There was an earthiness about this interview that could only have come from someone working the land. The story of the mothers deciding on opening the doors to the Land of The Dead has resonances with the people who mother the land - male or female - grounding us all in the realities of how to live - full stop! - never mind how to live better lives.
The question of whether this was a call to go back or to go forward was really interesting and I am quite in agreement with the sentiment that we shouldn't go back. It's very likely that we can't go back and that we can never reproduce any moment in time just as you can never reproduce the exact swirl of water in a turbulent stream that you have noticed. I am completely on board with Iain McGilchrist's spiral which is both analogy and reality demonstrating that what from one perspective something can look the same, coming full circle when you look down on the spiral, is actually a progression to a higher level when you see it from the side.
Ancient communities communicated an awe of the world through stories of vengeful forces, gods and spirits and the need to placate them for a peaceful and productive life. We have a desperate need to regain that sense of our place in the world but not through those sorts of stories because we have learned so much.
We know that the biosphere is a hugely complex system, that life as we know it only exists for certain on this planet. We understand that to maintain life on this planet we need to play our part in nurturing the biosphere and while we understand some of the complexity we can't know it all and we have to allow nature to lead us in our learning. That returns us to a sense of awe but with a sense of relationship that dispenses with the punitive fiction without dispensing with the mystery.
I confess I flinched a bit when Kara talked about hierarchies but after a while I got the impression this was just a language thing. I have a feeling that she was talking more about where and when we should pay attention and that the attention should be on those that have most to offer in the moment.
This was a really nourishing listen and Kara is definitely someone to whom we should be paying attention. More, please!
Around 21min in she mentions to grow up in 1state, move to second, then 3rd and we are expected to do that.
I will tie saying with another US person, Bret Weinstein who said, yes humans are extremely adaptable species and seeking novelty as talked also here, but he said uprooting person can be done once, but after that we cannot function properly... this is talked nowhere in our society.
I would put analog that foster kid or dog in animal shelter need to be lucky to have good home, if that dog is moved time and time again, I would guess endless PTSD develops and they are put down. Humans, we see in Kamala Harris and bunch of others same kind of rootlessness and restlessness that is harmful as a result from this "ideal". This is even part of policies god heavens here in europe if someone doesnt have job, they are pushed constantly to do new things and move to new place. Another view is other people get numbed when constantly new people come and psychologically learn to numb and protect yourself not to get attached to new people as they would very likely leave again in less than year and then repeat this cycle.
I would tie with 3third podcast from different topic, that vagus nerve and nervous system seems to collect all this "data" from experiences and conscious mind has nothing to change that. Some therapies can counter and untangle these, assuming new things and experiences are not piling up anymore.
Biology/medical/genetics researchers have found epigenetics, not directly genes, have some kind of mechanism to "remember" environment of person and encode it in body, which will last from baby until maybe middle age or later. Ive seen some stories people born in WW2 around then, that they only as old 70-80yo person with quiet life and time to ponder, to decipher all those experiences bugging them and driving behaviour in certain ways, that maybe harmful like divorce for no visible good reason or any kind of extreme.
Bret Weinstein talked about these topics in this podcast:
Every village in Portugal is an opportunity to make this cultural shift and experience a better way of life. Boycott and divestment may be the only power plebs and proles have against the ideological brain sludge our leaders suffer from. Purmaculture is an ideal way to move away from business as usual. I hope people will follow Kara Huntermoon’s advice, but even if a billion people in the global north transition today, it wouldn’t slow down our accelerating collapse. Collapse has already been occurring for 300 years. Things will get harder and weirder, and passing on info packets is a gift to posterity. I have friends in Japan, Europe, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Uganda, Siberia, and the USA who have adopted similar lifestyles, and they benefit profoundly from the peace, joy, and love they are experiencing. Real progress is relational, as our host alluded to. The qualities of life these values imply should be incentive enough. What saddens me is that people have forgotten. The only way they can learn values rooted in Great Nature is to experience them. Thanks for creating opportunities to do this.
This was incredibly profound and timely for me - I am starting a book study group based on "When No Thing Works" by Gloria Wong, braiding indigenous wisdom and culture (Hawaii), movement organizing chops and Zen Buddhism. HIGHLY recommended!
