Beauty exists irrespective of financial circumstances.
Beauty is created by fellow human beings, and enhanced because they are in relationship with each other.
The good life may mean doing some things that do not feel comfortable. It may mean sitting long hours just with yourself as you begin to listen to your own questions. That was the reality for me when I was 27, and it was really terrifying.
Even the fear of death is nothing compared to the fear of not having lived authentically and fully.
I’ve grown certain that the root of all fear is that we’ve been forced to deny who we are.
We hear, Oh, we need to patent GMOs and develop new strains and new chemicals because Nature can’t provide what we need. I have to debate people all the time who say that Nature can’t provide enough.
We’ll learn fear might not mean ‘stop’; personally, I’ve come to believe fear usually means ‘go.’ It always means listen closely.
Breaking with the pack may be exactly what we should be doing. Saying no to the dominant culture that is trapping us in destructive ways of living might be the most life-serving thing we can do.
This is the first generation to know that the choices we’re making have ultimate consequences. It’s a time when you either choose life or you choose death … Going along with the current order means that you’re choosing death.
If we start with limits and a premise of scarcity and fear, it makes us fearful of each other, and that makes us vulnerable to anti-democratic systems.
I never like to use those terms [like pessimistic].
Humans need to feel effective – to feel that we can make a dent, as he puts it. So the art of living is to find expressions appropriate to our own uniqueness in which we can experience effectiveness.
