On hospicing modernity, an invitation to hold many paradoxical layers of complexity, to stretch your heart, to know vulnerability as your strength.

• (1:00) - Colonialism, identity, and family history.
• (7:10) - Modernity, its definition, and its impact on society, culture, and the environment.
• (16:53) - Modernity, colonialism, and their impact on humanity's mental health and well-being.
• (26:20) - Education, storytelling, and connection to nature.
• (32:50) - Indigenous perspectives on psychology, including the concept of the "bus" representing the multiplicity within the self.
• (39:08) - Modern society's disconnection from nature and self, with a focus on indigenous knowledge and practices for healing and growth.
  
  

Dr. Vanessa Machado de Oliveira Andreotti has served as a Latinx professor at the University of British Columbia, now Dean of the Faculty of Education of the University of Victoria.

Dr. Andreotti is a former Canada Research Chair in Race, Inequalities and Global Change and a former David Lam Chair in Multicultural Education. She is the author of Hospicing Modernity: Facing humanity’s wrongs and the implications for social activism (2021) and one of the co-founders of the Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures (GTDF) Arts/Research Collective. Most of her published articles and OpEds are available at academia.edu.

She began her career as a teacher in Brazil in 1994 and has since led educational and research programs in countries including the UK, Finland, Aotearoa/New Zealand, Brazil, and Canada.

Andreotti works across sectors in international and comparative education, particularly focusing on global justice and citizenship, Indigenous and community engagement, sustainability, and social and ecological responsibility. Her research examines relationships between historical, systemic, and on-going forms of violence, and the inherent unsustainability of modernity. Andreotti is one of the founding members of Gesturing Decolonial Futures Collective (decolonialfutures.net) and Teia das 5 Curas, an international network of Indigenous communities mostly in Canada and Latin America. She currently collaborates with these groups to direct research projects and learning initiatives related to global healing and wellbeing in times of unprecedented challenges.

On activating compassion through our simplest offerings of forgiveness, care, gratitude and respect.

• (0:30) - Japanese rituals for beauty, harmony, and love.
• (10:00) - Cleaning and its connection to healing and mindfulness.
• (16:36) - Organizing and decluttering, with a focus on the importance of forgiveness and creating more space in life.
• (24:49) - Healing, self-care, and relationships.
• (31:48) - Buddhist teachings, suffering, and healing through interconnectedness and self-reflection.

Paula Ara was raised in Detroit by a Japanese mother, and did Zen training in Japan. She obtained her Ph.D. in Buddhist Studies from Harvard University in 1993 and is now the Eshinni & Kakushinni Professor of Women and Buddhist Studies at the Institute of Buddhist Studies in Berkeley, California. She is the author of Bringing Zen Home: The Healing Heart of Japanese Women’s Rituals, Women Living Zen: Japanese Soto Buddhist Nuns, and Painting Enlightenment: Healing Visions of the Heart Sutra. Her work has been a tremendous force in my own spiritual formation.

(5:32) - Cancer treatment, body connection, and self-love.
(11:35) - Resilience, grief, and legacy after cancer diagnosis.
(18:07) - Starting a foundation and creating a membership community for personal growth.
(24:59) - Spirituality, self-forgiveness, and patience with a guest speaker.