I just came across this article about the history of ecological systems thinking and its relationship to design: https://placesjournal.org/article/ecology-and-design-parallel-genealogies . We have a local permaculture farmer named Danny Botkin and the article cited Daniel Botkin, author "Discordant Harmonies: A New Ecology for the Twenty-first Century".
They're not the same person, but it did activate for me the bridge between ecological systems and permaculture. On the Indigenous side, tribes live in the same place for eons, figuring out what works by observation and trial-and-error -- and I used to think that this was a static thing, the way Conservatives like Burke view the need to adhere to traditions.
But this article, echoing some of the things you said, says that ecologies are always in flux, and that our old system stasis model (build a culture around an environment so neither change) is wrong. Cultures need to observe and adapt because their ecologies adapt ... and that level of awareness that enables people to live in forests (or grasslands) is not going to come back, is it?
I mean ... when I hear about how indigenous trackers like the San of the Kalahari or the Pintupi Nine of the Australian Outback can read their environments -- I am awed. If that level of awareness is needed in order to design a prefigurative culture around the rapidly changing (and destructively degrading) ecosystems we have now and can predict ... I'm not hopeful.
Anyhing to respond to here, Kara or Rachel or anybody?
If you start relating directly with the plants and animals of your community, the knowledge accumulates in your being. I dug swales for 5 years with a shovel, 20-30 minutes per day every day of the wet season. When my friend came out to help me accelerate that work with a backhoe, he said we needed an 8-inch interval topo map to decide where to dig. I said, "No, we don't need that," and I walked through the pasture--in the dry season--and told him where the water would stand on the land. We put stakes in right then with the knowledge I held in my body. I didn't dig swales with a shovel in order to gain that knowledge, but I did spend literally hundreds of hours digging in the wet season, seeing where the water went, and adjusting my methods as I learned. I didn't know the names of the plants who grow in the low spots, but I observed that different plants grew there and they correlated with the standing water. It's not that hard. You just have to go out and do it--have the relationships, observe and interact.
The sad white Australian boy migrated online from computer games to become the infamous Christchurch Mosque Shooter . He used the horror of his live-streamed massscre and unregulated social media to simultaneously platform his manifesto which he titled "Th Grt Rplacemnt". He summarized his grandiose cartoon cult identity as "ethno-nationalist eco-fascist".
This conversation between Rachel and Kara will be a classic in gardens of coherence everywhere. I'm loving it.
I loved this: “…if you center your entire life around what mothers and babies need, you will solve all the problems on this planet”.
The discussion about speaking to people, particularly those you think are your polar opposites and make you feel you’ll have no common ground, was also absolutely essential, and I think something that has cropped up in previous talks. They should also force all politicians, members of parliament and congress and you name it, to sit in session next to “opponents” only and to go on regular team-building exercises. Get them out there rock climbing, depending on one another.
This was such a rich, nourishing, generative, connecting conversation Rachel. So much to reflect on. I appreciate it greatly, and I appreciate you and Kara and the work that each of you is doing in the world. Thank you
Don't plant wheat. You need to prioritize perennial crops as staples. Trees make more food in the same amount of space with less human labor over time. Chestnuts are your grain on a tree. If you must plant annuals for carbs, corn, squash, beans, and potatoes are a lot more nutritious, produce more in a smaller land area, and require a lot less specialized equipment to process into food. And if you have animals in this system, you don't want castrated males (oxen) and sterile mules (hybrids). You want fertile animals who can reproduce and make meat and milk for you. Multiple functions for each element.
Hire a local Permaculture person for a consult, and find out if your local Watershed Council or the NRCS can talk with you about funding ecosystem restoration. Talk to the Extension Service at your local Land Grand University. You can both restore ecosystem function and grow food on that much land.
There was an earthiness about this interview that could only have come from someone working the land. The story of the mothers deciding on opening the doors to the Land of The Dead has resonances with the people who mother the land - male or female - grounding us all in the realities of how to live - full stop! - never mind how to live better lives.
