Being a Tree Sister

Why?

I recently watched David Attenborough’s witness statement and the waking up to how we can heal our beautiful planet went again another layer deeper. Always faced with what can I do I waited for an answer. I then saw on musician Ayla Schaefer’s website that her music was planting tree’s and I thought well then yoga can plant tree’s too! So I too have become a tree sister. Every time someone books or rebook’s onto one of my 6 week yoga courses or workshops that run throuought the year I will plant a tree. So this year I have the goal of planting 365 tree’s one for each day of the year! Together in collobation with Tree Sisters we can plant a tree every day!

One of the best ways we can reduce climate change is in the rewilding of the planet, which means reforresting as much as we can and also rewilding ourselves and relearning some of the old ways of living in good relationship with the Earth whilst also pioneering new Earth loving technologies. Since I have had children my heart breaks for the sadness they will feel soon when they learn what we have done to our planet. Since I have had children I have done much soul healing and as an offshoot my spirit is returning to its natural wild state and then I fall in love more with the Earth and my passion to act grows. So lets rewild together the Earth and oursleves!

A huge part of the yoga practice focuses on our breath as prana or lifeforce energy. Through the simple act of coming to our breath we can remember our connection to the tree’s, to the Earth, to each other, too all of life and creation. Without the tree’s there is no breath, no prana, no life force energy. To stay vital and in full pranic health we of course need our great mother to be well. Being able to do someting, anything is giving me hope and Tree Sisters is a doorway to this course of action.

“TreeSisters is an invitation to everyone to do as much radical good as they can for the planet. Our global network of treesisters is transforming both lives and landscapes in extraordinary ways. TreeSisters offers unique global programs that focus on encouraging women's leadership, Nature-connection, and significant behaviour change as we make the shift from being consumers to restorers. TreeSisters is funding the restoration of environments, biodiversity and communities within more than 10 major ecosystems around the global Tropics, through a diverse portfolio of vetted, trusted reforestation projects and in the process, planting millions of trees. Join us in making ecological restoration the new norm! www.treesisters.org.”

Tree Sister’s Approach to Reforestation

Why Trees, Why Now? Trees offer humanity one of the most crucial ecosystem services available to us at this phase of our evolution. Currently global warming is threatening all life on Earth. While we figure out how to reduce carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, the forests of our world are drawing it down into their roots, branches, boughs and leaves. They are invaluable in helping to cool us down. To provide any viable hope for future generations, we need to replace deforestation with a reforestation revolution. We can't wait for governments to lead the way. Together, we are restoring forests in 10+ major ecosystems including those in Madagascar, India, Brazil, Kenya, and Nepal, Mozambique, West Papua and Cameroon. 

We plant trees to restore ecosystems and livelihoods whilst increasing protection against the extremes of climate change in multiple regions of the tropical forest belt. We do this in ways that recreate and restore natural forest ecosystems using indigenous species, fostering local knowledge and skills, and promoting women's participation. We strive to do it intelligently, appropriately, respectfully and successfully. 

Forests play a vital role in the hydrological cycles of our world, sequestering the atmospheric carbon dioxide that is driving climate change. When trees are removed, vibrant ecosystems are often overfarmed, eroded and rendered infertile in a cascade effect that is mirrored with social decline, grinding poverty and climate extremes. Reforestation can rapidly reverse these trends, stabilizing and nourishing the soils, restoring watersheds, revitalizing dry springs and providing good quality water to large populations living downstream. 

You can read more about our Reforestation approach and our Reforestation Partners on the homepage of our website.

Poem ~ Prayer for the Sisterhood

May we support each other's creations.
May we honour each other's unique wisdoms.
May we commit to looking for each other's beauty.
May we make way for the emergent feminine in each other.
May we forgive each other's mistakes.
May we know our own strength and support our sisters to find theirs.
May we know that we are cells in the same body. }
May we feel our roots in the earth.
May we gather, unite, rise and call forth a new way. Together.
~ by Clare Dubois, Founder & CEO, TreeSisters