Every day is Earth Day
Every day is Earth Day. Every day, Pachamama is breathing us into being whether we remember her or not.
Today is the official holiday known as Earth Day.
On April 22, 1970, 20 million Americans poured into the streets, parks, and college campuses in what became the largest civic demonstration in U.S. history. Senator Gaylord Nelson, grieving the devastation of a massive oil spill off the coast of Santa Barbara, wanted to harness the energy of the anti-war movement and turn it toward the earth. Earth Day was born — and within a year, the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and the EPA followed.
It was a remembering. A collective pause to say: we belong to this planet, not the other way around.
Fifty-six years later, I think the invitation is the same — but maybe it goes even deeper than policy. It goes into the body and into relationship.
I grew up a nature girl in rural Texas, spending many afternoons in the pastures and sparse woods behind my neighborhood. That love followed me to college in New York, through my Army years, and into motherhood. After my divorce, nature was my reprieve — every other weekend when my boys went to their dad's, I escaped to the mountains. Hiking in the woods was medicine to my grief-stricken body.
But at some point, I realized I was using nature. I felt better the moment I stepped outside — and I was grateful for that — but I was moving fast. Zipping past the trees, the rocks, the streams, racing toward the waterfall at the end of the trail. Missing all the potential relationships and conversations along the way.
It wasn't until my interfaith ministry training with the Center for Sacred Studies and learning earth-based ways of prayer that I had to sit with a hard truth: I didn't actually have a relationship with the other-than-human world. I was taking the feel-good vibrations and moving on.
So I started to slow down. To bring offerings. To sit beside a particular plant and introduce myself. To wrap my arms around an oak tree and thank her for her shade. To bless the water as I crossed a stream. To ask to be of service to the greater good for all kind.
That's what Earth Day is really asking of us, I think. Not just to recycle more or start a compost pile — but to remember that we ARE nature. That our nervous systems were built in relationship with soil and birdsong and moving water. That slowing down isn't a luxury. It's a homecoming.
Fifty-six years later, and here we are — April 22nd again. “Every day is Earth Day” can start to feel like a cheesy bumper sticker. And yet, the things that were warned about have arrived: the hail that comes out of nowhere, the cold snap after the dogwoods have already bloomed, polluted waterways, nutrient-depleted food due to harmful farming practices. We used to make small talk about the weather. Now we're bearing witness.
Maybe the exhaustion is worth honoring too. A lot of us have been carrying this awareness for a long time — living in that tender space between wonder and grief, choosing over and over to stay rooted in the belief that we belong to something larger than ourselves. We've felt it in our own backyards, in the hush of the woods, and standing next to a river, watching the water flow.
It is a spiritual truth that nothing created out of fear will last. We must fall deeply in love with Mother Earth and all of her offspring to create a better world for our children and children’s children.
Joanna Macy said it well: “the world will be healed by ordinary people whose love for this life is greater than their fear.”
If you’d love a morning to slow down, to cultivate a relationship with the natural world around you, and be in community with other nature-loving humans, then I’d love for you to join us at Mindfulness with the Meadow on May 31st.
We'll gather in the meadow to slow down, listen, and practice being in genuine relationship with the living world around us. No experience necessary — just a willingness to arrive.
Learn more and reserve your spot here.
Every day, the earth is waiting for us to remember.
And if you feel inspired to reply, I would love to hear a little bit about your relationship with Pachamama.
P.S. If you need a song for today, I gotchu! One of my favorite earth-love songs is Hey Mama by Jonah Kest and Satsang. Get ready to move and smile!
