Ecotherapy for All

This blog post is the second in a multi-part series about Indy Community Yoga’s use of public spaces to increase access, inclusion, and community-building through their practice. You can read the posts in any order: Part 1 covers affordability, and Part 3 explores the value of public spaces.

Affordability and inclusion are baked into everything Indy Community Yoga does—in fact, all of their yoga and meditation practices are totally free. When Tony Wiederhold founded the organization in 2016, his goal was to take yoga and meditation practice into the public sphere by removing the barriers that keep people from starting and exploring their own practice. While free yoga practice is part of what draws people to Indy Community Yoga, the inclusive community and general atmosphere of the classes is what keeps them coming back.

Tony and I sat down to discuss the history of Indy Community Yoga and what makes their model so special. Our conversation was full of advice on generating accessibility, inclusion, and community. The following excerpt is part two of our interview.

Marissa: You’ve mentioned throughout our conversation, and it’s on the Indy Community Yoga website a few times, the idea of harm reduction. In my own experience harm reduction is something I hear about in relation to the recovery community and substance use. I’m curious what inspired this focus on harm reduction in connection to community care, and how does Indy Community Yoga practice that?

Tony: There’s a really important Buddhist teaching that informs the way I live a lot, or has at least given me insight into my own behavior.  Sometimes it’s referred to as the Three Pure Precepts, I call it the Three Root Guidances. It’s three parts, and it’s a summation of the core of a lot of spiritual practices.

It goes like this. Number 1: refrain from doing cruel acts. As a human, you have the ability to choose. There have been times in my life when I have done things to hurt somebody on purpose. And hurt doesn’t just mean physical harm, it could mean emotional harm, or abuse. Number 1 means if you can stop yourself from hurting people on purpose, that’s huge.

The second one is, perform all acts of healing. That recognizes that as human beings, one can hurt somebody on accident. Or one can hurt somebody by indifference. So for example, if you want something and you pursue that knowing that there is a cost borne by somebody else, but “I want it so, ‘ehhh.’” I think this happens a lot, I think all of us have examples, even maybe from today, where we’ve done that. And then of course there’s harm you do out of complete obliviousness. You say something and it lands wrong. “Perform all acts of healing” recognizes that. And it also recognizes that the people all around us who we come into contact with are also hurt, either on purpose or by accident.

Hurt people hurt people. If I think about the times where I’ve wanted to really hurt somebody, it came from my own pain. By performing all acts of healing, we can reduce the likelihood of people hurting each other. We can also create circumstances for people in our lives to heal from whatever they have. I can allow myself to heal and make it less likely that I’ll hurt someone else. And also, we need to look at systems—the marinade that we’re in, and the harm that it causes by design or by accident or indifference.

The third part of it is to keep your mind clean of ill will and willful ignorance. In other words, own the effects of your actions. “Yes I hurt you, I’m sorry. That wasn’t my intention but I recognize that I did hurt you. How can I make it right?” That’s an act of healing, and also an act against willful ignorance. Versus, “You’re too sensitive” or “That’s not what happened.” #Gaslighting. “I’m sorry for what you felt.”

I think this is what being awake is. It’s like, “Oh. I’m part of this world, this universe, and my mere presence has effects.” And knowing that, why wouldn’t I walk with you? Why wouldn’t I try to help you heal your own stuff? Why wouldn’t we try to work together to make it so that there’s less harm in the world so we can lift each other up? It doesn’t seem like a debate to me.

This connects back to why we never require people to pay money. If we were to do that, that would create this other thing. The motive to make money. Even with the best intentions, it would drive our behavior. Harm reduction and community care – they’re the same thing. Through our work, how we operate, how we interact with people – we hope we live what we’re saying. And when we see that we’re not, we do something about it.

Marissa: I sense that with community partnerships, you’re very intentional about them and it’s a way of expanding your reach and meeting people where they’re at. How does Indy Community Yoga go about seeking and building community partnerships?

Tony: Well, we haven’t. We’ve been really lucky in that Tauja Catchings reached out to me and said, “Hey I like what you’re doing, can we have a class here?” I’m like, “Sure! Great!” Lori Osting at the West Perry Branch of the Public Library just emailed me out of nowhere to say, “Hey, we want to do this for our community,” so let’s talk about that. And then Thrival [Academy] came to us. We haven’t really sought anybody out. I feel like we’ve been very lucky because all of these organizations that have sought us out have a similar thing, like how do we invite people into this public space and make it available for everyone.

