{"id":9370,"date":"2025-12-09T17:00:13","date_gmt":"2025-12-09T17:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/?p=9370"},"modified":"2025-12-09T17:05:12","modified_gmt":"2025-12-09T17:05:12","slug":"introducing-the-mycelial-model-of-self-advocacy-louie-fermor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/fr\/introducing-the-mycelial-model-of-self-advocacy-louie-fermor\/","title":{"rendered":"Pr\u00e9sentation du mod\u00e8le myc\u00e9lien d'autod\u00e9fense"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"995\" height=\"1500\" src=\"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/image004-3-995x1500.png\" alt=\"Pinelitter Gingertail mushrooms\" class=\"wp-image-8963\" srcset=\"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/image004-3-995x1500.png 995w, https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/image004-3-531x800.png 531w, https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/image004-3-768x1157.png 768w, https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/image004-3-1019x1536.png 1019w, https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/image004-3-8x12.png 8w, https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/image004-3.png 1278w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 995px) 100vw, 995px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size\">In the natural world, life begets decay and decay makes room for more life. Even though we may think of fungi as odd, ugly, or repulsive, and perhaps as an omen of death, they are also an omen of life and of a healthy ecosystem moving through its eternal cycles. The presence of mycelial networks and fungi is a good sign: it indicates that one part of the process is working and therefore so are the others.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In a similar way, the inclusion of Deaf, disabled, Mad and neurodivergent people is also an indicator of a healthy society\u2014 one that can infrastructurally support a broad understanding of human diversity, community care, and provide high standards of living for all its members.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Last autumn I wrote an essay about my experience attending Sync Alberta 2024. At the time, I was also in M\u00een\u00ee hrpa (Banff, Canada) attending a writer\u2019s residency at the Banff Centre for the Arts and Creativity. Participants of Sync Alberta were encouraged to create metaphors for our leadership styles. I chose mushrooms. Later, for my essay, I described the experience of intentionally walking through the alpine forests of the Banff Centre\u2019s campus, some of the mushrooms I found there, and the inspiration I drew from them. The Mycelial Model of Self-Advocacy builds upon that original text: how \u2018odd\u2019 fungi can be a metaphor for the embraced failure and stubborn thriving of disability culture. The Mycelial Model can be a way to shift ourselves into that alternative mindset, so that the constant self-advocacy we must do as D\/deaf and disabled creatives, curators, and leaders can be sustainable.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The Mycelial Model for Self-Advocacy<\/strong><strong><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Off-to-the-side thriving<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Network-based<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Release spores<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Respect cycles<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>OFF-TO-THE-SIDE THRIVING<\/strong><strong><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As I wrote in my last essay for Sync, \u201cYou may not want to pay attention to the mushroom, may not even know it\u2019s there. That doesn\u2019t matter. Whether we give permission to it or not, fungi will grow and transform on its own and make a home for itself anyways [\u2026] The mushroom\u2019s metaphor for disabled stubbornness\u2014 the will to thrive, despite\u2014 is obvious\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This off-to-the-side mindset is the antidote to professional people-pleasing, a quality many disabled arts professionals have picked up along the way. When you get so few opportunities, you\u2019re conscious of scaring away the few you do get. So, you people-please: you accept the token or meagre opportunities, hoping they\u2019ll think of you next time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What if we happily thrived in the margins we\u2019ve been sent to, instead? Is that even possible? Aren\u2019t we already? While waiting for galleries, governments, societies, companies etc. to catch up, let\u2019s do what we do best and thrive \u2018off to the side\u2019. We dream of community, acceptance, recognition\u2014 until we get there, if ever, where are we now? Let\u2019s recognize and create meaning here as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>How can you change or update your workspace so that it not only accommodates your differences but shows respect for them? For example, as someone who experiences chronic fatigue, I need a couch in my studio. From the view on the couch, I can see thank-you cards, awards, and favourite paintings which all remind me of how proud I am of what I do. Taking time to rest and to reflect is exactly what gives my artwork and writing its thoughtful voice. I\u2019m off to the side resting on the couch and it\u2019s a good thing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>While waiting for galleries, governments, societies, companies etc. to catch up, let\u2019s do what we do best and thrive \u2018off to the side\u2019.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>NETWORK-BASED<\/strong><strong><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Mycelium <\/em>(my-seal-ee-um) is the name for the root structure and <em>mycorrhizal <\/em>(my-co-rye-zull)is the word for the network: the vast underground network of both fungal and plant roots that serves as a communication system and resource exchange between different species. Suzanne Simmard, a professor of forest ecology at University of British Columbia, completed field studies in the late \u201890\u2019s which revealed that trees are connected to other neighbouring trees through mycorrhizal networks. She observed a Douglas fir infested by insects using the network to send chemical warnings to a ponderosa pine nearby, and the ponderosa later produced enzymes that would protect it against the same insects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Be around other fungi. Go to online or in-person gatherings with other d\/Deaf, disabled, Crip, Mad, and neurodivergent people. And, if you can, go to these <em>more<\/em> than able-bodied\/neuro-typical gatherings. Grow there and look out one for another.