To Survive, We Must Respect the Water

Survival East West Newsletter — July 2025

It’s time we start listening—really listening—to the oceans, rivers, and skies.

For too long, we treated nature as a backdrop. A view. A resource. Something to conquer, control, or consume. But now, the tide is turning—literally and metaphorically. Rain no longer falls gently in the night. It crashes through cities in sudden floods. Winds rip from coastlines to cornfields, unseasonal and unrelenting. Rivers swell, then vanish. Lakes recede into cracked memory.

What we’re experiencing isn’t “bad weather.” It’s

a new relationship with the natural world—one we didn’t choose, but must now honor if we’re to survive.

Survival isn’t just a theme at SEW. It’s our mission. And it begins with respect. We must respect the forces reshaping our climate and reimagine how we live—*with* nature, not against it.

That’s why our Survival Book Discussions matter. In Blue Architecture, Brook Muller doesn’t just mourn the damage—he weighs what’s still possible: buildings that breathe, designs that filter floodwater, homes that bend with the wind instead of breaking. He sees living structures as acts of ecological humility, not human hubris.

This is the kind of conversation we want to foster: grounded, realistic, and forward-looking. Not “back to nature,” but forward with nature.

We won’t survive by walling ourselves off. We’ll survive by learning how to live in flow—like rivers do, like wind does. There’s beauty in that. And there’s power.

So as we stand in this moment—heatwaves rising, rainfall shifting, ecosystems stretching—we must ask:

Can we become the kind of society that survives?

At SEW, we believe the answer is yes. But only if we start now.

📚 Next Up in Our Survival Book Series:

In September, I’ll be hosting a solo discussion on one of the most compelling environmental books of our time—stay tuned for the announcement and details.

🎥 And… coming soon: our first YouTube Book Discussion—a new platform for environmental storytelling, cello strings included. Watch for the date.

Survive forward. Live forward. Think forward.

G. Britt,

Founder, Survival East West