Compassion in Every Breath

Social Transformation Begins Right Here

Dekila Chungyalpa led this EcoDharma Exploration July 26th, 2026. We welcome your support for this program. A recording is available below.

Our EcoDharma Explorations are co-created with Braided Wisdom and Spirit Rock as part of a new initiative, the EcoDharma & Transformational Culture Program. We at One Earth Sangha are honored and excited to collaborate with our partners on EcoDharma Explorations and beyond.

What do we and our societal systems need to transform given how we are now experiencing a cascade of environmental, climate, and social crises globally and locally? Dekila Chungyalpa, the founding director of the Loka Initiative at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, has been working with faith leaders and culture keepers of Indigenous traditions for over 18 years, collaborating on solutions that answer this question.

In this gathering, Dekila will invite us to follow our breath to the very source of the greatest compassion, Mother Earth herself, as a practice that can fill us up with courage and sustain us for what is to come. She will weave her personal story as the daughter of a Tibetan Buddhist nun and teacher, the environmental values she was taught while growing up in Sikkim in the Eastern Himalayas, the lessons she learned while working on biodiversity conservation around the world, and the realizations that led her to bridge the worlds of faith and science.

Dekila Chungyalpa is the director of the Loka Initiative, whose mission is to support faith-led environmental efforts locally and around the world through collaborations with faith leaders and religious institutions on environmental protection, sustainable development, and global health issues. Prior to that, she was the recipient of the McCluskey fellowship at the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies where she also lectured and researched. Dekila founded and directed Sacred Earth, an acclaimed faith-based conservation program at the World Wildlife Fund from 2009 to 2014. She has served as the WWF-US Director for the Greater Mekong Program and also worked for WWF in the Eastern Himalayas. Dekila serves as the environmental adviser for His Holiness the 17th Karmapa, head of the Karma Kagyu School of Tibetan Buddhism.

     Pieces on One Earth Sangha

This Exploration is offered  through a collaboration with Braided Wisdom, Spirit Rock’s ecoDharma & Transformational Culture Program and One Earth Sangha. We’re honored and excited to work with these partners.

This program is donation-based, with no required registration fee. We welcome your contributions to support this program and the work of Braided Wisdom and One Earth Sangha.

Support this Offering

One Earth Sangha, together with our partners at Braided Wisdom and Spirit Rock as well as our featured speakers offer these explorations on a donation basis, with no required registration fee. We invite you to participate in the tradition of offering dana, or generosity. Your support makes these gatherings possible, and any amount offered is greatly appreciated.

Another way to support us is to share what this exploration has meant to you in a way that we can use in our materials. We invite you to share a “testimonial” here! (select “EcoDharma Exploration Participant” from the dropdown menu.)

Recording

Additional Resources

More EcoDharma Explorations

Upcoming

Embodied Changemaking for the World We Wish to See

Venerable Clear Grace Dayananda shares the practice of walking meditation as radical sacred action. They invite us to explore how this movement, whether standing or walking, acts as sacred repair and nurtures Beloved Community.

Past

Turning Toward the Darkness Without Bypass or Collapse

Jess Serrante will share what she's learned in her years of friendship with Joanna Macy and her own experience carrying this lineage forward. Come ready to be tender with yourself and each other. We won't leave with answers — but hopefully with a little more room to carry what's true, together.

Past

Meeting the Paradox of Inaction with Compassion

What if we better understood each other? We have a responsibility to investigate our own perceptions about how others are feeling the challenge of existential crises. What possibilities might such understanding open up for us all?