The biggest gift you can give is to be absolutely present, and when you’re worrying about whether you’re hopeful or hopeless or pessimistic or optimistic, who cares? The main thing is that you’re showing up, that you’re here, and that you’re finding ever more capacity to love this world — because it will not be healed without that. That [is] what is going to unleash our intelligence and our ingenuity and our solidarity for the healing of our world. — Joanna Macy (The Marginalian)
After a life dedicated to personal, social, and planetary transformation, the “awake activist,” Buddhist scholar and deep ecologist Joanna Macy died this month, aged 96. There has been an outpouring of appreciation for her all over the globe, a testament to the game-changing effect that her life and work have had on so many, particularly through the transformational methodology she developed, called The Work that Reconnects (WTR). She is one of the people I call to mind when I am in need of a role model, an elder, a wise and compassionate presence to help navigate my way through these bewildering and distressing times. “Bewilderment is good,” I can almost hear her say, “let yourself feel it—honor it.”
There are excellent eulogies at Buddhistdoor Global and Tricycle, if you want to get a comprehensive view on her life. In this article I will take a more personal angle to honor her passing. I am sad that I never met her in person. I nearly did: in 2005, when she was invited by some of my Triratna Order friends to lead a training retreat for WTR facilitators at Taraloka Buddhist Retreat Centre. She wasn’t well enough to travel, but the retreat went ahead anyway, ably guided by people who had trained with her in the United States. I particularly remember the morning meditations, when we were read a selection of current news items ranging from the scary and exasperating to the hopeful and hilarious. We were encouraged to bring our mindfulness training to bear on what we were hearing, monitoring our emotional responses or reactions, doing our best to keeping our hearts and minds open.
“The Buddha himself didn’t hang out in the deep forest in the way that the forest teachers of his time did,” Joanna said in an interview in 2008. “He taught near the cities, and always in conversation with the people in power—the merchants, the kings, the courtiers and the ministers. He told his followers, ‘Go forth for the welfare of the many.’” (Transition Culture)
Joanna certainly followed this call. Inspired by both Theravada and Tibetan Buddhist influences—she took refuge with Sister Karma Khechog Palmo in 1974—she applied her considerable intellectual, creative, and organizational talents to serve the world she loved passionately. She had the clarity and boldness to address some of the most pressing concerns of our times, such as the nuclear threat during the Cold War and the accelerating ecological crisis. She often remarked on the gift of having been born into the world at this turning point in human history: “To sense the enormous privilege that is ours to be alive at this time, where our lives can matter. Where we make choices. Where in the very danger and darkness of our time we grow such solidarity. Where the play of our imagination and vision can matter supremely. It is a wonderful time.” (Transition Culture)
Joanna’s teaching helped me to reframe my understanding of the pervading distress I experienced just by living in this modern world. So many aspects of life often felt oppressive: witnessing, even from a distance, the crazy violence of war and the shocking aftermath; images of sea-creatures suffocated by plastic or the sea floor ravaged by trawlers; the rapid decrease of bio-diversity in environments degraded for maximum, short-term financial return; erratic and catastrophic weather events, so clearly related to the reckless pumping of greenhouse gases into our atmosphere; the smelly, smoky, concrete ugliness of many parts of our cities; the conflict-breeding, widening divisions between the rich and the poor; the alienating mood in supermarkets and airports; the all-pervasive presence of advertising, creating false needs; the breakdown of trust within many areas of the public domain. I could go on. I thought my unhappiness was largely due to my apparently overly sensitive temperament, combined with a challenging childhood, and that it was my personal failure not to be able to stay more resilient and positive. Macy exposes the reductively pathologizing view that lies behind this lonesome burden-carrying and replaces it with a stance that is radically liberating: “This is a dark time, filled with suffering and uncertainty. Like living cells in a larger body, it is natural that we feel the trauma of our world. So don’t be afraid of the anguish you feel, or the anger or fear, because these responses arise from the depth of your caring and the truth of your interconnectedness with all beings.” (Embodiment Matters)
Interconnectedness is the key to her approach—it integrates general systems science and the core Buddhist concept of pratityasamutpada, which posits that all phenomena, both physical and mental, arise in dependence on other phenomena, meaning nothing exists independently or in isolation. “It is a delusion that the self is so separate and fragile that we must delineate and defend its boundaries; that it is so small and so needy that we must endlessly acquire and endlessly consume; and that as individuals, corporations, nation-states, or a species, we can be immune to what we do to other beings.” (Greening of the Self, 152) Her teachings on the true nature of self – insubstantial, connected and conditioned as everything else – have brought profound and uncompromising Dharma perspectives to activist audiences who frequently suffer from burn-out. It is easy to unwittingly perpetuate ego-driven violence, even to oneself. “When you look at what is happening to our world—and it is hard to look at what’s happening to our water, our air, our trees, our fellow species—it becomes clear that unless you have some roots in a spiritual practice that holds life sacred and encourages joyful communion with all your fellow beings, facing the enormous challenges ahead becomes nearly impossible.” ((The Nature of Cities: “Greening of the Self,” 150) Her great gift was to bring, through her writing and the WTR, these theories alive in the hearts and bones of those of us who choose, at least some of the time, to open our ears to the cries of the world.
The Work that Reconnects is part of “The Great Turning,” away from an industrial growth culture that is trashing the planet into a life-sustaining culture. The WTR has four stages that build on each other and also include each other. It is described as “The Spiral”—with the experience deepening through each return. I have been using elements of this structure in many contexts, both for myself and teaching others—in meditations, workshops, retreats, conversations, and art projects. To give a flavor of the work, I will offer a brief summary of the steps, each with a typical WTR exercises/ritual—and there is a great treasure chest of those to choose from:
Coming from gratitude: grounding in appreciation for life, opening the heart and shifting focus from fear to relaxed presence.
Exercise: “Open Sentences”—in pairs, participants take turns completing prompts like “One thing I love about being alive is . . .”Honoring our pain for the world: creating space to feel and express our difficult emotions, as a natural result of our belonging to life.
Exercise: “Truth Mandala”—objects representing different emotions (grief, fear, anger, emptiness) are placed in the center, and participants speak their truths while holding one, witnessed and held by the caring and accepting circle.Seeing with new and/or ancient eyes: exploring interconnectedness and shifting to a systems perspective that reveals emergent possibilities for change.
Exercise: “Deep Time Walk”—participants imaginatively encounter ancestors while walking through time, gaining perspective on humanity’s place in the Earth’s story.Going forth: clarifying personal and collective roles in the Great Turning and committing to meaningful action.
Exercise: “Letter from the Future”—each person writes a letter from the seventh generation to themselves, articulating possible changes and challenges on the way.
As I write this, I find myself returning to that morning meditation practice from the 2005 retreat—opening to the day’s news with the willingness to be fully emotionally present, surfing the breaking edge of the moment. This is perhaps Joanna’s greatest gift: teaching us that our sensitivity to the world’s suffering isn’t a weakness to overcome, but a doorway to authentic and creative engagement. In a time when it’s tempting to shut down or turn away, she showed us how to stay awake, stay connected, and find in our shared vulnerability and love for the world the source of our strength. There are many ways of playing a part in the “Great Turning”, some more audacious and noticeable, some more quiet and internal. It is easy to feel that one is not doing enough, or that one’s actions won’t make any difference. The systems perspective changes this sense of futility dramatically: “You are freed from continually computing your chances of success”, Joanna said. “We are interwoven in a much vaster response, so that our part of it is just one strand in a moving, flowing tapestry of response.” (Transition Culture)
A quality that comes to me when I think of Joanna and that I want to make more room for in my own heart, is “ardor.” She loved the poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke and co-translated the Book of Hours. “Rilke reminded me that I had the strength and courage to walk out into the world as into my own heart, and to ‘Love the things / as no one has thought to love them.’” (Wayback Machine)
See more
Joanna Macy: And Her Work
Work That Reconnects Network
Dial Up the Magic of This Moment: Philosopher Joanna Macy on How Rilke Can Help Us Befriend Our Mortality and Be More Alive (The Marginalian)
Buddhist Teacher and Environmental Activist Joanna Macy Has Died, Aged 96 (BDG)
Ecodharma Leader and Activist Joanna Macy Has Died (Tricycle)
Exclusive to Transition Culture: An Interview with Joanna Macy (Transition Culture)
Answering the Call of Our Time (Embodiment Matters)
The Greening of the Self (The Nature of Cities)
The Force of the Storm – Garrison Institute (Wayback Machine)
Related features from BDG
Clootie Bridge: An Art Ritual to Awaken our Ecological Selves
Mandala of Socially Engaged Buddhism: A Tool for Sustainable Activism
Pain, Purpose, and Parenting: Greta Thunberg and Joanna Macy on Personal Crises and Societal Solutions
Weaving Dharma and Social Justice Practice Paths
The Barre Center for Buddhist Studies: EcoDharma Beacon
Book Review: Summoned by the Earth: Becoming a Holy Vessel for Healing Our World
