Sea and Soil Collective

We can’t talk about environmental restoration without also addressing people…

Healthy ecosystems require healthy communities tending to them. And healthy communities require spaces where people can gather, eat, play, grieve, laugh, and remember that we belong to something bigger than ourselves.

Where we can remember we ARE nature.

Over the past 5+ years, this is what Healing + Community Care have looked like in practice at Sea + Soil:

• 120+ free nature therapy gatherings for people and planet
• 20,000+ lbs of food donated to 170 families in San Diego
• Partnerships with 3 Tribal Nations supporting food sovereignty and Native Habitat Restoration

These numbers matter. But the real impact is harder to measure…

Kids seeing the ocean for the first time.
Volunteers learning how to identify native plant and animal species.
Shared meals after long days in the garden.
Strangers realizing how much they have in common.

Grassroots reparations in real time.

Healing the earth doesn’t happen without healing our relationships – with land and with each other.

And these gatherings have taught us something big: people are hungry for experiences that right the wrongs of broken systems, and reconnect them to land, culture, and community.

Which is exactly where we’re heading next. More soon.

To continue being alive is also an art 🖤

Thank you to the artists building vessels for our big feelings. All creators are credited in slides. Please tag below if we missed anyone ✨

Anybody else craving a mental health reset? How bout some community hangs, hands in the dirt, and time away from doom scrolling?

Join Sea + Soil and the Ocean Knoll Canyon Keepers as we work to restore Kumeyaay and Payómkawichum homeland in the heart of Panáa’o (Encinitas)! ,

We’ll be focused on the native habitat restoration of the Ocean Knoll Canyon and Moonlight Beach watershed.

🌼 SATURDAY, JAN 24 • 10am-12pm for a Native Habitat Restoration of the Ocean Knoll Canyon and Moonlight Beach watershed. 812 Bonita Dr. Encinitas!

🌈 BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, neurodivergent, differently-abled folks always welcome and encouraged to benefit from our free, community nature therapy offerings :)

🌊 Thank you to all who stayed tuned after last event’s cancellation due to weather!

As the summer heat dies off and the crisp, fall air exhales upon us, we’re reflecting on what a beautiful season of growth we’ve had with our Vista Garden Cohort.

Our goal was to study how a small group of surfers + garden volunteers could share land, stories, and support in a cohort model where responsibilities were distributed and no one was ever expected to manage alone.

What transpired was a small revelation: a giving circle, a co-op, a community of shared decision making, and a true bond of friendship from a group who were once strangers. We had no need for fundraising because all our resourcing needs were magically met. We worked simply, with small harvests, mostly building up healthy soil and prioritizing pollinators.

But the impact reached far outside the bounds of the garden, as vital life resources appeared from unexpected places: Mentorship was fostered for a member taking her medical board exams, housing solutions were arranged between members in need through harmonious alignment, spontaneous grief circles were held to support members who had lost loved ones, and celebrations were thrown to commemorate PhD graduates, birthdays, career evolutions, solstices…the list goes on.

Our expectation was to grow food and flowers, but we had no idea the power we had to grow a refuge of HOPE in a time of so much uncertainty. And as the seasons change, so will the shape of this Cohort container, but with deep roots that will always connect us, and a shared joy for what is to come.

Happy Equinox + thank you to all who have participated, we are so excited to share what’s coming next!