Alternative Radio - Wednesday, June 10, 2026

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1. Basque instrument to New Sonic Horizons
2. from their album Nomadak Che.
3. And then Hun Hurtu was first
4. and an album called Ancestors Call.
5. It's been wonderful keeping you company
6. and thank you so much for tuning in
7. and for celebrating the legacy of René Goiffon with me.
8. Until next time, be well
9. And remember that on July 1st, Omar Sosa will be my guest, and he too recorded on the World Village label.
10. Until then, have a wonderful and safe and healthy time.
11. You're listening to KPFK, 90.7 FM, Los Angeles.
12. I don't believe there's probably anybody that doesn't feel the grief,
13. the great grief for our time.
14. The losses are beyond the counting.
15. So we're being asked to be alive in this time when we can hold the grief
16. and hold it knowing that the grief and the outrage that comes up when we see what we're losing,
17. that pain we feel for them, is grounded in a deep caring.
18. That's Joanna Macy, and this is Alternative Radio.
19. I'm David Barsamian.
20. This edition of AR features Joanna Macy, Deep Caring for the Earth.
21. The challenges humankind faces, from the climate emergency to species extinction to terminal war,
22. may be difficult to comprehend, but we ignore them at our peril.
23. Looking away is a lot easier than facing reality.
24. Viewing the earth as a giant shopping mall to be exploited is leading us to a literal dead end
25. The capitalist system solely cares about making money
26. Can a deep caring for the earth emerge that is nourishing and sustaining rather than recklessly exploiting it?
27. What creative steps can we undertake to reverse the dangerous course we are on?
28. The clock is ticking as our precious planet takes one hit after another.
29. Can global society wake up to implement policies that will avert catastrophe?
30. If not, Joanna Macy says, it's curtains.
31. Our guest today is Joanna Macy, a scholar of Buddhism, general systems theory, and deep ecology.
32. Her lectures and writing on work that reconnects provided a visionary force in environmental and spiritual activism.
33. She the author of World as Lover World as Self and co of Active Hope And now Joanna Macy deep caring for the earth
34. What we most want, I believe, is to discover our true vastness, the immense life that is within us,
35. the great, fertile, brilliant web of life
36. that has brought us forth
37. to wake up to the company of other beings
38. through space and time
39. and walk out of that little closet
40. of self-concern
41. that is conditioned by the industrial growth society,
42. the consumer society,
43. the late capitalist political economy
44. where we're being treated like a bunch of addicts
45. that can't wait for the next fix,
46. whether it's a car or a dress or the latest foodie, gourmet, whatever,
47. as if we couldn't think of anything better to do with our lives
48. than to see how much we can own or how much we can put in the bank,
49. as if that were a measure of the life that is in us.
50. and so I think there's a great yearning
51. in each one of us
52. to be free
53. to be free to rejoin
54. that great family of beings
55. that great dance
56. the metaphors abound
57. for what we
58. yearn for and what we deserve
59. and what is our birthright to have.
60. To see the beauty of the world and let that be enough.
61. To feel the depth of affection we have for all beings and each other
62. and let that be enough.
63. To work together for the healing of our world.
64. Ah, that's more than enough.
65. and it's amazing that we at this point
66. we are reflecting that and working with that
67. with the students this weekend
68. how we were training our
69. vision to see
70. two amazing and apparently contradictory
71. things that are happening at the same time
72. in our world
73. both of them unique
74. one is a transition
75. to a life-sustaining society
76. from a self-destroying industrial growth society
77. which sets its goals
78. and measures its progress
79. by how fast it can grow.
80. Grow in what?
81. Wisdom?
82. Health?
83. Happiness, one thing only, corporate profits, market share.
84. And when you have that kind of force driving you,
85. it's an exponential, unsatisfiable, leads to a runaway system.
86. And so the transition that we're in, that many of us, including me,
87. call the Great Turning. I love the book about it that David Corton wrote. And I love the recognition
88. by many of the minds that have been teachers to me that this great turning this transition is the third revolution
89. of our journey as humans.
