Forms and Opportunities for Engaged Practice
Despair is paralysis. It robs us of agency. It blinds us to our own power and the power of the earth. Environmental despair is a poison every bit as destructive as the methylated mercury in the bottom of Onondaga Lake. But how can we submit to despair while the land is saying "Help"?
— Robin Wall Kimmerer
No small part of our challenge is the pervasive poverty of agency. How often do we hear, including from ourselves, “but I’m just one person”? Yet both Dharma and sociology disagree. Our words and actions matter so much and indeed they are all we have.
Yet whether or not our actions make a big difference that we can actually see, feel, and touch is, in a way, none of our business. Our opportunity is to meaningfully respond. We can speak in ways that actually help. We can act in ways that are deeply rooted, skillful, strategic, and unattached to specific outcomes.
EcoDharma
EcoDharma
- Nikayla Jefferson
One Earth Sangha’s suggestions for how to get started on taking action.
Current Action Opportunities
International
- Read: Ecocide and Resistance in Palestine in The Ecologist
- Read: 12 Guidelines for a Non-Violent Street Demonstration by Christopher Titmuss
- Check-out: Unthinkable Resource Hub launched a personalization quiz to get your care package sent to your inbox.
- Check-out: Project Drawdown’s Drawdown Explorer
- Join: #NoWar2025: Exploring Abolition Movements Virtual Conference with World Beyond War
- Read: Borrow a Drill, Save the World by Douglas Rushkoff
- Check-out: Fact-check 16 common myths about solar power
- Read: ‘It’s only going to get bigger’: Australia embraces the Japanese game that turns rubbish into sport in The Guardian
- Read: Eight ways Airlines exploit their own customers from Stay Grounded
Australia
- Act: If you’re a HESTA member, tell them to divest your retirement savings from climate destruction
- Act: Join the People’s Blockcade of the world’s largest coal port November 27 – December 3 and sign-on to the call to Port of Newcastle to stop coal shipments
Canada
- Submit: The Rewildering Arts Prize from the David Suzuki Foundation is open to artists throughout Canada
- Sign-on: Tell Canada to oppose the Mining Code and protect the deep sea from mining with Greenpeace
- Join: The People’s Ministry of the Future conference and days of lobbying October 19 – 21 with Citizens Climate Lobby
- Sign-on: To the pledge for Canada to go 100% renewable and tell Carney to do the same with Sierra Club
- Sign-on: Cancel the Canada-Israel Free Trade Agreement with CJPME
United States
- Check-out: The Water Survival Guidebook for community strategies for resilient access to clean water from Climate Mobilization
- Sign-on: Tell the EPA to keep the Greenhouse Gas Endangerment Finding in place with Earthjustice
- Read: Scientists breathe new life into climate website after shutdown under Trump by The Guardian
- Act: A Week Without Driving September 29 – October 5
Restoration is a powerful antidote to despair. Restoration offers concrete means by which humans can once again enter into positive creative relationship with the more-than-human world, meeting responsibilities that are simultaneously material and spiritual. It's not enough to grieve. It's not enough to just stop doing bad things.
— Robin Wall Kimmerer
Stories of Engagement
EcoDharma
EcoDharma
Buddhism, Social Change, and Skillful Means
- Melvin McLeod, David Loy, Mushim Patricia Ikeda and Joan Sutherland
How does our Dharma practice call us into politics and shape our engagement? While we no longer live in the moment of Occupy and the Tea Party movements, the words of David Loy, Mushim Patricia Ikeda, and Joan Suthlerland speak powerfully to this moment of 2024.
EcoDharma
EcoDharma
A Community Renounces Fossil Fuels
- Steve Seigan Miron
With its recent installation of an emissions-free heating system, Zen Mountain Monastery is one step closer to its goal of phasing out fossil fuel use by 2030.
EcoDharma
EcoDharma
Demand for Statehood and Ecological Protections in Northern India
- Justin Whitaker
In Ladakh, India, a coalition of political and religious leaders is organizing to safeguard human rights, cultural heritage, and environmental well-being.
