The Personal is Planetary
Wanna feel better? Start by reconnecting with Mother Earth.
Happy autumn, cari amici!
And greetings from the couch, where I’ve spent much of the last ten days after surgery to remove precancerous lesions on the upper part of my cervix. Devoting this much time to recovery is not my usual M.O. In fact, about four hours after I arrived home (still hopped up on IV painkillers), I felt better than I have in months. I walked a few blocks to the post office, did the dishes, scooped the cat boxes.
Then the headache hit — that post-anesthesia wallop this migraineur has come to expect not just from surgery but even from local lidocaine injections. As the pressure cloud moved into my brow and toward the crown of my head, the rest of the pain relief coursing throughout my system faded away. The deep aches reaching from the top of my spine down to the joints in my toes returned — now side by side with hearty lower belly cramps — and I found myself back on the couch, begrudgingly swallowing a Norco along with my tears.
While this surgery is an acute situation, the effects of which will subside within a few weeks, as a person with chronic illness, I know all too well how challenging it is to create space for healing. Recovery, restoration, and repair are all time-intensive processes that require maintenance. No one-and-done solutions here.
Healing is slow. Oh, so slow. It slams right up against the Amazon Prime “gimme it NOW” mentality we’ve convinced ourselves is our inherent right. But in order to survive — dare I say thrive? — we must find the patience and loving kindness required to heal ourselves and the planet.
During this downtime, I have found great solace in the work of Dr. Yuria Celidwen and the concept of ecological belonging. I first encountered this idea in the context of STEM education, where research indicates that the achievement gap for students from historically marginalized groups can be reduced by changing the cultural norms and language around difficult situations. In a world of ecological belonging, adversity is normal, temporary, and surmountable. When we feel connected, we can navigate through and around problems that would otherwise seem impossible to traverse.
For Celidwen, ecological belonging is planetary. She draws on the Indigenous perspective that all life is part of a natural, collective, and responsive system. Under this paradigm, our personal health and well-being cannot be separated from the environment, and the energy it takes to care for ourselves and the planet gushes forth from the same well of compassion.
Just as ecological belonging helps students overcome stereotypes to achieve academically, it can also transform our relationship with the climate emergency. There’s nothing normal or temporary about climate change, and yes, Celidwen concedes that “all these challenges are innumerable.” But through a connection to nature, we can foster constructive hope and discover an infinite number of opportunities to create a sustainable and healthy future together.
Celidwen’s work is a salient reminder that belonging is crucial to all kinds of healing, which is why I’m so grateful for all of you! Knowing there are over 1000 people who care enough about the health of their planet, their loved ones, and, heck, little ol’ me to subscribe to this newsletter buoys my spirit. What magic we can conjure when we work as one!
How You Can Cultivate Ecological Belonging
Celidwen offered a beautiful 10-minute guided meditation on an episode of the Science of Happiness podcast, which closes with the following incantation:
While our grief is daunting, also heartening is our compassion. We listen to the whole of Mother Earth’s humming, her calling, her heartbeat throbbing. We hear her pain, but it is her one voice who guides fear to safety, anger to action. Grief to meaning, despair to transformation… Now life, she ripples, she hums, pulses, quivers, she sighs, murmurs under the skies.
If that practice feels too prescribed or formal, consider finding a bit of nature wherever you are and taking a few minutes to connect with it, allowing your senses to guide you.
Small actions like this add up to meaningful change. The more we fill ourselves with hope and connection, the healthier we and the planet will become.
Coming Up
For all you fiction lovers out there, CliFiCon takes place Oct. 7 and 8. I’m so excited to be on the Writing Solarpunk for the Screen panel with my good friend and screen siren for science sister Taryn O’Neill and Tory Stephens, Creative Manager of Climate Fiction at Grist (Imagine 2200). Thank you to Susan Kaye Quinn for inviting me!
I’ll also be walking (limping?) in the Disability Pride March here in L.A. on Oct. 9 as part of a new documentary on life with hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos syndrome from filmmaker and sister spoonie Jennifer Kain.
Some Goodies to Make You Smile
This recording is from two years ago, but it feels seasonably appropriate: Celine Dion’s Falling Into You. Featuring my zaftig beauty Wamba, who makes an excellent metronome.
Just in time for the spooky season, my brilliant mindful writing teacher Sarah Herrington explains what witches and yoga have in common.
A patter song about ChatGPT? Yes, please! Featuring my dear friend Matthew McGloin.
Wishing you a fall full of joy and decorative gourds. Thank you for reading!
Baci a tutti,
P.S. When this email lands in your inbox next month, I’ll be under the knife again — this time for hip preservation surgery. So, thanks again in advance for your healing mojo and understanding of my slowness in responding to messages.
Seeeending all my love, Gia! Totally not on the same level at all: but I fucked my knee up twice in a row, and I meant I could not do any of my normal sporting, running, moving, walking, busy activities I usually fill my time with, and I had to just SIT. It was weird, and always feels WRONG, but we must ignore the internalised capitalism and give our body rest when it needs it.