Look closely at the present you are constructing.
It should look like the future you are dreaming.
~Alice Walker

How Can I be a Good Ancestor?

Dear Subscriber First Name

In Japan, during the months of July and August, many Obon festivals are being held. During these three-day events, to honor the spirits of one's ancestors, one typically visits their place of rest, clean their graves, and refresh their altars at home. And as you honor your ancestors, you are also invited to reflect on your role as a future ancestor.

Inquiries and examples about what it means to be a good ancestor have been appearing in my awareness more and more frequently these past few months.
For example, I notice renowned conservationist Jane Goodall’s visit to the Bay Area this month to celebrate her 90th birthday with Climate One founder, Greg Dalton, at the Commonwealth Club of San Francisco where she will be talking about three intertwined crises: biodiversity loss, climate change and environmental inequity.

Also, as part of a We Are the Great Turning podcast circle I am leading, I listen to 95 years old legendary eco-spiritual teacherJoanna Macy, her wisdom inspiring us to take action for The Great Turning. The Great Turning is the term she has coined to describe the paradigm shift that we have to embrace to move away from the Great Unraveling or Business As Usual, and envision a just and life-sustaining society for future generations.

These two women are not just “good” ancestors. They are amazing warriors who have fought tirelessly to preserve life on Earth. They exemplify what Dogen, the 13th century Zen founder, calls robai-shin or grandmother mind, the mind of great compassion.

Here is what Joanna Macy writes in her memoir about future generations:

"You live inside us, beings of the future. In the spiral ribbons of our cells, you are here. In our rage for the burning forests, the poisoned fields, the oil-drowned seals, you are here. You beat in our hearts through late-night meetings. You accompany us to clearcuts and toxic dumps and the halls of the lawmakers. It is you who drive our dogged labors to save what is left. Oh you who will walk this Earth when we are gone, stir us awake. Behold through our eyes the beauty of this world. Let us feel your breath in our lungs, your cry in our throat. Let us see you in the poor, the homeless, the sick. Haunt us with your hunger, hound us with your claims, that we may honor the life that links us. You have as yet no faces we can see, no names we can say. But we need only hold you in our mind, and you teach us patience. You attune us to measures of time where healing can happen, where soil and souls can mend. You reveal courage within us we had not suspected, love we had not owned. O you who come after, help us remember: we are your ancestors. Fill us with gladness for the work that must be done. You live inside us, beings of the future." —Widening Circles

Clearly Jane Goodall and Joanna Macy have known all their life what it meant for them to be good ancestors and to care for future generations.

Can they inspire us to do our part?

If you are wondering how YOU can be a good ancestor, I invite you to embark with me on a (Good Ancestor) Wisdom Walk. Like my (Inner Compass) Wisdom Walk, I will guide you into a a powerful and time-honored practice, the Wisdom Walk (also called Medicine Walk by indigenous cultures) that is guaranteed to support you in accessing personal insights and perspectives about your own place in the stream of life. Instead of coming with your own personal inquiry, we will use the more general inquiry “How can I be a Good Ancestor?”. We will work together to make this question specifically yours, using the framework of the six ways of “thinking long” proposed by Roman Krznaric in his book The Good Ancestor- A Radical Prescription for Long-Term Thinking: Deep-Time Humility, Intergenerational Justice, Legacy Mindset,Transcendent Goal, Holistic Forecasting, and Cathedral Thinking. Feel free to read more about this below.

This new offering is structured as a walk but can also be held as a series of coaching sessions.

Intrigued? Please contact me for more information or to share your comments.

Warmly,

Anne-Marie
September 3, 2024
422.78 ppm of atmospheric CO2 (safe level 350, a year ago 419.18 ppm)

PS: I have written about this topic previously, as it strongly relates to our role in mitigating the climate breakdown. In July 2021, I titled my newsletter Developing a Larger View of Time- Cultivating Timefulness. In May 2022, it was How Can We be Good Ancestors and included a self-reflection (see below) inspired by the book by Roman Krznaric.

Book and Self-Reflection

Poem by Rosemerry Whatola Trommer