Announcement and Essay on Humanity, Habitat and Evidence Online Degree

NOTE: The quoted information, below, consists of sections of coursework from anonymous participants in our sensory green-your-profession program. Other examples and findings are available through links on our survey page.

Dreams and Intentions

Guaranteed to: make you feel better, reduce stress, weight, sleep better, help you live longer, attract a mate, even improve your love life.
a) Just go out your door or if that is impossible find a potted plant.
b) Once there, just take a deep breath and quiet your mind, then just be aware.
c) The change may be subtle, it may even be uncomfortable at first, but if you suspend your stories and just be present, Magic will begin to happen

Why reconnect?
Our disconnection causes our planet pain and us.
It is hard to believe that something so natural is so uncommon. The average person is separated from nature over 95% of their lives. We get up, get ready for work, slurp down some coffee or if we are lucky some breakfast, Run to our cars, many parked in our garages, drive to work, jump out of our cars and rush to our cubicles. At the end of the day we rush back home, pick up our children, make dinner, watch a little TV and get ready for bed.
We are so disconnected that over 88% of the time even if we are in nature we are so distracted we remain disconnected.

We further foster this disconnection by mandating our children spend over 18,000 hours of their most formative years in cut off from nature, and their source. Is it any wonder that child obesity, ADD, Stress and drug and alcohol abuse are all becoming serious issues. Due to our own disconnection, we treat our children with more drugs.

Once we separate ourselves from nature we are open to the stories of separation
We have sequestered ourselves away from the very force that feeds us, nurtures us and sustains us. We listen to stories that tell us Nature is dangerous and we must protect ourselves from it. We fill our children's heads with stories of separation. We are told our dreams of a clean environment are impossible because it will cost too much, will destroy our economy. We must continue to burn coal and fossil fuels, build inefficient cars and generally abuse the very sources that sustain us because, we all know, that if we mandate thee things our economy will collapse.

In 1940 we produced over 500,000 tons of chemicals. In 1990 we produced over 200 million tons of chemicals. Many of these have gone into our air, our water and our soil to a point where we have changed the very chemical make up of our planet.

Our planet is evolving at a rate we haven't seen in over 65 million years. We are loosing species at an alarming rate. Unlike previous times, our evolution this time is not from natural disasters or cosmic event but the direct result of what we as a species cognitively pursue. WE have the power to change the very direction and make up of our planer and in doing so we hold in our hands today the recipe for what it is that we intend.

The path back to sanity
Thomas Barry, noted Scholar, theologian, and lover of the earth says we are on a cusp in our evolution. We can either evolve into a Technozoiac era marked by continued use of our natural resources and build more and more things. As we deplete our resources, we can replace them with technological inventions to cleanse and purify the air and water. We can develop special strains of seeds to be grown in a man made soup of chemicals to feed ourselves and build vast structures to house us and protect us from the very environment that once sustained us.

Or we can choose to evolve into an Ecozoaic era where we live in harmony with nature. Learn from its wisdom and use our technology to protect and enhance our connection with the planet.
I believe there are two steps we must take if we are to reconnect to our source and have a chance to evolve into an Ecozoiac era and away from the Technoziac path we have been on for some time.

1)   We must reconnect with Nature
2)   We must re-frame and retell our stories.

To Reconnect with Nature
1)   Go outside to a natural area or if necessary even to a potted plant
2)   Nature is all based on the natural law of attraction, so move to an area that seems attractive to you.
3)   Once there ask the area for permission to be there and to interact with it.
4)   Then be there and be aware.
a)   If it feels uncomfortable be responsive and move on to another place. Nature may be telling you that this is not a place you should be right now.
5)   Once you have received permission and you will know. Suspend all your current beliefs and stories and let nature teach you again.
6)   Don't discount the feelings, they are real and powerful reminders of our connection.
7)   Take time to absorb what you have experienced
8)   Then write down your experience

Once we take time to reconnect with nature, we will see that we hare all created and sustained by the same force. Call it God, Sensory wisdom or love. There is a web of life that connects us to each other and all that is. The Web's strength is its diversity.

