The Bioneers Conference, podcasts, books and global community has always meant connection with nature to me: “Revolution from the Heart of Nature” as they say – but it’s much more and it’s wisdom and global community has never been more needed. Moving  towards a Just Transition is heavy work!  And we need to be part of the solution.

Seems we’re at an impasse, first rush of young people moving to work with people over 60 – The Third Act –  and a great number of  young people have recenlty rallied hard for changes that require the whole of our culture to basically sign on.

Education was the first thing Greta Thunberg called for – but most people don’t even know the  issues let alone believe they can have any impact on our current and future history. EVs? Heat pumps? Solar panels, well, yes, that makes sense money wise and because of rolling blackouts – but HOW on EARTH do we ever achieve a global peace? Or even a peaceful nation?

No simple answer – but maybe there are simply tough questions we can answer.  Since Bioneers joined with the Othering and Belonging Institute recently at UCBerkeley, it occurs to me the simplicity of considering every person to be family would change it all.

The family of man and woman and whoever else is present!  Turtles!  Fish are sentient.
A new reach out into deep space came back with sounds like whales!  Could the univserse all be alive and us swimming in it? Possibly. There remain great mysteries we hope our human race lasts long enough to learn about.

Then along comes another iteration of the Bioneers Conference (34 years young) and for one brief shining moment the path seems sunny and covered with fresh wood chips.  I mean the inspirational speakers and the whole crowd who comes to Bioneers make you believe in your best self and your ability to change the climate story to a good one and the cultural story as well. A keynote speaker this time, Rebecca Solnit, who Bill McKibben thinks is our best living essayist, just published a little book with a lot to say, Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility.   I ordered ahead and also got the audio book version.

So at Bioneers, WE ARE ONE for awhile, and we sang that standing up with The WildChoir from Oakland, a kind of high I used to get on Christmas morning as a kid.

I’m still sorting through materials offered weeks after the conference and the videos are still available here:

https://www.bioneerslearning.org/products/bioneers-2023

I figure if you got this far into the discussion, you will greatly enjoy the keynotes!  And please do offer ongoing support for Bioneers so it/they can continue to bring vision, warmth, insight, calm to our struggle to survive with dignity, a truly Just Transition.