About Elizabeth
The future is asking us to slow down and listen, and to make loving and deliberate choices. This is a time that needs us to see ourselves and the world with new eyes, to be in love and in service to life.
What will the world be like–and what choices will we make–as we grow more and more aware of our interconnectedness with all of nature? Our opportunity is to revive and act with the authority of the ancient, unbroken bond between ourselves and the living body of earth.
My life has been a training ground for returning to Gaia as Source.
I was lucky to be born into a line of witches who understood the underlying patterns of nature, the rhythms of life, and our ancient kinship with the night sky.
I’m so grateful for this gift because it served as my lifeline while I was growing up. Without digging too far into my own story, I’ll share briefly that I experienced very real trauma and separation in early childhood. These experiences of loss and shock came early and hard and so, in response, I turned to the one thing I knew would not and could not abandon me: Nature/Cosmos.
It only seemed natural that my love for this world express itself early on through break-your-heart, break-your-life activism–the kind that inevitably leads to social division, burnout, despair, and numb disconnection from the circle of life. How is that for irony? And yet, I know my journey is not unique.
Environmental activism seemed a natural way to channel my love and respect for our world, but instead it led me to overextend, to take on too much of the world’s weight.
Meanwhile some of the most potent fuel any of us could ask for – the energy that arises from being connected with Source, from softening around the complex feelings about the apparent conflict of interest between modern civilization and mother earth’s survival – went untapped and unnamed.
Attuning to the natural flow of life takes practice. And it takes love…of self and of Life/Gaia. And if you can imagine what it looks like for a forest to return after a fire – well, that is what slowly happens as the ecological soul awakens. It gradually grows into the burned out places, and something fresh eventually takes root.
Eventually, I started to see a different story and path – one that promised kinship and intimacy with the world. Even with all of the wounds of the world, enchantment and magic are alive and woven into the fiber of life.
It took a lot of deep diving and self-honesty to arrive at a joyful means of empowerment and collective transformation. What I now understand is that we are far more powerful and authentic when we can acknowledge and move through the guilt, urgency and fear that drives so much of activist culture. We can then enter a playful, creative and biophilic state (biophilia is the love of nature and all living things) from which we can act as Earthlings — human creatures who are in deep bondedness with the living body of Earth.
As a result, I’ve apprenticed myself to the voice of nature and my core bond with Earth throughout my life. The strength and support, and the deep psychological comfort in feeling of rather than on Earth has been an incredible gift in my life. And it is this feeling of belonging which we urgently need at this time, for the benefit of the whole web of life. I know we are each a part of this living circle of the world, and I know that it is reaching toward us all the time. All of my offerings are informed by this approach.
Lineage and Influence
Following my mother’s and my grandmother’s lead, I’ve learned to tend a sacred well of nourishment in the most ordinary places: circles of women, dreams and imagination, the voice & cycles of Nature.
In addition to my own natural path as an ecofeminist and witch, some of my most meaningful collaborations and apprenticeships have been in the company of revered elders, playful colleagues, and curious friends. Joanna Macy, Matthew Fox, Starhawk, Susan Griffin, Bill Plotkin, Sherri Mitchell, Thomas Berry, Naropa University’s InterArts Instructors (Lee Worley, Barbara Dilley, Paul Oertel, Annie Brook and more) have all helped me to build a path to the world and its wyrd intelligence.
The teachings of Dharma Art, wilderness-based rites of passage, Authentic Movement, Body Mind Centering, Contemplative Dance Practice, and Performance & Outsider Art/Books/Music have all helped to shape my mythopoetic identity. (To get a taste of the creative sensibilities that inform my work, you can enjoy my curated playlists for the year at this link.
Our greatest good right now is served by projects, people, structures and experiences that awaken our ingenuity, compassion, authenticity and embodied presence in the world.
Decades of wild experimentation have led to a festive and strange array of ecospiritual capers, including a life-changing ecofeminist intentional community; The Center for Sustainable Living; Gaia’s Witness EcoArts Pilgrimage; the Be Space Community Studio; the Life.Art.Being Integrative Arts Festival & Planetary Dance; the Blue Dragon Ball; and now Earth Dragon Press, and the Dreamfruit series of books and programs for Radical Belonging.