In Conversation with Sally Gillespie
7 Questions on Writing About the Divine Feminine and Spirituality
Hello beloved reader,
Sally Gillespie is a writer, psychotherapist, and researcher whose work delves into the psychological, emotional, and spiritual dimensions of climate change, ecological consciousness, and personal transformation. With a background in Jungian depth psychology, she explores the ways in which our inner landscapes are intimately connected to the unfolding crises of the external world. Her writing is both an inquiry and an invitation—an exploration of how engaging deeply with climate disruption can lead not just to despair, but also to profound growth, wisdom, and reconnection with the living world.
Sally's work acknowledges the grief, anxiety, and existential uncertainty that arise when we fully recognize the scale of the climate emergency. However, she does not dwell solely in the pain; instead, she charts pathways through it, guiding readers toward a more integrated and resilient way of being. Drawing from her experiences as a psychotherapist and her research on climate engagement, she illuminates how facing the ecological crisis is not just an external challenge but an inner journey of consciousness change—one that requires us to relinquish outdated worldviews and embrace new ways of relating to ourselves, each other, and the Earth.
Her writing is rich with personal reflection, interdisciplinary insight, and a deep reverence for both science and storytelling. She weaves together psychology, mythology, activism, and ecological philosophy to articulate a vision of transformation that is both individual and collective. At its core, her work is about the power of awareness—of how shifting the stories we tell about the world can open up new possibilities for action, healing, and hope.
Sally Gillespie does not offer easy solutions, nor does she suggest that the path ahead will be smooth. But through her compassionate and courageous engagement with the climate crisis, she helps us see that within the turmoil, there is also an opportunity—a chance to grow, to connect, and to co-create a future that honors life in all its complexity. Her writing is both a reckoning and a call to action: an urgent yet deeply hopeful invitation to step fully into the realities of our time with open eyes, strong hearts, and a renewed sense of purpose.
I’ve had the privilege and pleasure of reading Sally’s book, CLIMATE CRISIS AND CONSCIOUSNESS Re-imagining Our World and Ourselves, and she is kindly and generously offering to email you a free pdf if you subscribe to her Substack and request a copy:
The 7 Questions:
1. Why are you drawn to writing about spirituality and/or the Divine Feminine?
Although I have never consciously set out to write about spirituality, looking back now I can see that all of my books do integrate a spiritual perspective, as does my Substack Newsletter Psyche’s Nest. My first book, co-authored with Lindsay River back in the 1980s was about astrology and female experience, my second and third books about dreamwork and my last book, Climate Crisis and Consciousness draws together depth psychology, ecopsychology and climate psychology insights. The subjects are diverse but underlying all of them is the theme of recognising how we are interwoven into the sacred life of the world, and how crucial it is to listen and align ourselves with this vast creative and healing intelligence.
Finding the right words in terms of spirituality is difficult when you come from a Western culture which has many problematic religious beliefs, such as the Earth is inanimate and humans are inherently sinful. Or that spirit and soul are disembodied and unearthly. To counter these deadening and deadly beliefs, I am drawn to write about ways of honouring and protecting Mother Earth and her beings, recognising humans as kin with all of life. This leads me to write about cultivating practices which encourage attention, gratitude, respect and care for all of creation, as well as about ways of perceiving and knowing that take us beyond egoic consciousness.
2. How does writing about spirituality affect you, in your work and/or personal life?
To be a good writer is to be a good observer, listener and reader. Right now, I feel very nourished by all that I am learning from the human and more-than-human world which opens up horizons and perspectives I was not given by my education or culture. I am very privileged to live on a continent (Australia) which is the home to the oldest continuous living culture on Earth, stretching back 70,000 years and more. The cultures of the First Nations people here honour Earth as Mother and Country as Kin. For millenia, songlines, ceremonies and ways of living have imbued this land with a spiritual presence which is becoming more palpable for me, the more I listen to and learn from the teachings of First Nations elders and scholars. While First Nations cultures are not and never can be mine, I can hold up their voices, knowledge, history and spiritual perspectives through my writing. I can also write about what I am learning about my own culture, through listening to cultures which have maintained their connection to our Earth Mother, and have also experienced, and continue to experience, the horrors and abuses of colonisation. All of these understandings help me to name and resist the deathly spiritual void in modernity culture which underlies the crash of ecosystems and biodiversity and the wellbeing of people. Discarding modernity’s false story of a disconnected self, occupying a mechanistic body and planet is very freeing and enlivening as I find a greater sense of belonging and purpose within a network of communities, human and more than human.
3. What is an experience you have had that is perhaps the most mystical and unexplainable in the rational/material realm?
