Restorative Communities: From Conflict to Conversation (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781934355619)

What happens when a former political journalist, operative, and consultant in her forties loses faith in her country, moves to a foreign land to seek solace, but still can't quite give up on the promise of America? And what if-right at that moment-a former schoolteacher and serial entrepreneur is seeking an authentic voice with a healthy amount of skepticism to help him develop a new movement he's been building up to his entire career?

Welcome to the story of Kerra Bolton, an accomplished Black journalist who broke up with her home country over its wild identity dysphoria in 2016. Disillusioned and disgusted with America's unwillingness to face the ugly realities of its birth and socio-political legacy, Bolton fled to the peaceful beaches of the Mexican Caribbean to soothe her wounded spirit. Little did she suspect that the seeds of her spiritual and emotional healing would come in the form of a phone call from a Pennsylvania-based educator and innovator, who had one more trick up his sleeve and believed she could help with his vision.

This book is the culmination of four years of research, interviews, writing and outreach by Bolton, in service of helping entrepreneur and author Ted Wachtel develop a new social movement, Building A New Reality. It tells, in the context of her personal and professional struggles, the story of this unlikely collaboration that has launched a quiet revolution by conversation.

Covering the Six Facets of today's society and how they are successfully addressed by Restorative Practices, Bolton examines new ways of approaching the world's political upheaval, civil strife, spiritual malaise and how it's all playing out in a post-COVID world. Best of all, she provides case studies of how restorative communities large and small are taking back our society in a positive, productive and hopeful movement toward a more just and equitable life. It's a much-needed, non-partisan message backed by empirical data and government-sanctioned experiments in direct democracy for every facet of modern life.