Mission

Evvie Ormon founded Emergent Phoenix to support people and organizations as they develop and practice courageous discovery. Courageous discovery cannot be done by repeating the same practices we already know don't work for everyone, or by replicating oppressive systems that harm.

Supported by the Emergent Strategy principle of "Never a failure, always a lesson," organizations explore new ways of being and doing for the purpose of novel discovery, healing, and liberation. Emergent Phoenix molds responsive containers that can hold the charge of historical and persistent institutional violence that often lies at the heart of activation and harm. This permission to acknowledge and speak truth to power enables radical self-compassion and unfolding of new practices that accompany the emerging, liberatory outcomes we desire.

Evvie, by calling in imaginal resources and naming ancient wounds that lie at the heart of most discomfort and conflict -- both individually and within organizations -- they support participants to re-imagine, and re-member, and create new practices to metabolize stagnant or “stuck” energy that fuels limiting beliefs, conflicts, and narratives. Evvie calls this process Conflict Illumination, and has been gifting their special medicine to organizations and individuals for over 15 years.

Values

SPIRIT

Emergent Phoenix celebrates Spirit, Ancestors, and sacred ritual practices of all people working towards liberation centering queer, trans, and gender-expansive Black and Indigenous Bodies of Culture (BIBOC). In any space you find in Emergent Phoenix, there will be a naming of lineage and ancestors, a communal altar open for all participants, and music.

RECIPROCITY

We are doing the work of living into our counter-cultural values. Being authentically rooted in anti-oppressive practices means balancing anti-capitalist practices, while also working towards ending all socioeconomic oppression. We do not desire to practice exploitation of people from marginalized backgrounds, including ourselves. Our time, labor, and expertise are valuable, and we practice and require RECIPROCITY to honor the exploited, still unpaid labor of millions of our ancestors and contemporaries.

EMERGENCE

Evvie has woven the principles of Emergent Strategy a groundbreaking book written by Adrienne Maree Brown into every aspect of Emergent Phoenix. The way this manifests is vulnerability to experiment and learn with excellence. We don’t know what your life looks like in its most liberated form. However, we believe that collective transformation happens through collaboration and we are your collaborator. Although this is not required to work with Emergent Phoenix, we invite anyone interested in collaboration with Emergent Phoenix to explore Emergent Strategy by reading the book.

IMAGINATION

“There are times when expanding our imaginations is what is required. The radical movement has overemphasized the role of activism and underestimated the role of reflection.” —Grace Lee Boggs, American Revolutionary

Evvie values imagination as a somatic resource in the pursuit of embodied liberation. Imagining ourselves outside the boxes that a dominant culture full of barriers permits us is a radical act of love and resistance.

ARTISTRY

“Let the medicine be delicious” is Evvie’s goal when creating tinctures, teas and food as medicine. This is a value inherited from Evvie’s eastern North Carolina ancestors, who could make any food delicious regardless of the ingredients. We at Emergent Phoenix practice radical honesty and truth-to-power, alongside radical compassion, joy, pleasure, and heart-centered connection.