What is DANCE?

Dharma Action Network for Climate Engagement is a space to connect and explore the breadth of possible Dharma responses to climate change and related issues.

The aim of DANCE is to support a network of localized groups for passionate, compassionate engagement and political action around our shared climate crisis. We hope that a wide range of creative ideas and experiments in right action may be shared, incubated, and hatched together through this space.

DANCE is also a forum to discuss perspectives and to voice feelings about the environmental crises we face.

Furthermore, DANCE is a hub for information on relevant events and resources, including related retreats, workshops, artistic endeavors, and other enterprises.

Mission

Our mission is to bring practice to support awakening, emotional resilience and active response to climate change and other threats to our shared home through education, sustainable living, advocacy and activism. Through practices and collaboration on projects which cultivate awareness and compassion in response to climate change our aim is to build connections and foster the courage and confidence required to take action which ignites positive social change.

DANCE is for anyone who feels called to consciously respond to climate change, and is open to all. Members of the group extend across a variety of Buddhist traditions, but also include people who have a secular outlook and are not affiliated with any religious tradition, who are interested in exploring contemplative practice through myriad avenues. The intention of DANCE has always been to be as open as possible and welcome people of all faiths, or non-faiths, who wish to connect and come together to respond consciously to climate change.

History

DANCE was initiated in early 2013 by a group of Dharma teachers, staff and friends of Gaia House – as a forum for the wider sangha to explore what might be possible in bringing Dharma responses to the climate crisis.

This group of co-founders continues to generate projects and share them here and on the Facebook page, but the core intention is to support creative ideas and initiatives, as well as perspectives, from a much broader base. Our invitation, then, is for you to connect not with only with us, but also with others, and to take action in whatever ways inspire and make sense to you. You may even want to start up a DANCE group in your local area – and please do contact us if you would like to post an event on this website.

By sharing and working together, we can encourage, support and inspire each other in this great and beautiful heart-work of our times. We can make a difference.

Eco-Dharma

Bringing mindfulness to the climate conversation

We are living at a time when climate change, the greatest crisis of our civilization, threatens a sustainable environment that supports life on Earth. The scope of what this means can feel overwhelming, and seem insurmountable, and lead to feelings of ‘stuckness’, of anxiety, suffering and despair.  Mounting research on the physical and mental health benefits of mindfulness has contributed to and helped to legitimize a growing interest in meditative practice, with recent studies linking mindfulness with emotional stability, improved sleep, increased focus and memory, enhanced creativity, and higher levels of emotional resilience to be able to ‘be with’ anxiety, depression and despair.

Why is this important now?

The People’s Climate March in September 2014 was a turning point moment which brought hundreds of thousands of people around the world to the streets and placed climate firmly back on the broader agenda as the key moral issue of our time. With the scientific community warning of ‘catastrophic changes’ and a crisis which is already placing thousands of vulnerable people at risk, a sense of urgency is now steadily increasing in the lead up to the climate talks in Paris, December 2015. The scale of the devastation that we are currently facing has prevented many from being able to grasp or indeed engage emotionally with the issue, which in turn has created a a barrier to wise action.

Mindfulness and meditation offers an important role in helping one another to engage, and build emotional resilience, as well as to extend the tools of the practice outwards to help others; to see, accept and respond to the way things are with wisdom and compassion.

What does Dharma mean?

Dharma has a number of meanings that depend on the context in which it is used. Sometimes it refers to the teachings and practices of the Buddha, but it’s most significant meaning is the natural truths, laws and processes of the path of practice, and is characterized by and expressed through non-harming to ourselves and all living beings.

While we take inspiration from the Buddha's teachings on skillful response to suffering in our use of the word 'dharma', we also embrace dharma more broadly as teachings arising directly from climate change and the connected social crises that challenge our current ways of life and call us to a different relationship to the earth, and her peoples. We feel many commonalities with other contemplative traditions, and see the term 'dharma' as one that can contain a multiplicity of skillful views and practices including those beyond the traditional boundaries of Buddhism.