Nine Legs
By Janet Thomas

"Going Green" is the only political hope for this country, but it has to start with "Feeling Green" or it won't survive the cataclysm. I can attest to thenearly impenetrable depth of the problems undermining the infrastructure of democracy in the U.S., having just returned from being a poll watcher with Election Protection in Columbus, Ohio.

A greening of consciousness is essential if we are to revive the meaning of freedom and transform these consuming times into a global movement of collective responsibility. It's a daunting task, all too vulnerable to the very problems the Green Party is fighting against the rant and rhetoric of politics-as-usual. And the very Nature of things gets lost in the fray of opinions.

Eco-psychologist Michael Cohen explores this Nature in his work. Cohen calls for a synthesis of "four-legged" (nature-based) feeling with "five-legged" (intellect-based) thinking. He terms this "living on all nine legs," and he's developed an extensive blueprint for how we can both experience this synthesis and teach it to others. He also calls us to deal with denial about our disconnect with nature, so that Greens don't become just another rant in the political marketplace. Sharing our love for the natural world will ultimately be far more effective than venting our outrage, because love is nurturing and has lasting power. Love changes the mind through the body.

The Green challenge is to help people get to these feelings of restoration, where body, mind and spirit are supported and celebrated in and by the natural world. Then we must help folks formulate their feelings into a language of ideas and actions that transforms environmentally destructive behaviors (such as unconscious voting and careless consuming) into a lifestyle that truly reflects a greening love of life in all its manifest forms.

For information about Project NatureConnect, go to: www.ecopsych.com/nineleggrnplatform.

Janet Thomas is a member of the San Juan Chapter of the Washington State Greens and the author of The Battle in Seattle: the Story Behind and Beyond the WTO Demonstrations (Fulcrum 2000).