SUSTAINABLE LIVING

Technical expertise is invaluable when considering the topic of sustainability in our modern world. At the same time, I have learned from my study of cultures and traditions that have existed for millennia that another kind of knowledge - along with technical know-how - is also essential. This other kind of knowledge might best be described as a "spiritual orientation" to life: recognizing that we are all connected, not separate from anything or anyone. As Chief Seattle of the Salish tribe famously said in 1854, "Man did not weave the web of life - he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself." Taking to heart this perspective means that in order to create a sustainable world we must wake up and take greater responsibility for our lives and our world in ways that are far beyond in depth and breadth of what most of us have previously imagined. Now is the time for us to reexamine our personal lives, to look deeply into how we conduct ourselves in our relationships with others, and to reevaluate the values that we have held dear, that we have believed to be life-sustaining. Sustainable living requires that we revise how we "practice" our lives. In a sense it's an initiation into a new way of living that might, if we're lucky, produce the kind of sustainability that has served our ancestors so well.

-- Robert Elliott