I think without that attitude it’s a very different thing. We’ve talked with entities and found that some insist on charging attendees money for various reasons. We’re not really into that. I feel like we’ve been very lucky that we have people who also have the same attitude, and similar work of placemaking in beautiful public spaces, and bringing people together without the expectation of spending money for both community wellbeing and for their personal wellbeing and it has been very wonderful.

The world’s full of sweet people. I think we just find each other. You just know it and it’s beautiful and it’s great.

Marissa: I have definitely found that to be the case as well, like when I first learned what ecotherapy is, I thought “this is very cool, but it’s only happening in the UK, or like California. It’s certainly not happening in Indiana. (Tony: Why not?) Marissa: Who’s doing it? But the more that I sought it and was courageous enough to voice that this is something I’m interested in, then new partnerships arose. That’s how I met you, and now we’re talking about this! I think it’s so cool how we find each other and the more you put it out into the world it builds off that.

Tony: I’m really happy you said that because it’s a really important thing that completely skipped my mind, and that is being trustworthy. Being trustworthy involves being reliable and consistently doing it. Consistently holding the space. Consistently offering the thing for community wellbeing in all phases, and doing it for a long time. We didn’t get approached by community partners until last year. Lori at the library was the first person to reach out. That wouldn’t have happened if we didn’t have a track record of a program that has been going on since 2016.

Actually, trustworthiness is on another Buddhist list, the six practices of a compassionate being (The Six Paramitas of a Bodhisattva). Trustworthiness is number 2. [Tony notes that the list includes generosity, trustworthiness, patience/forgiveness, energy, diligence, and seeing things as they are/being able to set aside your ideas about things to see the clear picture of what’s in front of your face.] I’ve found that trustworthiness – sincerity – is maybe the most important characteristic in people I choose to work with and in any relationship really. Part of my personal practice includes reflecting on my own sincerity and seeing when I am fooling myself or performing.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Ecotherapy spans a wide audience, from traditional therapists practicing outside to community-based nature mindfulness guides to individuals trying to add nature to their self-care practice. All of us can benefit from the models Tony shared. Community building is not only important for a practice like meditation, it’s also vital as a mental health support and helpful for place-making (in our case, making nature more inviting and accessible).

Community partnerships can magnify your impact and help with the sustainability of your practice (whatever it looks like!). Informal partnerships can take the form of information exchange, volunteering, mentoring, or encouraging participation, while formal partnerships generate power fiscally and can share resources, tools, and technical assistance. Pooling these resources helps our organizations widen our audiences, work more sustainably, and bring new perspectives to the table. Parks departments or foundations and non-profits from different sectors often have infrastructure in place that can easily add on ecotherapy programming to expand partnerships in your area. All it takes is a few passionate people to get the ball rolling.

Expanding the impact of ecotherapy can go beyond reaching more participants to reaching more future practitioners. When we create community partnerships, we are spreading information about what ecotherapy is and how it can help people, sharing tools for practicing ecotherapy in different settings, and developing new leaders in providing mental health support through nature.

Taking a “teach the teacher” mindset empowers others to bring ecotherapy to their own communities. Indy Community Yoga models this for meditation by training their volunteers to lead practices, and then inviting them to have a leadership role in the organization. Other partnerships like the Eagle Creek Park Foundation and Indy Parks & Recreation have seen success by training volunteer mindful hiking facilitators to lead events in their space. Instead of one person being in charge of teaching ecotherapy and leading events, this model helps practitioners avoid burnout, reach more participants, and share information about different ways to do ecotherapy.

Some questions to consider as you explore building authentic partnerships:

• Who is already doing ecotherapy or similar work in my community? (Non-profits, community gardens, and local meditation/gardening/hiking groups can be a good place to start looking. It’s useful to know this from the start to avoid duplicating work or stepping on anyone’s toes.)
• What would a mutually beneficial partnership look like? What will our partner organization receive in return for working with us? (Make sure to consider this to avoid a relationship where you are only taking and not giving, and don’t be afraid to ask your partners this question to make sure you’re providing benefits that they truly need.)
• What expectations will we share to maintain accountability, trust, and respect with everyone involved?

I hope this conversation with Tony inspires you to recreate some of Indy Community Yoga’s practices in sharing power and creating safe, affordable, and inclusive community practices. We’ll continue the conversation in Part 3, where we’ll dive into the role of nature in creating wellbeing through community.

You don’t have to champion ecotherapy in your community alone—and most things are better with friends. Before you go, think of 1-2 ways you can invite others into informal or formal partnerships. As an individual, this can be as simple as asking a friend to join you in your favorite ecotherapy activity!