The question of whether this was a call to go back or to go forward was really interesting and I am quite in agreement with the sentiment that we shouldn't go back. It's very likely that we can't go back and that we can never reproduce any moment in time just as you can never reproduce the exact swirl of water in a turbulent stream that you have noticed. I am completely on board with Iain McGilchrist's spiral which is both analogy and reality demonstrating that what from one perspective something can look the same, coming full circle when you look down on the spiral, is actually a progression to a higher level when you see it from the side.
Ancient communities communicated an awe of the world through stories of vengeful forces, gods and spirits and the need to placate them for a peaceful and productive life. We have a desperate need to regain that sense of our place in the world but not through those sorts of stories because we have learned so much.
We know that the biosphere is a hugely complex system, that life as we know it only exists for certain on this planet. We understand that to maintain life on this planet we need to play our part in nurturing the biosphere and while we understand some of the complexity we can't know it all and we have to allow nature to lead us in our learning. That returns us to a sense of awe but with a sense of relationship that dispenses with the punitive fiction without dispensing with the mystery.
I confess I flinched a bit when Kara talked about hierarchies but after a while I got the impression this was just a language thing. I have a feeling that she was talking more about where and when we should pay attention and that the attention should be on those that have most to offer in the moment.
This was a really nourishing listen and Kara is definitely someone to whom we should be paying attention. More, please!
Oh such an exciting, enjoyable and wonderfully nourishing conversation.
Nom, nom, nom - the stuff that makes me glad to still be alive : )
Thanks as as always Rachel.
Around 21min in she mentions to grow up in 1state, move to second, then 3rd and we are expected to do that.
I will tie saying with another US person, Bret Weinstein who said, yes humans are extremely adaptable species and seeking novelty as talked also here, but he said uprooting person can be done once, but after that we cannot function properly... this is talked nowhere in our society.
I would put analog that foster kid or dog in animal shelter need to be lucky to have good home, if that dog is moved time and time again, I would guess endless PTSD develops and they are put down. Humans, we see in Kamala Harris and bunch of others same kind of rootlessness and restlessness that is harmful as a result from this "ideal". This is even part of policies god heavens here in europe if someone doesnt have job, they are pushed constantly to do new things and move to new place. Another view is other people get numbed when constantly new people come and psychologically learn to numb and protect yourself not to get attached to new people as they would very likely leave again in less than year and then repeat this cycle.
I would tie with 3third podcast from different topic, that vagus nerve and nervous system seems to collect all this "data" from experiences and conscious mind has nothing to change that. Some therapies can counter and untangle these, assuming new things and experiences are not piling up anymore.
Biology/medical/genetics researchers have found epigenetics, not directly genes, have some kind of mechanism to "remember" environment of person and encode it in body, which will last from baby until maybe middle age or later. Ive seen some stories people born in WW2 around then, that they only as old 70-80yo person with quiet life and time to ponder, to decipher all those experiences bugging them and driving behaviour in certain ways, that maybe harmful like divorce for no visible good reason or any kind of extreme.
Bret Weinstein talked about these topics in this podcast:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvtV_k9gCs0
Great conversation, thanks Rachel. So much food for thought, especially trying to apply it for ourselves.
Every village in Portugal is an opportunity to make this cultural shift and experience a better way of life. Boycott and divestment may be the only power plebs and proles have against the ideological brain sludge our leaders suffer from. Purmaculture is an ideal way to move away from business as usual. I hope people will follow Kara Huntermoon’s advice, but even if a billion people in the global north transition today, it wouldn’t slow down our accelerating collapse. Collapse has already been occurring for 300 years. Things will get harder and weirder, and passing on info packets is a gift to posterity. I have friends in Japan, Europe, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Uganda, Siberia, and the USA who have adopted similar lifestyles, and they benefit profoundly from the peace, joy, and love they are experiencing. Real progress is relational, as our host alluded to. The qualities of life these values imply should be incentive enough. What saddens me is that people have forgotten. The only way they can learn values rooted in Great Nature is to experience them. Thanks for creating opportunities to do this.
