The land gets inside of us; and we must decide one way or another what this means, what we will do about it.

One must live in the middle of contradiction, because if all contradiction were eliminated at once, life would collapse. There are simply no definitive answers to some of the great pressing questions. You continue to live them out making your life a worthy expression of leaning into the light.

The cold view to take of our future is that we are therefore headed for extinction in a universe of impersonal chemical, physical, and biological laws. A more productive, certainly more engaging view, is that we have the intelligence to grasp what is happening, the composure not to be intimidated by its complexity, and the courage to take steps that may bear no fruit in our lifetimes.

It is the imagination that gives shape to the universe.

One of the great dreams of man must be to find some place between the extremes of nature and civilization where it is possible to live without regret.

Have we come all this way, I wondered, only to be dismantled by our own technologies, to be betrayed by political connivance or the impersonal avarice of a corporation?

People think that if you've written a book and somebody's given you a pat on the back then, you know, it's all - you're all settled, you know? You're going to be fine. I know that if I'm not confused, and really afraid, my work isn't going to be any good.