Nature Evolutionaries

Grant Wilson, Directing Attorney for the Earth Law Center, speaks about the rights of rivers and the processes that individuals and communities engage in to assure basic rights for their rivers.   See the Earth Law Center's Universal Declaration of River Rights.

Grant has advanced environmental campaigns in the United States and worldwide, from representing island nations at the United Nations Climate Change Conference to National Land Policy work in Kenya. As Directing Attorney of Earth Law Center, Mr. Wilson works to advance the rights of nature in law, and in particular focuses on ensuring that our rivers thrive. Grant earned a degree in Environmental Policy from Huxley College of the Environment at Western Washington University, and a J.D. with a Certificate in Environmental and Natural Resources Law from Lewis & Clark Law School in Portland, Oregon.  

This is the third episode in a series of episodes centered around Rivers of Life. 

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Dr. Rosita Arvigo-- famed ethnobotanist, spiritual healer, shaman, and author-- will share about the Macal river which was the life-blood of an ancient Mayan civilization and is still important to the people there today. 

The Macal River flows through the Cayo District in western Belize and eventually into the Belize River. Sites along the river include the ancient Mayan town of Cahal Pech and the Belize Botanic Gardens. The river is a meandering waterway flowing through rugged mountains and countless ancient archaeological sites.  It was one of the ancient Maya’s superhighways, linking urban, trade, and ceremonial centers and connecting the interior to the coastal trade routes. After linking up with the Mopan at Branch Mouth, it joins the Old Belize River to carry on down to the coast. For centuries it was a vital part of the Maya Empire and an important source of water, transport, communication, trade, food, hygiene, and recreation for the Maya.

Rosita Arvigo is a Doctor of Naprapathy, ethnobotanist, spiritual healer, author of six books on traditional healing of Central America, co-founder of The Belize Ethnobotany Project with Dr. Michael Balick of the New York Botanical Garden , and an international speaker. She is the founder of Ix Chel Tropical Research Centre in Belize, the Rainforest Medicine Trail, the Terra Nova Medicinal Plant Reserve, and the children’s Bush Medicine Summer Camp in Belize. She had a thirteen-year apprenticeship to one of the last Maya shamans, Don Elijio Panti, who was born in Peten, Guatemala. She is the recipient of The Earth Award, 2007. As the founder of THE ARVIGO TECHNIQUES OF MAYA ABDOMINAL THERAPY she teaches extensive courses on the subject as well as courses in Maya Spiritual Healing.

This is the second episode in a series of episodes centered around Rivers of Life. 

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Ecuadorian, teacher and healer, Rocio Alarcon will join us to kick off a series of episodes centered around Rivers of Life and will speak about the Amazon River-- considered the “mightiest river in the world”. South America’s Amazon ecosystem is often described as ‘larger than life’ and indeed it comprises the most expansive rainforest in the world, home to the second-longest river on earth. Combined, they spawn an incredible amount of life, with the sheer abundance of flora and fauna making it an essential breeding and feeding ground. A passionately protected yet endangered bio-network, the Amazon River and Rainforest provide our planet with indispensable oxygen, fresh water, and biodiversity. Join us to hear Rocio’s unique perspective of this magnificent river.

Rocio Alarcon is renowned and beloved worldwide for her caring, loving, and passionate approach to people, plants, and nature. An Ethnopharmacologist, Ethno-botanist, shamanic practitioner, and extraordinary teacher and healer, Rocio has spent over 30 years working with ethnic groups in the tropical rain forest and Andes Mountains of Ecuador and in the Basque Country, Spain.  Rocio is the co-founder and director of the Iamoe Center in Ecuador. 

This is the first in a series of episodes about Rivers of Life.

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Rani Findlay, celebrant and For a Tree Co-founder, speaks about Tree ceremonies and especially the Tree Gratitude Ceremony, and the importance of reciprocity. The short ceremony is a way to say thank you and show our deep appreciation for the trees that give us life. 

In ceremony, we connect with one another, to the spirit, and to the web of all life. The sacred act of ceremony with trees creates the opportunity for us to experience our identity and responsibility as caretakers of life on our Mother Earth.  Our whole-hearted participation opens closed parts of ourselves to all the blessings that are ours to offer for all the gifts we receive.  Rani will share about Tree Gratitude Ceremonies and invite us to use this ceremony to begin or expand our grateful relationship with trees, one based on an exchange of giving and receiving. 

Rani Findlay was initiated into the act and art of ceremony in India forty years ago, guided by revered teachers of the Vedic tradition in upholding the harmonious functioning of nature. A decade ago she met a ceremonial leader of Andean lineage and continues to receive counsel in the indigenous wisdom ways of preserving the continuity of life on Earth. 

In 2012, Rani began exploring with her Celebrant colleague, Woody Winfree, how to actively engage individuals and communities in ceremonies that honor Trees and recognize their immense significance in the web of life. 

This episode is the fifth in a series of episodes centered around the Tree of Life. 

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Kate Gilday has been a clinical herbalist, flower essence practitioner and creator, Ayurvedic lifestyle consultant, and teacher for over 30 years. In this episode, she speaks about the intimate partnership Trees invite us to be a part of.

 For many years, Kate was a member of Collaborative Healing, a group of local practitioners who address health care through a unique integrative network, educating the community and combining conventional medicine with expert complementary care. She is well-loved for the clarity and clinical relevance gleaned from decades of experience in her teachings. Kate brings her love of the wild places, song, and healing to the workshops she presents around the Northeast.  A creative medicine maker, Kate is the founder of Woodland Essence, a forest botanicals and flower essence company and workshop center.