90. The third we know about.
91. And that it's fully as huge
92. in scope and in magnitude
93. as that first revolution
94. in the late Neolithic 10,000 years ago,
95. the agricultural revolution.
96. That changed everything.
97. Settling down, growing a surplus,
98. growing more people, trading,
99. learning to compute, to write,
100. build silos, temples, stratified societies, etc.
101. Changed everything.
102. And then a bunch later, that second revolution,
103. equally enormous in its effect on our psyches and on our relationships.
104. That happened almost three centuries ago in England,
105. and that was the what?
106. Yeah, the Industrial Revolution.
107. And again, that changed everything.
108. the machine
109. the power of industrial technology
110. pulling people off the land
111. into the mines and the mills
112. and the factories
113. changing our relations to each other and to the earth
114. and now right on the tail of that
115. comes this third revolution
116. and I remember the first time
117. I heard about this in these terms
118. of Third Revolution was from William Ruckelshaus, who was our first
119. Environmental Protection Agency head, and he said the amazing thing is where's the
120. first revolution, agricultural revolution, took centuries and the Industrial
121. Revolution took decades, maybe generations. This one, this third one, to
122. sustainability will have to happen in a matter of years and will have to be a
123. totally conscious operation. We will choose it. So not only is there this
124. revolution, this great turning, but at the same time, and you know this, I'm just
125. saying things you already know in your heart, that there is this great
126. unraveling. David Courtney uses that term and I find it totally apt that the social
127. and the ecological systems, the biological organic systems that have
128. been woven over the millennia bringing forth complexity of form and
129. and intelligence are being shredded by loss of diversity,
130. and by poisoning, and by paving over,
131. and by our heedlessness.
132. So this is a time when you could get real depressed if you let yourself.
133. And as a matter of fact, if there is,
134. I don't believe there's probably anybody in this room
135. that frankly doesn't yet feel the grief,
136. the great grief for our time.
137. The losses are beyond the counting So we being asked to be alive in this time when we can hold the pain and not run from it hold the grief and know that we capable of that and hold it knowing that the grief
138. and the outrage that comes up when we see what we're losing, and some of these losses,
139. many of them are irretrievable
140. that pain we feel for them
141. is grounded in a deep caring
142. you look at that pain
143. and don't let yourself be persuaded
144. by mainstream culture
145. that it has to do with some
146. can be reduced to some private pathology
147. or neurotic pattern
148. don't fall for that
149. if tears come up and rage for what our people are doing to the earth
150. don't let them be persuaded that this is due to some private craziness
151. just pause for a moment and bow to that
152. and say, ah, I'm capable of suffering with
153. I'm suffering with my world, ouch
154. and you will know that it's wholesome and natural
155. and unavoidable if you're alive
156. and then you remember that the literal meaning of compassion
157. is just that, to suffer with.
158. Ah, I am a compassionate being.
159. I am alive as a cell in the living body of earth
160. and this body is in trauma
161. so of course I feel it too.
162. So we're in this incredible moment
163. unlike any that I can imagine
164. ever having happened before.
165. This moment when everything
166. we've ever had to learn
167. about courage,
168. about our interconnectedness
169. can be put to use
170. as we stand with this
171. two possibilities right in front of us.
172. The great unraveling and the great churning.
173. And we don't know.
174. We don't know whether we're going to pull it off.
175. But we know that we're here
176. as part of that work.
177. And that we can engage in that more fully
178. when we see its inevitability
179. and don't require guarantees that we're going to see
180. just how wonderful our little piece of it is.
181. That we free ourselves from dependence
182. on seeing the results of our own actions.
183. So it's just amazing to me that being alive in this time,
184. if you don't close your eyes and ears,
185. it's just like getting so many spiritual teachings.
