by Telma G. Laurentino, PhD
within Spectrum to Heal the Climate by Healing Living Systems
What is it?
Returning Home is a moon-guided sharing circle to learn tools of decolonization of the mind & reconnection with our wild inner and outer ecosystems.
During 5 weeks, following a full moon cycle, the participants will gather every week to connect with themselves and others, and share personal experiences guided by Telma G. Laurentino. She will bring readings and themes of (dis)connection to the natural world with the aim of collectively observing cultural patterns that distract us from the power to belong and contribute to a more sustainable world.
By the end of the moon cycle, we may have:
- Found a community of aligned and engaged peers;
- Found our way back into the rhythms of nature that nurture our personal lives;
- Found nature guides that will keep the journey alive in the long run;
- Renewed our intuition to listen to our bodies, minds and surroundings without overwhelm;
- Renewed our sense of belonging to our inner and outer ecosystems;
- Reconnected with personal love and heartbreaks that fuel our mindful activism
for planet Earth;
Learning program
- Found a community of aligned and engaged peers;
- Found our way back into the rhythms of nature that nurture our personal lives;
- Found nature guides that will keep the journey alive in the long run;
- Renewed our intuition to listen to our bodies, minds and surroundings without overwhelm;
- Renewed our sense of belonging to our inner and outer ecosystems;
- Reconnected with personal love and heartbreaks that fuel our mindful activism
for planet Earth;
Week 1 – Gathering
Addressing: Pervasive capitalistic tendencies
Root concept: the “law of limitation”, natural cycles, rest as revolution
Offering: New ways to “gather” mindfully
Teachers: Squirrel, Bower bird, Puffer fish…
Homework: gather with permission from the land
Week 2 – Weaving
Addressing: Pervasive capitalistic tendencies
Root concept: the “law of limitation”, natural cycles, rest as revolution
Offering: New ways to “gather” mindfully
Teachers: Squirrel, Bower bird, Puffer fish…
Homework: gather with permission from the land
Week 3 – Echolocating
Addressing: Pervasive capitalistic tendencies
Root concept: the “law of limitation”, natural cycles, rest as revolution
Offering: New ways to “gather” mindfully
Teachers: Squirrel, Bower bird, Puffer fish…
Homework: gather with permission from the land
Week 4 – Interbeing
Addressing: Binary, Dichotomy and Separation (each other, human/nature, etc.)
Root concept: We as ecosystem, Interconnectedness
Offering: New ways of BEING
Teachers: Seed, Lichen, Mycorrhiza, Gut microbiota…
Homework: Experience yourself as an ecosystem within ecosystem (guided meditation / medicine walk)
Week 5 – Reflection on the collective transformation
What resonated?
What was harder?
What was freeing?
What still seems impossible?
What have we learned?
What have we transformed?
Homework: Create a symbol of what to let go and what to carry on
Who is it for?
- Those searching for ways to free themselves from prescribed disconnection
- Those in need of a nudge in the directions of creativity and freedom
- The secular, the spiritual and all holding evolving belief systems & world views
- Lovers of Science and Poetry
- Those who want to be more in touch with themselves and nature
- The curious and brave willing to hold the complexity of the ecological crisis
- Those who love the Earth and feel its pain
- Those who want to listen and share in a safe space
- Those looking to Return Home
Who is Telma?
Telma G. Laurentino, PhD is an academic researcher, educator, and writer. Born and raised in Portugal, Telma’s research in evolutionary biology had her moving to Switzerland to obtain her PhD and to the USA, where she worked as a Postdoc researcher of the adaptation of lizards to desert habitats, at UC Berkeley. In 2019, she founded evALLution: an education project to make evolution and biodiversity accessible for, and with, people with blindness.
Her study of biodiversity took her to 5 continents and her scientific research has been published in high impact international peer-reviewed journals since 2012. Her personal connection with her surrounding ecosystems is now illustrated in her first published book “A love letter FROM THE FOREST to you, through me”, where science ceases to be a mere language of separation and dissection, instead being reclaimed as a language of uncertainty and wonder. With all her work, she hopes to contribute to healing the artificial divide between scientist and poet, human and non-human.
More about her work at www.telmagl.com
I believe in individual power and community belonging as sources of collective transformation. During this journey back home together, I’ll be a facilitator, translator of science and collective space holder, but Nature is the true guide and mentor. Each of us is a traveler already carrying the wisdom we need, while simultaneously being each other’s faithful walking sticks. We’ll return together.”
Living mural
Doesn’t need account creating nor any extra work!
A space where every participant can add:
- Arts & Crafts that emerge fueled by the conversations
- Weekly writing & illustrated reflections
- Resonant quotes, images, readings
- Photos of their process
- Links for resonating materials
- Suggestions in Our shared library
Inspirational readings
Excerpts of some of these books will be shared during the course for
collective discussion
- Being Salmon, Being Human: Encountering the wild in us and us in the wild by Martin Lee Mueller
- 8 master lessons of Nature by Gary Ferguson
- Coming Back to Life: Practices to Reconnect Our Lives, Our World by Joanna Macy
- The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know Is Possible by Charles Eisenstein
- Rooted by Lynn Haupt
- The spell of the sensuous by David Abram
- Sensuous Knowledge – a black feminist approach for everyone by Minna Salami
- Rest is resistance, a manifesto by Tricia Hersey
- Sacred seed by Vandana Shiva et al.
- Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer
This library will grow in collaboration, as we learn together and share
inspiration with each other!