Take Heart: Encouragement for Earth's Weary Lovers
with Erin Geesaman Rabke of Embodiment Matters and Leilani Wong Navar of Turning Season
3 Sundays in November
Nov 3: Beauty as Ballast | Nov 10: Grief as Guide | Nov 17: Body as Sacred Land
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Carrying on with “business as usual” is not working for humanity. It’s not working for the rest of the planet either.
The good news is that Business as Usual isn't the whole story.
Neither is "the Great Unraveling" - although the intersecting crises happening around our world are part of the story, too.
Here at Turning Season we're focusing on a third plotline: the global adventure story Joanna Macy has called "The Great Turning":
our collective shift toward life-honoring, life-sustaining ways of being human.
Hi. I’m Leilani Navar. I was inspired to start Turning Season Podcast in 2021 after participating in a multi-week Work that Reconnects workshop. In some sessions, as part of our greeting, we each shared an observation from the week that could be seen as "evidence that the Great Turning is happening." I loved the variety of what was named. From permaculture projects to public policy changes, from urban beekeepers to children helping drowning bugs, the evidence was diverse and plentiful.
I'd been having a great time podcasting about dreamwork (and interviewing amazing dreamworkers!) for almost two years, but at that point, my focus was naturally broadening to a wider range of topics. I felt that it would be delightful and supportive to expand the podcast to include all manner of Great Turning evidence, and host deep conversations that let you get to know the how's and the why's and the hearts of individuals who are rising to their unique roles in this time on Earth.
In addition to hosting these conversations, I serve my community in clinical practice and online as an acupuncturist, herbalist, and dreamworker. I help people tend to their physical and emotional health - and the connection between them - through practical wisdom from Chinese Medicine, and insights from their own dreams. I also facilitate the Work that Reconnects, most often through School for the Great Turning. In personal health and global outlook, it lights me up to see people feel relief, and a new sense of possibility.
To keep me heartened, actively hopeful, and honoring my pain for the world, I turn regularly to the work of Joanna Macy, who's been bringing her incredible heart and brilliant mind to meet these times since before I was born. "The Great Turning" is a term of Joanna's, and refers to one of "The Three Stories of Our Time." You'll hear more about all three stories on the podcast. (And if you're curious, you can click here to learn more about me and ways we can work together.)
EPISODES
Episode 44: Summoned by the Earth (with Cynthia Jurs)
I’ll be honest with you: the “great unraveling” is as real as the “great turning.” They’re happening at the same time, and have been for decades. The unraveling was already accelerating, and now (late 2024) to see a democratic election process choose a path of more, worse, faster harm to our planet and our fellow…
LISTEN NOWEpisode 43: Beauty as Ballast, Grief as Guide, Body as Sacred Land (with Erin Geesaman Rabke and Leilani Navar)
I’m so happy to share this conversation with you. It’s between me and my dear friend, Erin Geesaman Rabke, about sustaining our tender hearts and our dedication to showing up for the web of life on Earth, through all the heartbreak, overwhelm, and discouragement that can happen when we care deeply about our world. We…
LISTEN NOWEpisode 42: Resilience & Mental Health in Humanitarian Response (with Paula Ramírez)
“How is it that those individuals who are in the front line, in the first response, can bring that awareness, that connection to their own selves through their own nervous system, owning again a quality of spaciousness in their body?” My wonderful guest for this episode, Paula Ramírez, supports mental health in contexts of war…
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