Andrés R Edwards - Renewal: How Nature Awakens Our Creativity, Compassion, and Joy

Advance Praise for Renewal

Rediscovering joy through nature is of critical importance within the climate movement; the bonds that hold movements together arent just strategic, they build our compassion. This book can be a guide on that journey.

May Boeve, executive director, 350.org

Renewal is a journey that takes us home.... Edwards personal love affair with this world and his eclectic relationship with sages from every time and culture make this journey delightful, nourishing, and worth every page.

Sandy Wiggins, co-founder and principal, Consilience, LLC; Director, Business Alliance for Local Living Economies (BALLE)

This inspiring mix of inner work and outer action reminds us we still have a chance to save the planet (and ourselves), if we turn to nature as our guide.

Mary Reynolds Thompson, author, Embrace Your Inner Wild and Reclaiming the Wild Soul

Andrs Edwards important new book walks us through the steps of forging a powerful emotional bond with the rest of nature...

Linda Buzzell, co-editor, Ecotherapy: Healing with Nature in Mind

A key subject, explored with clarity.

Jeremy Narby, author, Intelligence in Nature

Renewal contains many guiding ideas and suggestions for making the connection [with nature] a real part of our lives. After you read it, get out there and build your own lifetime of experiences.

Carl Safina, author, Beyond Words: What Animals Think and Feel

Saving nature is not just an altruistic act. In saving nature we also save ourselves since our innate affiliation with it supports our well-being. Nature provides services that we can hardly replicate and can be the inspiration for the things we design. Andrs Edwards has articulated the message that our lives are tied economically, intellectually, and spiritually to nature.

Bill Browning, Partner, Terrapin Bright Green

This book is a pioneering exploration of an epochal (and bitterly necessary) shift in our attitude toward nature. Edwards sees nature not as an external resource to make human life safe but as part of the paradigm of reciprocity that makes our existence possible and allows reality to flourish.

Andreas Weber, author, Biology of Wonder,
Matter & Desire, and Enlivenment

This book includes remarkable stories and neuroscience discoveries that inspire us and call on us to connect to nature and live more fulfilling lives.

Thupten Jinpa, author, A Fearless Heart

Robinson Jeffers wrote: We must uncenter our minds from ourselves; we must unhumanize our views a little, and become confident as the rock and ocean that we were made from. Andrs Edwards confidently and elegantly guides us through how to unhumanize, and then rehumanize, ourselves.

Wallace J. Nichols, PhD, author, Blue Mind

In these times when less than half of Americans say they participate in outdoor recreation, and mental health problems have become epidemic in part due to people spending too much time watching electronic screens, Andrs book will help people return to their roots and discover the healing and inspiring powers of nature.

James A. Swan, PhD, author, Nature as Teacher and Healer

Using personal anecdotes and scientific evidence, Renewal illuminates the different ways we can emotionally and intellectually connect with nature as well as practical ways we can deepen this relationship to promote both our own flourishing, and that of the natural world around us.

Craig L. Anderson, PhD, University of California, San Francisco

Copyright 2019 by Andrs R. Edwards. All rights reserved.

Cover design by Diane McIntosh. Photo iStock 486974672.

Text images: Peter Hermes Furian;
tree silhouettes gorralit / Adobe Stock.

Printed in Canada. First printing April 2019.

This book is intended to be educational and informative. It is not intended to serve as a guide. The author and publisher disclaim all responsibility for any liability, loss or risk that may be associated with the application of any of the contents of this book.

Inquiries regarding requests to reprint all or part of Renewal should be addressed to New Society Publishers at the address below. To order directly from the publishers, please call toll-free

(North America) 1-800-567-6772,

or order online at www.newsociety.com

Any other inquiries can be directed by mail to:

New Society Publishers

P.O. Box 189, Gabriola Island, BC V0R 1X0, Canada

(250) 247-9737

LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION

Edwards, Andrs R., 1959, author

Renewal : how nature awakens our creativity, compassion, and joy /

Andrs R. Edwards ; foreword by Marc Bekoff.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Issued in print and electronic formats.

ISBN 978-0-86571-880-7 (softcover) ISBN 978-1-55092-673-6 (PDF)
ISBN 978-1-77142-268-0 (EPUB)

1. Human ecology Psychological aspects. 2. Nature Psychological aspects. 3. Human beings Effect of environment on Psychological aspects. 4. Well-being Psychological aspects. 5. Nature, Healing power of. 6. Nature Effect of human beings on. 7. Human ecology. 8. Nature. 9. Well-being. I. Bekoff, Marc, writer of foreword II. Title.

New Society Publishers mission is to publish books that contribute in fundamental ways to building an ecologically sustainable and just society, and to do so with the least possible impact on the environment, in a manner that models this vision.

To future generations of practical visionaries
who embrace a reciprocal relationship with nature
for the benefit of all life

Introduction:
Forging an Emotional Bond with Nature

The inspiration for this book came to me several years ago during an afternoon bike ride. Since that day, Ive been blessed with the insights of many who have helped to shape the book. I am thankful to the following colleagues and organizations for their valuable insights into our relationship to the natural world: Elizabeth Thompson, Megan Ahern and J. P. Harpignies formerly of The Buckminster Fuller Institute; Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education; Greater Good Science Center; Stacy Carlsen from the Marin County Livestock & Wildlife Protection Program; M. Ananda Kumar and Smita Prabhakar from Nature Conservation Foundation; Peter Sherman from Prescott College; and Camilla Fox from Project Coyote.

I would like to thank the following friends and colleagues who, through our numerous lively discussions over the years, have helped me to take a deep dive into the perspectives expressed in this book: Robert Apte, Laurent Boucher, Phyllis Mufson, Jim Newell, Greg Newth, Jeff Reynolds, Lia Rudnick, Mark Samolis, Nadine Ulloa, Nils Warnock, Don Weeden and Mark Woodrow.