Zen Ecology

Introduction

WHAT A TIME to be alive. Violence and war continue to wreak immense harm. Changing social conditions are making many of us feel vulnerable, left behind, or disrespected. Here in the United States, social divides are widening, white nationalism is on the rise, bizarre conspiracy theories are getting accepted by wider swaths of the population, and the terrorism threat is now more domestic than foreign. Many of us hurry through our days, feeling scattered as we multitask. We may see our lives as cluttered, with too many things on our calendars and too much going on in our heads. Some of us are lost in the hyper-individualistic world of consuming and self-branding. Even when linked through social media, we may feel disconnected from other people. Hanging over these issues are grave environmental problems, with climate disruption even threatening to destroy civilization as we know it.

In the face of all of this, many of us wish we could simplify our lives and find greater calm and contentment. We may yearn to be more connected with nature and the people around us. Some of us may even wish we were living more ecologically and doing more to mitigate climate disruption. Typically, though, we keep on doing what’s familiar and find succor in food, television, films, shopping, sports, family life, and social media, without a clear sense of an alternative way of living that can reduce our negative environmental impact and help us get more engaged in solving problems like the climate crisis.

Recently, I’ve been trying to envision and practice a way of living that can help me slow down, stay grounded, and deal with all that 2is flying at me, and at the same time help me reduce my ecological impact and get more engaged in responding to the climate crisis. What I’ve come up with thus far is not something systematic, and certainly not a sure fix, but simply a way of living that is spacious, simple, embedded in nature, connected to others in community, and supportive of collective action. Though we may think that living ecologically and engaging in activism sacrifices our own enjoyment and happiness on the altar of doing the right thing, what I’m envisioning is a way of living that can actually be more fulfilling than typical ways of living. Rather than deprivation, it can bring us richness.

Though I’m still figuring this out and don’t always do what I intend, I know that I don’t want to become numb to what’s been happening, and neither do I want to dwell in the distraction afforded by apps, videos, and the busy-ness I see all around me. I don’t know if there is any truth to the metaphor about frogs failing to jump out of a slowly heating pot of water, but I don’t want to ignore what’s happening around me. If possible, I’d like to stay awake and help turn the burner off. To use another metaphor, I don’t want to sleepwalk into a dystopian future.

Having spent much of my life studying and practicing Zen Buddhism while working as a professor of Religious Studies, I’ve been blessed with an array of resources from which to draw as I envision this alternative way of living. In workshops, lectures, and writings, Buddhist teachers have been sharing their tradition’s resources to help people deal with climate anxiety and understand the cause of the climate crisis, and what they are offering has huge value at this time. While I have benefited greatly from their teachings, I’ve also found myself wanting to hear more about what I can actually do—what specific actions I can take to mitigate the crisis, and how those actions can be informed by Buddhism and perhaps even support us on our spiritual paths.

One reason I’ve created this book is to fill that void, at least partially. In the process of writing here about Buddhist resources for an alternative way of living, I’ve felt resistance within myself 3to suggesting specific actions and to using my own efforts as an example. I haven’t wanted to run the risk of being overly prescriptive or coming across as virtue-signaling. But I do think that many of us are looking for some direction as we feel the impetus to do something—anything—in response to the climate crisis, and so I’ve assumed that risk in the hope that you can find at least some of what I share here to be beneficial to you, and in the hope that you may give me feedback as I try—and in many moments struggle—to live in a green and engaged way.

Much of what I am formulating here is a set of Buddhist ideas, practices, and values that can inform our attempts to live ecologically.¹ In sharing my attempts to put these resources into action, I move outward in a series of concentric circles, starting with myself and core relationships, then proceeding to the home, nature around us, local community, and broader arenas of activism. At the individual level, to deal with distraction, clutter, and ecological harm—or, to put it positively, to help us pay attention, simplify our lives, and free up time and energy to take action—I’ve been working with spaciousness in relation to mental, verbal, and physical action. I also deploy such Buddhist mental states as mindfulness, generosity, and contentment to envision a type of environmental virtue ethic. In the next concentric circle, as a support structure for spaciousness and the cultivation of these mental states, I offer some ideas about the home as a “place of the Way” (dōjo), with Zen monastic life as a model for this. Then I turn to how we can realize our embeddedness in nature and emplace ourselves in community with others, including other animals. Next, I offer some comments about how on this basis we can engage in activism to create a world that is more supportive of ecological health and spiritual fulfillment.

As you will see, much of what I explore here pertains more to people of privilege who bear more responsibility for the climate crisis than people who are struggling and may be disproportionately affected by the crisis. I’m pitching my comments to those who can—and need to—green their lifestyles and who have the time and resources not only to practice contemplative traditions but to get 4involved in activism to mitigate the crisis. That is to say, I’m assuming that many of my readers will be people with privilege deriving from their occupation, wealth, race, or gender, and hence are also people who can use that privilege to make a difference.

My explorations here build upon two of my previous books, Zen on the Trail: Hiking as Pilgrimage and Meditations on the Trail: A Guidebook for Self-Discovery. In those books I describe ways of connecting with nature or, more accurately, of realizing our embeddedness in nature as nature.² For many of us, this realization is a first step toward becoming more aware of what’s happening to the beautiful planet we call home.

But this enhanced awareness is not sufficient. We must also figure out alternative ways of leading our daily lives. And not only that, but creative ways of responding to systemic issues. Simply put, this historical moment calls for lifestyle change at the individual level and structural change at the societal level. We need this dual focus, for to call only for a reduction of our personal carbon footprints is to lay responsibility for causing and solving the problem at the feet of individuals and thereby let our economic system and powerful players like the fossil fuel industry off the hook.³ Advocacy of lifestyle change may also overlook the fact that many of us cannot afford to buy an electric car or equip our homes with heat pumps, better insulation, and weathertight windows, if we even own a home. And many of us don’t have access to good public transportation or healthy, locally grown food with a minimal carbon impact.

In sharing this largely Buddhist approach here, I’m not viewing Buddhism as a panacea. Nor do I see its traditional beliefs and practices as sufficient for greening our way of living and bringing about structural change. Indeed, those beliefs and practices were formulated to liberate us spiritually, not to show us how to live in a healthy way with the earth and our fellow beings. Nevertheless, with its emphasis on restraining desire and cultivating mindfulness, insight, compassion, non-harming, and simple living, the fundamental Buddhist path is ecological. Practicing it now, with some of 5the tweaks and additions I offer here, provides a win-win scenario: this path, this way of living, bears both ecological and spiritual fruit.

I imagine that you, too, have thought about how to live in these times and have devised strategies of your own, and I offer this book to share what I’ve come up with thus far and to initiate a dialogue with you. Though the challenges we face are daunting, it is still possible for us to make changes, transform our world, and live fulfilling lives.