Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
I want all the outraged folks to learn from this. Walk away now. In fact, run. Do whatever you can within your community to pull all your needs within that small boundary. This benefits your community as well as you, building strength and resilience in your place and creating networks of reciprocity
It is easy to say things such as “we must take care of nature” or “humans must respect all other organisms” or even “we are no better/have no more right to exist than frogs/deer/bugs”. But what does it mean?
In the dualist view, because we possess a mind—and a superior one, at that—we still privilege ourselves as special and separate. In other words, the destructive consequences of dualism stem more from the mind/matter split than from which beings are included in the (still hierarchical) club.
In the face of the climate crisis and unprecedented wealth inequality we’re imagining, and working toward lives no longer guided and marked by overconsumption, environmental devastation and dreams blocked by lack of opportunity based on economic class. So, yep, I’m anti-fascism and have a problem with capitalism. Does that make me a terrorist?
An autonomous citizenry would be more likely to seek a nuanced understanding of its society and our collective problems, participate in campaigns to elect champions of public interests, and have the resilience to overcome the challenges involved.
Viewing mass tourism within this backdrop of degrading environments, cultures, and economic equality helps us all to critically understand that there is no such thing as a cheap flight. Someone, something, somewhere is paying for it. In my view, it is time to reconsider how travel is embarked on, to whom, for how many, and why.
How long can we live in the strange world of President Donald Trump and his version of what might be thought of as Defeat Gardens before we figure out a better way — how to truly feed and care for ourselves and one another? What are the systems that we need to build to replace the distinctly broken and shattered ones in this world of ours?
Every act of care, every restored relationship, and every small step toward shared responsibility contributes to the future that is already taking shape. This is work we can keep doing, steadily and together.
What does a livable future look like 100 years from now? If we unlocked unlimited green energy, what would we actually do with it? And are our dreams of a renewable-energy utopia sometimes just as delusional as the fossil-fueled ‘drill baby drill’ mentality?
I do think we need this feast to return to its roots, as a potlatch, a bonding redistribution of wealth and full bellies, a rapprochement across the great divides, and a coming together in joy to feed each other. We need something that draws us into community, that builds ties, that creates relationship and memories.
Rather than being a religion, animism is a mindset that had common purchase around the globe prior to modern times. Not only is it important to appreciate how we used to be when the planet’s ecological relationships were more “normal,” but it offers a worthy alternative to dualism that has much overlap with an astrophysical perspective.
In this episode, Nate is joined by guide and author Samantha Sweetwater to explore how separation is at the root of the metacrisis and how nurturing interconnection, relationships, and ecological maturity act as foundational components for systems change.