Over the millennia we have lived and grown with the trees and they continue to invite us into a partnership that we may all thrive even in uncertain times.  Each species carries gifts of its essential nature. By creating time to be with these ancient ones and in paying attention with all of our senses, we can answer the invitation the trees offer and learn how the spiritual essence of a tree can touch and enter our hearts, minds, and own personal essence. We come into a relationship where our lives and that of the trees are enriched. It simply takes stepping forward, opening our arms and spirits to embrace the gift of intimacy that awaits.

These tall ones do seem to be conduits between earth and sky-- storing sunlight in their bodies, releasing oxygen into the atmosphere, and bringing water up from the deeper recesses of the soil.  They carry the long story of the land, of change, and of the qualities to withstand and even flourish in times of uncertainty.  Strength, resiliency, networking, communication, generosity, and the essence of community, there is much we can learn and integrate from the wisdom held in a forest.

This episode is the fourth in a series of episodes centered around the Tree of Life. 

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Esperide Ananas has traveled the world to reactivate the deep connection between humans and Trees.  In this episode, she speaks about the network that trees create and the role of humans in that network.

Trees, through their specific sensitivity and intelligence, are able to weave the tightest network of connections that exists on the planet making them the largest and most powerful “living computers” on Earth.  For us, as humans, re-establishing a spiritual connection with these beings is a way to recuperate an important part of our collective soul.  We have long forgotten that we are all part of the same spiritual ecosystem, and that our survival and evolution depends on the presence of these extraordinary beings. Through her stories and sharing, Esperide reminds us of our deep kinship with Trees and inspires right-relationship with the Tree World.

Esperide Ananas is an ambassador for Damanhur, an eco-society in Italy, and has been instrumental in their Tree Orienting project.  She is also a spiritual researcher, innovation consultant, and international speaker; she is also the author of several books including The Music of the Plants and Spirals of Energy. Additionally, Esperide conducts research in the field of Selfica, the energy structure of the human being, and the vital energies of nature, and leads courses around the world helping humans to awaken to their potential and connect with nature.

This episode is the third in a series of episodes centered around the Tree of Life. 

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Michael Dunning is a teacher and a guide who-- after a sequence of harrowing near-death encounters with elemental beings -- was drawn to an ancient yew tree close to Edinburgh. In this, episode Michael speaks of the wisdom and mysteries imparted on him by the yew.  Mysteries learned over nine years as the immensely powerful female yew restored him to health and initiated him in the teachings of the Yew Mysteries. Michael now lives in the USA. 

The Yew is the earthly and sentient expression of the ONE original pre-earthly organism that the earliest cultures referred to as the Tree of Life. The ancient and yet timeless language of the living Yew holds memory and information concerning the pre-earthly origin and spiritual lineage of human beings.

This episode is the second in a series of episodes centered around the Tree of Life. 

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Clare tells her story of awakening into nature connection and her search for her purpose. She shares her relationship with the trees and gives us all an embodied experience of the TreeSisters' BluePrint of a Restorer Species to help activate our life force on behalf of life.  She also shares how we can take a life-changing inner journey of awakening alongside thousands of others as part of the launch of the TreeSisters journey to a Billion trees a year.

Clare Dubois is the founder of TreeSisters.org, a feminine nature-based organization inspiring the world’s women to take shared leadership around tropical reforestation. TreeSisters reflects Clare’s exploration of the links between feminine consciousness and Nature’s intelligence. She and her team experiment overtly to discover how to call forth the unique capacities and creativity of women on behalf of the trees. They aim to be funding a million trees a month by the end of 2017.

Clare is known for her direct, catalytic energy; her whole systems approach to behavior change, and her unending loyalty and love for the natural world. For two decades she created behavior change processes within the personal growth and social change sectors and volunteered for three years as the UK co-ordinator for a massive agro-forestry initiative in southern India called Project GreenHands (PGH) before initiating TreeSisters.  In her own life, her aim is to reclaim balance, rediscover freedom and health, and to be 'walking permission' for those who are fed up of being held back, and just want to have a go.

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In this episode, Pam shares the teachings and wisdom of White Pine, the tree of peace.  White Pine has been a main ally of Pam’s for two decades and is an elder among trees who helps to initiate humans into what it means to be truly human. Pam will also share stories from the White Pine Initiation held in September. 

Pam Montgomery is a founding member of O.N.E.  For over 30 years, Pam has been inspiring and guiding individuals to remember their innate relationship with all Beings and to deepen this connection by creating an intimate partnership with Nature.  Pam lectures and teaches around the globe and is recognized internationally as a Voice for the Plants.  She is the author of Plant Spirit Healing: A Guide to Working with Plant Consciousness and Partner Earth: A Spiritual Ecology, as well as a contributing author of Planting the Future.  Pam is the creator of Partner Earth Education Center and co-steward of Sweetwater Sanctuary in Danby, VT.

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Arkan Lushwala bridges the global north and south, carrying spiritual traditions from the Andes in his native Peru. In this episode, Arkan introduces our new series of episodes around the Tree of Life, and speaks of his own experiences and teaching with the Tree as the embodiment of the prayer and promise of continuity.  His eloquence, as both an author and speaker, gives expression to timeless wisdom in a refreshingly simple and digestible way.

A traditional healer, and founder of a remote ceremonial center and community in New Mexico, Arkan has been a leader and teacher for many years and is the author of  Time of the Black Jaguar and Deer and Thunder.

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