John-Seed on deep ecology

Quote: John Seed; "Deep ecology looks at the spiritual disease..."

Wed, 24 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0000

“Deep ecology looks at the spiritual disease that underlies the environmental crisis: the illusion of separation between humans and the rest of the natural world… In order to nourish our ecological identity, Naess called for the development of community therapies “which heal our relations with the widest community, that of all living beings.” — John Seed

Cosmic Walk Introduction (John Seed, August 2023)

Tue, 01 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Transcript of John Seed’s spoken introduction to a live Cosmic Walk, August 2023. Companion piece to The Cosmic Spiral, the ritual script itself.

This process was devised by Sister Miriam Therese McGillis, a Catholic nun from a community called Genesis Farm in New Jersey, who was a colleague, devotee and perhaps disciple of the late Father Thomas Berry, the most respected, progressive Catholic theologian of the second half of the 20th century.

Profile: John Seed

Thu, 29 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000

John Seed is an Australian environmental activist who co-created the Council of All Beings practice and founded the Rainforest Information Centre. His work connects direct action rainforest protection with experiential deep ecology practices.

Born in Australia, Seed became involved in rainforest protection campaigns in 1979. His participation in direct actions contributed to the protection of Australian rainforests during the 1980s. In 1984 he helped establish the US Rainforest Action Network, organizing roadshows that connected Australian forest campaigns with North American audiences. He produced the documentary “Earth First!” for Australian national television in 1987, documenting rainforest protection efforts.

Quote: John Seed; “once we realize that the nature within…”

Thu, 29 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000

“once we realize that the nature within and the nature without are continuous, then we too may share and manifest the exquisite beauty and effortless grace associated with the natural world” - John Seed

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Quote: John Seed; “The fundamental insight of deep ecology…”

Thu, 29 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000

“The fundamental insight of deep ecology is that underlying all of the symptoms of environmental problems, there is the illusion of separation between human beings and the natural world” - John Seed

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Interview: JOHN SEED on Deep Ecological Identity

Fri, 30 Sep 2022 00:00:00 +0000

An interview with John Seed on the For The Wild Podcast

What could our reality look like if we had not grown up in a society so deeply committed to an anthropocentric understanding of cosmos and planet? What would it mean to no longer identify as “the spider in the center, but as a single strand in the spider’s web?” These questions engage our imagination to think beyond what we know and envision a future that is both deeply connected and full of gratitude. Yet mere awareness of this possibility or awareness of the possibility of biological collapse has proven to be insufficient. We know the changes we face, we read the news, we have all the data and statistics to confirm a changing climate or the perils of resource extraction and loss of biodiversity. Yes, we are aware, yet we remain disempowered and continue to engage in the habits causing detriment to what extends beyond our very skin. This week’s guest, John Seed, reminds us that to move forward we cannot simply know, we must honor and engage with our deepest emotions in order to radically change the reality we are living in.

Event: 21st-23rd Oct 2023- Deep Ecology Workshop – With John Seed: Nimbin

Sat, 03 Sep 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Fri 21st Oct 2022 – Sun 23rd Oct 2022 AEDT

![/images/deepEco_John.jpg)

The Rainforest Information Centre presents an in-person, immersive DEEP ECOLOGY workshop with John Seed

Tickets are sliding scale from $150-$450 .

25% of the proceeds will be donated to protect Ecuador’s rainforests.

Bookings:

Location

Black Sheep Farm Guesthouse, 449A Gungas Rd, Nimbin NSW 2480, Australia

Details:

Vegetarian meals will be provided, gluten-free and vegan options by request after booking.

Essay: The Ecological Self by John Seed

Thu, 23 Jun 2022 00:00:00 +0000

The Trumpeter ISSN: 0832-6193 Volume 22, Number 2 (2006) The Ecological Self John Seed

In this article John explores some of the key issues in deep Ecology, his own experience as an activist and facilitator of the work.