When we begin to reconnect with nature we will begin to see that in many ways we are really not so much different than our non-human relations,
At first it may seem absurd to say that we like a tree, a bird or a fish, but when we take a closer look
1)   We are all born
2)   We all grow
3)   We all reproduce
4)   We all breathe
5)   We all need food
6)   We all feel pain
7)   We all die
In fact there are over 53 separate characteristics or senses that we share with all living things.
As a matter of fact the only significant difference between humans and the rest of the natural world is what Michael Cohen, Author of “reconnecting with Nature” calls our new Brain. Eckert Tolle calls it our ego. It is here in our new brain that we tell ourselves the stories in an attempt to explain what is.

Retell our stories
The way most of us live our lives is a result of our new brain's interpretation of the stories we are told and tell ourselves.

Our stories can help us grow and understand our world and ourselves or they can distort the truth. They can tell us we are not worthy. We are ugly, we are not smart enough, they can grip us in fear, build walls around us and immobilize us to such an extent that we surrender our very lives to the lies these stories contain.

It is important to realize that when somebody activates these stories, but more importantly, it is critical to realize that when we accept these stories, we separate ourselves from each other, nature and our source. It is these stories of separation that we need to rewrite by retelling them from our new experiences.
Writing down our experiences will help us reframe and retell them from a new connected perspective.

One story that we may want to start with our story of creation. Each tradition and people have their own version of the creation story. For those of us that grew up in the Judeo-Christian tradition it is the one told in the Bible in the Book of Genesis.

It goes something like this…
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth…and the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters… And God said Let the earth put forth vegetation: plants yielding seed and fruit trees of every kind on earth that bear fruit with seed in it. And God saw it was Good… And God said let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let the birds fly across the sky… And God created great whales and every living thing that moveth…and every winged fowl… and God saw it was good.

Then God said “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness”
So God made man in his image, blessed them and told them to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over all the fish… birds and every living thing that moves.
It is this second part that I believe has been mistranslated and needs to be re--framed and retold and I believe many other statements in Genesis as well as in the Psalms support my contention.
First Let us look at who is the “us” Genesis 1:26 is referring to. If in the beginning there was only God, then who is the writer of Genesis referring to? While I am sure there are many interpretations, I believe that the writer is referring to the creatures and plants made before man's creation.
And are we really to subdue and have dominion or to nurture and protect as he commands us elsewhere.
If it were as I have come to believe, it would force us to re-look at our relationship with the natural world. We could no longer look at them as separate and different, but would need to look at them as our kin and relatives.
If we did re-frame this story it would go something like this:

Let us make man in my image and the image of the trees, the whales, the dolphins the creatures large and small. The creatures that walk on the earth, and the ones that grow from it and the ones that live below its surface. So God made man in his image and that of his other creations and God saw it was good. Then God said let man, the ultimate expression of my love, tend to, nurture care for and live in harmony with all his relations.

Like our creation story we must begin to examine and retell all the stories that result in our separation from each other and our non-human brothers and sisters.

When we are connected to nature and have retold our stories we will begin to see the world differently.
We will see that everything grows from love.
We will see that we are all interdependent on each other and everything
We will realize that the diversity of life is our strength.
We will begin to see the webstrings that connect each of us and will begin to understand the attractions to those things that sustain and feed us
We will begin to see God, not as a separate entity but as a part of us, and all that is.

Wayne Dyer talks of the Power of Intention; the secret talks of the power of Attraction.
We know that the power of attraction and intention are real and powerful forces in the universe and will respond if we ask and believe. So I ask you today. What is your intention for our Community?

We are a microcosm of the planet. We have a special gift that many do not have. We have each other. We are a community built on love. Love for each other, love of life and love of God. Most importantly we realize that what we envision we can manifest.

So the question we need to ask is what is it we want to manifest.
A world connected to all things that are. One in which all life thrives and gives to each other. Or one in which we separate ourselves from each other and all the non-human beings on this earth.

We all know the only sensible option. Our community is filled with many talented and gifted people that are already performing and creating wonderful and powerful things. But how much more powerful and grand would it be id w could harness and collect all this individual energy and collectively manifest a model for others to follow.

We could be:
A showcase for organic living
A place of powerful healing
A place where children connect with nature and learn its lessons and our new stories
A place of refuge where people can come to heal, learn and recharge
A place that radiates love and harmony.

Whatever our dreams and intentions are they must include all our relations, humans and non-human alike. Together we are strong, individually as a person or species we are weak and vulnerable. The choice is ours.