Earth Ethos is led by Valerie and Lukas Ringland, who have been life partners since 2011, and Kimia Maleki has began working with Valerie in 2019 and has become a trusted colleague.

Dr. Valerie Cloud Clearer Schwan Ringland 

I am an East Frisian–Sumerian (Jewish) woman born on traditional Shawnee land in the US and living on traditional Yuin country in southern NSW, Australia. My spiritual name is Cloud Clearer (Wulkenkloorjer) because I facilitate clarity of inner wisdom. Schwan is my family totem (swan in German), a shamanic/medicine person symbol across cultures.

I am an Indigenous scientist, author, space-holder, medicine woman, teacher, researcher, mother, partner, friend, and community member. I embed Indigenous science throughout my life, personal and professional. I have over a decade of experience working around the world (Australia, U.S., India, South Africa and Peru). I have lived experience knowledge of intense trauma, grief and loss, health challenges, spiritual crises, grounding, ancestral communication, and conflict resolution. I have done apprenticeships in indigenous ceremonial dancing, earthing ceremonies, dreamwork, sweat lodge ceremonies, and sacred circle-keeping. In terms of Western training, I have a Ph.D. in social work, a J.D. in law, B.A. in maths, and certifications in mediation and restorative justice.

Lukas Ringland 

I am an Anglo-Celtic Australian decolonising on Yuin Country, the land of my first settler ancestor. I’m on a long journey to unpack the depths of my identity. So much of who I am has seemingly been shaped by the darker and overwhelmed aspects of Judeo-Christianity, masculinity and whiteness. I see it as being of vital importance to acknowledge and honour this darkness, whilst also trying to revitalise these aspects of being. Through this lens, overwhelmed masculinity becomes the sacred masculine, patriarchal and shame-based Judeo-Christianity becomes an honoured if flawed ancestral belief structure, and obliterating oppressive whiteness becomes a celebrated ethnic and tribal identity, in equal relationship with other tribes.

I know, too, that I must find balance with earth-based, feminine qualities of being and knowing that have for so long been repressed. Exploitation of the earth, and the controlling, patriarchal dominance of the “engineering/fix-it mind” becomes an “earth ethos”, more in tune with emergence instead of forceful logical positivism, and open, intuitive complexity instead of narrow, limiting rationality. In other words, I want to find my Indigeneity once more, complicated as this is by my being a recent arrival on Australian shores in ancestral terms with such deep ties to other places, despite being born here. Destructive and stagnant longing for the old countries, often unconscious, must shift into grief, transition and growth.

My professional life was once defined by a vision of being “the man in the suit” who dominates through his intellect. I may have chosen a “softer” line of work in the not-for-profit sector, but “suit man” remained the vision of success, with all the collateral damage — internal and external — that this archetypal journey through the world entails.

The transition away from “suit man” has been one of the most painful yet vital journeys of my life.

I’ve now come to see my greatest strength as my empathetic heart and intuitive wisdom expressed through interpersonal and community work. I no long define myself in terms of “career”. I am a husband, father, community member, friend and brother. I seek at all times to protect, nurture and teach mind, body and spirit, and that of my community, both those parts that are strong, and those that are healing. I value and respect synchronicity and The Middle Way.