In this luminous episode of the RE:Generation Collective, host Silke von Brockhausen sits down with Mansi Jasuja—facilitator, artist, sense-maker, and former architect whose career spans UN, EU, and municipal work in urban ecology, WASH, housing, and climate adaptation. What unfolds is a deeply human, practical exploration of how institutions like the UN can shift from urgency and hierarchy to coherence, courage, and collaboration.Mansi’s offer is deceptively simple: regeneration begins when we remember how to be fully human—together. From that place, different decisions become possible.
Who is Mansi—and why her lens matters for the UN
Born in India, now based in the Netherlands, Mansi reoriented her life in 2008 from conventional “conveyor-belt success” toward Art of Hosting & Harvesting Conversations that Matter—a living systems approach to participatory leadership. She designs spaces where people arrive as whole humans, beyond roles, to listen deeply, surface patterns, and co-create next steps. Her work has supported public institutions, UN programmes, NGOs, municipalities, and community initiatives navigating complexity and crisis.What she brings to this conversation is rare: the grounded pragmatism of an urban systems practitioner, the embodied presence of a host, and a fierce, joyful commitment to justice, equity, and life-affirming outcomes.
The heart of the episode
Regeneration as rebirth. For Mansi, regeneration is a return to essence—an existential check-in for humanity at a precarious edge. It asks: Who are we? Who do we want to be? Do we still choose to be here—and how?This is not rhetoric. It’s a leadership stance.
Hosting vs. facilitation.
Where standard facilitation often drives a linear process from A to B, hosting centers relationships, context, and the living systems we’re part of. It asks: What’s the real purpose? What came before, what’s adjacent, and what becomes possible after? The result isn’t just better workshops; it’s a different culture of governance.
A different leadership archetype.
Mansi names the leadership she longed for inside big systems: heart-centered, service-oriented (seva), accountable to ancestors and the unborn, grounded in humility, and modeled in behavior—not just words. If she had to choose, she says, “grandmothers should be leaders.” It’s a reminder that maturity, care, and long-horizon thinking are strategic assets.
The interstitium metaphor.
Beyond boxes and organograms, Mansi evokes the interstitium—the fluid connective tissue in our bodies—as a metaphor for the flows between teams, sectors, and roles. Most organizations are built like rigid organs; thriving systems depend on healthy between-spaces: trust, information, nutrients, and care flowing where they need to.
Decolonizing practice.
Not a slogan—an integration. Decolonization here means wholeness: bringing head, heart, body, culture, grief, and joy back into work; ending silo wars (water vs. energy vs. housing) with transcontextual problem-solving; and measuring what actually matters to life.
Why this matters for UN staff (right now)
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From performative urgency to coherent presence.
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From saviorism to community agency.
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From logframes to living portfolios.
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From metrics of output to indicators of life.
Practical moves UN teams can try right away
1) Begin meetings with bodies, not slides.Two minutes of breath, feet on the floor, a brief check-in round. Then decide. You’ll notice less reactivity and more listening.
2) Use the Four-Fold Practice (Art of Hosting) as a team backbone.
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Be present
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Participate
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Host
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Co-create
3) Shift facilitation to hosting in field missions. In post-crisis settings, create story circles before solutioning. Ask: What do you need to heal? What is your vision? What first steps feel true and possible? Let communities set direction; UN holds resources and scaffolds.
4) Prototype one “interstitium” experiment.Pick a priority (e.g., cholera risk, flood resilience). Convene water, health, housing, energy, and finance in one room, plus community leaders. Map relationships and flows, not just tasks. Fund a small cross-silo pilot; harvest and share.
5) Make values a living conversation.Select 3–5 team values. Each month, review: Where did we live them? Where did we fall short? What do we change next? Treat values as practice, not posters.
6) Invite joy and grief—on purpose.Schedule beauty breaks (green time, music, art) and allow honest emotion. It’s not “soft”—it’s how humans reset and reconnect to purpose.
If Mansi were UN Secretary-General in 2027
She wouldn’t lead alone. She’d establish a Wisdom Council at the apex (not a single hero), redesign power toward the edges where life happens, and rebuild the UN as a sociocratic, fractal, living system. Bioregions and watersheds would matter. Representation would be real. Decisions would be iterative and learning-based. In short: a platform that enables life, not just reports on it.
A daily micro-practice for UN colleagues
Choose one anchoring ritual you’ll actually keep (ten minutes counts): breath, a short walk, drawing, prayer, yoga, journaling. Do it before your first meeting. Then bring one listening move into that meeting: ask a real question and let silence work. Tiny coherences ripple.
The takeaway
Silke and Mansi don’t offer a new buzzword. They offer a different way of showing up—as people in service to life, building institutions that behave more like ecosystems than machines. Start small. Start human. The rest grows from there.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-art-of-hosting-the-future/id1841851629?i=1000730799302
Youtube:
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/6s3cvZ7SgmM0TMGKLL9Og1
Connect with Mansi:
Linkedin Profile | ArtofHosting.org | www.aohnetherlands.org