awakening the dreamer, changing the dream

The most moving and inspiring event I' ve encountered in almost 3 decades of working on green issues is the Awakeing the Dreamer, Changing the Dream symposium.

www.awakeningthedreamer.org

It arises with the Achuar people of the Amazon side of Ecuador - an intact indigenous culture that had not had outside exposure until the 1970s.  Upon seeing the devastation caused by the extraction industries in their region, they correctly surmised that any culture capapble of such destruction must be so completely cut off from reality that they're living in a dream or trance. (Psychiatrists have a diagnosis for that and it's called psychosis).

But being a warrior culture, they took it upon themselves to awaken the dreamer, for they knew it was not just their lands that were in danger, but the life carrying capacity of Pachamama, Mother Earth, herself. So, they made contact with some people in the US and together they created the Pachamama Alliance, which with a lot of hard work were able to secure 5 million acres of rainforest from development, for now. But they kept telling the Americans that if they really want to help them, they need to go into their world  and "change the dream of the modern world" -- and so, in 2005, the Awakening the Dreamer symposium was launched in San Francisco.

Now there are over 2200 trained facilitators world wide (more than 130 in Canada) and many thousands more who have been exposed to the symposium.

It's purpose? To bring about an ecologically sustainable, socially just and spiritually fulfilling human presence to this planet as a guiding principle for our time. How Green is that?

So check out www.awakeningthedreamer.org click on "symposium" and find a symposium near you. You won't regret it.

And while you're at it, check out www.fouryearsgo.org -- what we do in the next four years will determine the quality of life for the next 1000.

be well

david