I asked around the village to see what other villagers are reading. Deborah Clark recommended Helen Zuman’s book Mating in Captivity, A Memoir. It’s about her experiences in the Zendik Farm cult, which she didn’t know was a cult until she was in it for a while and discovered that her autonomy and self-worth were being eroded by the cult leaders. You might call it a cautionary tale of someone who was very interested in community life and looking for love, but found a distorted version with the Zendiks.

Deborah reports “I’ve actually read the book twice, and it’s really well written — she conveys what happened and her process with a satisfying balance of juicy description and economy: never a wasted word. Somehow she clearly speaks her truth while maintaining some objectivity, portraying the cult leaders as humans and not monsters. It was particularly interesting to me because I had read about the Zendiks and was curious about their ‘community,’ and also knew someone else who had gotten out (he was there at the same time Helen was). It was especially juicy the second time I read it, because by then I had gotten to know Helen as a dear friend, but I think the book would be of interest to anyone who is interested in the topics of community, cults, and personal transformation.”

Spoiler alert: Helen survived the cult, did some good healing and processing, or as she would say “composting” of her experiences, and went on to be a successful writer, activist, and entrepreneur, and now has a regular podcast called Chocolate Church.

Bruce Johnston is reading a book called Shame: How America’s Past Sins Have Polarized Our Country by Shelby Steele.

Bruce reports “The book is about how America’s ‘culture wars’ began in the 1960s, when America finally became accountable for its treatment of Black Americans, and then for imperialism, sexism, and so forth. The book argues a schism in American life has come from that awareness and the loss of moral authority that white America experienced as a consequence of that awareness. The book contends that this cultural war has prevented sensible policy in many areas of life and has generated an avoidance of principled discussion around sensitive topics like race and gender, mostly because American institutions still feel that they lack the moral authority to do so. I recommend it because it is a point of view on these topics that I rarely hear: unconventional, delightfully practical, humanistic, and relatively free of ideology.”

And our elder Arjuna da Silva is reading a book that’s 50 years old, but not yet known — The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind by Julian Jaynes. She says that it’s a radical and amazing investigation of the more likely evolution of human thought and consciousness based on ancient texts that have apparently rarely been seen in these lights. She recommends it for people interested in evolution, consciousness, or healing.

What are you reading? If there’s a book you’d like to share, please share it in the comments.

The post Books we’re reading appeared first on Earthaven Ecovillage.

(Transcript)

NikiAnne: I have some blue comfrey here. I got gifted this by a friend and lo and behold it likes to spread. It’s ambitious and I’ve been using it in what I call my nursery; a place that I just put plants where I don’t know where I want them. Ultimately, but eventually they’ll find their own their final home and they lie low.

They have blue flowers- hence the blue comfrey name. They’re not as tall as the Red Russian variety of comfrey, but they multiply and they’re a great ground cover and keep the weeds at bay.

And they’re really great for guinea hens, turkeys, sheep, goats, and anything that likes to nibble on stuff that you want to keep at bay as well in your yard. So beauty and food all the same time.

The post NikiAnne in the Blue Comfrey Patch at Earthaven Ecovillage appeared first on Earthaven Ecovillage.

(Transcript) NikiAnne:

So really what I want to be in life is a Columbine farmer. I don’t know if that exists.

This is just the beginning of the Columbine coming back after winter. The ones in this yard- the flowers are deep, deep, purple and then there’s another one that’s like red peach and orange yellow together. They’re just gorgeous.

They’re not flowers that you would pick and put in a vase because they kind of like face down.  But wow are they amazing!

Last fall when they had gone to seed I harvested some seed and I threw a lot of seed in other places I wanted the columbine to populate. We’ll see if it’s stratified and did well. I’m also going to seed some in trays this year with my friend, Eli, and see if we can populate the valley here with more beauty with these flowers.

Let’s do Columbine!

The post NikiAnne the Columbine Farmer at Earthaven Ecovillage appeared first on Earthaven Ecovillage.

(Transcript)

NikiAnne: So, I don’t know if you can see what’s here…I’ve got some strawberries and sedum.

The sedum I just wanted to mention because I use it as a weed barrier. It spreads really easily it’s really hearty. I even use it as a mat. Bless its sweetness.

It can sustain some roughness and it keeps the weeds out.  It also can choke out plants, so I thin it so that it’s not choking out these strawberries. I haven’t thinned it yet but that’ll be something

I’m doing this spring. Literally I can just grab it like that and then put it someplace else and it just roots. So it anchors a lot of soil really easily on banks that need some stability.

The post NikiAnne in the Sedum Patch at Earthaven Ecovillage appeared first on Earthaven Ecovillage.

Transcription:

NikiAnne: So, this green friend was introduced to me by my friend, Dimitri. It is ox eye daisy. It grows so well, it reseeds itself and it’s just coming up. It’s spring and so it’s going to get a little fuller and eventually bloom into what are called ox eye daisies.

