Another thing we share - I used to watch the Wide Wide World of Sports avidly on Saturdays, back when that was the only place to see surfing (East Coaster childhood).
And you know I love Amanda Blake - and her "waves" approach to life circumstances. Here I would again lift up that Somatic Coaching and Somatics in general are an extremely helpful toolkit to add to what you and Brit are writing about. Embodiment practices can help us heal individual trauma and become fully embodied leaders, and we can also apply the principles to great benefit to empower and enable organizations and movements such as with Staci Haines' organization Generative Somatics. https://generativesomatics.org/our-strategy/#_why-_somatics-for-_organizing__002c-_movement-_building__002c-__0026-_action__003f
Brit Wray - wow. I started this response an hour and a half ago, and am just now back from reading Gen Dread. What an incredible set of writing and resources, and definitely one I'll be spending more time with in the coming weeks. Thanks as always for this shower of gifts.
To this specific article you've reposted: all yes from here. And I love how resonant this is with May Bartlett's re-storying coaching approach for climate coaching. "Creating better stories" is also right in line with Manda Scott's challenge that we all try to visualize, as a practice, "what would it look like if we got it all right?" Such a different and evocative question from the usual approach to this snarl of complexity.
And that third point. Definitely we need to be able to forge new stories that include all the regret, shame, judgement, guilt, blame -- and the need for reparations at the grandest scale, to each other and to every ecosystem and bioregion on the planet. There will be humility, and requests for forgiveness, and this all must spring from deepest gratitude for what we will be regaining, together, as we reconnect with and begin to properly steward Gaia as we are meant to.
And three cheers for this "The future of our species now depends on creating new norms for environmental leadership, which means centering the idea that we must also address this crisis at the level through which it was created: human behaviour; our psychology." This is the point you and Dr. Renee Lertzman and many others are also making, such as the motivational interviewing mentioned here (see also, Alex Evans + Kate Pumphrey at A Larger US in UK; Frederic Laloux with his The Week intervention; Dr. Josie McLean in ANZ). We need to do our inner work *and* outer work as small groups to move from fight or flight to tend and befriend, and through co-creating the vision of the shared climate future we all want.
My current read (audiobook, actually) is Sand Talk, by Tyson Yunkaporta -- cannot recommend it highly enough to listen to it in his own voice as he is coming from an oral culture. It was recommended by Melanie Goodchild at Turtle Island Institute as their upcoming book club pick. Yunkaporta is like Robin Wall Kimmerer - Indigenous (in this case Aboriginal) by heritage, and also an academic, with a similar specific mission to lift up Tribal wisdom as what is needed right now to help us resolve climate disruption and arrive at more integral and whole ways of being *as* the earth. "I’m trying to build a collective base of knowledge and relationships and conversations that might help try to stop the world from dying in the next few decades." The number of absolute gobsmacking insights and new ways of being in the world per chapter is also similar to Braiding Sweetgrass. And his delivery is refreshingly raw -- a taste here: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/05/world/australia/Tyson-Yunkaporta-Indigenous.html I'm grateful to him for the painstaking way he has crafted this as a set of yarns, dialogues, along with sand-drawings, as a way to involve us as reader/listeners in the conversation as accountable stakeholder-participants, as opposed to assuming a colonial distance of viewing it through a window -- as a spectacle of what he calls "Indigeneity."
I have learned and continue to learn so much from you, Peter. Of course, Amanda Blake came into my life by way of your recommendation and references, as has somatic coaching more generally. Somatics has become integrated into the way I think about sitting with and moving through our emotions, as evidenced by the wave metaphor being the first one that popped into my head in reading Britt's writing.
As I am sure you and others have seen on social media, there is a meme of cascading waves that is making the rounds. It began with COVID-19, then the recession, then climate change, then biodiversity collapse. As time marches on, people seem to keep adding more and more waves to the image. Just as Amanda Blake suggests holding back the emotional waves as an exercise in futility, so too does annotating the compendium of perpetual waves approaching us.
