The Beauty of the Earth is a bell of mindfulness. If you can’t see it, you must ask yourself why. May be something is blocking the way. Or may be you are too busy looking for something else you can’t hear the call of the Earth.
~Thich Nhat Hanh

No Longer Seasonal….

For the last two years, I have been leading Seasonal Contemplative Walks in the foothills of the Santa Cruz mountains. The idea behind the term seasonal was to explore, each season, the same landscape, walking the same trails, observing inner and outer changes, attuning to the song of the land at different times of year. Walks were conducted four times a year, in February, May, August and November. In 2021, the observations that I gathered during my walks made me really uncomfortable, even disoriented, as the season that was announced for the day did not fit what I was observing in my environment, and what I had witnessed in the past two or three decades of living here. During the February walk, which was supposed to be a walk in the season of Winter, Spring was clearly in full bloom. In May, for the Spring walk, the buckeye was already wilting as if at the end of Summer. In August, for the Summer walk, the drought had taken such a toll on the vegetation and animals that the leaves had already changed color or fallen to the ground. Here is a haiku I wrote capturing the confusion I felt during the Spring contemplative walk:

Blooming while wilting
Poison oak already red
Late Spring or Autumn?

Earlier this week, I found the same disorientation described in an essay titled Dolphins in December written by a friend, Nitin Iyer, in Climatic Thoughts, his monthly newsletter exploring how climate change is at the intersection of literally everything. He writes:

Seasons provide a rhythm to guide us through time. You feel a certain way each year when you first hear a summer thunderstorm, or when you first smell spring flowers blooming, or when you first notice that you can see your breath in the morning air. Our lives are built upon this foundation of repetition. But now this rhythm is breaking apart. Something deep inside tells you that it’s strange to be sweating outside in December just from walking around

Then in the Guardian on February 2, I read an article titled Flowers arriving a month early in UK as climate heats up.

Catherine Pierce too hinted at the cognitive dissonance that the loss of seasons can induce in her poem Anthropocene Pastoral, published in the collection of essays in All We Can Save-Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis.

So what I could have taken as anecdotal evidence, appears to be widespread.

But will this new disorientation, felt on an even more present basis than the extreme weather events, be a more vivid realization for us - that Climate Change is here? - that now is the time to act before we are so sorry as Catherine Pierce writes?

I certainly hope so, but, in any case, I am abandoning the term of the season for this year’s walks. Instead, I invite you to join me on an elemental contemplative walk. May these walks be strong reminders of our own elemental nature and connection to the planet!

For the first elemental contemplative walk of the year, scheduled for Saturday February 12, we’ll focus on the element of water and what it means to be in the flow of life. In May, we’ll explore the element of air, the elements of fire in August and of earth in November (exact dates to be announced at later date).

If you’d like to join me on this exploration, please register below.

Warmly,
Anne-Marie
February 4, 2022
419.39 ppm of atmospheric CO2 (safe level 350 ppm)

PS: And if you need help figuring out what role is yours to play in mitigating the effects of climate change, I am here to help. Simply be in touch.

Walking Meditation- A Poem by Thich Nhat Hanh

Take my hand.
We will walk.
We will only walk.
We will enjoy our walk
without thinking of arriving anywhere.
Walk peacefully.
Walk happily.
Our walk is a peace walk.
Our walk is a happiness walk.
Then we learn
that there is no peace walk;
that peace is the walk;
that there is no happiness walk;
that happiness is the walk.
We walk for ourselves.
We walk for everyone
always hand in hand.
Walk and touch peace every moment.
Walk and touch happiness every moment.
Each step brings a fresh breeze.
Each step makes a flower bloom under our feet.
Kiss the Earth with your feet.
Print on Earth your love and happiness.
Earth will be safe
when we feel in us enough safety.

Thich Nhat Hanh
Call Me by My True Names: The Collected Poems of Thich Nhat Hanh,
Parallax Press, Berkeley, California, 1999, p. 194

Every Job is a Climate Job-
Taking Climate to the Workplace

To change everything, we need everyone.
~Ayana Elizabeth Johnson & Katherine K. Wilkinson
(All We Can Save)

After seeing the powerful engagement generated and the actions that resulted from my 10-week All We Can Save-Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis book circle (Jan-April 2021) and following the lead of All We Can Save project and Drawdown labs who have partnered to expand the AWCS circles to the workplace, I am happy to announce that I am offering my coaching services to support YOU in leading such a circle in the workplace. If you are wanting to take climate conversations to your workplace and need support to do so, click the button below to get started.