186. wake up
187. wake up
188. wake up to your true nature as part of life
189. wake up to your mutual belonging
190. wake up to the courage that is in you
191. let your heart be broken
192. that's okay
193. actually they say the heart that breaks open
194. can hold the whole universe
195. it's that big
196. and in this time
197. then
198. It's so wonderful to be sitting in this room, in this place, where the teachings, the Dharma
199. teachings have been revered and kept among the many strands of the revitalizing of the
200. spiritual life of our people. And how good to come here and see that in the Buddhist
201. community and in Naropa there is this environmental leadership program. Saying again and again,
202. and you need to say that in Western Buddhism, which has a tiny tendency to think that the
203. Buddha Dharma is given to us for our private tranquility. There's a little, little tendency
204. there in case you haven't noticed. Yes. So that you can get very calm and serene. Yeah.
205. So I consider this sometimes, it can be a little case of premature equanimity. Because
206. what I find in the teachings
207. and in my brothers and sister teachings out of this tradition
208. as well as others is that the spiritual gifts
209. of this planet and the lineages are coming
210. forward now in this time of crisis and need
211. in order to bloom with fresher, stronger meaning than ever
212. before. To help us walk out, to find
213. that we can be what we most want to be.
214. Heroes and healers.
215. Part of the great transformation.
216. Part of the waking up.
217. And we're not doing that out of some
218. inflated notion of who we are,
219. but rather stepping aside
220. from what we thought were our strengths
221. and our individual wonderfulness
222. to let the power of life come through.
223. the power of the earth,
224. the power of our interdependence,
225. the power of our relationships,
226. the power of life itself,
227. so much bigger than anything we could ever attribute
228. to ourselves or our achievements.
229. What a time to be alive.
230. I think that all the religious traditions in this time
231. have riches for us
232. who would take part in the healing of our world.
233. I think central to all the great earth wisdom traditions,
234. indigenous traditions,
235. Christianity, Sufism, Islam,
236. Judaism, Hinduism, Tao, all of it,
237. are there bringing forth gifts for us
238. to find our true strength.
239. But I want to talk a little bit about the Buddha Dharma
240. and about being right here in the Shambhala Center,
241. the Tibetan strain of it.
242. I feel so grateful.
243. My life was changed, you know,
244. by when I went over in the Peace Corps with my husband to India.
245. We were staffed then.
246. We went over with our children,
247. and I found that I got very close to a volunteer
248. who up in Himachal Pradesh and this was in the 1960s was working with groups of Tibetans and a particular community of Tibetans Kargyu Tibetans who had been very close to Ch Trungpa Rinpoche
249. They were sort of like Dharma brothers together in the community of Tashi Jung.
250. and I saw that in what they had experienced as they were leaving Tibet,
251. fleeing the depredations of the Chinese and the occupation of Tibet,
252. preserving the tradition that they had cherished.
253. they were well acquainted with grief
254. they had seen
255. what
256. how swift destruction
257. can take over a people
258. and its land, how fast it can be plundered
259. how quickly its institutions
260. even those most revered
261. could be insulted and demolished
262. they're just like they expected some of this
263. and here is from the warrior song
264. of King Gezar
265. written how many centuries ago
266. eight, nine centuries ago
267. and doesn't it sound as if it were today
268. it goes
269. our earth is wounded
270. her oceans and lakes are sick
271. her rivers are like running sores
272. the air is filled with subtle poisons
273. and the oily smoke of countless hellish fires
274. blackens the sun
275. men and women scattered from homeland
276. friends, family, wander desolate and uncertain
277. scorched by a toxic sun
278. in this desert of frightened blind uncertainty
279. some take refuge in the pursuit of power
280. some become manipulators of illusion and deceit
281. if wisdom and harmony still dwell in this world
282. as other than a dream lost in an unopened book
283. they are hidden
284. in our heartbeat
285. and it is from our hearts
286. that we cry out
287. we cry out and our voices
288. are the single voice
289. of this wounded earth
290. our cries are a great wind
291. across the earth
292. I can feel that
293. I can feel our cries
294. ringing out
295. and the yearning of our hearts
296. like a great wind
297. and that it's appropriate.
