News from School of Lost Borders

The images of Gulf Coast sea birds smothered in carapaces of oily, toxic muck are grotesque and horrifying. Our first reaction is to look away-close our eyes, click to another page of the internet, turn the channel on the TV. It's as if these images, once allowed, into our consciousness, might cling to us, the way the oil gushing from BP's rig clots the feathers of those gulls and pelicans, and pull us down forever.

Yet, by turning our gaze from the calamitous effects of that ceaselessly spewing oil-and from our own emotional responses to it-we manage only to push our feelings momentarily aside. Then, like any sore spot we try to avoid, those neglected feelings fester. And it's not just pain, or the fear of it, we're holding at bay. Any person who has the impulse to turn away from the suffering of another is someone who is simultaneously turning away from his or her own capacity to feel compassion. We are connected to others who inhabit this world with us, including the plants, animals, and waters. When the Earth hurts, we hurt with it.

Bringing our attention willingly and mindfully to wounded places which we would instinctively prefer to avoid is the first step toward strengthening our innate emotional and spiritual physical bond with the world around us. Simply sitting and taking in what is before us, knowing we can't do a thing to fix it, we come to realize that we are neither on top of a sad and frightening situation nor below it; we are simply part of it, as it is part of us. Being present is also the first step in a simple process called the Earth Exchange, in which people seek out damaged places and go there to share their stories, sit and listen to what the land reveals to them, open themselves up to difficult feelings of loss and grief, and, finally, give back an act of beauty to the place. The Earth Exchange is part storytelling, part community action, part healing work, part artistic expression, and part ceremony. It's called an Earth Exchange because in the process of enacting it, an exchange is made between people and place. People receive meaning and beauty from a place they might previously have seen as spoiled or even worthless, and the place receives compassion and creativity from the people who care about it.

On June 19 people all over the world will enact these events as part of a network called the Global Earth Exchange. Among the locations where gatherings will take place are a mountain in West Virginia whose top was blown off to facilitate mining, a clearcut forest, a mountain in Germany sacred to pre-Christian people and the site of spy satellites during the Cold War, the Great Salt Lake, a retreat center in South Africa where young former combatants go on vision quests, a cave in Virginia where bats are dying of a fungus, and many more. Glenn Albrecht, the Australian philosopher who coined the term "solastalgia," meaning "the pain experienced when there is recognition that the place where one resides and that one loves is under immediate assault," will join the Global Earth Exchange in Australia. Award-winning author Barry Lopez will participate privately near his home in Oregon.

The Global Earth Exchange is sponsored by Radical Joy for Hard Times, a non-profit organization founded on the belief that creating a sustainable, thriving future on Earth depends upon opening our hearts to the natural world in its brokenness as well as its splendor.

If you are interested in participating in the Global Earth Exchange, see the Radical Joy for Hard Times website.