In our heartfelt desire to acknowledge and be in the natural world, there can be a tendency for our minds to try to extract from it the peace, ease, and joy we so desperately need. The desire for this is understandable; even wholesome. But the attitude of entering the natural world with the question of what we can get from it fundamentally alters the relationship and repeats the dominant culture’s extractive relationship with the more than human world.
In this EcoDharma Exploration, Susie Harrington invited us to sense our way into reciprocity with the natural world. What might a more wholesome, mutually beneficial relationship look like? How can we be in nature as a participant, as an offering-maker, rather than only as a taker?
This exploration took place on November 19, 2023. You can find the recording of this event below.
Susie Harrington is the guiding teacher for Desert Dharma and Sky Mind Retreats, teaching both in the Southwest and internationally since 2005. She delights in teaching outdoors, knowing that nature nourishes the heart and inspires wisdom. She encourages, through silence and intimate presence, coming home to our embedded natural aliveness and belonging, and the freedom that is our natural state. Her roots are in the Insight tradition, having trained extensively with Jack Kornfield, Guy Armstrong, and Joseph Goldstein; she is also well practiced in the Tibetan and Diamond Heart traditions as well as in Hakomi Therapy. For more information: www.desertdharma.org.
Support this Offering
One Earth Sangha and 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.
We also welcome your support for One Earth Sangha:
Recording
The recording of this EcoDharma Exploration includes a special reflection practice offered by Susie for those who couldn’t attend the live gathering and join breakout groups. This reflection starts at 25:37 in the video.
Inquiries for Group Discussion
- Discussion 1: Share a way you ‘take’ from nature
- Discussion 2:
- Share some thing, or some place, you belong to
- What is an action you might do that would express your belonging and reciprocity? (This could be something that you already do, or could potentially do, that expresses this relationship).
Additional Resources
- A few poems shared by Susie during the gathering:
- A quote from Dogen Zenji: When the self goes out to fill the world, that is delusion. When the world comes in to fill the self, that is awakening. (Translations vary)
- You can find more of Susie’s offerings and subscribe to her newsletter on her website.
