Pagpapalitaw ng Ugnayan: Dreaming together and allowing emergence
Anong maaaring mabuo pag nabigyan ng pahintulot, oras at puwang ang pakikipag-ugnayan?
Kamusta, mga ka-Ugnayan?
Ang bilis ng panahon. Miss na namin kayong makasama.
We know it’s been a while since our last letter.
Ang daming nangyari — between working on our individual creative and professional practices, dealing with household health concerns and care work, trying to keep up with current events (crises) without going crazy, the elections (!) etc.
There’s this feeling like we’re just trying to keep up or catch up with life. At the same time, we want to be intentional in sharing how want to move forward.
So in this love letter to you, we look to the first three themes in our Ugnayan deck (Sadya, Daloy, Laro) to guide us through reflecting on allowing emergence, dreaming together, and the gift of community.
Maaaring may mga sadya o layunin tayo, pero minsan (madalas) ay may sariling daloy ang buhay, na pwede nating salubungin nang may laro upang lumago sa halip na malanta.
Palitaw: To let emerge
One of my favorite Filipino treats is palitaw, which literally translates “ to let emerge”. Made from galapong — washed, soaked, and ground malagkit or sticky rice, it is rolled and flattened into a circle and dropped into boiling water. We wait for it to float to the surface to signal that they are done, then it is dipped in niyog or grated coconut, and served with a mix of sugar and sesame seeds.
It is a quick snack to buy, if you live near someone who still makes them, but if you backtrack its journey — from topping it with sugar and sesame seeds, coating it in niyog, waiting for it to float to the surface, shaping the galapong and flattening it, grinding the sticky rice into galapong, growing the rice — mahaba-habang paglalakbay ang kanyang pinagdaanan.
Allowing creativity to emerge
What is your process for birthing creative projects?
After launching our Ugnayan deck, we were often asked:
How long did it take for you to create the deck?
The short answer is that our production process spanned about three months, from conceptualization to printing. However, the more accurate answer is that it took years of composting those provocations, cultivating our respective crafts, thinking about our creative dreams, deprioritizing them, audaciously reprioritizing them before actually creating the cards, and finally launching them in November 2023. ❤️🔥
To allow something to emerge is:
to give someone (or ourselves) permission (pahintulot) to do something; and
to give the necessary time, space and opportunity for something to emerge.
Even as I write this, I can hear the push and pull of efficient practicality vs. emergent possibility battling in my head —
The voices of urgency (pagmamadali): “Why is it taking so long for this to get done?”, and trust (pagtitiwala): “Everything will happen in its own time.”
The voice of ease in the familiar (kaginhawaan sa nakasanayan): “Let’s stay with what we know” / “Dito tayo sa alam natin.”; the voice of courage in the uncertain (lakas ng loob sa hindi tiyak): “Let’s just go for it!” / “Subukan lang natin!”; the voice of resilience in the unexpected (tibay ng loob sa hindi inaasahan): “Whatever happens, I’ll be okay” / Anumang mangyari, okay ako.”
I’m beginning to allow the “delays” to create a richer, more fertile ground for what’s to come.
It is not a passive forgetting of our single-minded goals, but a liberating remembering of our wholeness as humans in an ecosystem.
It was ten years ago when the first seed of an idea of conversation cards were planted in me. But I didn’t come to the richness of intention, questions and design of the cards if it weren’t for all the people and experiences I met along the way, and a final push to actually have it break ground in 2023.
It was two months ago when I first drafted this newsletter, but I didn’t quite know what to tell you yet about (except for the same things I said in January). I’m still not sure I fully know…but I trust that the answers will emerge when I show up with authenticity and integrity.
In a society where time and attention has become a commodity, taking our time is an act of resistance.
I’m still navigating the balance between efficient practicality and emergent possibility. I carry a certain impatience with myself about how we should have had more tools or offerings by now to support you — our ka-Ugnayans, or connection cultivators — in your respective communities. Nevertheless, I trust that the path will emerge as we take steps forward.
While we patiently allow emergence to enrich our soil, we also want to make sure we can share the gifts (in the forms of creativity, care and connection) as we receive them, because there is no benefit, only waste, in keeping it to ourselves for too long.
How might we give ourselves permission, time and space to let things emerge?
What can help us share these gifts more freely when they emerge?
Pangarap: To dream or hope together
Even before our Ugnayan journey, we’ve believed in cultivating intentional and joyful growth towards a vision of a world that is more interconnected (magkakaugnay), compassionate (may malasakit), liberating (mapagpalaya) and regenerative (nagbabalik-buhay).
Pangarap gives us permission to dream for better futures, pang harap.
In an isolated world, we dream of kapwa spaceholders who open up bridges and portals for connection, care and creativity.
In a divided world, we dream of individuals giving of themselves openly and generously for the benefit of the collective or the commons.
In an oppressive world, we dream of people questioning current systems and reimagining what collective liberation might look like.
In an extractive, materialistic world, we dream of a culture of “enough-ness” and a reciprocal relationship with nature.
In a small way, we hope the cards can help bring us back into connection and right relationship with ourselves, each other and the natural world. We hope the cards could be a tool for you to bring connection back into your own spheres of influence too — creating wider and wider circles and constellations of connection, care and creativity.
What are your dreams for yourself? Our country?
What is the community you’d like to bring together?
What might co-creating a connected, compassionate, liberating and regenerative world look like with them?
Yaman ng Pamayanan: Abundance in Community
We’ve had the benefit of being nourished by different communities throughout our lives, and in the past year, I’ve looked to Good Food Community (who grow a culture of collective care with organic growers and consumers-turned-coproducers — that’s all of us!) and The Arts and Health Institute by Magis Creatives (who nurture facilitators of psychosocial support and wellbeing through arts and creativity).
The work of cultivating and sustaining community can be challenging, but when asked about what keeps the “alab ng puso” alive for me, I always come back to community — the sense of relational wellbeing and belonging to something bigger than one’s self. ❤️🔥
I see this in all of you who have supported us, bought our cards, wrote us about your experiences with them. Our lives are richer because of the stories you shared, and our work becomes more meaningful when you cultivate connection with your own circles or communities.
As we wrote last January, here’s what we’re committing to as we continue journeying with you:
Creating new Ugnayan tools. We’ll keep you posted when the seed we’re germinating has transformed into fruit ready for you to eat. 🥭
Supporting you in holding space. When we host Ugnayan Tambayans this year, it will be less about making meaningful connections with strangers (though inevitably, there will be that), and more about building your capacity to hold space for others. Our all-too-brief tambayan on Making Meaningful Gatherings was a taste of that. We hope to co-create deeper, more experiential learning opportunities for that this year — starting with our next gathering this June! 🇵🇭
Follow @ugnayancards for updates! 
Sharing your Ugnayan circles. It was never our mission to run so many gatherings ourselves (like we did last year 😅). Our hope is that we’re able to support you in cultivating your own capacity to gather and connect meaningfully with others. If you are planning your own open gatherings with the use of our Ugnayan Cards, we’d love to learn about it and share it with others too! Check out this Farms, Food, Freedom gathering with Good Food Community, SAKA, The Art of Yarn and Pagbubuo at Roots Collective this coming May 25!
I appreciate that you’ve come this far, and we’ll keep you posted on what’s to come. 😉
Nananabik makipag-ugnayan muli,
Jen Horn | @pagbubuo
Tagapagpadaloy, Ugnayan Cards