What you and many others have helped me to appreciate is that it is not the specificity of the waveform itself that matters, perhaps not even the magnitude of the wave, but rather our state of being in the face of ALL the waves. Whether it is the shedding of old stories that no longer serve us to make room for new stories as you referenced with May's work (influenced by Thomas Berry) or the cultivations of compassion and loving-kindness through myriad practices discussed over these many months, we will always live in a world of waves. If, like you, May, Britt, Renee, Anne-Marie, and others call for, we begin to recognize that the "work" is cultivating our emotional intelligence to face the waves, we may transition from living in fear of the next waves to supporting each other in the face of them. Then we might just be able to see beyond their crests, over the horizon, to the future we want to create. As much as I love being on the wave while surfing, my favourite moments tend to be sitting on top of my board, looking out at the horizon and daydreaming about the possibilities that lie ahead.
Wow Peter, thank you for this exceptionally thoughtful comment. It is full of references that I'm excited to check out. You're very right to point out somatic work and how meaningful it is for delving into these topics. It is an area that I'm slowly learning more about and connecting to my own coping as well as research with others. Also, Tyson Yunkporta sounds amazing, thanks for bringing him to my attention. I'm glad that we've connected!
Adam, it's so nice to see the confluence of Gen Dread and The Understory with Dr Renée Lerztmann's work as an island right in the middle. Congratulations! And I love your analogy of moving from fearing to facing to riding the waves so we can see beyond their crests, over the horizon. Thank you very much.
As a "quasi-surfer" in Long Island decades back (perhaps 20 days a year), I clearly remember the feelings of apprehension, commitment and exhilaration. I can right now remember the feelings on the board, the waves approaching, commit, stand and swoosh.
In my 20 years+ as a business and climate activist, the feelings of disbelief, deep sadness, raw anger, and my unalterable life commitment to action are inherent in each breath. To deny the realities of the impact we human predators have on the orangutan, polar bears, whales and my 18 month old granddaughter, Maddy, to the billions hanging on the fringes, is to live an unconscious life. To deny the realities of our human capacity to love, empathize and act boldly on behalf of all humans, all creatures and life is to simply squander ones life. As stewards of the Anthropocene we all make choices on the journey to the future we choose. Love, courage, truth
Another thing we share - I used to watch the Wide Wide World of Sports avidly on Saturdays, back when that was the only place to see surfing (East Coaster childhood).
And you know I love Amanda Blake - and her "waves" approach to life circumstances. Here I would again lift up that Somatic Coaching and Somatics in general are an extremely helpful toolkit to add to what you and Brit are writing about. Embodiment practices can help us heal individual trauma and become fully embodied leaders, and we can also apply the principles to great benefit to empower and enable organizations and movements such as with Staci Haines' organization Generative Somatics. https://generativesomatics.org/our-strategy/#_why-_somatics-for-_organizing__002c-_movement-_building__002c-__0026-_action__003f
Brit Wray - wow. I started this response an hour and a half ago, and am just now back from reading Gen Dread. What an incredible set of writing and resources, and definitely one I'll be spending more time with in the coming weeks. Thanks as always for this shower of gifts.
To this specific article you've reposted: all yes from here. And I love how resonant this is with May Bartlett's re-storying coaching approach for climate coaching. "Creating better stories" is also right in line with Manda Scott's challenge that we all try to visualize, as a practice, "what would it look like if we got it all right?" Such a different and evocative question from the usual approach to this snarl of complexity.
And that third point. Definitely we need to be able to forge new stories that include all the regret, shame, judgement, guilt, blame -- and the need for reparations at the grandest scale, to each other and to every ecosystem and bioregion on the planet. There will be humility, and requests for forgiveness, and this all must spring from deepest gratitude for what we will be regaining, together, as we reconnect with and begin to properly steward Gaia as we are meant to.
And three cheers for this "The future of our species now depends on creating new norms for environmental leadership, which means centering the idea that we must also address this crisis at the level through which it was created: human behaviour; our psychology." This is the point you and Dr. Renee Lertzman and many others are also making, such as the motivational interviewing mentioned here (see also, Alex Evans + Kate Pumphrey at A Larger US in UK; Frederic Laloux with his The Week intervention; Dr. Josie McLean in ANZ). We need to do our inner work *and* outer work as small groups to move from fight or flight to tend and befriend, and through co-creating the vision of the shared climate future we all want.