In the 1970s, when Jerry Brown was Governor of California, the eco-poet Gary Snyder was working in his administration. One day Gov. Brown felt exasperated. He said to Snyder: “Gary, why is it that, whatever the issue, you are always going against the flow?” Gary replied: “Jerry, what you call ‘the flow’ is just a 16,000 year eddy; I’m going with the actual flow!” The deep, long-range ecology movement is based on a feeling for nature that sees the environmental crisis as a symptom of a psychological or spiritual ailment that afflicts modern humanity in technological societies. We moderns are enveloped by an illusion of separation from nature, made more extreme by anthropocentrism or human first centredness. Supporters of the deep, long-range ecology movement critique the idea that we are the crown of creation, and the measure of all beings. We tend to think that the world is a pyramid with humanity rightly on top: that nature is merely a resource and that it has only instrumental value. To maintain such a position, we have to ignore our own deeper feelings that our poets remind us of.

The Development of the Deep Ecology Process

Tue, 10 May 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Our Philosophy page describes Arne Naess’s call for “therapies which heal our relations with the widest community, that of all living beings”, and notes that the processes answering that call were developed largely by his coauthors on Thinking Like a Mountain. What follows traces that development more closely: how a workshop first conceived in response to the nuclear threat became, over four decades and in two hemispheres, the body of practice now generally offered as the Work That Reconnects.

Film: Earth, Spirit, Action

Sun, 01 May 2022 00:00:00 +0000

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMSq9EOU2JY&list=PLuxO8kkii2s3ue5C-r027aT0GzqFqkeL7&t=2s

Film produced and directed by Ruth Rosenhoek

Vandana Shiva, Starhawk, Matthew Fox, Ruth Rosenhek and John Seed speak about Deep Ecology, Living Democracy and Revolution in Consciousness in a fast moving discussion of the type of change that needs to take place for a Sustainable Future. An inspirational and stimulating film including beautiful nature footage and a colourful array of global action shots.

For further video resources visit the [Rainforest Information centre’s You Tube channel][1]

Gandhi, Non-Violence & the Rainforest Movement

Sun, 01 May 2022 00:00:00 +0000

From the Rainforest Information Centre archives — a letter exchange between Harsh Prabhu and John Seed on the influence of Mohandas Gandhi on the Australian rainforest movement. Reproduced with attribution as an example of “Going Forth” — translating insight into sustained, non-violent action.

Letter to John Seed, 7 September 1999

Dear Friend,

Would it be possible to write 50–100 words on the influence of M K Gandhi on the environmental movement in the rainbow region? We have been invited to participate in an expo on Gandhi, and we thought we would invite people from the alternative/environmental movement here to make a contribution on the topic of Gandhi and his influence, from a local, Australian perspective.

Philosophy in the Mountains: ABC radio show about Arne Naess and interview with John Seed.

Sun, 01 May 2022 00:00:00 +0000

https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/philosopherszone/philosophy-in-the-mountains—arne-naess/3176186

“Arne Næss, who died in January just a couple of weeks short of his ninety-seventh birthday, was a great mountaineer and part of the history of twentieth-century philosophy. He started out as a member of the great philosophical school the Vienna Circle but was better known as the founder of the movement known as deep ecology. This week, we pay tribute to the man and his work.”

—arne-naess/3176186

Letter from Gaia

Mon, 28 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

A “going forth” exercise for the very end of a workshop. Source: rainforestinfo.org.au/deep-eco/letter from gaia.htm.

This is a great “going forth” exercise for the very end of the workshop.

Ask participants to get their journal, or a pen and paper, and give the following instructions:

Begin by writing “Dear [your name]” at the top of the page. Wait until everyone has done so before continuing.

Now write: “This is a letter from your Mother Gaia.” (Or “Father Gaia,” if preferred.) Wait until everyone has done so before continuing.