298. It's all right to feel that.
299. Okay if the heart breaks.
300. And then, later on,
301. from this same community of Tibetans
302. that I became sort of wonderfully wedded to in a way,
303. that's one of the greatest things that happened in my life
304. was that this community of Tibetan laypeople and lamas took me in I would visit them over the years when I go to other places other countries back to my homeland we would be seeing each other And once when I went back it was 1980
305. and Ronald Reagan had just been elected,
306. and I heard, back in Tashi Jong, people talking about a prophecy
307. that seemed to be coming true in our time.
308. even though it was 12 centuries old.
309. It was found in the Kalachakra Tantra.
310. But it seemed to be happening for this generation now
311. in the late 20th century.
312. Well, what's it about, I said.
313. And they said it's about a very dark and troubled time.
314. well I wanted to hear about that
315. being rather apocalyptic
316. at my turn of mind
317. and as I said
318. Ronald Reagan had just been elected
319. and
320. so
321. I asked
322. for
323. some of the lamas
324. to tell me about it
325. and this is the version
326. of it. I found that there were different versions. One version I got from Taisitu Rinpoche who had
327. his monastery not far away. And when he spoke of it, it was in connection with a retreat that he
328. wanted me to take for three years. And I said, Rinpoche, I can't do that because I have to stop
329. nuclear war. And he said, well, don't you know that the kingdom of Shambhala is coming and the
330. king of Shambhala will disarm the weapons by his power, as if that could happen without our doing
331. anything. He said, just take it easy and go and meditate. Well, I couldn't do that. And I didn't
332. really buy into that particular version of the Shambhala prophecy. And then another version
333. that I heard was that
334. it didn't really have to do
335. with this coming of the kingdom of Shambhala.
336. That's what the prophecy is.
337. It didn't have to do with the outside world,
338. but it was all a metaphor
339. for one's internal battle
340. or growth or enlightenment.
341. Well, that didn't interest me too much either.
342. But what did, and what I'm going to tell you,
343. is the version of this prophecy
344. that I heard from Dugu Chögyal Rinpoche.
345. I'm going to tell it to you
346. because it has given me my marching orders
347. for the last 30 years.
348. In pretty much his words.
349. And as you hear this,
350. you will hear the phrase Shambhala warrior.
351. figure. And you may recognize that this is a metaphor for the Bodhisattva. That is the
352. hero figure in the Buddhist scriptures Buddhist world the one who really gets it about our mutual belonging our radical interdependence And so they say the Bodhisattva keeps turning back from the gates of nirvana
353. to return to samsara till all beings, even to every blade of grass, is enlightened.
354. So that kind of compassion.
355. So here we go.
356. I'm going to tell you the prophecy
357. as I heard it from Duguccia del Rimpeci
358. and I want you to hear it
359. as if it is about you
360. which I actually think it is.
361. There comes a time when all life on earth
362. is in danger.
363. In this time great powers have arisen
364. barbarian powers
365. and although they waste their wealth
366. in preparations to annihilate each other
367. they have much in common
368. and among the things they have in common
369. are weapons of unfathomable
370. devastation and death
371. and technologies that lay waste
372. to the world
373. and it is just at this time
374. that when the future
375. of all beings seems to hang by the frailest of threads
376. that the kingdom of Shambhala emerges.
377. Now you can't go there because it's not a place.
378. It exists in the hearts and minds of the Shambhala warriors.
379. And actually you can't tell a Shambhala warrior
380. by looking at her or him
381. because they wear no uniforms.
382. They bear no insignia.
383. They wield no banners to identify them.
384. They have no barricades on which they can climb
385. to threaten the enemy
386. or behind which they can rest and regroup.
387. They don't even have any home turf
388. because ever and always they must move across
389. the terrain of the barbarian powers.
390. And then he said, now the time has come
391. when great courage is required of the Shambhala warriors.
392. Moral courage and physical courage.
393. Because they are going to go right into the heart of the barbarian powers
394. to dismantle the weapons.
