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Essentially, I’m really worried about climate change.

There’s been a host of things to be worried about ever since the dawn of civilization, but this one seems to me like a real doozy. The whole planet may be coming apart at the seams.

I feel like I should have started doing something a long time ago. Activism? Making adjustments to my lifestyle? Educating myself more? Exposing myself to real suffering? But I haven’t been.

Don’t get me wrong, I try to be a good person. I vote, act ethically, recycle, buy organic when I can, sign lots of online petitions, and feel guilty when I drive.

But for a long time – maybe all along – I’ve felt like it wasn’t enough, but I didn’t know what do about it.

Let’s just say the climate crisis has lit a fire under me and I’m determined to change the way I relate to the world.

What will that mean? I don’t know yet. I just hope that over the course of the next year or so, I will develop:

a personal conviction that I am facing the difficult issues and choices instead of avoiding or denying them;
a greater sense of confidence that I am doing what I can;
a better understanding of what keeps nice people like me from getting more involved when so many beings are suffering;
a better sense of how – for me – my Zen practice relates to my concern for the world, and vice versa.

My journey will be informed by, and intimately related to, my Zen Buddhist practice. However, I believe that anyone who has compassion and a sense of personal ethics will be able to relate to it. It is impossible for a person of practice (or, if you will, faith) to separate their spiritual or religious practice from the kinds of questions I will be contemplating here. In fact, the world would probably be much better off if people of practice or faith challenged themselves to more fully integrate their ideals and their actions.

Check back in to see how I’m doing! I promise to be very honest, and you just might resonate with some aspect of my quest. In fact, I hope you do.

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