Passion and vision describe Leah Pisaruck well! She is the epitomy of intelligent, fresh perspectives on caring for and preserving our earth. She clears a path, into the wild of a new future, filled with hope. Leah holds the voice of courage for the next generation with a deep sense of stewardship, a connection to the Divine Feminine, and love for our Mother Earth. We are thankful that our paths have criss-crossed and directing focused energy to a brighter tomorrow. Celebrating the “wildness” here and the pleasure to have Leah as our guest writer to start off this year.
During a time of such radical division in America, it can seem almost impossible to remember that we are each part of one beautiful whole. Yet it is more important now than ever to realize that we are all interconnected, with each other as well as with the rest of nature.
Humanity is utterly lost in this world because of the loss of a holistic sense of connection. The rioters who stormed the Capital and incited violence on our democracy especially need to learn this truth. Though it was a horrific event, these fellow humans are at least as lost as the rest of us.
Right or left, black or white, we are all human. We all live on the same Planet Earth. We all share the same life force. We are all essentially wild.
As Henry David Thoreau once famously said, “In Wildness is the preservation of the World.”
Wildness indeed is a strange word: a manifestation of the power of the wild, defined here as the ancient natural force that we are all a part of. The wild connects everything on Earth: black, white, tree, dirt, wolf, spider, ocean, mountain.
The power of the wild is Mother Earth’s overarching order that reigns over humankind and all other natural entities. It is a primal power which we can never fully comprehend or dominate, only follow. Wildness is what makes our world go ‘round!
Accepting, welcoming, and identifying with this quality of wildness is necessary in order for us humans to fight against the disease of disconnect and heal the division that will become our death sentence. Hate and violence are the symptoms; love, empathy and mindfulness are part of the cure.
Gary Snyder professes in The Practice of the Wild, “We are in danger of losing our souls. We are ignorant of our own nature and confused about what it means to be a human being.”
We must now rediscover what it means to be human… Which means to be connected, creative, and wild.
Snyder continues, “To speak of wildness is to speak of wholeness. Human beings came out of that wholeness, and to consider the possibility of reactivating membership in the Assembly of All Beings is in no way regressive.”
This is a time of proactive healing. It is time to return to a warm sense of wholeness with all earthly beings. We must learn to live on this Wild Earth without demolishing its wildness: the ancient energy that created and sustains our only home in the universe.