Breathing With Trees

Fri, 18 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Breathing With Trees asks a simple thing: sit or stand with a plant, and breathe deliberately, attending to the literal exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide passing between you. In a workshop flow, this process can function as a linking and grounding piece between an Honouring Pain for the World process (such as the Truth mandala or Cairn of Mourning) and “seeing with New Eyes. It can also be a regular personal practice - connecting :seeing with new eyes” to basic breath awareness practices

Book: Thinking Like a Mountain-HTML version

Tue, 15 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

This post holds an HTML version of the text of the book “Thinking Like A Mountain – Towards a Council of All Beings”. Published in 1988, this seminal text by John Seed, Joanna Macy, Arne Naess and Pat Fleming outlines their collective vision for a “Council of All Beings” group process. These workshops, aimed at healing humanities’ illusion of separation from the natural world, were a response to the multifaceted challenges which face us to day in the form of intersecting ecological and social crises. Later developments gave rise to what are now referred to as “Deep Ecology” Workshops, and the “Work that Reconnects”.

The Council of All Beings Workshop Manual (complete)

Thu, 10 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

The full text of the Council of All Beings Workshop Manual, prepared by Eshana (Elizabeth Bragg, PhD) in January 1998 with updates through February 2001 by Ruth Rosenhek, published on John Seed’s Rainforest Information Centre site. Its stated aim: “to provide potential facilitators with enough material to facilitate a weekend length Council of All Beings with no previous experience or additional resources.” Reproduced in full here, section by section, so that individual practices already ported to this site — The Milling, The Cairn of Mourning — can link back to their original, complete context, and so nothing in the manual is lost to link-rot on the source site. As the manual itself says: “facilitators should by no means limit themselves to the processes outlined here” — different versions of this workshop exist all over the world, including the Work That Reconnects Network’s own page on the practice Macy and Seed developed together.

The Council of All Beings

Tue, 08 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

By Joanna Macy, Ph.D. Written for The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature. Full source page: rainforestinfo.org.au/deep-eco/Joanna Macy.htm.

The Council of All Beings is a communal ritual in which participants step aside from their human identity and speak on behalf of another life-form. A simple structure for spontaneous expression, it aims to heighten awareness of our interdependence in the living body of Earth, and to strengthen our commitment to defend it. The ritual serves to help us acknowledge and give voice to the suffering of our world. It also serves, in equal measure, to help us experience the beauty and power of our interconnectedness with all life.

The Council of All Beings Instructions

Mon, 07 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Below is a script and set of instructions in brief for the Council of All Beings process, excerpted from the facilitator’s manual and John Seed’s full workshop-introduction transcript. See also Joanna Macy’s own history and reflections on the practice she and Seed invented together, and the Work That Reconnects Network’s own page on it.

Soon we will enter one of the central practices of this work together: the Council of All Beings.

In our ordinary lives, we humans speak almost endlessly. We explain, debate, argue, analyse, persuade. We have become very practiced at occupying the centre of the conversation. In the Council, however, we experiment with something different. We step quietly to one side and make room for the voices of the more-than-human world.

The Milling

Sat, 05 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

A facilitation script by John Seed, shared with permission as part of the Council of All Beings process he developed with Joanna Macy, Pat Fleming and others. Usually run as an opening/bonding sequence before the deeper stages of the work — the Truth Mandala and the Council of All Beings ceremony typically follow. Full manual context: Milling section of the complete Workshop Manual.

This is a series of exercises designed to create group bonding, and to focus our whole attention (heart, body, mind) on the subject of the workshop: our relationship with the rest of the natural world. Feel free to be creative with this series of exercises — any group-bonding and trust-creating activities will be effective.

John Seed's Introductions to the Council of All Beings Workshop (full transcripts)

Fri, 04 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Transcribed by Chris Lehman from the Council of All Beings workshop at Northern Pines Lodge, Maine, USA, 24–25 October 1992, and reproduced here as the numbered sequence in which John gives them over the course of a workshop (I–VI), to be read in conjunction with the full workshop manual. Reproduced with permission as part of John Seed’s shared process materials — the first section is the fuller companion to the excerpt already published in Despair and Empowerment: Joanna Macy’s Foundational Work and to John’s own essay referencing the same Hopi encounter. Sections II–VI are reproduced with only obvious transcription typos corrected; John’s live, spoken register — asides, digressions, the parenthetical notes he added afterward — is otherwise left as he gave it.