395. Those armaments that are fabricated and deployed on air trigger alert.
396. Yes, and the decisions that are made,
397. they are going to go into the corridors of power
398. to dismantle the weapons of mind.
399. And he said, Joanna, mind this.
400. This is very important.
401. The Shambhala warriors know
402. that these weapons can be dismantled
403. because they are mano maya.
404. Mind made.
405. alternative radio
406. These weapons can be dismantled
407. because they are mano maya,
408. mind-made.
409. They are made by the human mind.
410. They can be unmade by the human mind
411. because the dangers that are coming upon us now
412. are not brought by some evil extraterrestrial force
413. or some satanic deity
414. or even some inexorable, unalterable fate.
415. But they arise from our actions,
416. from our relationships,
417. from our habits.
418. They are made by the human mind.
419. They can be unmade by the human mind.
420. So, now is the time, he said,
421. when the Shambhala warriors go into training.
422. How do they train? I asked.
423. I was ready to sign up
424. and he said they train in the use of two weapons
425. what are they?
426. and Dugu Chagyal held up his hands
427. the way the lamas hold the ritual objects
428. and the great lama dances of his people
429. and he said one is compassion
430. and the other is
431. insight into the radical interdependence
432. of all phenomena
433. and you need both
434. one is not enough
435. you need the compassion
436. because that provides the fuel
437. the motive force to move you out
438. to go where you need to go
439. to do what you need to do
440. And what it involves is this, to not be afraid of the suffering of your world.
441. And if you're not afraid of the suffering of your world, then nothing can stop you.
442. But he said, by itself that's not enough because it can burn you out. It's very hot.
443. So you need the other, that wisdom, that insight into our inter-existence.
444. Now that's very important, he said, because with that you know that this is not a battle
445. between the good guys and the bad guys. But that the line between good and evil goes through
446. the landscape of every human heart. And that we are so interwoven with each other in the
447. web of life that even the smallest act with clear intention can have reverberations through
448. the web that you can hardly begin to discern. But that, he said, as important as it is,
449. it's a little cool. And so you need the heat of the compassion.
450. But I realized then that, ah, when I had been seeing the Tibetan monks in their puja with
451. their, moving their hands in the moving mudras, hand gestures, often as not they were dancing
452. with their hands, the interplay between wisdom and compassion. Well that's it. That's the
453. prophecy On that occasion my family happened to be with me and we were lodging at the edge of the community And I rushed back and I was getting back to me I went in and I said
454. You won't believe what I just heard from Chucho Rinpoche,
455. and I told the prophecy.
456. And my son Jack said,
457. Well, didn't I tell you how it's going to end?
458. It's wonderful that you laugh.
459. I laughed too. I said, oh Jack, if he had told me how it's going to turn out, I wouldn't have believed him.
460. And don't you believe anyone who tells you how it's going to turn out.
461. Because the magic and power of being alive at this time is directly proportional to the uncertainty.
462. That uncertainty keeps you awake.
463. you think sometimes that you want guarantees
464. well I would get involved in that campaign
465. if I were sure that my involvement
466. would make a decisive difference
467. I hear that a lot you know
468. but that kind of certainty
469. is not in the scene for us now
470. that kind of certainty
471. doesn't grow courage
472. it's in the risk taking
473. that the courage happens
474. and then I remember
475. ah I'd like a guarantee
476. but where is there a guarantee in life
477. when you fall in love
478. with someone is there a guarantee
479. that you're going to have a lasting healthy relationship
480. when you plant
481. seeds in the soil
482. is there a guarantee
483. there's going to be sufficient warmth
484. and moisture for a bumper crop
485. there never is
486. and it is that
487. which draws forth from us
488. the vital ingredients
489. of our engagement
490. and our involvement
491. and our risk taking
492. and our courage
493. and our solidarity with each other
494. there you have it
495. I think it's just about
496. my favorite thing to tell you
497. but I have some other things
498. I want to share
499. what is this you know those uh two weapons is actually that's the term he used uh compassion
500. and wisdom relate to my two favorite hand gestures of the buddha the mudras
501. there are so many different ones there's this for teaching there's this for giving you know
502. but my favorite too
503. is this
504. I'm giving them to you
505. yeah
506. as my gift to you
507. there that's the first
508. that's the abhaya mudra
509. it means
510. fear not
511. don't be afraid
512. so you can use that
513. very useful in a time like this
514. where even our own government
515. likes to keep us in line
516. by scaring us
517. and when I saw that
518. you know what I immediately thought of
519. the traditional Native American gesture
520. when I was a little girl in school
521. I thought all Indians went around doing this
522. how?
