- Webinars
January 11, 2025 – How do we navigate through life when we find ourselves tossed into the uncharted seas of climate crisis, biodiversity collapse, cultural divisiveness, all amid the demands and challenges of our personal lives?
For ancient travelers, having reliable navigation tools was essential to making their voyages.
While they used tools like a compass, an astrolabe, and a map, we need different tools for different times. When we aim to be a part of the Great Turning toward a more life-giving way of being human, we benefit from wise guidance.
We take heart in the reliable guidance offered by contemplating the Five Vows of the Great Turning (a.k.a. The Five Commitments of Active Hope) articulated by our elder and teacher, Joanna Macy.
When asked what one person can really do during these times, the wonderful writer Kathleen Dean Moore replied, “Quit being one person! Get together with others!”
We invite you to gather with us and other like-hearted people to explore the gifts and challenges inherent in relating to these vows. Being in community and conversation about living into the vows can be especially invigorating and encouraging during these times when the foundations of stability in nature and culture are being rattled to their core.
This webinar is for those of us who refuse to give despair the final word. For those of us who want to do something much more life-giving than lateral violence or shame and blame of others. It’s for those of us who care a lot and who feel vulnerable to distraction, numbness, and overwhelm. It is for those of us who want to participate in the Great Turning in a way that is right-sized for our current energy and capacity and suited to our real lives.
The world desperately needs such people. We hope the warmth in our circle blows on the embers of your courage and bolsters your heart. We get good at what we practice, so let’s practice with intention being a part of the Great Turning.
Erin’s Work
Explore more of Erin’s work at http://www.embodimentmatters.com and listen to her Embodiment Matters Podcast
Leilani’s Work
Explore more of Leilani’s work at https://leilaninavar.com/ and listen to her Turning Season Podcast
Resources Mentioned during the Webinar
Erin and Leilani’s adaptation of the vows
I vow to myself and each of you:
- To commit myself daily to the healing of our world and the welfare of all beings.
- To live on Earth more lightly, less violently, and more lovingly in the food, products and energy I consume, and my relationships with myself and with others.
- To draw strength and guidance from the living Earth, the ancestors, the future beings, and my siblings of all species.
- To support you in your work for the world and to ask for help when I need it.
- To pursue a daily practice that clarifies my mind, strengthens my heart, and supports me in observing these vows.
The original Five Vows (unadapted) are posted in our Resource Library
They are also in the book Coming Back To Life by Joanna Macy and Molly Brown (multiple translations available)
An inspiring podcast with Rosemerry Whatola Trommer on Embodiment Matters
Mother of Us All by Steven Levine
Mother-of-us-all prays to free us
from our image of perfection
to which so much suffering clings.
When in the shadowy mind
we imagine ourselves imperfectly,
praying to be freed from gravity
by enlightenment, she refines our prayers.
Putting her arms around us
she bids us rest our head on her shoulder
whispering, Don’t you know
with all your fear and anger
all you are fit for is love.
-Stephen Levine
Carry This All by Ahlay Blakely
you do not carry this all alone
no you do not carry this all alone
this is way too big for you
to carry this on your own
so, you do not carry this all alone
“Guilt and defensiveness are bricks in a wall against which we all flounder; they serve none of our futures.” –Audre Lorde
Erin Geesaman Rabke is a Somatic Naturalist & Embodiment Mentor; a writer, a mother, and a long-time teacher and group facilitator.
Professionally trained as a Feldenkrais® Practitioner, an Embodied Life Teacher, a Work That Reconnects Facilitator, and a Community Grief Tender, she weaves all of these lineages into her work. Over the past 30 years, she’s been trained in many somatics lineages as well as in the Tibetan Buddhist traditions of Dzogchen and Lojong.
Along with her husband, Carl, she hosts the Embodiment Matters Podcast and the online course Weaving Glimpses. They live in Salt Lake City, Utah, with their 14-year old son, many wily animals, bees, and a wild garden. Find out more at http://www.embodimentmatters.com
Leilani Wong Navar is a mother, an acupuncturist and herbalist, and a dreamworker. With groups, she facilitates the Work that Reconnects and teaches practical wisdom from Chinese Medicine. Leilani hosts Turning Season Podcast, a series of conversations with people around the world taking part in the Great Turning in their own unique way.
Leilani attended Evergreen State College where she studied Political Economy and Holistic Health, and earned her Masters of Science in Oriental Medicine from the National University of Natural Medicine. She is in ongoing study and exploration within multiple lineages of wisdom for the well-being of the landscape of the body and the body of the Earth.