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EcoGathering: Metabolizing

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Metabolism is the sum of all the energetic movements of matter which facilitate life itself. It’s the endless flow of nutrients from one corner of the universe to another, it’s the process of breaking down to build again, the mechanism behind the fundamental concept that energy cannot be created or destroyed. It is the cycle of life. Metabolism holds the imagined oppositional binaries together as one allowing catabolism and anabolism to dance in their true state of constant motion and exchange. One thing must die for the other to be born.

In this session, we gather to metabolize. By identifying what is currently breaking down, has already broken down, or is soon expected to break down, we see what resources, nutrients, and energy become available to reassemble and reintegrate into something else. In a culture consumed by endless growth, awareness of the metabolic balancing act required to sustain that growth via breakdown and collapse is necessary. With a strong foundation of understanding that existence depends on a constant exchange of energy and nutriment, we can better understand our own energetic entanglement to everything living, and hold a greater appreciation for both the internal and external work of deconstruction as it gives way to reconstruction.

Recommended resources for this EcoGathering:

  1. Geoffrey West & Nate Hagens: Metabolism and The Hidden Laws of Biology on The Great Simplification Podcast

  2. Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures Collective, 7 Steps Back/Forward/Aside

  3. Vanessa Machado de Oliveira, Hospicing Modernity, Ch 9: There is No Away

  4. Andreas Weber: Farewells and Fresh Starts: Our Stuff Changes, Our Self Remains from Matter and Desire

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October 1

EcoGathering: Hospicing

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October 15

An Elemental Life in Unbalanced Times Book Talk with John Hausdoerffer