Contemplative Ecology: Naturalizing to a Place

Can getting in-touch with sacred space restore ecosystems?

I pledge allegiance to the soil
of Turtle Island,
and to the beings who thereon dwell
one ecosystem
in diversity
under the sun
With joyful interpenetration for all.

Gary Snyder

The "sacred" refers to things set apart as extraordinary and inspiring awe or reverence, while "profane" encompasses the mundane, ordinary, and everyday aspects of life that are not considered sacred. Many feel that denying the obvious if inconvenient truth of climate change and biodiversity loss is a profanity. Polarized ideologies provide a simplified binary choice – one: our world is sacred; or two: Science has excised superstition and de-spiritualized (almost) all locations, which rationally exist for housing, industry, resource extraction and dumping trash and pollution. Choice two relies on government regulation to optimize economic outcomes. The dominant global economic model fetishizes a few natural pristine places for our enjoyment but endorses business-as-usual everywhere else.

I’ve been implying in these blogs that reductionist Ecological Science is congruent with choice two; not exactly preferring it, but well able to coexist with it. Choice one, which I have been calling Embodied Ecology leads us – paraphrasing Joanna Macy – away from business-as-usual and its inevitable consequence of a great unravelling toward a great turning.

Choice one is rooted in all spiritual traditions, among them Buddhism, whose most basic philosophical principle is Dependent Origination, which reveals that we are deeply connected in what Thich Nhat Hanh called Interbeing. Hindus call it Indra’s Web; Baruch Spinoza, substance monism; Idealists, panpsychism. Some Christian theologians argue that thinking of God as Interbeing can be a way to counter the dualistic tendencies that have sometimes infected Christian theology, such as the separation of the spiritual and material worlds (Google Ai). What follows, as I’ve been writing in previous blogs about embodied ecology and enactivism, promotes “embodied knowing” based on Interbeing and emptiness, which means that things are not independent “units,” rather being embedded in the whole of Interbeing.

The unintended consequence of dualistic economic models is climate change and biodiversity loss. You might say that economics is the residual of an ultimately reductionistic theory of ecology. Mundane business-as-usual knowledge has blind spots – unilluminated shadows leading to unintended consequences. Tarthang Tulku puts it this way:

When knowledge still revolves around the self's short term needs, you will find there are gaps, wastelands, and blank areas on the map, the result of knowledge drawing in on itself according to its patterns and policies. But these gaps too can be explored; the places where our knowledge breaks down can become our teachers. Keys of Knowledge 157

In my blog – We Embody Knowledge – I wrote that these shadows are our teachers, not our enemy. Our enemies must become our teachers. This, of course, is not easy! It begins with insight into the nature of our situation, but that insight needs to be harnessed to practice. Tarthang Tulku writes:

The first step is to permit ourselves to pause, to stop treading the spiral path of negativity, to recognize those patterns as fossils, long-vacated empty shells. We will discover, if and when we are able to do this, that energy for great creativity is released.

The next step is to engage in deep contemplation. But this doesn't necessarily mean cutting our ties, and retiring into a cave to practice. In contemplation, in deeply relaxed exploration, we draw closer and closer to the nature of mind - mind in life, in our experience, here and now.

Knowing mind can learn to contemplate itself; mind can look in its own mirror...

Practice may be needed in order to stabilize this seeing. Many of us have caught glimpses of this play of mind for a few moments, but seeing will need support to carry on longer than that. It is worth patiently cultivating, for even a few minutes of this kind of contemplation can make a powerful impact on understanding.

Keys of Knowledge 159

Stabilizing the vision of choice one consecrates the world; illuminating the shadows requires spiritual practice. The practice – contemplation – need not be a formal religious practice or observance. It is not about prayer to a great being – a deity - who we moderns do not find walking on Earth, but it may be about allowing great spirit to reinhabit our planet, or for great spirit to re-inhabit our hearts so that Gaia is once again recognized, and all locations become sacred places again. Our beloved planet will heal when we recognize Gaia, or whatever name you would prefer to apply.

A related way to connect spirit and place is understanding mandalas:

A mandala is a geometric configuration of symbols. In various spiritual traditions, mandalas may be employed for focusing attention of practitioners and adepts, as a spiritual guidance tool, for establishing a sacred space and as an aid to meditation and trance induction.

Wikipedia

The mandala above is literally the floor plan for a palace inhabited by a blue Buddha. Please understand that for Buddhists all beings - most specifically all human beings - have Buddha nature. By getting in touch with our Buddha nature we see with wise eyes and see sacred space. So, contemplative practice, which gets us in touch with our larger being, with Interbeing, allows us to see through the shadows which so far obstruct humanity’s ability to allow the restoration of the Earth.

Sometimes it seems unlikely that a society as a whole can make wise choices. Yet there is no choice but to call for the recovery of the Commons-and this in a modern world which doesn't quite realize what it has lost. Take back, like the night, that which is shared by all of us, that which is our larger being.

Gary Snyder

The Dharma College Ecology program explores Embodied Knowing and incorporates contemplative practices. Please join us! The 5^th iteration of this Dharma College Zoom Class will happen this Spring. Subscribing to this Substack will keep you informed of the specifics as they emerge.