These green leaves though are edible and they’re so unique in flavor.

I don’t even know how to describe them but like interspicing that into a salad mix is like so much explosion of flavor of mouth.

Find some ox eye daisies…or move them because they definitely multiply.

The post NikiAnne in the Ox Eye Daisy Patch at Earthaven Ecovillage appeared first on Earthaven Ecovillage.

Transcription from video:

NikiAnne: Oh my gosh, I love my firewood. Thanks to my partner Chris Farmer who built this!

This is under a plastic like greenhouse roofing corrugated that allows a lot of sun to get through. Keeps it dry and we have cut it to really short lengths so that it fits in our small stove.

I like to say that we judge our wealth by our firewood. How many years ahead have we seasoned the wood? So that it’s dry and not green. This is probably two years old and we have enough to have it be supplying for years obviously. Or just the little, teeny snow we have.

Bless the firewood, the ancient ones. Ancient sunlight, thank you, thank you.

The post NikiAnne and the Firewood Stack at Earthaven Ecovillage appeared first on Earthaven Ecovillage.

Above: 2017 Ancestor Feast Altar featuring Chuck, Suchi and Kimchi

by NikiAnne Feinberg

Rituals to help land-based and regional communities process what has happened and is happening in our world are so powerful. We look to ritual to help us digest the unsavory and the unpalatable. We connect with teachers whose wisdom, guidance and experience can help our concentric rings of community continue to process the grief and sorrow we experience, to some degree on a daily basis.

So many of us are skilled at honoring birthdays, seasonal holidays, and the memory of famous people, but how many of us are ready to authentically honor the changes and losses of life?

Here at Earthaven, we’ve buried three community members this past year. The ritual tools Sobonfu Somé shared with us have been enormously useful in helping us know what to do when tragic events occur. They gave us a common language for addressing our grief, as well as a solid foundation from which to build our own rituals based in connection to the natural world and each other. We’ve had quite a bit of practice these last two years in how to process grief in the present and transform it into a sense of well-being, of life moving forward…. (So many of us are still longing to honor and grieve Sobonfu’s passing…and will have an opportunity to do so in the upcoming Transform, Connect, and Heal Ritual Weekend here May 4-6.)

There are many ways to use these emotional and spiritual tools and practices:

• for the loss of loved ones.
• for the untended historical trauma over the extermination of indigenous peoples.
• for the fear and dismay at what is going on in the nation’s political arena.
• for outrage at the racial injustices in our institutional and governmental policies.
• for the powerlessness we feel over ever more major, irreversible environmental atrocities.

We want to continue practicing the language and expression of emotions and communion with the ancestors in the presence of others. We also want to learn new rituals we can grow into (and with) as community. We want to use ritual to honor the land we live on and make offerings of gratitude for all that it provides for us.

I want to be a voice for Earthaven being a place that has learned to welcome death as a part of intentional and integrated living. Through demonstrating and also sharing what and who we learn from, we contribute to our community’s dual missions of transformative lifestyles and education.

These trainings have been essential to Earthaven’s journey of maturing into a community that embraces death, not only by gracefully accepting it as a reality in life, but by skilling up on tending to our own beloveds’ deaths.

Led by two of Sobonfu’s long-time students and friends, Susan Hough and Jennifer Halls, the Transform, Connect, and Heal Ritual Weekend will focus on the practice of ritual, in which the true outcome might not be understood until long after the end. On the immediate level, however, ritual is a powerful way to transform inner and outer situations, connect to Spirit, and deeply heal on many levels. I invite you to join me and others from all over the country in this powerful ritual of honoring and growing.

The post Building Community Through Ritual appeared first on Earthaven Ecovillage.

Among the many new and exciting things life in an ecovillage exposes us to—new ideas, new diets, new techniques and technologies, new celebrations—one of the most vital are the new people we meet! Our gate is open to visitors who may come for a tour, a workshop, to visit friends or family, or with the clear intention of finding their niche at Earthaven. Some stay or return to do work trades or internships, or to get the ball rolling toward membership.

We call the newest residents at Earthaven our “New Roots.” They come from far and wide, often are under 30, and participate in a variety of ways: as work exchangers, interns or apprentices, as long-term guests of family members, or as employees of on-site businesses. Generally, they’re all here to discover if Earthaven is the place to settle.

Thirteen New Roots, including New Roots Committee member (also an Exploring Member) NikiAnne Feinberg (left, bottom row) along with Community Service Coordinator Lyndon Felps (center, black tee shirt), got to know Earthaven and each other better at a recent check-in.

The New Roots are mentored both by the individual members who host New Roots and by the New Roots Committee. At periodic check-ins, New Roots get a chance to meet and discover how each other are handling living in the woods, coping with so much that is new and different, such as staying in tiny houses or communal set-ups, using and conserving off-grid power, reusing and recycling like crazy (including their own pee and poop), and shopping at the Free Store. Their adventures are life-changing!

