Creative Resources

Resources to stretch your thinking

A growing collection of tools and exercises that go alongside Overton's Garden — one strand for each part of the book. Play with them, share them, and let them nudge your thinking a little further.

Part Zero

Artificial Light

  • A pink flower growing from a mound of dark, rich compost

    Composting Toilet Calculator

    Spend a penny, save a poo

    See how much compost, free fertiliser, clean water and carbon a composting toilet could save. Set the (playful) sliders and find out what a year keeps hold of.

    Explore the resource

Part One

Overgrowth

  • A handwritten letter beginning “Dear fossil fuels”

    Love Letter Exercise

    A love letter to your “enemy”

    Write to someone — or something — you can't stand, and look for the good, the connection and the struggle beneath. A gentle exercise in compassion and Nonviolent Communication.

    Explore the resource

Part Two

Fauna

  • A 1930s black Ford motor car, illustrated in black and white

    Inflation Calculator

    What would your pay have bought in 1937?

    Enter your monthly pay and see what it would have bought in Britain in 1937 — from a house to a loaf of bread — then watch inflation quietly melt your savings.

    Explore the resource

Part Three

Fertile Ground

  • A wide-eyed man with his hair on end and his shirt singed, as if he's had an electric shock

    Boredom Generator

    How well can you cope with boredom?

    How long can you sit and do nothing? Inspired by the study in which people chose electric shocks over being left alone with their thoughts.

    Explore the resource

Part Four

Fresh Shoots

  • A black-and-white portrait in an ornate gold frame, hung upside down

    Drawing Exercise

    Draw it upside down

    Sketch random photos you've never seen, shown upside down, to quiet the part of your brain that rushes to label things and wake up the part that really sees.

    Explore the resource
  • A scatter of yellow dots plotted across a four-quadrant chart

    Prioritisation template

    Plot the difference

    List the things you could do to help create a better world, then plot each one by how important it feels and how hard it is for you. An interactive chart you can fill in and download, plus a printable version.

    Explore the resource
  • A glowing arched doorway with light spilling through

    Guided Meditation

    The world you wish for

    A six-minute guided meditation. Step through a door into the world exactly as you'd wish it to be — free of the constraints of the present — then share what you found on the community wall.

    Open the meditation

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