ONE collaborator Matthew Zylstra (Research Associate, Sea Change Trust) has a new publication called “Meaningful nature experiences: pathways for deepening connections between people and place” which features as a chapter in the much-awaited book Cultural and Spiritual Significance of Nature in Protected Areas (2019).
The book’s editors, Bas Verschuuren and Steve Brown, emphasise that:
“Cultural and spiritual bonds with ‘nature’ are among the strongest motivators for nature conservation; yet they are seldom taken into account in the governance and management of protected and conserved areas.”
Therefore the book as a whole aims to provide a starting point for emphasising the wide range of beliefs, values and experiences that motivate action to conserve earth’s diversity.
Zylstra’s chapter provides a conceptual map for understanding the essence meaningful nature experiences and addresses the question “What are they like?” It therefore explores the characteristics and commonalities which comprise such experiences and which give them a perceived “non-ordinariness”. It further looks at the importance of such experiences in supporting a sense of connectedness both with the place of the encounter (in this case, protected areas) as well opening pathways toward a integral worldview that embraces wholeness.
The symbiotic link between meaningful nature experiences and a noetic ecology is a critical one. Noetic ecology embraces the full spectrum of human experience in understanding – and deepening – our relationship with nature. Therefore direct profound encounters with non-human nature are catalysts for the deeper felt sense of ‘knowing’ that defines a noetic experience. Furthermore, research on common triggers for meaningful nature experience finds that intention and attention – what we pay attention to (noema) and how we do that (noesis) – are vital ingredients in our quest to cultivate such experiences more reliably.
Discussions around conservation, sustainability and regenerative futures inevitably return to questions about how to inspire motivation and change worldviews. Motivations usually find roots in direct emotional (affective) responses resulting from significant experiences, with the subsequent sense of personal meaning being a key motivator for changes in behaviour.
As one respondent in Zylstra’s original research1 reflects:
“I think that meaningful experiences have shaped me as they are a constant reminder that it is not all about me or about mankind”.
Cumulative reflections like this have the potential to support a more inclusive and ecocentric (instead of egocentric) worldview.
Other studies on meaningful nature experience have shown that ‘awe’ awakens the mind from self-interest to collective interest and from isolated self to integrated self – with this smaller ‘self’ including other beings and supporting pro-social action, sacrifice, and wider community integration.2
Conservation and sustainability are usually portrayed as being about finding implementing objective tangible actions within economic, ecological and social spheres. This overlooks and excludes the subjective interior cultural, experiential, and value-based dimensions which drive behaviour and frame worldviews.3
We must recognise the potency of these inner worlds, for better or for worse. We must own up to the realisation that competitive individualism, selfishness, and narcissism is degenerative human condition – a desensitised psychosis that not only leads to chronic illness for the individual but leads to destructive behaviour towards the collective – that is, in disservice to human and non-human communities.
We are witnessing an ‘extinction of experience’ in modern society – a devolution toward a largely unnoticed loss of regular, direct, and meaningful contact with nature.4 This reinforces ‘inattention nature blindness’- an ability to notice nature or recognise its foundational value to human health and wellbeing. If nature no longer forms part of our everyday consciousness, we cannot expect an ecological conscience which motivates care, responsibility, and action.5
It is only when we address ‘inner’ dimensions and transform individual consciousness that can we hope to achieve the desired changes in cultures and systems needed for a sustainable and regenerative ’outer’ world.
What we need in this time are life-affirming experiences that support inner and outer – and individual and collective – wellbeing through fundamental shifts in worldview.6, 7
Meaningful nature experiences promise that potential.
