“I knew then that I was no longer acting on behalf of myself or my human ideas, but on behalf of the Earth . . . on behalf of my larger self, that I was literally part of the rainforest defending herself.”
“We ask for the presence of the spirit of Gaia and pray that the breath of life continues to caress this planet home.”
“We call upon the spirit of evolution, the miraculous force that inspires rocks and dust to weave themselves into biology. You have stood by us for millions and billions of years — do not forsake us now.”
–John Seed
In this conversation, John shares his take on the meaning of deep ecology, anthropocentrism, bio and eco-centrism, the role of grief and other emotions in responding to the environmental horrors, and he quotes from poets, Leonard Cohen and Robinson Jeffers, and more. He’s about as informed as anyone on the magnitude of our predicament, and yet he maintains a joyfulness that is contagious.
John Seed is an Australian environmentalist and director of the Rainforest Information Centre, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to the protection of the Earth’s remaining rainforests in partnership with the indigenous people and local communities who depend on them.. He is also a prominent figure in the deep ecology movement and co-creator, with Joanna Macy, of the Council of All Beings, and other re-earthing processes.
I highly recommend his Book, Thinking Like a Mountain, published in 1988, which is now available online. You can download a free pdf copy from his website https://www.rainforestinformationcentre.org/john_seed_articles_essays which contains other writings and talks by John. It will take you deeper into the experiential awareness of our inter-connectedness with nature.
In our conversation, John shares the influences of his parents and the shifts in consciousness that brought him to his deep ecological awareness. Starting with lsd and the counter-culture, he found himself in a direct engagement with the voice of the forest that took him onto his path of partnership with Mother Earth in saving the rainforests and more.
John’s “philosophy” comes from direct experience with the inner and outer natural forces of evolutionary change. He works at several levels. Even at 80 years, he continues to participate in direct action – sometimes chaining himself to trees or heavy machinery and getting arrested. He meets with corporate boards to negotiate ending their earth destroying practices. He facilitates workshops with groups to engage in deep ecology practices. These powerful ceremonies help people to open to and move through all the emotional reactions they have to the destruction of our life network. They then find motivation and empowerment to do what they are directed to do from within themselves.
In a very moving way, John describes his own process which is beyond rational decision making. “What I do is lie down in the forest and cover myself in leaves. I say, “Mother, I surrender to you.” I deliberately allow all of my energies to sink into the earth and to be aligned with the earth. Then when I get up, I do whatever I’m moved to do.”
Listen or watch and I’m always interested to hear back from you.
Links to John and his work:
Occasional blog posts at johnseed.net
podcasts, essays, films etc https://rainforestinfo.org.au/johnseed.htm
Substack https://substack.com/@johnseed
https://www.facebook.com/johnseed.deepecology
https://www.instagram.com/johnseed_deepecology/
Finally: Here’s a gift. This delightful interview between John Seed and Ram Dass is from 1991. It was made as part of the Reaching Out http://www.reachingout.org/programs_1_main.html series produced by Joseph Tieger. http://www.crossingtheboundary.org/blog/
“To Wake Up One Day Different” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYUN_Sg1Qcg&t=452shttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYUN_Sg1Qcg&t=452s