Background: This article is about our experience of, and inquiry into, using critical creativity as we learned to live with the unknown and to fly the mandalas of critical-creative companionship and critical creativity. It is about letting go, flowing the other way and trusting our ‘in-body knowing’ as we navigated the unchartered waters in which we found ourselves. The inquiry was supported by the inaugural Angie Titchen Award (2019).

Aim: Our aims at the outset were: for Margaret, to embed and embody the mandalas in her facilitation of the everyday in practice and life; and for Angie, to deepen her understanding of her own tacit, professional artistry of critical-creative companionship as she helped Margaret use the mandalas in her everyday nursing leadership and facilitation. When unforeseen global, community and personal events struck, we flowed into working together virtually in ways that deepened our critical-creative companionship and enabled us to flourish.

Methods: Alone and together, we captured our experiences and understandings using body/cognitive senses, connecting with Nature, reflexive conversations, stories, poems, symbolism, metaphor, creative writing and artistic expressions. We used a layered, storybook approach to show:

• Our adventures of experiences, co-learning and discovery
• How critical-creative co-learning through inquiry is done
• The impact on us and our practices in various phases (chapters)
• Stepping stones to help readers into new ways of seeing, knowing, being and becoming through a practice-before-theory approach.

Conclusion: The purpose of this article is to help readers step into the complexity, mystery and magic of the mandalas, getting a feel for what they might mean and then be drawn into exploring them theoretically and experientially with a critical ally or companion.

This article by Margaret Codd and Angie Titchen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 3.0 License.