The Cairn of Mourning

Fri, 04 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

A facilitation note by John Seed, drawing directly on Joanna Macy’s Despair and Empowerment work. These days the Truth Mandala, is usually used, but the Carin of Mourning can be a useful replacement in a shorter process, or in contexts where the intensity of the Truth Mandala may be difficult to present safely or deeply. See also hope’s place in that process. Full manual context: Mourning section of the complete Council of All Beings Workshop Manual.

Essay: RAINFOREST and PSYCHE

Thu, 03 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

by John Seed

In the fourth World Rainforest Report, Queensland zoologist Peter Dwyer noted that the New Guinea highlanders find the rainforest wildlife not only good to eat, but also “good to think”.

He goes on to say that “Whilst we don’t eat our rainforests, we do become enmeshed in our perceptions and thinking about them until they suddenly and vividly possess for us values that we can only identify as symbolic, intrinsic and – with some desperation, – as spiritual.

Song: “I Am A Child Of The Universe”

Thu, 03 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

A song about our Origins and cosmic story written by Theo Simons of the band Seize the Day (http://www.seizetheday.org/music.cfm?…), and sung here by deep ecologist, author and activist John Seed (johnseed1@ozemail.com.au and http://johnseed.net/). John is singing it in MoonCourt in the Blue Mountains of Australia (https://pagaian.org/articles/mooncourt/), which has a brass spiral inlaid in the floor representing the Unfolding Cosmos for the telling of the Universe Story. John had been facilitating an Earth, Spirit, Action workshop during which that story – our Story – was told, in a Cosmic Walk ceremony: https://pagaian.org/articles/cosmic-w…

Spirit of The Earth

Wed, 02 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

I"f we enter the rainforest and allow our energies to merge with the energies we find there, I found, a most profound change in consciousness takes place. We realize that our psyche is itself a part of the rainforests. I am protecting the rain forest becomes I am part of the rainforest protecting myself. I am that part of the rainforest recently emerged into thinking" - John Seed

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SPIRIT OF THE EARTH

Video: Give Trees a Chance – The Story of Terania Creek

Wed, 02 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

This 1980 documentary tells the story of the first eco-blockade in the world – the Terania Creek forest protest in Australia in 1979. A historic event, it brought rainforest preservation into public consciousness and led to the formation of the Nightcap National Park. Narrated by Jack Thompson.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CE-LVZTuCY

The Cosmic Walk — Ritual Script (John Seed's version)

Tue, 01 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

This is the ritual script John Seed has used since 2012, adapted with thanks to Sister Miriam Therese McGillis (Genesis Farm, New Jersey) and Ruth Rosenhek. For the illustrated, browsable version of this same story, see our Cosmic Walk timeline; this page is the spoken ritual text itself, meant to be read aloud while walking a lit spiral. For why this story is told at all — Thomas Berry’s case for one shared creation story — see John’s own introduction.

Book: Thinking Like a Mountain - PDF

Sun, 27 Feb 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Below you will find an embedded PDF version of the seminal book by John Seed, Joanna Macy, Pat Fleming and Arne Naess which gave rise to the “Council of All Beings” group work, later referred to as “Deep Ecology” workshops.

Embedded PDF:

An Interview with John Seed from “Deep Times, A Journal of the Work That Reconnects”

Fri, 18 Feb 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Excerpt: “Lisa: I thought our conversation could follow the Work That Reconnect’s spiral; so what, in this day and age, after all this time of doing this work, do you feel grateful for?

I feel grateful to have had 13.7 billion years of this amazing journey in the universe; I celebrate that all the time. And just what an extraordinary place it is, and how fortunate I am to have existed!

Video: “Wild Earth, Wild Mind, Wild Heart” with John Seed

Fri, 18 Feb 2022 00:00:00 +0000

In this video, filmed in the spring of 2005, John Seed performs some songs and poems. He also offers detailed introductions to some of the group processes he has developed and taken around the world.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4-onPzlVxc

Video: Reweaving Shivas Robes

Fri, 18 Feb 2022 00:00:00 +0000

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3ewikJxt8Y

Arunachala is a sacred mountain near Tiruvanamalai in southern India. Seen as a manifestation of the god Shiva, it is a site of great annual pilgrimage. Over the last 20 years, it has also been the site of much tree-planting. This 12 minute documentary tells the story of the formation of the Annamalai Reforestation Society (ARS) and examines the juncture between spirituality and practical environmentalism.