My current read (audiobook, actually) is Sand Talk, by Tyson Yunkaporta -- cannot recommend it highly enough to listen to it in his own voice as he is coming from an oral culture. It was recommended by Melanie Goodchild at Turtle Island Institute as their upcoming book club pick. Yunkaporta is like Robin Wall Kimmerer - Indigenous (in this case Aboriginal) by heritage, and also an academic, with a similar specific mission to lift up Tribal wisdom as what is needed right now to help us resolve climate disruption and arrive at more integral and whole ways of being *as* the earth. "I’m trying to build a collective base of knowledge and relationships and conversations that might help try to stop the world from dying in the next few decades." The number of absolute gobsmacking insights and new ways of being in the world per chapter is also similar to Braiding Sweetgrass. And his delivery is refreshingly raw -- a taste here: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/05/world/australia/Tyson-Yunkaporta-Indigenous.html I'm grateful to him for the painstaking way he has crafted this as a set of yarns, dialogues, along with sand-drawings, as a way to involve us as reader/listeners in the conversation as accountable stakeholder-participants, as opposed to assuming a colonial distance of viewing it through a window -- as a spectacle of what he calls "Indigeneity."
Also this - listening now: https://soundcloud.com/transition-culture/episode-seventeen-what-if-indigenous-wisdom-could-save-the-world
I have learned and continue to learn so much from you, Peter. Of course, Amanda Blake came into my life by way of your recommendation and references, as has somatic coaching more generally. Somatics has become integrated into the way I think about sitting with and moving through our emotions, as evidenced by the wave metaphor being the first one that popped into my head in reading Britt's writing.
As I am sure you and others have seen on social media, there is a meme of cascading waves that is making the rounds. It began with COVID-19, then the recession, then climate change, then biodiversity collapse. As time marches on, people seem to keep adding more and more waves to the image. Just as Amanda Blake suggests holding back the emotional waves as an exercise in futility, so too does annotating the compendium of perpetual waves approaching us.
What you and many others have helped me to appreciate is that it is not the specificity of the waveform itself that matters, perhaps not even the magnitude of the wave, but rather our state of being in the face of ALL the waves. Whether it is the shedding of old stories that no longer serve us to make room for new stories as you referenced with May's work (influenced by Thomas Berry) or the cultivations of compassion and loving-kindness through myriad practices discussed over these many months, we will always live in a world of waves. If, like you, May, Britt, Renee, Anne-Marie, and others call for, we begin to recognize that the "work" is cultivating our emotional intelligence to face the waves, we may transition from living in fear of the next waves to supporting each other in the face of them. Then we might just be able to see beyond their crests, over the horizon, to the future we want to create. As much as I love being on the wave while surfing, my favourite moments tend to be sitting on top of my board, looking out at the horizon and daydreaming about the possibilities that lie ahead.
Wow Peter, thank you for this exceptionally thoughtful comment. It is full of references that I'm excited to check out. You're very right to point out somatic work and how meaningful it is for delving into these topics. It is an area that I'm slowly learning more about and connecting to my own coping as well as research with others. Also, Tyson Yunkporta sounds amazing, thanks for bringing him to my attention. I'm glad that we've connected!
Adam, it's so nice to see the confluence of Gen Dread and The Understory with Dr Renée Lerztmann's work as an island right in the middle. Congratulations! And I love your analogy of moving from fearing to facing to riding the waves so we can see beyond their crests, over the horizon. Thank you very much.
As a "quasi-surfer" in Long Island decades back (perhaps 20 days a year), I clearly remember the feelings of apprehension, commitment and exhilaration. I can right now remember the feelings on the board, the waves approaching, commit, stand and swoosh.
In my 20 years+ as a business and climate activist, the feelings of disbelief, deep sadness, raw anger, and my unalterable life commitment to action are inherent in each breath. To deny the realities of the impact we human predators have on the orangutan, polar bears, whales and my 18 month old granddaughter, Maddy, to the billions hanging on the fringes, is to live an unconscious life. To deny the realities of our human capacity to love, empathize and act boldly on behalf of all humans, all creatures and life is to simply squander ones life. As stewards of the Anthropocene we all make choices on the journey to the future we choose. Love, courage, truth