I feel I am a child that's lost its mother. I feel like a calf whose mother has gone off to slaughter.

human animals and nonhuman animals can communicate quite well; if we are brought up around animals as children we take this for granted. By the time we are adults we no longer remember.

I am not interested in being a role model, or in fulfilling the expectations of others. I know I am of most use to others and to myself by being this unique self: Nature, I have noticed, is not particularly devoted to copies, and human beings needn't be either.

My God is not a religious God. My God is nature, my God is everything there is. That's God. Everything is God. I'm a child of that.

You don't need organized religion to connect with the universe. Often a church is the only place you can go to find peace and quiet... But it shouldn't be confused with connecting with one's spirit.

Honestly, that is the most important thing to me: Can I continue to live up to my own expectations of myself - and not fall back into slacking?

My ancestors make up the skin of the world. That's who that is. That's what that is. That's us.