The Bigger Picture View Brings Healing & Mental Wellness

One of the things I’m interested in is the way hierarchies and systems of supremacies cut individuals off from the wider human body, so they’re not able to emphathize, or feel the pain of another. I once heard Jeannette Armstrong describe our Okanagan definitions of insanity, and one of them is ‘cut off from your whole earth part.’

- excerpt from, Turn This World Inside Out by, Nor Samara

Confession: one of my self soothing and decompression activities is to watch nature documentaries. Planet Earth, Blue Planet, Nature, you name it…I can get lost in it when my physical and mental being need a break from this daily life. Growing up as a latch-key kid in San Jose, the TV was where I turned to for my nature fix because it brought me the mystery and curiosity of the natural world. And it’s what that kept me close to a place that wasn’t “here”.

And after what seems like a lifetime of cultivating this love I have for nature, I recently found about this term that Astronauts know of as, “The Overview Effect”(watch the 15 min video with astronauts). When they’re there out in space, the view of Earth somehow changes the way you see your place on the planet. So when I learned about it, I felt like I finally had a word for that feeling I have when I get lost in the drama of nature and start to feel just a bit smaller as a human being. It brings back a sense of humility, of being connected to something bigger than myself, and essentially my multidimensionality. I realized this is what continues to nurture me and my mental health as my external environment seems to be imploding in on itself. 

Now, if you’ve been to any of my talks, workshops, or trainings you know that this is the central message I give to manage the deep work many of us are doing in social justice and community organizing: our wholeness IS our wellness. And even if you’re not in social impact work, the lines between corporate and community-based are quickly fading. 

So, if you’re curious about understanding the power of this nature-based approach to your work and everyday navigation through life, I offer my unique, nature-based way to engage with this material and begin your journey towards more self-awareness and intentional impact potential to your work.

You can start easily by reading more about my Radical Nature Framework and how this shapes the work of engaging with nature’s systems to heal our relationships with each other. Sharing this framework has been a profound exercise helping folks understand DEI, cultivate a social justice lens, explore spiritual guidance, and bring conscious land-based work forward. All this, guided by looking towards the natural world. Check out Our Approach and reflect on what comes up for you when you read about this framework. 

Find that moment to tap into that Overview Effect by taking a walk in nature, visiting a local botanical garden, or zoning out on the next episode of a nature documentary! And share with me:

What views and experiences in nature bring you back to 
a sense of wholeness and interconnectedness?