Animism is the experiential ontology that has been natural to humanity for the overwhelming majority of our existence. Humans have and still do experience a world which is itself fully alive, made up of a fractally embedded diversity of living beings, from mountains to microscopics. Not only have almost all human cultures envisioned the world this way, we have taken care to communicate respectfully with its many parts, striving to navigate harmoniously as one type of being among many, all of whom need to get along and maintain the balance of a benevolent world. Not all types of beings have the kind of consciousness we associate with humans, but all have their own consciousness, intelligence, wisdom, and culture, which are no less legitimate, and are almost always vastly older than ours.

In the dominant culture we have forgotten all this, and the results are visible and terrifying. Not only in the climate crisis and incomprehensible destruction of our precious biosphere, but in losing the certainty that we are at home here in the world, our sense of togetherness and belonging, our ability to communicate with other species, the daily wonder of intimacy with the richness of creation – losing most of the joy of life. But, to quote Josh Schrei, “Animism is normative human consciousness.” The ability to perceive an animate world is as innate to humans as is the ability to learn language. We can regain and reclaim the experience of our daily world as living and intelligent, and of life as a shared process.

I agree with those who say that there is no environmental problem, only a problem of human consciousness. This offering is my invitation to start solving it, by reviving the perspective that kept us connected for hundreds of thousands of years.

The course will be held on Zoom, with 9 weekly sessions of an hour and a half that will include a talk, a short practice, homework and time for questions, with exercises for developing the animistic senses in between, with a final meeting in person. The planned topics are: