Nature and Self

I have been doing research to investigate how a changed relationship to nature changes us, and what the ongoing impact of climate change will be on the human psyche. The journalist Richard Louv suggests that obesity, ADD and even bipolar illness can be traced to children's disengagement from nature. The more alienated we are from nature, the less sensitive are our relations with the planet. We abuse and hurt our ecosystem everyday because we no longer think about it as a living organism with which we are in a partnership. Although I love the "back to nature" concept, sometimes people are so unfamiliar with the wilderness and behave so harmfully, that one might think the earth fares far better when left alone than when inhabited by human guests. My family has discovered trash on the mountaintop, or laptop camping trip movies, complete with advertisements, obscuring the view of falling stars in the rural night ski.
What I am seeing is that young adults long for permission to live less materialistically, and seek opportunities to connect to long lost parts of themselves from which they have disconnected. As someone said in a recent interview, "You realize right away to stop caring about animals and to stop thinking about the outdoors. If you watch what our society does to animals, forests, open spaces, it is very clear that nature is like some kind of scapegoat for humanity. Staying open to that is just too painful." This responsive wistfulness comes up quite a bit. But I find that many people no longer know how to access or utilize those parts of themselves. Last night Barack Obama stated that people needed to turn off the TV and unplug the video games. I couldn't agree more, and am studying what I call the vicious cycle - or the triangle of concern - between the unbalanced use and acquistion of resources, people and the earth.

On Peoples' Minds: "How do you go hiking without a car?" overheard outside a Manhattan bar.
"I've never been on a hike, a walk, camping --- nothing. But I like nature videos." A Manhattan high school student.

In the News: People can't heal an earth they barely know, or understand a nature they barely experience. In fact, the more people are alienated, the easier it is to behave in a manner that causes more harm.