The Earth Path, by Starhawk

In The Earth Path, Starhawk presents strategies, ideas, and inspiration to develop a new way to live holistically with nature. It is a manual of understanding how to decolonize your mind from westernized mechanistic thinking, to literally observe and reflect the patterns of nature in your life. Many humans have realized the need for overarching change in the current world. Rampant injustice, suffering, and abuse take place to fellow humans and the earth. In order to change the situation, we must first be able to articulate what world we wish to create. This is the magic and power of intention: the act of defining and stating the future you wish to see.

The book is also like a manuscript of much of what we learned at the Earth Activist Training. It feels almost like a textbook to remind and reinspire me when I will inevitable forget the energy and information from the training. Starhawk covers evolution and the roles of bacteria in the genius of photosynthesis, as well as the attributes of the four elements earth, air, fire, and water and thier core teachings. Patterns in nature and observation are covered in depth.

The main technique for grounding your spirit in nature is to find a special spot in nature and go there as often as possible and just observe. This is the foundation of the Kamana Program which I am doing concurrently in this term. The more I hear this idea expressed, through many teachers, writers and thinkers, the easier it is to actually put this practice into being. I find I am extremely resistant, not to the idea, but to actually carrying it out. What happens is an extreme level of self-criticism comes up when I go into nature just to observe. It is so uncomfortable to experience this harshness that I avoid the act that brings it up. In reality, the more I do it the easier it becomes and the little voices are getting quieter.

There are many experiential exercises in the book. I am touched by the exercise "A Sacred Intention," which guides us through identifying our core values, the things that we truly cherish dear to our hearts. What would it be like if the institutions of government, education, etc., all supported and worked toward the thing/s that you cherish? How would the current system change if it implemented your core value/s as a central guiding point? If we would like to live in a world where our core values are cherished, we say "It is my sacred intention to create a world that cherishes _____."

Later, sacred intentions are suggested as a way to help guide decision-making processes. I find this exptremely relieving. How many times have I stuggled to make a clear decision? Well, she suggests simply asking "does ____ serve my goal toward my sacred intention?" The simplicity of this excercise guarantees it's effectiveness for me. I have tried it several times since then, and the effect is that it feels as though I have installed a tuning fork into my decision making process, and I get to check how closely the resonance of any given decision matches the tune of my sacred intention.

Throughout the book I found myself crying, touched by the truth and heartfelt inspiration in her words. The book begins with the story of Starhawk and her fellow community members doing a ritual to honor the fire ecology of the Cazadero Hills of Sonoma County, California, where they live. The hills there have evolved for thousands of years with human burning, which kept brush down and food plants plentiful; the frequent burning ensured a lower burn temperature because there was less fuel to heat the flames, and life would return quickly after these much-needed and healing disturbances. The ritual was to ask the fire to stay at bay, since the land is choked and surpressed from a century or so of western settlement and an end to indiginous burnings. If a fire came through the country now it would be devastating. The ritual was also to express an intention that the land my once again return to a comfortable cycle where humans may live in balance again.

A foundation of healing the human relationship with nature is recentering our values to be earth-based in essence. Starhawk presents a way of seeing the world where all entities of the universe become sacred at all times.

I am inspired to create the life that I want to live right now. This is the ancient magical technique of creating your own reality. It means visualizing the way I want it and actively making it happen. This could even come out in small forms, such as improving the living systems at my house to make it livable and easy to do household chores. It means designing systems around me that flow, that work with my rhythms and the rhythms of nature to create a working easy flow. An example that would support my value of conservation and living simply could be changing the placement and improving the technology of our clothsline to improve the likelihood of using it. There is no excuse to not make life easier and flowing better right now. That is permaculture, and that is working with nature by creating sustainable systems.