523. then I realized that that gesture
524. of Native Americans is precisely
525. don't be afraid
526. see don be afraid I carry no weapon My hand is bare naked nothing to fear
527. I come in peace.
528. And my other favorite gesture is the one that is always associated with the Buddha of our time, Sakyamuni Buddha,
529. because as you know, as the Buddhist movement developed through time,
530. the truths that were conveyed in it seemed so great
531. you could never imagine that they weren't always around.
532. So people figured that there were earlier Buddhas
533. and a whole string of them.
534. But our Buddha, Shakyamuni Buddha of our era
535. was known in art and the way he was represented
536. by touching the ground, touching the earth.
537. Bhumi Sparsa Mudra.
538. So, you remember to do that.
539. And I want you to remember the story that goes with it,
540. which you may know already, so you'll hear it again.
541. How Gautama, before he became the Buddha,
542. he had left home, he was seeking the end of suffering,
543. he was trying to figure it out.
544. Why is it, how is it that we cause suffering to each other and ourselves?
545. and he went to the best of the yogic teachers,
546. excelled in every domain.
547. He did mortifications of the flesh till he almost died.
548. And then he just said,
549. I'm going to sit down there under that tree
550. and I'm not going to get up
551. until it becomes clear to me the cause of suffering.
552. And so he did.
553. So when the Buddha sat down, that tendency was represented in the figure of Mara, who
554. was portrayed or understood as the figure of sin and death. And Mara was furious that this young
555. Gautama Siddhartha was going to sit down and figure out the cause of suffering for the
556. sake of the cessation of suffering. That was a very unwelcome idea to Mara because suffering
557. was his stock and trade. So he had to scare Gautama the Buddha off. And so he sent visions
558. of very seductive dancing girls. And did our boy Gautama flinch? Did he move? No. He just
559. stayed in perfect concentration. That didn't work so then he sent visions of ghoulish demons
560. and arms with weapons and all kinds of scary things.
561. Did our Gautama flinch?
562. No, they just stayed there, totally concentrated.
563. So then Mara was furious, and he said,
564. By what right do you think that you can sit there
565. and resolve the problem of suffering. By what authority do you think you can do that?
566. Now interestingly enough Gautama did not present his curriculum vitae He didn say my father is a prince He didn say I been to the very best yogic schools he didn say
567. I have
568. mortification of the flesh, PhD
569. in that, no
570. he didn't say anything about himself
571. what did he do
572. he touched the earth
573. I am doing
574. this by the authority
575. vested in me by the
576. earth. That's what that
577. gesture says.
578. And they say
579. in the scriptures that the earth roared.
580. Now I love that story
581. but
582. what the point of it is
583. that you have the same
584. authority
585. for you in whatever
586. you are taking, whether it's planting
587. a garden or
588. protesting at a nuclear power plant or running for office. You are doing that for the healing,
589. for your people and the healing of our world by the power invested in you by the earth.
590. You have been brought forth by the earth for this time.
591. And earth will provide you, the web of life will provide you, the dependent co-arising, that power
592. of our relationships
593. with all that is
594. will provide the power.
595. It's brought you up from the amoeba.
596. It certainly ought to be able
597. to get you through the next few days.
598. So we can begin trusting that.
599. We can begin really learning
600. that what we most have going for us
601. is not our own smarts
602. and our own wiles, or our own connections,
603. but our passion for the earth and earth's love for us,
604. which is life's.
