Mycelial knowledge

I’ve been taking courses in environmental studies that lean heavily into indigenous knowledge.

One of the things I learned was that there is no word for “weed” in the Menominee language. They believed every living thing had value and had a reason for existing.

I love the idea that no piece of life is wrong or undesirable, even if it’s in the wrong place.

Another thing I learned was about the mycelial network. This is an underground filament network that connects plant roots and trees – and even with animals and soil. It’s a communication network. It’s a mutually beneficial system by which the fungi help plants and other trees absorb nutrients, and the trees and plants produce nutrients that feed the fungi.

I think the most striking thing was in one of the videos we watched, which pointed out that we need to think of nature as part of our community. That’s something that modern Western society doesn’t do – we see it as a supplement, as a resource to be consumed, as a thing to be tamed, and entirely separate from us.

It isn’t.

Nature knows this. Indigenous people know this. We’re now rediscovering what was always right there.

And I actually dislike that way of framing it – rediscovering. I prefer to think that those of us descended from colonizers and manifest destiny are finally starting to listen and recognize the errors introduced into our society. Namely, that people are separate from and superior to nature. That the world exists to provide for us, and we can take endlessly without giving back. That natural spaces are things to be conquered and paved over. That expansion is destiny, regardless of who or what it harms.

Interconnectedness is something we need to remember. And value. And let go of the idea of rugged individualism, which was and always will be a myth.