Almost a quarter of those present at a recent check-in said they were interested in getting on the “membership track,” which begins with an Exploring Member interview with the Membership Committee. The interview also includes suggestions about what the potential Exploring Member might need to learn about Earthaven before joining. Exploring Memberships last up to a year, and Exploring Members are encouraged to attend (and sometimes join) committee meetings to learn about work going on behind the scenes. Financial commitment also expands at this time.

Within that year, the deeper commitment of Provisional Membership (the last step before the “jump” into Full Membership) is under consideration. Although not everyone takes the journey to Full Membership, just about everyone becomes part of Earthaven’s extended family, returning for long or short visits again and again.

Arjuna da Silva, a co-founder of Earthaven, has been a writer, editor, counselor and communitarian since before she can remember. She’s been focusing on a newer passion—natural building—for the last ten years or so, coordinating courses and a natural building internship program at Earthaven, now in its fifth year.

The post Cultivating New Community Members Starts with New Roots appeared first on Earthaven Ecovillage.

Several weekends in a row this past April, we had the pleasure of hosting college groups from the College of Charleston, Furman University, and Elon University.

We dig bamboo, but how many shoots can we eat?! Bamboo needs maintenance to keep it from overextending its boundaries. Here, students help remove bamboo sprouts from a former mini-grove. The voracious grass was coming too close to home and residents chose to remove it.

Earthaven’s Group Educational Tours (GET) program offers tours and experiential learning opportunities for student groups year round. Service-learning programs are increasingly popular and have become a hugely successful complement to traditional academic learning environments. Hands-on learning allows participants to create an authentic connection with their world and embody academic lessons more fully, while enhancing critical thinking and teamwork skills.

Students from Elon University help Johannah Femling start a layered “lasagne garden” at the Forest Garden Learning Center. Their Philosophy prof, Anthony Weston, also worked on the site but was out of camera shot.

We view education as primarily a social learning activity. The process of immersion into an active, living culture of sustainability solutions, critical thinking, and  systems orientation makes for not only an integrated, holistic approach to education but a rare opportunity to see experiments in action. Please inquire about how your group can get a taste of the integrated life through Earthaven’s GET program.

Students from Furman University in South Carolina and Wes Dripps (center), Professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences, helped members build a stairway up the grassy slope to their home.

NikiAnne Feinberg has over a decade of experience with experiential, nature-based programs in both the non-profit and academic sectors. SOIL is the manifestation and culmination of her life experiences in sustainable living, experiential-education leadership, and program management.

The post ‘Tis the Season of the Students appeared first on Earthaven Ecovillage.

Farmer and NikkiAnne in front of the MicroHut (Farmer’s residence at Earthaven) at Gateway Neighborhood. Photo taken Summer 2010.

On Tuesday night, Nov. 16,^,

Earthaven member Chris Farmer (often called “Farmer”) threw a farewell dance party in the Council Hall and said goodbye to Earthaven . . . at least for now.

“I’m leaving for the indefinite future,” he told friends in the packed Council Hall.  “I may be back, and I’d like to come back, but I’m not making any specific plans about it.” He’ll be living in Santa Barbara, California, close to his sweetheart, an environmental activist and former Earthaven work exchanger. Farmer has been an Earthaven member for 13 years.

Chris Farmer (left) with Brian Love.

One of Earthaven’s earliest advocates for agriculture, Farmer is co-owner with Brian Love of Gateway Farm, as well as their business, ArtiSun Construction. He co-founded the Forestry Co-op (1998- 2004): felling trees, mastering timber-framing carpentry, and innovating the use of a geopolymer concrete substance as well as a wall-truss system with wood milled from thinner trees.  He built a timber-framed 12’ x 12’ x 12’ “micro-hut” with chip-slip walls in the Hut Hamlet, and later built a similar hut in Gateway neighborhood in the hybrid natural/conventional style he and Brian innovated.

Farmer has stimulated and entertained Earthaven members, friends, neighbors, and visitors with his “Sorcerer’s Apprentice,” “Clueless Honky,” and “Open-Source Mythology” raps. (See videos.)

Farmer in a large goodbye hug at his farewell party.

Farmer was Earthaven’s Firekeeper (president) in 2007, where he lead us in dealing with state officials re water quality and distribution standards. He has served on Land Use/Site Planning committee and on the ad hoc Council Document committee, and is one of Earthaven’s best facilitators.

We’ll miss you Farmer. We wish you all the best!

Earthaven member Diana Leafe Christian is an internationally known ecovillage activist, author of Creating a Life Together and Finding Community (New Society Publishers), and publisher of Ecovillages newsletter. Click here for her website.

The post Farewell (For Now) Farmer appeared first on Earthaven Ecovillage.