
Norman Bates - #StopMonsanto
It’s been an amazing retreat with returning retreat leader’s Siri Rishi and Shivanter Singh of Rishi Retreats and they are kicking off their last day with Ocean Stand Up Paddle boarding! The retreat, appropriately named “FEARLESS” pushed the retreat participants to the confront their fears and transform them through the courageous fire of Action. During this retreat participants were pushed beyond their imagined limitations allowing themselves permission to step off of the edge and into the vastness of nature and all that she has to offer. Allowing nature to awaken our cellular memory to a deep remembrance of our Truth and Victory!
Siri Rishi and Shivanter plan on returning for their 3rd retreat with us this December so stay tuned for more updates or email us to get involved and become FEARLESS!
| — | Patanjali is credited with the creation and compilation of the Yoga Sutras. These sutras, based upon the structure of the holy Indian text, Bhagavad Gita have become an inspiration to students around the world looking to reach a higher state of consciousness. |
Ten worst ‘ecocides’
From floating plastic islands and orbiting space junk to mountaintop removal and deep-sea mining, the worldwide destruction of ecosystems is worse now than at any other time.
- Alberta tar sands: Referred to as the most damaging project on the planet. According to Greenpeace, emissions from tar sands extraction could grow to between 127 and 140m tonnes by 2020, exceeding the current emissions of Austria, Portugal, Ireland and Denmark. If proposed expansion proceeds,it will result in the loss of vast tracts of boreal forest and peat bogs of a territory the size of England
- Deep-sea mining: The emerging underwater mineral extraction industry is sounding alarm bells among marine biologists, environmental scientists and campaigners such as Polly Higgins, who predict that mining for gold, silver and copper on the seabed will be the next great ecological disaster. The fragile marine ecosystem of the sea floor is a frontier that we know very little about
- The North Pacific gyre: A swirling island of 100m tonnes of plastic bits and bottle tops, spins clockwise from Hawaii to Japan. Also known as the Pacific trash vortex, it is estimated to be the size of Texas. This picture shows a laysan albatross (Diomedea immutabilis) giving a bottle cap to its chick
- The Niger delta: Fifty years of oil extraction in the Niger delta has scarred the Niger delta. Oil companies operated here for decades with very little environmental supervision and the delta, notoriously beset by conflict and poverty, has been steadily pushed towards ecological disaster. Villagers struggle to live off land and water poisoned by years of oil spills, and crops fail under the acid rain caused by gas flares
- The Dongria Kondh: Members of the Dongria Kondh tribe gather on top of the Niyamgiri mountain, which they worship as their living god, to protest against plans by Vedanta Resources to mine bauxite from that mountain. The mine will destroy the forests on which the Dongria Kondh depend and threaten the livelihoods of thousands of other Kondh tribal people living in the area. Vedanta denies allegations that the planned mine would violate the rights of thousands of people
- Mountaintop removal: Aerial of mountaintop removal coal mining site in West Virginia. Mountaintop mining involves a highly destructive practice of blasting through hundreds of feet of mountaintop to get at thin but valuable seams of coal
- Linfen, China: The most polluted city on earth. Located at the heart of a 12-mile industrial belt of iron foundries, smelting plants and cement factories, fed by the 50m tonnes of coal mined every year, unregulated because of rapid development
- Toxic dumping by Chevron Texaco in Ecuador: Chevron, formerly Texaco, is alleged to have dumped billions of gallons of crude oil and toxic waste waters into the Amazonian jungle over two decades. This oily pond is at the oil production site of Guanta, near the city of Lago Agrio. Ecuador’s recent bill of rights for nature has changed the legal status of nature from being simply property to being a right-bearing entity. Campaigners hope this will stop similar ecological disasters from happening again
- The Amazon: The razing of the Amazonian rainforest, a key stabiliser of the global climate system, by logging, mining, crop planting and beef production. Almost 60% of the region’s forests could be wiped out or severely damaged by 2030
- Space junk: From spent rockets to defunct satellites, the millions of pieces of orbital debris have reached a critical level. A computer-generated image released by the European Space Agency shows an approximation of 12,000 fragments in orbit around the Earth

An interesting scientific idea that can explain recent tendencies towards ecological travel is Biophilia, a concept by Harvard biologist E. O. Wilson. It suggests that we depend on interactions with nature and wildness. Because humans evolved over generations within nature and in interactions with other species in the wild, we have an instinctive need to experience natural habitats and wildlife.
| — | Jewel Mathieson |