On Monday, 1st June, some pupils in the UK will return to school after the lockdown due to coronavirus. Lots of thoughts and worries but listening to Janine Benyus talk about the “great pause” as she calls the lockdown offer a vision of utopian glimmer in the darkness. The lockdown due to the coronavirus has provided us with time for not only reflection but also opportunity to think and ask questions.
“Viruses are all around us. In a square meter, 800 million viruses a day fall from the sky. They are a hugely important part of our world and our evolution. But these pandemics happen when the natural defences are broken. [Meanwhile] climate change is just putting everything under stress. So, we’ve got this natural system that is out of kilter.” Janine Benyus
Ecological collapse and climate change are two conditions that have created a greater risk of global pandemics. Nature is sending us all a message and exploring these message from biomimicry lens can offer hope.
Janine says: “We’re seeing a bit of utopian glimmer coming through, and natural selection chooses what works over and over. So, when we get back to normal, we get this glorious choice to put back in our lives only what is best, only what we found made life worth living.”
The video is long, but offer great material for discussions about asking questions about how our future.
I love this way of expressing a new way forward.
“We’re saying, ‘Let’s make ourselves as small as possible and not harm anything around us.’ But let’s break that open and say, ‘Let’s put the wellness not just inside our homes, but outside the walls,’ How can we go from meeting our own needs to doing what other organisms do, which is hailing goodness and benefit to everything around us?”
What does it mean to put wellness out the walls?
Can you imagine how cities will function after the pandemic?
Biomimicry for Young Children 