Relationship as teacher of sustainability: Post-individualist education

In the face of destructive human presence, sustainability has become a prominent and central theme of the contemporary environmental and wellbeing discourse. Our chapter takes the current environmental and sociopolitical challenges humanity faces as our species’ developmental issue precipitated by the bonding rupture between human beings and other beings. We propose that the sustainability discourse be taken in the direction of healing the wounds of bonding rupture and facilitating the evolution of human consciousness and development of a more mature identity. We posit that the latter is concomitant with overcoming materialistic individualism and moving towards the relational integration of self, community, and world. We make the case that these relational practices are intrinsic to evolving and developing sustainable humanity. In particular, this chapter shows, by way of narrative illustrations, how we may create teaching and learning environments in schools and other institutions that are conducive to experiencing and internalizing a relational sense of self.