Wellsprings: A Fable of Consciousness

Selections from the Novel by William T. Hathaway

Cosmic Egg Books 2013

2026. The earth's ecosystem has broken down under human abuse. Water supplies are shrinking. Rain is rare, and North America is gripped in the Great Drought with crops withering and forests dying. In the midst of environmental and social collapse, an old woman and a young man set out to heal nature and reactivate the cycle of flow by using techniques of higher consciousness. But the corporations that control the remaining water lash out to stop them.

In the novel water is analogous to consciousness. People are out of contact with their own inner wellsprings of consciousness, so their lives are withering. And their ignorant actions have driven the earth's water deep underground, so nature is withering. Human life and the earth's life are trapped in suffering. The story shows the two main characters evolving their consciousness to a level where they can sense the water and restore its natural flow for humanity and the earth. A blend of adventure, ecology, and mystic wisdom, WELLSPRINGS: A Fable of Consciousness is a frightening but hopeful look into a future that is looming closer every day.

It's also a love story, which is of course also good for our consciousness.

The book begins with the narrator, Bob, getting ready to leave his hometown in California after graduating from high school: (more…)

A legal duty of care - protecting our planet

Interview with Polly Higgins

by Katy Olivia van Tergouw

London barrister and author Polly Higgins discusses the legal aspect of the Earth's right to life, which is threatened by the Ecocide practiced by commercial interests. Source: Share International, October 2013 

"The crime of ecocide is a natural evolution of law: the Ecocide Act is not radical in its remit. On the contrary, it is part of an evolution of legislation dealing with the impact of pollution and the principle of superior responsibility. In the eyes of the law, creating the crime of ecocide is not about closing the door to evil. It is in fact about protecting a higher value: the sacredness of life, all life." - Polly Higgins

During her years as a barrister in London courts, where she represented both individuals and corporations on discrimination cases and corporate law, Polly Higgins became convinced that the Earth needed a good lawyer. The planet was also being treated unfairly and the tools of Ms Higgins' trade were not adequate. Quite simply, the laws to protect the interests of the Earth do not exist.

In 2010 Polly Higgins proposed to the United Nations that Ecocide be made the Fifth Crime Against Peace. At present the Rome Statute sets out Four Crimes against Peace (genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression). Her book, Eradicating Ecocide: Laws and governance to prevent the destruction of our planet won the 2011 People's Book Prize for non-fiction, and has been followed by Earth is our Business - changing the rules of the game. (more…)

Breaking the silence: taking action on cancer and the environment

In an interview, internationally recognized authority Dr. Sandra Steingraber discusses the mounting evidence linking cancer and pollution, and asks how much evidence is needed before action is taken.

Ecologist, author and activist Sandra Steingraber PhD, is an internationally recognized authority on the environmental links to cancer and human health. She is the author of four books, including Raising Elijah: Protecting Children in an Age of Environmental Crisis (2013) and Living Downstream: An Ecologist's Personal Investigation of Cancer and the Environment (1997, revised 2010). Dr Steingraber holds a doctorate in biology and is a scholar in residence at Ithaca College in Ithaca, New York. Jason Francis interviewed her for Share International. (more…)

The Source Project: really sustainable farming

Interview with Jason Taylor
by Niels Bos

Jason Taylor, filmmaker and photographer for the The Source Project, discusses the ways in which progressive farmers in India demonstrate the sustainable agricultural techniques that can help save our planet.

Jason Taylor is the filmmaker and photographer of the Source Project, a self-funded multimedia venture that documents the methods, stories, and work of progressive farmers in India. He works primarily on agriculture-related issues and is based in Asia. 
In his work he focuses on the everyday lives of Indian farmers and captures their environments, as well as their ideas and visions on agriculture by means of vivid photographs and video footage. Niels Bos interviewed Jason Taylor for Share International.

After ten years of working as a photographer and a filmmaker in the international development sector Jason Taylor came to the realization that much of what he was involved in was little more than what he describes as "managed poverty". For him, the voice of the people he was being sent to document seemed to have far more clarity than the voice of the international development community and the terms of reference he was to work with seemed to have little in common with the reality of the field. So he decided to start a self-funded project called the Source Project and began a journey to meet some of the most progressive and enlightened farmers of India, documenting their stories about agriculture and food production in a series of films and photography. (more…)

Protecting the 'rainforests of the sea'

