The Great Turning & The Stories of These Times.
My heart hurts many days. In my heart exists a grief so vast and wide for all of us.
Other times, fear grips me and holds on, shrinking and shriveling any tendrils of hope.
Doom scrolling.
How often do you do this?
When you come up for air, how is your nervous system? How much time has gone by?
I have a notecard on my desk with these words in black sharpie. READ AND WRITE MORE, SCROLL LESS!
It takes resolve and paying attention to my bullet journal not to get caught up in the intense urgency of all the things now. The heat wave doesn’t help and the anxiety and overwhelm is palpable in spaces and places with people.
I don’t always succeed.
Combating my existential dread feels like a full time job. Staying informed and choosing what might be a skillful action rather than reactivity requires discernment and discipline.
Joanna Macy, root teacher of The Work That Reconnects, teaches us that even now, in the midst of so much unrest, we can opt for a life sustaining world.
Part of opting in to a life sustaining world is recognizing the stories present in these times. Here, we can consciously choose to co-create the story that lies underneath the noise.
The Great Turning.
Let’s explore these stories together.
Business as Usual.
This is the story that there is little to change about our lifestyles. The central narrative says we need to get ahead, have more, make money and continue to live without regard for our impact on the planet or how our actions/policies impact other humans.
We all take part in this. For example, even with awareness of the environmental impact, I, and perhaps you as well, choose to fly to travel.
There is a strong evolutionary pull towards organizing our lives into routines and efficiency.
The Great Unraveling.
This is the story we hear from climate scientists and environmental activists and independent media that links our actions in Business as Usual to climate catastrophe. This is also the story of the collapse of our economic and social systems as well as our biological and ecological systems.
The unbearable nature of this story explains why so many of us live our lives in Business as Usual mode. This may also explain (but not justify) the rise of far right, authoritarian platforms.
So what remains?
The Great Turning.
This story arises from those who see possibilities in the shift from an Industrial Growth Society to a Life Sustaining Society where the Great Unraveling is recognized but doesn’t have the last word.
New and emergent responses that define the Great Turning seek collaboration, adaptation, reciprocity and collective engagement together for the sake of Earth and all her species.
3 areas/dimensions that are mutually reinforcing where this is occurring :
- Actions to slow damage to Earth and living systems.
- Transformation of our common life (emergent economic and social systems).
- A fundamental shift in worldview and values.
An example of all three of these dimensions can be seen in Standing Rock.
In 2016, permits were given to construct a pipeline to carry 19 million gallons of toxic fracked oil a day from NorthDakota to Illinois. This pipeline traveled through sacred land of the Lakota Sioux, with the likelihood of contaminating water and impacting the biodiversity in these lands.
A movement arose led by Lakota Sioux and supported by hundreds of First Nations Peoples and millions of other peoples.
An encampment arose under the common understanding of Water is Life.
This consisted of a holding section to stop the pipeline through sacred lands of First Nation Peoples, the sharing of resources and community care in the encampment and the shared values of the land as sacred through ritual and prayer acknowledging the sacredness of Earth.
*Note-The Pipeline still is in the courts as of 2024.
adrienne maree brown in her book, Emergent Strategy calls upon the imagination by black science fiction writer Octavia Butler and biomimicry. Instead of the artificial systems of capitalism, socialism, etc…observing how nature adapts, responds and self organizes combined with radical liberatory imagination defines Emergent Strategy..
For me, the mindset of not only seeing myself as this individual named Rachel but as an expression of Earth, as a part of the diversity of species, as an essential part of the whole. Here diversity and uniqueness are celebrated rather than hyper-individualism. Joanna Macy call this the awareness of The Ecological Self.
If i see myself, other humans and other forms of life as part of the living systems of this living, breathing organism that is our planet, our home, how might this shift my thoughts, behaviors and actions?
Covid brought glimpses of new ways of organizing. Overnight, little wooden community libraries became food pantries for non-perishable items. People that sewed created tons of masks for healthcare workers and frontline workers until the supply chain caught up with the demand. Mutual aid and collective care became part of how we functioned.
More of this please.
We are capable of so much. Let’s lean into this Great Turning together.
Here is a song by Ma Muse that speaks to the Great Turning covered by me and friends.
For more on the work of Joanna Macy and The Work That Reconnects, please visit School for The Great Turning.
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Let’s do this. It is time to thrive,
