Sometimes I come across a tree which seems like Buddha or Jesus: loving, compassionate, still, unambitious, enlightened, in eternal meditation, giving pleasure to a pilgrim, shade to a cow, berries to a bird, beauty to its surroundings, health to its neighbors, branches for the fire, leaves for the soil, asking nothing in return, in total harmony with the wind and the rain. How much can I learn from a tree? The tree is my church, the tree is my temple, the tree is my mantra, the tree is my poem and my prayer.

In spite of nuclear weapons, large numbers of American citizens feel totally insecure. And in spite of so much wealth, industry and technology, many Americans are living under deprivation and anxiety. So happiness is not in accumulation of material goods, it's in sharing and caring.

The old story is a story of measurement. And the New Story is to bring measurement and meaning together. You cannot measure meaning.

Our modern world of old story is completely failing humanity. This is the reason that increasing numbers of people have become and are becoming disillusioned from politics. People don't like voting. Whoever you vote, government gets in. Whatever they promise, they never fulfill.

Nature is out there, and we can do what we like to it. We can cut down the rain forest. We can put animals in factory farms and slaughter them as we like. We can over-fish the oceans. We can pollute the rivers. We can pollute the water and change climate. We are somehow superior to nature. We are somehow rulers of nature.

People are are moving away from the fossil fuel-based economy, to a more renewable economy. That is what is called the 'transition town' movement. There are three hundred towns in Britain that are making this transition. Taking energy from solar power, from wind power, from water power.

If individuals start to walk on the path of spirit and feel a sense of the sacred connectedness, then social, economic and political problems will also begin to get resolved.