This is an invitation to remember

Ecological Belonging is a Locally Rooted, Universally Human movement to reawaken a felt sense of interconnectedness between ourselves, each other, and the natural world.

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What is Ecological Belonging?

Think about rituals each season to celebrate the arrival of spring or the harvest, think about rituals of gratitude and abundance each day to remember where our food came from or who was involved in cultivating the earth.

Ecological belonging is living in an ongoing interconnected relationship with ourselves, each other and our broader natural world. For most of human history we have done that through storytelling, ritual and practice. This ‘invisible architecture’ made meaning, focused attention, connected communities with themselves and their natural environment.

Throughout most of history, this is how we as humans have enabled and engaged in a respectful relationship with ourselves and all life on earth.

What are we doing?

Ecological Belonging is an emerging idea centered on developing a new narrative around how we connect ourselves to the world. We start with a simple question: “How do we live?”

We are inviting people to remember, renew and reweave the stories, rituals and practices that root us in a deep interconnectedness between ourselves, our communities, our local environments, and the universal human experience.

Anchored by Georgetown University and The Wellbeing Project, this exploration of Ecological Belonging is taking place through a number of interwoven tracks. We are collaborative with people from across geographies and disciplines to catalyze a movement to gently guide humanity back into a deeper harmony with itself and the natural world.

Together, we envision a movement that builds and embraces a hopeful ecological narrative that is locally rooted and universally human.

Some Examples from Our Exploration in 2024

The Ecological Belonging Innovation Fellowship

50 students from 4 universities participated in our Ecological Belonging Fellowship. Students engaged in exploration of ecological identity and place.

Artists as “Ritual Alchemists” around the world

Working with our partner CAN (the Community Arts Network) we selected 8 Ritual Alchemists, an amazing group of artists who helped to creatively express Ecological Belonging and rituals in cities around the world. These take part alongside many of The Wellbeing Project’s Regional Hearth Summits.

The Role of Elders in Civic Education

Working in partnership with The CIVICS Innovation Hub and the NECE Festival, we engaged over three months with a cohort of participants from 16 countries to explore the role of intergenerational dialogue and wisdom of Elders in Public Policy and civic education.