Seeds for Thought: an Ecopsychology Blog

Logging In

So, I don't know whether it is one of the coolest things I've seen in ages, or one of the most bizarre - probably a little of both - but apparently good friends of mine TiVo'd the yule log TV loop and played it all Christmas morning on their new 50" flat screen TV. I guess what's truly bizarre about this story is that they have a fireplace, which sits no more than 6-8 feet from the TV, and Christmas this year was a blustry, cold day that just begged for a proper fire.

So, what do you think about this? On the one hand, it's a positive sign that something this simple and natural is so comforting and satisfying that it beats the ratings for almost anything else broadcast on Christmas Day, and it warms my heart to know that people who are too poor to have a fireplace can at least imagine one. On the other it's a bit worrying when people would rather have a simulated fire than a real one...

Alotta Errata

A guest blog entry by melissa

I cried tonight. Somewhere around page 243 of Ecopsychology, about 8 or 10 paragraphs into Joanna Macy's "Working Through Environmental despair," I cried. I cried because she said it was OK. For the first time I felt my frustration, my rage, my crippling pain was justified. Reading her words made me realize that this hole inside of me, this emptiness that sneaks up on me, the unsettling feeling that something is very very out of place, is not caused by the social and environmental distress and disfunction that I see everyday but by the suppression of my feelings about them. Macy States that "Many people, conditioned to take seriously only those feelings that pertain to our immediate welfare, find it strange to think that we can suffer on behalf of hte larger society-and on behalf of our planet-and that such suffering is real, valid, and healthy." I can't agree more.

happy solstice

It was lovely to read lots of solstice greetings on the ecopsychology list. Gmail sorts messages into threads and gives each contributor a different colour so it made a lttle rainbow from round the world  It tells of more storms in British Columbia, drought and bush fires in Australia. Here a songthrush was singing in the station as the trees start to bud.

we celebrate the web of life on our fragile electronic web

here's a song for winter solstice

Seafort

I just got an email from an environmental artist friend of mine, Stephen Turner, with news of a creative project he did last year called Seafort. You might recall my mentioning him and his work in the past - he's pretty incredible. I wrote about an earlier project  of his - Time and Change in the River Medway - in the Art & The Environment issue of our Journal, Gatherings.

Anyway, for the Seafort project he once again set up residence in a man-made structure within an isolated natural setting - this time he stayed in one of the English coastal sea forts from WWII, spending 36 nights alone, perched above the waves in a little shack on stilts, with only the sky and his camera for companions.

He kept a fascinating web log of this experience, which is an incredible read with insights into the rarity of uninterrupted creative contemplation, and he's published this gorgeous book, now available from Artdata in the UK.

television

I have watched David Attenborough's recent series Planet Earth with mixed feelings of awe and sadness. It seems these are shared by  the team who made it, there is an accompanying series Planet Earth - the future in which an assortment of scientists, environmentalists, filmmakers and even a token Bush apologist denier for balance speak  (they do not debate) interspersed with clips, the team talk of returning to areas where they have filmed before and sometimes seeing huge and awful changes. A veteran save the whale activist is near tears as he talks about the resumption of whaling by Japan and cronies.

on the radio

Dear All,

If you care to HEAR ecopsychology...

Check out this My Moonster page for:

* interviews with Elizabeth Vooght and Chris Johnstone
* four book at bedtime stories with the Joanna Macy spiral theme
* a 3-part dramatization

Please feel free to send me all comments and feedback. :)

peace&love

Panarchy

A recent book, "Up Side of Down", introduces an ecological term "panarchy" to describe situations where systems increase efficiency and complexity at the expense of "resilience." Consider the difference between a bicycle and a motorcycle. There are only 2 ways a bike can break down but there are many ways a motorcycle can break down including running out of gas. It is easier to fix a bicycle and the "operator" needs less training. Thomas Homer-Dixon (Tad) claims the same is true of social systems. Local farming may be less "efficient" but more resilient than industrialized agriculture. A few wild pigs shut down the organic lettuce distribution across North America a few weeks ago. A brief power surge shut down the east coast power grid which effect communications systems, traffic and refrigeration. When complex systems break down people resort to simpler ones (bicycles, candles).