A newly linked group of trade books used in self-study and online degrees and courses in educating, counseling and healing with nature demonstrate the destructive results of Industrial Society's denial of its hidden prejudice against nature. The books and program offer remedial sensory ecology activities to eliminate this critical disorder.
A fifty year research study results in unique online opportunities to increase personal, social and environmental well being
Friday Harbor, WA, --October 22, 2009 -- : Project NatureConnect at the Institute of Global Education has announced a new re-publication of trade books for self-study and online degrees and courses in educating, counseling and healing with nature. The books document the destructive results of Industrial Society's hidden prejudice against nature and offer a new sensory science, Natural Attraction Ecology, that empowers us to address this detrimental bias.
An overview of the key discoveries and processes of Natural Attraction Ecology that help us reduce environmental and personal disorders is found in articles published by About.com. This Internet site is the "Guidance. Not Guesswork" part of the The New York Times Company whose core purpose is to distribute high-quality, socially and environmentally responsible news and information. Its recent articles, "The Science of Natural Attraction Ecology" and "The Hidden Voice in Natural Systems"were guest written for About.Com by Dr. Michael J. Cohen, the Director of Project NatureConnect. From his 50 investigative years into humanity's relationship with nature he authored eight Natural Attraction Ecology books. These include his most recent trade publications, "Educating, Counseling and Healing With Nature," [http://www.ecopsych.com/weboflife.html]"The Web of Life Imperative,"[/url]and "Reconnecting With Nature."
Cohen's books along with his About.Com articles describe how, from the nucleus of an atom to our solar system and beyond, all of nature, including our body and psyche, consist of, and are bound together by natural attraction. Natural attraction is nature's unifying essence. Many of nature's attractions register in our consciousness as 53 natural senses. They are basic forms of love that our thinking is naturally designed to use in order to sensibly relate to the natural world within and around us and each other.
Cohen's research has identified a prejudiced against nature story we hold, a story that we deny influences our reasoning. Its hidden bias misleads us to believe that we know how to think better than the way nature works to produce its purifying and balancing flow through us. Cohen notes that this error misleads us to excessively live, on average, over 95 percent of our time indoors. Over 99 percent of how we think and feel is separated from the nurturing and restorative attributes of nature.
"Our undue disconnection from nature and the natural encourages us to conquer and exploit nature rather than respect or revere its self-correcting and recycling powers," says Cohen. "Our lack of contact with nature subdues the natural sensory wisdom and renewal that nature's nurturing ways give us. For this reason, our thinking often becomes polluted. The frustration and hurt this creates drives us to attach ourselves to satisfactions we obtain from harmful relationships with people, places and things."
Cohen's books and programs demonstrate how the educating counseling and healing with nature process of NAE helps us remedy our disorders. Backyard or back country, it enables us to create moments that let Earth teach and renew us. It is a holistic mental health and stress management art that enhances therapy, spirituality and psychology.
Natural Attraction Ecology works best for individuals who have at least one good experience in nature, including a quiet walk in the park. Cohen says, "Without this experience, our society's bias against us being a part of nature's flow makes our natural selves and NAE suspect. To our loss, our thinking often omits the unifying truth conveyed by Mary Elizabeth Frye:
Do not stand at my grave and weep;
I am not there. I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripend grain.
I am the gentle autumn's rain.
When you awaken to the morning's hush,
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry;
I am not there. I did not die.
For Additional Information and Free Materials:
www.ecopsych.com/
360-378-6313 nature@interisland.net
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About Project NatureConnect
The pioneering mission of Project NatureConnect is to increase personal, social and environmental well-being by helping individuals genuinely connect their thinking and feeling with the sensory intelligence of nature's self-correcting ways, in and around them. The online program's low-cost, UNESCO approved, training courses and degrees enables its participants to make conscious sensory contact with the life-wisdom of the eons that awaits discovery within them and in natural areas, backyard or back country.
Program Founder and Director:
Recipient of the 1994 Distinguished World Citizen Award,EcopsychologistMichael J. Cohen, Ph.D. is a Program Director of the Institute of Global Education, where he coordinates its Integrated Ecology Department and Project NatureConnect. He also serves on the faculty of Portland State University and Akamai University. Dr. Cohen has founded sensory environmental education outdoor programs independently and for the National Audubon Society and Lesley University (AEI), conceived the 1985 National Audubon Conference "Is the Earth a Living Organism," and is an award winning author of "The Web of Life Imperative," "Reconnecting With Nature," and "Educating Counseling and Healing With Nature." A video about his lifework may be viewed at http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1357054/
CONTACT:
http://www.ecopsych.com/mjcohen.html
Email: nature@interisland.net
360-378-6313, Pacific Time Zone
