There are No Gaian Teachers, Only Gaia
Every sip of water, every breath of air, every morsel of food, and every time my heart beats. Gaia is within and around me. Who better to learn from than that?
Every sip of water, every breath of air, every morsel of food, and every time my heart beats. Gaia is within and around me. Who better to learn from than that?
Many people are now realizing that they cannot move forward without us. And indigenous peoples are saying: “you are not going to talk on our behalf, nor about us, anymore”.
An ethical global perspective is necessary today. We must find the unity of Earth and the world. It would be helpful if we had a word, better yet a name, that encapsulates this unity.
So even while there were beautiful reminders of our connection to nature at this conference—talks, posters, and so on—there was, and will continue to be, far more reminders of our broken relationship, which Gaians and other ecologically spiritually minded folk should, and I hope will, continue to work toward healing.
If we accepted this as our single, solitary chance to live, then we might do better at living. We might focus on life, on the here and now, on being.
If Earth is indeed Gaia, and we humans are a living part of Gaia, then maybe the living biosphere has something to say to us.
Deliberative democracy (DD) shares some key features with Gaianism and is intrinsically compatible with it, to the point that Gaians might think about taking an interest in practicing and promoting DD.
Holonically, we are inside Earth, which includes and transcends, includes and dissolves. We are part of Gaia, and “going Green”, for me, was the first step to “going Gaian”.
But as a matter of fact, in the household and at the community level, it’s very often the case we as women have a very important cultural and spiritual role.
Indeed, this is where Jesus’ and Christianity’s teachings are so relevant: living simple lives—one might dare say “impoverished” lives at least when compared to the aspirational American lifestyle—in service to others and to Creation (i.e. Gaia) is an essential part of this transition.
What is the proper label for a community of people who share a way of looking at life, a way of understanding who we are, a worldview that encompasses so much? The word “religion” seems like the most appropriate descriptor.
Tami Simon hosts the popular Sounds True podcast, Insights at the Edge, which has been downloaded more than 20 million times. With its guiding principle “to disseminate spiritual wisdom”, Sounds True has grown into a multimedia publisher that has produced over 6,000 titles. She addresses the question of “What Could Possibly Go Right?”