Interview with Ken Nedimyer
by Jason Francis

Ken Nedimyer, founder of the Coral Restoration Foundation, discusses the ecology of the biologically diverse coral reefs, the ways in which CRF is rebuilding them, and efforts to educate the public as to the human impact on these critical oceanic resources.
The Coral Restoration Foundation (CRF) is a nonprofit conservation group based in Key Largo, Florida, that develops offshore coral nurseries and reef restoration programs for critically endangered coral reefs at local, national and international levels. Tens of thousands of corals are grown and maintained in multiple offshore nurseries. With the help of students, volunteers, scientists, dive operators, public aquariums, and community groups, thousands of corals grown in CRF's nurseries have been replanted on degraded coral reefs. Ken Nedimyer, a commercial fisherman and tropical fish collector, formed CRF in 2007. Jason Francis interviewed Nedimyer for Share International. (more…)

The people and the planet

Interview with Stephen Leahy

by Felicity Eliot

Canadian environmental journalist Stephen Leahy discusses the obstacles to halting climate change and the exploitation of resources in emerging countries.

Stephen Leahy has worked as a freelance Canadian journalist for the past 12 years, including five years writing for Inter Press Service. Leahy specialises in science, the environment and agriculture. He has been published in leading magazines and newspapers in several countries. Based near Toronto, Canada, Leahy is a professional member of the Society of Environmental Journalists. He is also the 2012 co-winner of the Prince Albert/United Nations Global Prize for Climate Change. (more…)

School of Life

Interview with Marion Spielmann
by Andrea Bistrich

Marion Spielmann, founder of The School of Life in the Austrian provence of Steiermark, discusses a new model for education based on the heart's natural connection with nature. This new approach fosters Aquarian qualities in character development, ecological sustainability, and honest relationships within communities. May 2013 

Marion Spielmann founded the 'School of Life' in 1990 in the Austrian province of Steiermark, also known as Styria, which campaigns for a new culture of thinking and a spirituality in harmony with the laws of nature. Along with the School of Life she is involved in many further projects; amongst others she instigated the idea of a World Future Day, on 21 December. For the last seven years Marion Spielmann has been an ambassador for 'Peace through Culture' and is engaged in the development of national, international and inter disciplinary co-operation between different scientific and cultural groups. Marion Spielmann was interviewed by Andrea Bistrich for Share International. (more…)

The Consciousness Of Sustainability And Growing Organic Food

Digging The Dirt Out Of Your Thinking Before You Plant One Seed In The Ground

by Gabriel of Urantia

I am glad that so many Occupiers all over the country have been taking my advice and trying to start communities and grow organic food. But sustainable living is not just a physical thing that you do and goals of things to accomplish. Long-lasting and continually evolving sustainable living is a shift in consciousness, a state of being. It is a total lifestyle and a way of thinking and doing that is not done in part.

You can’t bring the city to your new country home. This is what Americans have done for decades, in trying to move away from the city to the suburbs, thinking that was going to change the quality of their lives, but all they did was make the new suburbs extensions of the cities. Even in the cities, you can begin to live more sustainably by composting and recycling and trying to conserve on gasoline by using mass transit, walking, bicycling, and using smaller, more compact vehicles, even electric vehicles and other hybrid cars. (more…)

A Week of Sustainable Living in an Intentional Community

Niánn Emerson Chase

I, along with Gabriel of Urantia, founded the intentional community of more than one-hundred people who now all live at Avalon Organic Gardens & EcoVillage located in the Tubac/Tumacácori area. It was more than two decades ago in Sedona (located in north-central Arizona) that Gabriel and I, with our three small children (an infant and two-year-old twins) began the journey of striving and struggling to create and maintain a culture more sustainable than the one that dominates Western civilization and increasingly the rest of the world. Within a few months of us beginning this adventure, others started to join us in our commitment to a vision that we all shared. Together we participated in the unfoldment of an intentional community that continues to expand on many levels—quantitatively and qualitatively. (more…)

"Glaciers are the canary in the global coal mine"

Interview with James Balog
by Jason Francis

James Balog, founder of the Extreme Ice Survey, discusses climate change as evidenced by the massive systemic changes wrought by humans in the basic chemistry of the planet. April 2013; source: © Share International

James Balog has been a leader in photographing, understanding and interpreting the natural environment for three decades. He has a graduate degree in geography and geomorphology and is an avid mountaineer. To reveal the impact of climate change, Balog in 2007 founded the Extreme Ice Survey (EIS), the most wide-ranging, ground-based, photographic study of glaciers ever conducted. The project is featured in the highly acclaimed documentary Chasing Ice, which has won numerous awards worldwide. Balog is also the author of eight books; his most recent, Ice: Portraits of Vanishing Glaciers, was released in the fall of 2012. Jason Francis interviewed James Balog for Share International. (more…)