Have a scenic Earth Day, everyone!

For this Earth Day, when we are all urged to think about living in harmony with nature and to ask ourselves what we can do given the reality of global warming and a devastating number of environmental concerns, I wanted to share this work I stumbled upon by Ben Walsh from the University of Vermont's Environmental Program, who writes on the relationship between Martial Arts and nature through the lens of Taoism, Zen Buddhism, and the nature-centered religion Shinto.  He interviews a number of martial arts practitioners from different traditions looking to understand how they think of their martial arts practice in relation to nature; how they use nature as both metaphor and teaching tool, how they use natural elements, specific animals and phenomena to illustrate physical techniques, and so on. (Full PDF source: Academia.edu) Enjoy!

"The Teaching, Philosophy and Technique of the Martial Arts in Relation to Nature" by Ben Walsh