How do you relate to the place that you live? Does it feel like a friend and ally?  Or an afterthought?    

This course offers a group experience to support you in forming a new relationship with the place you live. When you’re in a relationship with a person, you have an idea of what to do: You get to know how they see themselves, witness their actions, find out about their needs and dreams, and watch how they change through the days, the months, the years. 

Television and movies give us endless examples of people in relationships with each other, but they don't show us much about how to be in relationship with the place that we live. It’s almost as if we do not consider the Earth as an option for relationship.  This completely ignores that every part of our lives is shaped by where we are.

During the course we will explore and discuss questions like:  Where does the place you live begin and end, and how are you embedded within it?  How have people lived in this place throughout history?  What else is living here, how well do you know the plants and animals, and their rhythms throughout the seasons?  Can you create strong relationships with the land that mutually promote health, wellness, and thriving?

Wouldn't it feel good to know the place you live well enough to fall in love?

Course launches in May, 2025!

Each course is tailored to the participants’ needs and interests, but an overview of topics is here:

Week 1: How am I currently relating to this place?

Week 2: What are human political boundaries in this place (and do they make sense)?

Week 3: The world as it is - what are the biospheres, bioregions, and watersheds here?

Week 4: Who are my non-human neighbors?

Week 5: How do the pre-colonial relationships & history affect this place?

Week 6: How do the colonial-era relationships & history affect this place?

Week 7-11: Deepening the above topics and/or topics such as

• Where are the boundaries here? What is imposing those boundaries?

• What is the local history of climate chaos and industrial disaster?

• How does nature observe and measure time differently than humans in this place?

• What are some social change organizations in this place, and what is needed?

• What is my/our vision for the future of this place?

• What questions have emerged over the course?

Week 12: Honoring our relationships and experience together as we close the course

• Facilitated small-group discussion

• Listening, speaking, and community building strategies

• Time in class for research and discovery

• Space to share thoughts and feelings that arise

• A deepening relationship with the place you live