605. I've been stressing the Buddhist line on this,
606. but that's there in all the great spiritual traditions
607. and the earth wisdom traditions of the native peoples.
608. And it is there in the scientists of our time.
609. because there is a great scientific revolution,
610. cognitive revolution going on now,
611. which is turning our understanding
612. toward that same recognition
613. of the power of our relations
614. with each other and with the universe.
615. That we are not separate abiding selves,
616. monads that have to be competing with each other or creating our own perfection and purity,
617. but that we are currents of knowing and feeling and action fed by streams of matter, energy,
618. and information, these weaving together. And that became so clear to me in my own life when I
619. turned toward systems theory. Happenstantially, as a matter of fact, I'm just looking, I had
620. no, I didn't even know what systems meant. And if I had somebody to explain it, I would
621. have thought it was very boring and some realm of science that had nothing to do with me.
622. But I walked in and I listened to what the professor was saying and what he was saying
623. was drawing on the board and I thought, this is the Dharma in another guise. And the main,
624. again and again and again, key points about the Dharma were reflected in the ontology
625. and epistemology of the system's view. I bring that up, not to make you laugh so much,
626. which I don't mind, but which is to say that this shift in identity
627. that we are invited to make now,
628. you don't need to think of it just in spiritual terms
629. or in poetic or mystical terms.
630. This is seen very clearly in scientific terms
631. from the system's perspective,
632. that it is this notion that we are a self
633. doing our thinking between our ears,
634. looking out at the world from behind our eyes,
635. acting on it as a separate and distinctive individual
636. is not the only way you see it.
637. And that there is indeed, we get into a terrific trap
638. if we identify who we are with this separate self
639. whose name we wear, you know.
640. If I think all I am is Joanna,
641. a white, aging American woman.
642. And I want to just read a couple of paragraphs
643. from the systems perspective.
644. This is from my book,
645. World is Lover, World is Self.
646. So systems theorists point out,
647. we were talking about that in our workshop this weekend,
648. because I always bring it in.
649. this is part of the liberation of our time
650. we can identify, shift our identity
651. with something much bigger
652. than the dramas and ambitions
653. of this little piece of reality
654. that is inside my bag of skin
655. so there's no categorical I
656. set over against a categorical you or it
657. one of the clearest teachers of this is gregory bateson he says the false reification like
658. thingification of the self is basic to our planetary ecological crisis
659. we have imagined that we are a unit of survival and we have to see to our own survival
660. and we imagine that the unit of survival
661. is the separate individual or a separate species
662. whereas in reality
663. through the history of evolution
664. it is the individual plus the environment
665. the species plus the environment
666. for they are essentially symbiotic
667. the self is a metaphor
668. we can choose to limit it to our skin
669. our person, our family, our organization, or our species.
670. We can select its boundaries in objective reality.
671. And what we are experiencing is a bankruptcy
672. of seeing this self as a unit of consumption
673. that must always be buying and consuming to keep our capitalist political economy going we can be liberated from that and more and more people are allowing that waking up to happen
674. A waking up for the sake of life.
675. My friends, this time it's not just one Buddha.
676. This time everybody has to wake up.
677. this time everybody wants to wake up
678. this time everybody can wake up
679. and without that
680. it's curtains, you know
681. so that's quite an interesting situation
682. to be in
683. and we're waking up in so many different ways
684. in the great turning
685. people are linking together in study groups
686. People are linking arms to say no to war and the fabrication of weapons.
687. People are meeting in their towns and places to accelerate a great change, the great transition.
688. So a beautiful part of the great turning is the transition culture.
689. becoming aware of how long we've been around that we have a right to be here that we have the
690. authority of our 14 billion years of this unit living in this universe and that also invites us
691. to open our heart-minds to the future ones
692. and to their right to live on a planet
693. that is not poisoned,
694. that is not decimated,
695. that is not denuded.
