If we take our youth seriously, provide tools to strengthen their natural prowess, and empower them to make the changes they want to see in the world, then this planet and her creatures have the chance to heal and flourish.

I grew up as a country boy.

The will to live that possesses us to create medicine, to become firefighters or teachers, is the same will to live that is woven into all living beings.

Acting definitely makes me feel so remarkably alive.

It's not who you know, it's who you don't know.

More than ever, it's very apparent that we are strapped for natural resources. We configure and reconfigure to try and find a way to maintain natural assets, when, ultimately, we are overlooking the most abundant, dynamic, and powerful resource we have available to us - our youth.

Very little makes me feel vulnerable these days. I hit my absolute apex of vulnerability when I returned to my home state of Louisiana, during the Gulf oil spill disaster, and witnessed mass devastation to every demonstration of life surrounding me - from grass, trees, bayous, insects, to animals and people - we all felt demolished.