All of my life I have been a strong dreamer usually remembering a few dreams every night. There have been times in my life when the dreaming world has felt as, or even more, vivid and present to me than the waking world. I have often made decisions based on what I dreamt, not because my dreams tell me what to do, but because they have changed me in ways that shape my decisions. Seventeen years ago, when I was a psychotherapist in private practice, I had a very intense dream/vision experience which dramatically changed my life and my sense of self. In this dream, I swung high above the Earth on a rope. From my vantage point I could see the globe beneath me and the continents heaving as the oceans rapidly rose as a result of global heating. It was a mind stopping view. Instinctively, I chose to let go of the rope, and fall into the midst of this planetary chaos, fully accepting that I was surrendering myself to being one of millions of people, and other beings, struggling for life. I awoke from this dream, sad, frightened yet determined. I knew, without a doubt, that from then on my lifework would be focused on engaging with climate and ecological crises. Another way this dream changed me, was by giving me the experience of letting go of a ‘world view’ that literally placed me above Earth, separate from life’s connections, complexity, catastrophes and communities. When I let go of the rope, I surrendered some part of my privileged Western viewpoint with its false assumptions about individual autonomy and independence from life on Earth. Waking up I knew that I was subject to the collective fate of Earth as much as any other being, and that in the times to come climate and ecological upheavals would be a major determinant of how we live and die.
4. What is the first memory you have that there was something else besides the material realm?
I have a memory of myself at a very young age standing inside the front door of our house with my parents and some visitors. They were chatting and going through their goodbyes. I looked up at these big adults feeling so puzzled by why they were saying these words, when clearly each of them had very different feelings and thoughts inside of them which were loud and clear to me. This was the beginning of my conscious puzzling out of people and situations where so often what was said, was not what was thought or felt. The need to acknowledge what is not being said or felt still remains strong in me.
5. What do you hope for, for your writing?
Firstly, that I keep doing it and stay fresh and true in what I write. Then, that I find ways to share my writing that nourishes readers and stimulates conversations about how we can act in response to ecological and social upheavals. We cannot meet the complexity of systemic crises on our own, community is essential for both action and evolving a culture which has the wisdom, knowledge and respect to protect life on Earth. My hope, like so many others here on Substack, is to play a part in creating a culture of care through sharing my own and others’ stories and learnings through community.
6. Who is a writer or other creative artist who makes you feel inspired, helps you to remember we’re spiritual beings having a human experience, and perhaps makes you cherish Mother Earth just a little bit more?
As I mention above, I feel inspired and reorientated by the writings and teachings of the First Nations people, for whom care for Country is inextricably intertwined with care for soul and for all of life. In the United States, I think particularly of Robin Wall Kimmerer, while here in Australia, Professor Anne Poelina, Tyson Yunkaporta and Bruce Pascoe have all helped me to understand what people from extractivist cultures can learn from First Nations’ teachers about the metaphors of kinship and belonging that lie at the root of all ancient human cultures, and a healthy human identity. I have often heard Anne Poelina, a Nyikina Warrwa elder, say the Earth would be lonely without us, which is such a beautiful affirmation of the role we can play in being a caring companion for our sacred world, recognising Earth as our spiritual home and creating life-honouring cultures that are mature, resilient and creative.
7. What are the words of wisdom and/or spiritual principle(s) that you come back to time and time again that give you solace and uplift your heart?
The poet Mary Oliver wrote “The first, the wildest and the wisest thing I know: that the soul exists and its built entirely out of attentiveness”. I love this! It’s so true, whenever I do settle into a deep attention, especially when focusing on the natural world, I come into a more loving, joyful and grounded way of being. Two poems that I frequently return to that express this, are Mary Oliver’s Wild Geese and Wendell Berry’s The Peace of Wild Things, each so filled with faith in their place – our place – within Earth’s glorious web of life.
BIO:
Dr Sally Gillespie worked as a Jungian psychotherapist for over twenty years before undertaking doctoral research on the psychological experience of ongoing climate engagement. Since completing her PhD at Western Sydney University in 2014 she has been lecturing and facilitating workshops on climate and ecopsychology. In addition to a number of book chapters and papers, Sally’s book Climate Crisis and Consciousness: Reimagining our world and ourselves (Routledge 2020) explores the psychological challenges and developmental processes of climate engagement for individuals and societies. She is an active member of Psychology for a Safe Climate and the Climate Psychology Alliance UK, and is on the Editorial team of Explorations in Climate Psychology Journal. Sally grew up in Aotearoa New Zealand and now lives on the unceded traditional lands of the Wangal people in Warrane/Sydney, Australia.
Please also note: this series of interviews will live under the tab labeled “Alchemical Conversations” on this Substack, with the intention that the space will become a kind of resource of writers collaborating in reclaiming the Divine Feminine. Perhaps each string of words each of us writes is a thread in a vast, intricate, and beautiful tapestry we are collectively weaving—each row of this evolving fabric moving us toward an evolution of consciousness, a deeper awareness of the spiritual dimensions of our ecological crisis, and the healing needed to restore a harmonic balance with Mother Earth.
Next week we also get to enjoy Rev. Dr. Stephanie Rutt’s responses to these 7 questions.
I'm loving these interviews, Camilla. So much to learn from so many beautiful women. And thanks, Sally for your insights, inspiration and wisdom.
“Earth would be lonely without us” is such a tender generous way to phrase things!