Moving from Apathy to Action: How Facing Grief Can Help Us Navigate a World in Crisis

Reality Roundtable #17

When facing the realities of our world, the urge to drown in grief or shut down into apathy is becoming more and more common. As we are flooded with information and global predicaments outside of our control, overwhelm can set in, affecting our energy, efficacy, and even our ability to care. But what if facing our grief is actually the pathway to increasing our capacity to stay connected to and work on the things that matter most to us? What tools, practices, or rituals could we use to help us begin to metabolize our grief?

In this episode, I’m joined by

John Seed

and Skye Cielita Flor to explore the power of rituals and community for processing grief and transforming it into a deeper connection with ourselves, each other, and the natural world. We discuss the primary influences of their work, including ‘The Work That Reconnects,’ a framework developed by Joanna Macy and others, as well as the philosophy of Deep Ecology, founded by Arne Naess. Most importantly, John and Skye share their experience with deepening their own emotional capacity and embodiment of ecological values, and how they’ve helped others do the same.

How has an absence of ritual and the avoidance of grief in our culture distorted our relationship to loss – and therefore our ability to protect what we love? What practices do other cultures use to nurture ecological identity and kinship with the more-than-human world? And finally, why might grief, when honored and integrated, be a vital part of building more resilient and ecologically-grounded systems for the future?

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In case you missed it…

In the latest Frankly, I read and responded to questions from viewers of the channel, offering reflections on a wide range of topics from current events, balancing fear and action surrounding often existential topics, green technology, and more. By directly addressing these questions, I aim to further unpack some of the nuances in the complex and expansive concept of The Great Simplification.

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