as well.

Our Vision

Thriving: We believe that life is precious and magnificent, and that we were put on this Earth for more than mere survival. We all have the birthright to love, to prosper, to grow, and to learn ever more what it means to be who we are.

Just: We believe that people everywhere deserve to be free and respected as they are, to have their basic human needs met, and to have their gifts recognized and called forth. As we see ever-widening gaps of wealth, safety and freedom, we value sustained attention and commitment to equitability, diversity, partnership across differences, shared decision-making, redistribution of resources, and social justice.

Regenerative: We believe personal and planetary ecology are inseparable, and that everything we do sends out ripples not only to the whole Earth community, but also to all future generations. We seek to walk consciously upon the Earth, bringing intentionality to every choice we make and its impact upon all of life. We aim to leave the Earth wholer and healthier than we found it and advocate for systems and practices that nurture Earth wisdom and all the beings who share this planet.

Key principles:

Fostering Well-being and Regeneration

The problem: Often, the greatest saboteur of our movements is the internalized oppression and unresolved traumas of our personal and collective histories.

What We Do: We help individual changemakers to deepen their root system, and grow in consciousness and self care, so that they can become more healthy and effective, and restore balance and well-being in many cases.

Supporting Means to Ends Consistency

The problem: We have seen too many sustainability activists burning themselves out, peace activists who hit police with peace signs, and social justice activists caught up in organizational power struggles and hierarchy.

What We Do: We foster means to end consistency. We believe that when there is congruence between our goals and how we work, we can generate more lasting and effective positive impacts.

Creating Partnerships Between Diverse Allies

The problem: Diverse movements with profound core values operate in fragments and miss out on opportunities to effectively engage and collaborate.

What We Do: We support connections and alliances between diverse allies. If divide and conquer is the strategy that has been used to destroy, then connecting and self-organizing may be strategies for healing and regeneration. We believe real partnerships can be most effectively built on a foundation of trust and connection.

Encouraging Love & Spirit

The Need: Materialism, isolation, and reactive consciousness stifle breakthroughs and limit inspiration.

What We Do: We help activists to open space for love and spirit to step in. We believe that love and spirit can totally change the conversation, making extraordinary things possible and helping to change the way we do change. They are not just tools for personal wellness – they enable individuals, organizations and even movements to be guided by a deeper wisdom, and to welcome the presence of the miraculous.

Encouraging Love & Spirit

The Need: Materialism, isolation, and reactive consciousness stifle breakthroughs and limit inspiration.

What We Do: We help activists to open space for love and spirit to step in. We believe that love and spirit can totally change the conversation, making extraordinary things possible and helping to change the way we do change. They are not just tools for personal wellness – they enable individuals, organizations and even movements to be guided by a deeper wisdom, and to welcome the presence of the miraculous.