Featuring John Seed, John Button and J.Jayarama

Essay - Council of All Beings – John Seed

Wed, 16 Feb 2022 00:00:00 +0000

![/images/council-of-all-beings.jpg) ‘Only if one loves this earth with unbending passion can one release one’s sadness’

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The Council of All Beings is a series of re-Earthing rituals created by myself and Joanna Macy to help end the sense of alienation from the living Earth that most of us feel, and to connect us with new sources of joy, commitment and inspiration that follow from union with Gaia.

I had been working for the rainforests since 1979 first in Australia and then elsewhere around the world. Although many of our early efforts were crowned with success, I couldn’t help but notice that for every forest we were able to save, worldwide 100 disappeared. Clearly we weren’t going to be able to save the planet one forest at a time. One green Earth or a bowl of dust, unless somehow a profound change of consciousness was to sweep the globe we could kiss the forests goodbye, the ones we had “saved” alongside the rest.

Gaia Meditations

Wed, 16 Feb 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Excerpt from the book “Thinking Like a Mountain – Towards a Council of All Beings”

for the full text visit: Book: “Thinking like a Mountain “html version

by: John Seed and Joanna Macy

What are you? What am I? Intersecting cycles of water, earth, air and fire, that’s what I am, that’s what you are.

WATER — blood, lymph, mucus, sweat, tears, inner oceans tugged by the moon, tides within and tides without. Streaming fluids floating our cells, washing and nourishing through endless riverways of gut and vein and capillary. Moisture pouring in and through and out of you, of me, in the vast poem of the hydrological cycle. You are that. I am that.

Essay: Buddha touched the Earth – By John Seed

Sat, 16 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

An Exploration of Engaged BuddhismBy John Seed

(See below for an embedded pdf version with illustrations)

Buddha Touched the Earth is the title of a new workshop facilitated by William James, Lisa Siegel and I that was first held at North Farm near Bellingen in northern New South Wales, Australia Feb 7-10 2012.

The workshop brought together Buddhist meditation with experiential deep ecology processes. Mornings were spent in silence, yoga, sitting and walking meditation. Afternoons and evenings consisted of experiential deep ecology processes as devised by Joanna Macy, myself and others.

Essay: Ecopsychology – by John Seed

Sun, 02 Oct 1994 00:00:00 +0000

PAPER DELIVERED BY JOHN SEED TO THE ECOPSYCHOLOGY SYMPOSIUM AT THE AUSTRALIAN PSYCHOLOGICAL SOCIETY’S 28TH ANNUAL CONFERENCE, GOLD COAST, QUEENSLAND, AUSTRALIA, 2/10/94

I take “ecopsychology” to mean psychology in service to the Earth. ECO, PSYCHE, LOGOS: Knowing that the Earth is home to our soul. In spite of the modern delusion of alienation, of separation from the living Earth, we are NOT aliens, we belong here. The human psych too is Earth-born, the result of 4000 million years of continuous evolution and the complex, exquisite biology from which psyche emerged inevitably remains the matrix, the grounding of any sane psychology.

Essay: Beyond Anthropocentrism – By John Seed

Fri, 08 Jan 1988 00:00:00 +0000

from the book Thinking Like a mountain - Towards a Council of All Beings - Seed et al by John Seed, Joanna Macy, Arne Naess & Pat Fleming, New Society Publishers, Philadelphia, 1988

First published in ECOPHILOSOPHY 5 (Sierra College, California) and reprinted in PANTHEISM; OIKOS; AWAKENING IN THE NUCLEAR AGE and several Australian journals.

“But the time is not a strong prison either. A little scraping of the walls of dishonest contractor’s concrete through a shower of chips and sand makes freedom. Shake the dust from your hair. This mountain sea-coast is real For it reaches out far into the past and future; It is part of the great and timeless excellence of things.” (1)