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>RELEASE SPORES<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The point of flowers and fruiting bodies is to spread pollen and seeds, or in the case of fungi, to spread spores. There are a fascinating variety of ways they do this. Take the stinkhorn mushrooms, which emit odours that are foul to us\u2014 often compared to the scent of rotting meat\u2014 but are highly attractive to scavenger animals and insects, who will visit, curious about the smell, and carry some spores with them when they scurry or fly away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Many types of common shelf fungi, which grow horizontally out the side of tall hardwood trees, use less dramatic methods, and simply drop thousands of spores onto the forest floor from their perches high above. Aided by wind and gravity, the tiny spores litter down and are carried off to other sections of the forest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We can be inspired by this, and litter our life and work with small \u2018spores\u2019 of self-advocacy. There are courageous, heroic exclamations of self-advocacy like performances and protests, statements, and refusals\u2026 while these are necessary, they\u2019re hard to do over and over. Instead, between these larger gestures, we can pace ourselves and routinely drop smaller \u2018spores\u2019 of self-advocacy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Keep a link to an access reader in your email signature. This smaller gesture normalizes artists and professionals having access needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>RESPECT CYCLES<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the original 2024 essay, I wrote, \u201c\u2026 These small beings will die soon\u2014 gingertail [mushrooms] only last a day or two at most. I take a photo, tap my finger against one of the caps, and smile when it bounces gently under my touch\u2026 mushrooms are only the fruit of a much larger mycelial network we cannot see. They are only temporary beauties, like fruits on a tree.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For me, part of a mushroom\u2019s beauty is its transience. Like the passing day and night, the short-lived spring flower, or the red and ochres of autumn: these things are made more meaningful because of their passing nature. While the dramatic life and death of flowers and fruits are an essential period of the growth cycle, it\u2019s the roots underneath that will last (there are mycelial networks in North America estimated to be over two thousand years old).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the arts, a performance or the exhibition is like the fruiting body on the surface of advocacy efforts. Standards of care, respectful workspaces, and supported artists are the mycelial root system. We can\u2019t put all our efforts into the showy \u2018fruits\u2019 and not have any time or energy for the roots; without healthy roots there aren\u2019t fruit for very long.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Learn when to say \u201cnot right now\u201d. Set boundaries around time and energy and respect the cycle of art and yourself. Importantly, figure out what those boundaries are before the projects start and not while under pressure and in the middle of it. Set goals for the \u2018fruits\u2019 of your labour alongside plans for sustaining the roots.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>According to the 2023 Canadian Survey on Disability, 27% of Canadians have a disability that limits them in their daily activities<a href=\"#_ftn1\" id=\"_ftnref1\"><sup>[1]<\/sup><\/a>. That\u2019s around 1 in 4. Poor representation and ableist infrastructures may make us feel we are alone in the world, but\u2014and especially when we band together across disabilities\u2014 we\u2019re actually in the company of many others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Though we may start off as someone who walks through a forest or city unaware of the fungi growing around us, we can be taught how to see and find them. We can also, in a similar way, find our fellow spoonies, crazies and Crips. Until we get to the better representations and futures we dream of, let\u2019s make today sustainable and meaningful. It\u2019s today that we are designated as odd, monstrous, alien, or as failures in the eyes of a normative world. It\u2019s today that we can be unapologetic about our unusual minds and bodies, and the different ways we thrive and create with them. Today we can ask, <em>what would a mushroom do<\/em>?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"custom-player\"><a href=\"#_ftnref1\" id=\"_ftn1\">[1]<\/a> Statistics Canada, released 1 December 2023<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns are-vertically-aligned-center custom-player is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-abceabcf wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2018<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u00ab En attendant que les galeries, les gouvernements, les soci\u00e9t\u00e9s, les entreprises, etc. rattrapent leur retard, faisons ce que nous faisons de mieux et prosp\u00e9rons 'sur le c\u00f4t\u00e9'. <\/p>","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":8963,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-leadership-thinking","category-think-sync"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9370"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9370\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9391,"href":"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9370\/revisions\/9391"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8963"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/syncleadership.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}