JOANNA MACY on the World as Lover and Self⌠HOMAGE⌡/371
Photo of leaf floating over rippling sunlit waters; vintage National Geographic
On July 19th, Joanna Macy, our beloved teacher and past guest, died peacefully at home in Berkeley, California. In honor of her incredible legacy and the significant impact her work continues to have, we are rebroadcasting her episode “The World as Lover and Self,” originally released in January of 2015 when the podcast was known as Unlearn and Rewild.
In this quintessential For the Wild episode Ayana speaks to Joanna Macy on grief, change, and connection – all themes that have become even more relevant in these times.
As we find ourselves alive in this time of great turning, where feelings of grief, despair, and gloom are omnipresent – we seek counsel from Joanna on finding emotional courage, building allyship, and practicing gratitude for all which moves us. Joanna offers her wisdom for remaining sane and grounded as life-long activists in the uphill battle of ecological crisis. Instead of succumbing to denial, complacency, or isolation we can emerge from it, and move through it, to participate in radical transformation and collaborative action. By accepting the truth of our times, we can see the world as our larger living body, freeing us from the assumptions and attitudes that now threaten the continuity of life on Earth.
As you soak into this episode and its evergreen lessons, we invite you to take in Rainer Rilke’s words as translated by Joanna.
Onto a Vast Plain
Through the empty branches the sky remains.
It is what you have.
Be earth now, and evensong.
Be the ground lying under that sky.
Be modest now, like a thing
ripened until it is real,
so that he who began it all
can feel you when he reaches for you.
Joanna Rogers Macy leaves a legacy that will long continue to inform and energize both the work of healing the world from the frenzy of industrialized capitalism, and the complementary movements to come home to the true nature of our being. For, as she would say, we are embedded in the web of life.
A respected voice in movements for peace, justice, and ecology, her scholarship is interwoven with learnings from six decades of activism.
Joanna’s wide-ranging work addresses psychological and spiritual issues of the nuclear age, the cultivation of ecological awareness, and the fruitful resonance between Buddhist thought and postmodern science. The many dimensions of this work are explored in her thirteen books, which include three volumes of poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke with translation and commentary.
As the root teacher of Work That Reconnects, Joanna created a ground-breaking framework for personal and social change, as well as a powerful workshop methodology for its application. In the face of overwhelming social and ecological crises, this work helps people transform despair and apathy into constructive, collaborative action. It brings a new way of seeing the world as our larger living body. This perspective frees us from the assumptions and attitudes that now threaten the continuity of life on Earth.
“This is a living world. I’ll do everything for it. Nothing will ever befall me that will separate me from the living world. It’s my larger body.”
Joanna Macy
Joanna Macy Ph.D., (May 2, 1929 – July 19, 2025) author and teacher, is a scholar of Buddhism, systems thinking, and Deep Ecology. A respected voice in movements for peace, justice, and ecology, she interweaves her scholarship with learnings from six decades of activism.
Her wide-ranging work addresses psychological and spiritual issues of the nuclear age, the cultivation of ecological awareness, and the fruitful resonance between Buddhist thought and postmodern science. The many dimensions of this work are explored in her thirteen books, which include three volumes of poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke with translation and commentary.
As the root teacher of Work That Reconnects, Joanna has created a ground-breaking framework for personal and social change, as well as a powerful workshop methodology for its application. In the face of overwhelming social and ecological crises, this work helps people transform despair and apathy into constructive, collaborative action. It brings a new way of seeing the world as our larger living body. This perspective frees us from the assumptions and attitudes that now threaten the continuity of life on Earth.
♫ Music by Anne Carol Mitchell, Roberta Flack, Pharoah Sanders, and Roy Harper
Links & References
View the recording of a global, online gathering celebrating Joanna’s life and work
Joanna Macy | Website
Work That Reconnects Network
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For The Wild is a slow media organization dedicated to land-based protection, co-liberation, and intersectional storytelling. We are rooted in a paradigm shift away from human supremacy, endless growth, and consumerism. As we dream towards a world of grounded justice and reciprocity, our work highlights impactful stories and deeply-felt meaning making as balms for these times.