Taking Good Care of Ourselves*

Creating ephemeral earth art is a healing modality that facilitates deep connection with nature, grounding me in the present moment. By mindfully arranging natural elements into intricate designs, I engage in a practice that nurtures reflection, meaning-making, and a sense of interconnectedness with the universe, offering emotional and spiritual healing. This act of creation allows me to process what is on my mind and in my heart.

I have worked as a teacher and principal in special education settings, director of anti-sexual violence programs, and now as a chaplain with a focus on dying, death, grief, and loss. Over the years, I have often turned to the healing arts. Breath work, meditation, visual storytelling, Zentangle, and most recently, the creation of impermanent earth art are my primary sources of self-care.

I stepped into the Mornings Altars practice of nature-based art during the pandemic, seeking to add to my repertoire of wellness practices. The alchemy of nature, ritual, and art envelopes me. The rest of the world falls away for a time. I experience the seven steps of the practice seamlessly:

1. Wonder & Wander—treasure hunting in nature to collect what has fallen to the ground and inspires me in relation to my query or intention
2. Place—slowing down to arrive in the space, listening to nature
3. Clear—making space at my feet to reveal a blank canvas so that inspiration can flow
4. Play—laying out everything I have foraged, exploring shapes, textures, and colors to develop patterns
5. Gift—dedicating my art to my intention
6. Share—crafting a memory, capturing it in my mind, or photo, to memorialize the experience
7. Let Go— walking away, giving up any attachment to the physical manifestation of my work and play

In this practice, I become immersed in a multi-sensory experience that supports gentle inquiry into my inner landscape and provides opportunities for insights and expression. Over the past year, my subjects of introspection and altar construction have included: Releasing and Readying, Many Conversations/Listening for Other Voices, Becoming/Unfolding, Transforming a Gift, Letting Go, and Crossing a Threshold. My altars are created inside or outside, in 15 minutes or 60, range in materials from all nature-based (branches, leaves, flowers, berries, shells, bark, ashes, and more), to inclusion of my artwork, and art materials, and in sizes that fit in my palm to others with a four-foot diameter.

When offering workshops, I create a safe(r) container, encourage working with materials at hand (in nature or in home), offer prompts (to be worked with or let go), suggest moving into the experience by attuning to one’s feelings and thoughts, with a focus on personal touch in design not perfection, being with their creation upon completion, and reflecting or journaling about their question/intention, process, or the entire experience.

Perhaps this practice, engaged with on your own or with others, will offer you moments of peace, calm, and clarity.

Dr. Jill Greenbaum
Contemplative Chaplain
End-of-Life Doula
Expressive Arts Grief Coach
Certified Morning Altars Teacher
Death Café Host

The resources for plorking (playing and working) include:

• Why Awe Is Such an Important Emotion, Dacher Keltner
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysAJQycTw-0
• Morning Altars: A 7-Step Practice to Nourish Your Spirit through Nature, Art and Ritual, Day Schildkret
  Hello, Goodbye: 75 Rituals for Times of Loss, Celebration, and Change, Day Schildkret
• Shots of Awe, Jason Silva, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QyVZrV3d3o
• Earth Artist and his Process, Andy Goldsworthy, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sngXz55b4bc

* This piece was originally published in the February 2026 issue of Connects, the Association for Death Education and Counseling newsletter.