20th of November 2024 eamba Exchange:
Offering a mindful path through the ecological crisis – with Rob Brandsma.
Missed being present?
Here is the recording. You can catch up.
How can we deal with the news about our planet – temperatures are rising, extreme weather is accelerating, species are dying out?
How can we go move from a sense of powerlessness to realistic hope?
How to find clarity and peace in the midst of an ecological crisis and still enjoy what life has to offer?
Mindfulness helps.
With the support of anchoring, self-care and compassion practices that are all part of mindfulness, we can face reality while staying grounded, and then move in a direction that is good for ourselves and for the world.
Rob Brandsma shared his pioneering work on Mindfulness for the World with the eamba Community
exploring how to move from concern into structural systemic action. He quoted the Dalai Lama on this issue “the answer to this problem is community.“
From climate anxiety and reactive anger it’s a small step to act with a caring heart – and the way to enable ourselves and others is rooted in mindfulness. We experienced a specific grounding practice, and to finding the sweet spot between turning to / being with the difficulty and nourishing the senses by noticing and enjoying beauty.
Rob reminded us of “Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.” encouraging us to experience the uplifting and energizing effect of a (far-reaching) vision.
His work has led to a course that will be available in the English language in 2025, training M. Teachers to know how to offer a mindful path through the ecological crisis guided by the aspiration “What if we get it RIGHT?”
In this workshop, Rob Brandsma took us through the dilemma’s the climate crisis is presenting, and how mindfulness can serve as a ‘superpower’ to navigate them. If you were not able to attend in person, you can find the recording on eamba’s Youtube channel (URL)
Rob offered some practices and introduced an 8 (12)-week training called Mindfulness for the World.
He shared some of the evidence for the effectiveness of this program, as presented at the 2024 International Mindfulness Conference (ICM:24).
Rob Brandsma is an international teacher trainer in mindfulness and compassion based in the Netherlands.
He is associated with the Amsterdam Mindfulness Academie and has published books for M. teaching in several languages.
You might already know him as the author of The Mindfulness Teaching Guide.
Lately, he is focussing on a mindfulness approach to relief the impending ecological crisis.
