Deciphering the End of Nature
This week as a class we discussed and read over a few sections from the book, Coming of Age at the End of Nature.
These readings provoked a great deal of emotions and thoughts that I have been battling from within myself from some time now.
As I continue to struggle in grasping how it is I feel about reaching this sense of coming to age, I cannot help but sense this declensionist narrative
coming from within not only my own outlook on the “end of nature” but, of many of the people around me.
I can externally feel this sort of doom and gloom narrative heavily hanging over our heads.
With so much turmoil in the state of the world it’s troublesome to imagine the state of our environment and our resemblance of nature in the coming years.
However, I perceive it as all of us not losing nature but, losing our current perception of nature as we know it.
My coming of age turning point was when I finally stopped constructing my view of nature as something that was separate from humans.
Coming of age at the “end” of nature to me means understanding how I am as much a part of nature as I am simultaneously a driving force in the the destruction of nature.
There is no separation only balance. That is why I struggle to come to terms with accepting whether or not this coming of age is so much a good or bad thing.
I choose to see it as more of an understanding thing, in that at the coming of age I now have a notion.
A notion where I’m able to see how over the course of time all us humans simultaneous play a role in this driving force that is nature.
A quote I read this week that really came to heart and relates back to our readings come from the Buddhist philosopher Thich Nhat Hanh and he states,
“Take one thing and do it very deeply and carefully and you will be doing everything at the same thing.”
The quote makes me reflect on how interconnected our actions are when you change one thing you are inadvertently changing another simultaneously.
All actions generate consequences or an equal and sometimes opposite reaction if you will. The notion of all those actions adding up is what plays a resemblance
into my perception of what it is to be coming into “the end of nature”. My “millennial” generation is at a tipping point poised with having to make some tough adaptations
to constructing a more sustainable relation with nature whatever that may be. Only time will tell but, as things continue to change you, yourself must continue to change with it
for that is how you let go of nature as you know it.
These readings provoked a great deal of emotions and thoughts that I have been battling from within myself from some time now.
As I continue to struggle in grasping how it is I feel about reaching this sense of coming to age, I cannot help but sense this declensionist narrative
coming from within not only my own outlook on the “end of nature” but, of many of the people around me.
I can externally feel this sort of doom and gloom narrative heavily hanging over our heads.
With so much turmoil in the state of the world it’s troublesome to imagine the state of our environment and our resemblance of nature in the coming years.
However, I perceive it as all of us not losing nature but, losing our current perception of nature as we know it.
My coming of age turning point was when I finally stopped constructing my view of nature as something that was separate from humans.
Coming of age at the “end” of nature to me means understanding how I am as much a part of nature as I am simultaneously a driving force in the the destruction of nature.
There is no separation only balance. That is why I struggle to come to terms with accepting whether or not this coming of age is so much a good or bad thing.
I choose to see it as more of an understanding thing, in that at the coming of age I now have a notion.
A notion where I’m able to see how over the course of time all us humans simultaneous play a role in this driving force that is nature.
A quote I read this week that really came to heart and relates back to our readings come from the Buddhist philosopher Thich Nhat Hanh and he states,
“Take one thing and do it very deeply and carefully and you will be doing everything at the same thing.”
The quote makes me reflect on how interconnected our actions are when you change one thing you are inadvertently changing another simultaneously.
All actions generate consequences or an equal and sometimes opposite reaction if you will. The notion of all those actions adding up is what plays a resemblance
into my perception of what it is to be coming into “the end of nature”. My “millennial” generation is at a tipping point poised with having to make some tough adaptations
to constructing a more sustainable relation with nature whatever that may be. Only time will tell but, as things continue to change you, yourself must continue to change with it
for that is how you let go of nature as you know it.
On a side note to continue on with my thoughts of deconstructing nature as something that is seen as separate from humans.
I repeatedly reflect back on the way in which photographer Ansel Adams depicts nature as this fantasizing place of remoteness.
A way in which nature is glorified as an entity separate from humans constructing a false narrative.
You see before the coming of age my perception of nature was just one false narrative.
I repeatedly reflect back on the way in which photographer Ansel Adams depicts nature as this fantasizing place of remoteness.
A way in which nature is glorified as an entity separate from humans constructing a false narrative.
You see before the coming of age my perception of nature was just one false narrative.
(~random poem I just made up inspired by that last paragraph~)
Through the clever framing of societies past
My thoughts of nature circle together
Dead at last,
Are we forever doomed to repeat the past?
Just let it go and try again
Don’t hesitate,
For it is not to late
The future is ready, just innovate.
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