Imagination in a Changing World

Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. 
On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.
Arundhati Roy

In this presentation, we will explore our current threshold moment, marked by a mix of despair and hope, and examine how disruptions in cultural and environmental patterns might lead to a transformative shift in worldview. By reflecting on past instances of near-collapse and the power of human imagination, we will consider how embracing an animate worldview could guide us toward a more harmonious future with both other-than-human beings and future generations.

We are at a threshold moment in our planetary journey. Some days, the future might feel despairingly bleak. At other times, we might feel hints of a possible world coming; we might even hear the intake of her breath. What lies between these two contrasting experiences? Perhaps it’s similar to the permeable border that lies between experiencing a dead universe and experiencing an animate cosmos – a border that might be crossed by way of imagination, perception, or shape-shifting worldviews. Our threshold moment is brimful with the disarray of familiar patterns, and not just patterns of climate. Cultural disruptions cause wobbles in matrices of power. Instabilities and uncertainties are now rampant in both outer-world phenomena and in our individual and collective psychic terrain. Is it possible that turmoil and even chaos prepare the way for surprising emergence?

Speaker Biography

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Geneen Marie Haugen, Ph.D., grew up a little wild, with a run amok imagination, and has lived at the wild edge for most of her life. Once upon a time, she was a whitewater river guide and a tipi dweller who loved knowing that only thin canvas separated her from the world. In her wild wanderings, she’s been amazed to have had dozens or maybe hundreds of close encounters with creatures such as moose, elk, grizzlies, wolves, black bears, cougars, bison, and more. For her, the scented hot springs of Yellowstone smell like home. Her matrilineal ancestors are the indigenous Sami of the European Arctic. A content creator and guide to the intertwined mysteries of nature and psyche with the Animas Valley Institute, she has been on the faculty of the Esalen Institute and Schumacher College. Her writing has appeared in Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth; Thomas Berry: Dreamer of the Earth; Parabola; Kosmos Journal; Ecopsychology; The Artist’s Field Guide to Yellowstone, and many others. She believes in the world-shifting potential of the human imagination allied with the planetary psyche.

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