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EcoBirth-Women for Earth and Birth

Uniting the earth and birth movements for the well-being of our world

Sunday, February 13, 2011

One Natural Life-what is a whole community?

Questions bubble constantly in my mind about what it might be to understand that our lives, selves and world are intimately related as a whole ecosystem. I am still considering what Peter Forbes says in "WHAT IS A WHOLE COMMUNITY? A LETTER TO THOSE WHO CARE FOR AND RESTORE THE LAND" 2006. He says, " The true benefit and skill of land conservationists is our ability to put on the table a feast of values that reminds every American of what is healthy, what is fair opportunity, what is beautiful and meaningful, and what it means to be in relationship." O, provocative stretch and growth for a segment of our society that has been tremendously successful over the last 30 years, but is being called to "express our own spirit and a moral voice that knows, and cares, and responds." Who of us ought to be looking at " our greater selves to realize that this moment of becoming asks something entirely different of us".

I want EcoBirth to provoke these kinds of questions and initiate compelling dialog about our moral responsibility to our descendants- that living whole is knowing our own sense of place, on our Mother Land, in kinship to all our fellow creatures, and recognizing our own embodied ecosystem. I understand that natural cycles are intrinsic to the being and living of our whole world- and if we look at how we consider those cycles, we might have a clearer idea of how we are in our lives. Then we might care and respond. Then we can touch our greater selves. Then we can affect our world and our legacy.

Peter Forbes can help us see our relationship with our land, not only by enabling access to a continuing portion of it, but also by creating a moral vision that says " I am for relationship between people and the land and for equity and fairness toward all lives, starting with our own human lives. The root meaning of healing is to make whole. I want to do my part to make whole the land and the people."

He also says " When we see our lives as full and respected, we realize the imperative to offer the same to all other creatures".

And what happens in EcoBirth's consciousness, when we realize that we are the "land", the place, the first environment for our children? What responsibilities do we have to embody our "whole" system with care for the generations of humans who will be our legacy? It helps me look at what I let into my body, voluntarily or involuntarily. It becomes very clear that how I allow the pollution of the earth ecosystem, will affect  me and my children and grandchildren. It makes me aware that the primary natural cycle of my embodied system is how I bring my children into the world.

It makes me want a whole, healthy body, with a spirit that can thrive in a community that is envisioned by Peter Forbes " A whole community is a mosaic of people living their lives in constant awareness and relationship with a healthy place...is safer and healthier for all forms of life." 

He says "Posing philosophical questions is a necessary step in changing our consciousness...now it is time to be prophets and poets again."

Here are some questions to start with: What are the natural cycles of life? What do I dream about and long for? What is my vision for the future of my children?

We are the prophets and poets needed today.
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Molly Arthur's Maternal Lines digital story from molly arthur on Vimeo.

We women can face the pain and grief we have for our suffering Mother Earth and reclaim our story of creation and redemption with the power and beauty intimately held in our body’s cells from our maternal lines since the beginning of the cosmos. Our existential and communal grief heals within the loving gathering of our feminine compassion, connecting us to the truth and strength of our Mother Earth and all our kin. We start with Molly’s Personal Environmental Story-to explore the birth stories and places and times of ourselves, our mothers and grandmothers.Using the stories of our own maternal lines, with sharing, active listening and intention, we call on our ancestors, our inner wisdom and the shared circle to witness our story with compassion. Using ritual, song, movement, and sharing of our truths, in community and powerful circle as well as spending time on the land - we can acknowledge the oppression in our lives, feeling it in our bodies, grieving it, transforming it and ourselves in a safe, loving space. Our healing path connects our sacred lineage from the womb of our Mother Earth to integrate our inner and outer lives and discover our place in the connected caring cosmos. We are a part of a continuum of sacredness, lifeforce, divine energy including our Ancestors back to the stuff of the stars. We can reclaim our cells, our lineage and our legacy to the future generations. Like in birth labor, we must yield to our bodies innate knowing, to progress, to open, to birth our love. With our active surrender to fierce compassion we can restore our connection to the natural world and our own inner wisdom. We can drop our obsessive addictions to control and return to our healing, caring, befriending tendencies- innate for us nurturers. And then we can repair, regenerate, and renew our culture for tenderness and kindness, naturally embodied by us. We will be able to guard and protect ours and all descendents - becoming their Beloved Ancestors- by asking - What is possible now to transform our world for Future Generations?

Molly Arthur of EcoBirth- My Personal Environmental Story November 2012 from molly arthur on Vimeo.

Why EcoBirth’s My Personal Environmental Story
EcoBirth’s My Personal Environmental Story will help women tell their life story by considering the two primary environments- place and birth- for themselves, their mothers and their maternal grandmothers. Through this process each participant will come to realize the hazards in their environmental genealogy and realize the healing in telling their own story. And they will be empowered to affect the changes that are necessary for our Mother Earth and our children and grandchildren to thrive.
Imagine looking back to your grandmother's and mother's birth time to figure out what environmental influences you might have inherited? And have passed onto your children and grandchildren? Would you wonder what was in the air, water and food in their lives- and look twice at what diseases, birth defects, addictions there are in your family?