Blog Action Day, October 15, 2007

Environment
Notes: 1. environment emerged linked with nature, implying ‘natural’ (not human, not cultural) surroundings; ecology emerged as a scientific effort to connect organisms (such as the human) to their environments
2. environment is the area in which something exists or lives; habitat is a the place or type of place where a person or thing is most likely to be found

Source: Roget’s New Millenniumâ„¢ Thesaurus, First Edition (v 1.3.1) Copyright © 2007 by Lexico Publishing Group, LLC. All rights reserved.

Please don’t misunderstand. I love the sky and stars, the flowers, the animals and the ocean, the fire that lights and warms, and the rainbow colors that stole my heart when my eyes first opened. They steal my breath. I’m stunned to silence whenever I reflect on life without them.

Yet I wonder whether environmental change has a chance when we focus on their protection. Imagine nurturing what we can. . . . The question tugs at me do have a hope of healing the planet when we’re so woeful at healing ourselves, our missteps, and our own hurt feelings.

What if we healed our personal environment first? What if we brought our whole selves to make a whole Earth? Would doing the first part make the second part happen faster?

Personal Environmental Action

Did you ever love playing in the dirt?

What if we start with us? What if we heal ourselves first?

Inside our heads.
Inside our hearts.
Inside our thoughts and feelings.
About ourselves.
About others.
What if we put away the drama?

Do we love the words that hide inside our heads,
the words that say we don’t deserve
the breath-taking world set before us?
Let’s live self-respect and deserve what we have.

It doesn’t have to hurt.

Do we love the people, who
have taken trust and broken it,
violated and defiled something good?
Let’s shine our hearts on caretakers and caregivers instead.

Did you ever wish upon a star?

Do we love the events in the past,
that strapped the world — its fights and
its hurts — on ou rbacks and shoulders?
Let’s leave yesterday’s battlefield to reach the gold of tomorrow.

We get to pick who we are.

Self-respect and a shining vision on so many hearts,
just might be the gentle rain we need to heal the world
. . . without a word, a law, a cause.

There is no difficulty that enough love will not conquer . . . — Emmett Fox

It starts with us . . . and how we love.

Did you ever love playing in the dirt?

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Do you suppose if we thought more of ourselves, we would take better care of the planet? Or do you think that the problem is rooted in thinking about ourselves too much already?

–ME “Liz” Strauss