This was incredibly profound and timely for me - I am starting a book study group based on "When No Thing Works" by Gloria Wong, braiding indigenous wisdom and culture (Hawaii), movement organizing chops and Zen Buddhism. HIGHLY recommended!
I just came across this article about the history of ecological systems thinking and its relationship to design: https://placesjournal.org/article/ecology-and-design-parallel-genealogies . We have a local permaculture farmer named Danny Botkin and the article cited Daniel Botkin, author "Discordant Harmonies: A New Ecology for the Twenty-first Century".
They're not the same person, but it did activate for me the bridge between ecological systems and permaculture. On the Indigenous side, tribes live in the same place for eons, figuring out what works by observation and trial-and-error -- and I used to think that this was a static thing, the way Conservatives like Burke view the need to adhere to traditions.
But this article, echoing some of the things you said, says that ecologies are always in flux, and that our old system stasis model (build a culture around an environment so neither change) is wrong. Cultures need to observe and adapt because their ecologies adapt ... and that level of awareness that enables people to live in forests (or grasslands) is not going to come back, is it?
I mean ... when I hear about how indigenous trackers like the San of the Kalahari or the Pintupi Nine of the Australian Outback can read their environments -- I am awed. If that level of awareness is needed in order to design a prefigurative culture around the rapidly changing (and destructively degrading) ecosystems we have now and can predict ... I'm not hopeful.
Anyhing to respond to here, Kara or Rachel or anybody?
If you start relating directly with the plants and animals of your community, the knowledge accumulates in your being. I dug swales for 5 years with a shovel, 20-30 minutes per day every day of the wet season. When my friend came out to help me accelerate that work with a backhoe, he said we needed an 8-inch interval topo map to decide where to dig. I said, "No, we don't need that," and I walked through the pasture--in the dry season--and told him where the water would stand on the land. We put stakes in right then with the knowledge I held in my body. I didn't dig swales with a shovel in order to gain that knowledge, but I did spend literally hundreds of hours digging in the wet season, seeing where the water went, and adjusting my methods as I learned. I didn't know the names of the plants who grow in the low spots, but I observed that different plants grew there and they correlated with the standing water. It's not that hard. You just have to go out and do it--have the relationships, observe and interact.
This was very informative, especially with incorporating into more complex cities.
Permaculture is the antithesis of ecofascism.
The sad white Australian boy migrated online from computer games to become the infamous Christchurch Mosque Shooter . He used the horror of his live-streamed massscre and unregulated social media to simultaneously platform his manifesto which he titled "Th Grt Rplacemnt". He summarized his grandiose cartoon cult identity as "ethno-nationalist eco-fascist".
This conversation between Rachel and Kara will be a classic in gardens of coherence everywhere. I'm loving it.
The amazonians invented bio-char !HA
I loved this: “…if you center your entire life around what mothers and babies need, you will solve all the problems on this planet”.
The discussion about speaking to people, particularly those you think are your polar opposites and make you feel you’ll have no common ground, was also absolutely essential, and I think something that has cropped up in previous talks. They should also force all politicians, members of parliament and congress and you name it, to sit in session next to “opponents” only and to go on regular team-building exercises. Get them out there rock climbing, depending on one another.
This was such a rich, nourishing, generative, connecting conversation Rachel. So much to reflect on. I appreciate it greatly, and I appreciate you and Kara and the work that each of you is doing in the world. Thank you
♾️🌍🌎🌏♾️
Don't plant wheat. You need to prioritize perennial crops as staples. Trees make more food in the same amount of space with less human labor over time. Chestnuts are your grain on a tree. If you must plant annuals for carbs, corn, squash, beans, and potatoes are a lot more nutritious, produce more in a smaller land area, and require a lot less specialized equipment to process into food. And if you have animals in this system, you don't want castrated males (oxen) and sterile mules (hybrids). You want fertile animals who can reproduce and make meat and milk for you. Multiple functions for each element.
Hire a local Permaculture person for a consult, and find out if your local Watershed Council or the NRCS can talk with you about funding ecosystem restoration. Talk to the Extension Service at your local Land Grand University. You can both restore ecosystem function and grow food on that much land.
Will the AI do the dishes for us?