At this moment on Earth, we possess more technical prowess and knowledge than our ancestors could have dreamt of. Our telescopes let us see through time to the beginnings of the universe; our microscopes pry open the codes at the core of organic life; our satellites reveal global weather patterns and hidden behaviors of remote nations. Who, even a century ago, could have imagined such abundance of information and power?
At the same time we witness destruction of life in dimensions that confronted no previous generation in recorded history. Certainly our ancestors knew wars, plagues, and famine, entire civilizations foundered. But today it is not just a forest here and farmlands and fisheries there; today entire species are dying - and whole cultures and ecosystems on a global scale, even to the oxygen-producing plankton of our seas. What is in store for our children's children? What will be left for those who come after? Appalled by the questions themselves, we turn to immediate tasks and try to close our minds to to nightmare scenarios of want and war in a wasted, contaminated world.
When we are fearful, and the odds are running against us, it is easy to let the heart and mind go numb. Because the perils facing us are so pervasive, and yet often hard to see, this numbing touches us all. No one is unaffected by it. No one is immune to doubt, denial, or disbelief about the severity of our situation - and about our power to change it. Yet of all the dangers we face, from climate change to nuclear warfare, none is so great as the deadening of our response. The numbing of mind and heart is already upon us - in the diversions we create for ourselves as individuals and nations, in the fights we pick, the aims we pursue, the stuff we buy.
The very alarms that should rivet our attention and bond us in collective action tend to have the opposite effect. They make us want to pull down the blinds and busy ourselves with other things. We eat meat from factory-farmed animals and produce grown by agribusiness, knowing of the pesticides and hormones they contain, but preferring to not think they will cause harm. We buy clothes without noticing where they are made, preferring not to think of the sweatshops they may have come from. We don't bother voting, or if we do, we vote for candidates we may not believe will address the real problems, hoping against all previous experience that they will suddenly awaken and act boldly to save us. Have we become callous, nihilistic? Have we ceased to care what happens to live on Earth? ...
Pain for the world is not only natural, it is a necessary component of our healing. As in all organisms, pain has a purpose: it is a warning signal, designed to trigger remedial action. It is not to be banished by injections of optimism or sermons on "positive thinking." It is to be named and validated as a healthy, normal human response to the situation we find ourselves in. Faced and experienced, its power can be used. As the frozen defenses of the psyche thaw, new energies and intelligence are released.
- Joanna Macy, from World As Lover, World As Self
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What do we most need to do to save our world?
What we most need to do is to hear within us the sounds of the Earth crying.
~ Thich Nhat Hanh
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