696. And much of the growing amount of the work that reconnects that we do
697. is also nurturing our capacity to not only reach back to the origins that feed our power,
698. but to those who are coming after us, so that those of future ones can...
699. We're working for their sake too, you know.
700. And you've come to be together and to listen tonight,
701. partly out of a desire that life go on.
702. And it is that commitment to the future ones that I found tremendously vitalizing and refreshing in my own life.
703. So that you're here for this moment of great turning.
704. your presence here, our presence here,
705. our courage of heart and mind
706. reaches out to draw strength from the ancestors
707. and also inspiration from the future ones
708. so that we can act,
709. that we leave this planet inhabitable.
710. Our love is sufficient for that.
711. Our strength is sufficient for that.
712. My closing poem
713. is from Rainer Maria Rilke.
714. It is the last of his sonnets
715. in the sonnet to Orpheus and
716. it is in a book that I with my co-translator
717. translated and during the time we were working on this during the time of our invasion the U invasion of Iraq and the time was so dark
718. and we felt such great futility, discouragement,
719. but this kept us strong.
720. This poem had a quality to bring us in touch
721. with our strength and our faith and our true identity.
722. so I'm going to say it to you.
723. And then the first line is
724. quiet friend who has come so far.
725. That's you.
726. You've come a long distance
727. through the ages.
728. Quiet friend who has come so far.
729. Feel how your breathing
730. makes more space around you.
731. Feel that every time with a mindfulness
732. of breathing in and breathing out.
733. Feel how your breathing
734. makes more space around you.
735. Let this darkness be a bell tower
736. and you the bell.
737. And as you ring,
738. what batters you becomes your strength.
739. My favorite line,
740. so I'll have to repeat them.
741. let this darkness be a bell tower
742. and you the bell
743. as you ring what batters you
744. becomes your strength
745. swing back and forth
746. into the change
747. what is this intensity of pain
748. if the drink is bitter
749. turn yourself to wine
750. in this uncontainable might
751. be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses
752. the mystery discovered there
753. and if the world has ceased to hear you
754. say to the silent earth
755. I flow
756. and to the rushing water speak
757. I am
758. to the silent earth speak.
759. I flow to the rushing water I am.
760. And that's what you are
761. by the magic of thousands of generations
762. in this swiftly turning world.
763. You've been given this flesh, this body,
764. this house for your heart and mind,
765. this sun, these stars, this soil.
766. And you are not separate.
767. Nothing can ever happen to you
768. that will ever separate you
769. from the living majesty
770. of life and earth.
771. Because that's your true nature.
772. You belong.
773. You're woven out of belonging.
774. That is your strength.
775. That was Joanna Macy
776. on Deep Caring for the Earth.
777. This classic from our AR archives was recorded in Boulder, Colorado in 2009.
778. Joanna Macy was a scholar of Buddhism, General Systems Theory, and Deep Ecology.
779. She passed away in 2025.
780. This program is produced by Alternative Radio, an independent nonprofit in our 40th year.
781. Our sole source of financial support comes directly from individuals just like you AR features such voices as David Corton Roxanne Dunbar and Robin D Kelly
782. To access our complete audio and book catalog, just go to our website, alternativeradio.org.
783. That's alternativeradio.org.
784. For copies of today's program, Joanna Macy, Deep Caring for the Earth,
785. And for the Howard Zinn classic book, You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train, call us 1-800-444-1977.
786. Again, 1-800-444-1977.
787. Or go online on our website, alternativeradio.org.
788. That's alternativeradio.org.
789. PDFs, MP3s, and printed transcripts are free of charge.
790. To get them, just call us 1-800-444-1977.
791. Series theme music is performed by the Kronos Quartet from Pieces of Africa.
792. Joe Rich is our general manager and editor.
793. I'm David Barsamian.
794. Thank you for listening.
795. We go out with background music from Joni Mitchell, Woodstock.
796. © transcript Emily Beynon
797. alongside Romeo and Juliet, Treasure Island, Noel Coward's Waiting in the Wings,
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