Jo Confino – Grieving could offer a pathway out of a destructive economic system

http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2014/oct/02/grieving-pathway-destructive-economic-system

Click on the link for this article in the Guardian by Jo Confino, about the road into more economically, ecologically and emotionally sustainable ways of living, through encountering grief – our pain and the world’s.

The writer agrees with Jo’s comment:-

“The answer is obvious. We don’t need more scientific data or superficial behaviour change initiatives but to engage individuals at a deep emotional, psychological and spiritual level.”

And resonates with her Campbell quote:-

“It is not society that is to guide and save the creative hero, but precisely the reverse. And so every one of us shares the supreme ordeal – carries the cross of the redeemer – not in the bright moments of his tribe’s great victories, but in the silences of his personal despair.”

Joseph Campbell

Thanks to the Facebook page for Spiritual Ecology for this link, posted yesterday around 6 pm:-

https://www.facebook.com/SpiritualEcology?fref=ts

We also like the Patricia McCabe quote from the article that Spiritual Ecology offers in this post:-

“Many indigenous peoples …have a pact with mother Earth that said we would hold on to the principles of thriving life, and that one day the world would turn back and come to us again. To be ready for that, we must also go through our grief in order to truly be able to come back into alignment of our mind, body and spirit.”

Patricia McCabe from the Dineh Nation of New Mexico and Arizona

One might say we all belong to this pact. We all depend on ‘mother earth’, and we are all indigenous peoples, back along our bloodlines.

Jo’s viewpoint has much in common with Joanna Macy’s ‘Work that Reconnects’:-

https://www.facebook.com/groups/30282864810/?fref=ts

https://www.facebook.com/groups/111468605594102/?fref=ts

Lastly, here’s a link to Findhorn (which Jo mentions), a spiritual community, education centre and eco-village working in cooperation with nature in Moray, Scotland:-

http://www.findhorn.org/

Update 12 October 2014

By synchronicity or shared inspiration, today’s post on http://www.beyondmeds.com also features Jo’s article, and it reminded Monica of Joanna Macy’s work too! Monica has some additional material in her post, so here’s a link to that:-

http://beyondmeds.com/2014/10/12/is-it-possible-to-hold-all-the-grief-in-the-world-and-not-get-crushed-by-it/

Palace Gate Counselling Service, Exeter