When we slow down, quiet the mind, and allow ourselves to feel hungry for something that we do not understand, we are dipping into the abundant well of spiritual longing.

We can be the one to take the first courageous step toward the other and to do something or to try to do something other than rejection or attack. We can do this with our siblings and our mates and our friends and our colleagues. We can do this with the disconnection and the discord all around us.

We have little control over the outer weather patterns as we make our way through the landscape of a life. But we can become masters of the inner landscape. We can use what happens on the outside to change the way we function on the inside.

We need to claim our power for something beautiful, something harmonious and something globally healthy.

But grief is also a tonic. It is a healing elixir, made of tears that lubricate the heart.

I pull from a place within me that has ultimate faith in the meaningfulness and beauty of human life.

As humans try to evolve out of greed, let's put aside some wild places, protected lands, protected farms, things like that, since we may not evolve fast enough to protect nature.