What Does It Mean to Listen to the Earth?

An invitation to an embodied inquiry into the living world.

As I prepare to launch my Listening to the Earth Circle in December, I have realised that I need to be a little more explicit about what I mean by listening to the Earth.

Something that feels quite obvious to me may not be obvious to others. And perhaps we are not even talking about the same thing when we speak about listening to nature.

So, before inviting you into this experience, I would like to share a little more about the thinking and the experience behind it.

For me, listening to the Earth means engaging in an embodied practice of sensing into the living consciousness of our planet.

It means stepping beyond the idea that we, as humans, are the ones who observe, study, interpret and ultimately decide what should happen to the Earth. Instead, it invites us to explore what it might mean to become participants in a much larger conversation. To consider that there is wisdom within the living world that we might be able to access, if only we learn to listen differently.

This is an invitation to expand our understanding of consciousness, perhaps beyond the human mind, to encompass the Earth and all her beings.

From relating to nature to co-creating with Earth

When I founded Rooting for Earth, my intention was to support the rebuilding of kinship between humans and the natural world. I felt that something fundamental had been lost in the way we relate to the living world, and that restoring this relationship was essential if we were to create meaningful change.

This intention was preceded by a profound spiritual experience in which I was brought to see the Earth as a being. In that experience, I felt myself merging with her, and came away with an understanding that the Earth is not simply the ground beneath our feet, a collection of ecosystems or a resource upon which our lives depend. She is a living being.

That experience changed the course of my life. Much of what I have done since has been an attempt to understand it, explore its implications and find ways of bringing this understanding into my work and everyday life.

Over time, this inquiry has also led me towards working with plant beings, developing my capacity for intuitive and expansive awareness, and learning to receive guidance through these relationships.

And now I feel called to invite others into this ongoing inquiry.

What if we could receive wisdom from the Earth?

I know that this proposition may stretch beyond the boundaries of what some of us consider possible. And I want to be clear: I am not claiming to know exactly what happens when we enter these states of expanded awareness and begin sensing into the more-than-human world.

What we receive might be our own imagination. It might be the Earth. It might be something entirely different. I don’t claim to know which of these is true.

What I do know is that, through my own experiences of engaging in this kind of intuitive relationship with plants and the living world, I have received guidance and insights that I do not experience as having originated from my conscious mind. Of course, I cannot prove their source. But I can speak to their impact.

They have been relevant, meaningful and often transformative. They have changed the way I see the world, the way I make decisions and the way I relate to life. They have helped me move towards a more holistic way of living, one that acknowledges my interdependence with the wider web of life.

And this, to me, is worth exploring.

An invitation to practitioners working for change

I particularly want to extend this invitation to those who work with nature, who are dedicated to the environment and committed to bringing about positive change, whether through conservation, regenerative agriculture, environmental education, climate action or other forms of ecological practice.

Perhaps you, too, have begun to feel that something is missing when our relationship with the Earth remains primarily an intellectual one. That even with all our knowledge, scientific understanding and good intentions, we are still approaching the challenges of our time from a paradigm in which humans make decisions about the Earth, rather than learning how to make them with the Earth.

What if we could cultivate a different kind of relationship? One in which we not only study the living world but also develop our capacity to sense, relate, listen and enter into dialogue with it?

I am not asking you to adopt a particular belief. I am inviting you to experiment with a different way of knowing.

To come with an open mind, an open heart and genuine curiosity about what might become possible when we allow ourselves to listen beyond what we already know.

Listening as an ongoing experiment

The Listening to the Earth Circle is an opportunity to explore this together. Through embodied and somatic sensing practices, we will experiment with expanding our awareness and developing our capacity to listen to the more-than-human world.

I see this as an experiential inquiry rather than a space in which I will be teaching you what the Earth has to say. I don’t have those answers. What interests me is what might emerge when we create the conditions to listen, individually and collectively.

What might we sense? What might we learn? What kind of relationship might become possible?

And how might what we receive influence the way we live, work, relate and make decisions?

I believe these are questions worth exploring, particularly at a time when we are searching for new ways of relating to the living world and navigating the profound ecological transformations of our time.

The inaugural Listening to the Earth Circle will take place in December. I am keeping this first circle intentionally small, with no more than five participants, to allow space for a deeper shared exploration. Places are limited.

If something in this invitation resonates with you, I would love to hear from you. You can share your interest through the expression of interest form on the circle page, or write to me through Connect.

This is the first in a series of articles in which I will explore what listening to the Earth means to me, the practices involved, and the possibilities that might open up when we begin to approach the living world not only as something to care for, but as something we can learn to relate to, listen to and co-create with.

Nathalie Markiefka Founder, Rooting for Earth · about Nathalie →