An inspirational message from Paul Hawken
Paul has long been one of the most inspirational guides for how to think imaginatively and sustainably but his Commencement address to the University of Portland in May is particularly good.
Commencement Address by Paul Hawken, University of Portland, May 3rd,n2009nnWhen I was invited to give this speech, I was asked if I could give a simple short talk that was "direct, naked, taut, honest, passionate, lean, shivering, startling, and graceful." Boy, no pressure there.
But let's begin with the startling part. Hey, Class of 2009: you are going to have to figure out what it means to be a human being on earth at a time when every living system is declining, and the rate of decline is accelerating. Kind of a mind-boggling situation - but not one peer-reviewed paper published in the last thirty years can refute that statement.
Basically, the earth needs a new operating system, you are the programmers, and we need it within a few decades.
This planet came with a set of operating instructions, but we seem tonhave misplaced them. Important rules like don't poison the water, soil, or air, and don't let the earth get overcrowded, and don't touch the thermostat have been broken. Buckminster Fuller said that spaceship earth was so ingeniously designed that no one has a clue that we are on one, flying through the universe at a million miles per hour, with no need for seatbelts, lots of room in coach, and really good food - but all that is changing.
There is invisible writing on the back of the diploma you willnreceive, and in case you didn't bring lemon juice to decode it, I can tell you what it says: YOU ARE BRILLIANT, AND THE EARTH IS HIRING. The earth couldn't afford to send any recruiters or limos to your school.nIt sent you rain, sunsets, ripe cherries, night blooming jasmine, and that unbelievably cute person you are dating. Take the hint. And here's the deal: Forget that this task of planet-saving is notnpossible in the time required. Don't be put off by people who know what is not possible. Do what needs to be done, and check to see if it was impossible only after you are done.
When asked if I am pessimistic or optimistic about the future, my answer is always the same: If you look at the science about what is happening on earth and aren't pessimistic, you don't understand data.nBut if you meet the people who are working to restore this earth and the lives of the poor, and you aren't optimistic, you haven't got a pulse. What I see everywhere in the world are ordinary people willing to confront despair, power, and incalculable odds in order to restore some semblance of grace, justice, and beauty to this world. The poet Adrienne Rich wrote, "So much has been destroyed I have cast my lot with those who, age after age, perversely, with no extraordinary power, reconstitute the world." There could be no better description.nHumanity is coalescing. It is reconstituting the world, and the action is taking place in schoolrooms, farms, jungles, villages, campuses, companies, refuge camps, deserts, fisheries, and slums.
You join a multitude of caring people. No one knows how many groups and organizations are working on the most salient issues of our day: climate change, poverty, deforestation, peace, water, hunger, conservation, human rights, and more. This is the largest movement thenworld has ever seen.
Rather than control, it seeks connection. Rather than dominance, itnstrives to disperse concentrations of power. Like Mercy Corps, it works behind the scenes and gets the job done. Large as it is, no onenknows the true size of this movement. It provides hope, support, and meaning to billions of people in the world. Its clout resides in idea,
ot in force. It is made up of teachers, children, peasants, businesspeople, rappers, organic farmers, nuns, artists, government workers, fisherfolk, engineers, students, incorrigible writers,nweeping Muslims, concerned mothers, poets, doctors without borders, grieving Christians, street musicians, the President of the United States of America, and as the writer David James Duncan would say, thenCreator, the One who loves us all in such a huge way.
There is a rabbinical teaching that says if the world is ending and the Messiah arrives, first plant a tree, and then see if the story isntrue. Inspiration is not garnered from the litanies of what maynbefall us; it resides in humanity's willingness to restore, redress,nreform, rebuild, recover, reimagine, and reconsider. "One day younfinally knew what you had to do, and began, though the voices aroundnyou kept shouting their bad advice," is Mary Oliver's description ofnmoving away from the profane toward a deep sense of connectedness tonthe living world.
Millions of people are working on behalf of strangers, even if thenevening news is usually about the death of strangers. This kindness ofnstrangers has religious, even mythic origins, and very specificneighteenth-century roots. Abolitionists were the first people toncreate a national and global movement to defend the rights of thosenthey did not know. Until that time, no group had filed a grievancenexcept on behalf of itself. The founders of this movement were largelynunknown - Granville Clark, Thomas Clarkson, Josiah Wedgwood - andntheir goal was ridiculous on the face of it: at that time three out ofnfour people in the world were enslaved. Enslaving each other was whatnhuman beings had done for ages. And the abolitionist movement wasngreeted with incredulity. Conservative spokesmen ridiculed thenabolitionists as liberals, progressives, do-gooders, meddlers, andnactivists. They were told they would ruin the economy and drivenEngland into poverty. But for the first time in history a group ofnpeople organized themselves to help people they would never know, fromnwhom they would never receive direct or indirect benefit. And todayntens of millions of people do this every day. It is called the worldnof non-profits, civil society, schools, social entrepreneurship, andnnon-governmental organizations, of companies who place social andnenvironmental justice at the top of their strategic goals. The scopenand scale of this effort is unparalleled in history.
The living world is not "out there" somewhere, but in your heart. Whatndo we know about life? In the words of biologist Janine Benyus, lifencreates the conditions that are conducive to life. I can think of nonbetter motto for a future economy. We have tens of thousands ofnabandoned homes without people and tens of thousands of abandonednpeople without homes. We have failed bankers advising failednregulators on how to save failed assets. Think about this: we are thenonly species on this planet without full employment. Brilliant. Wenhave an economy that tells us that it is cheaper to destroy earth innreal time than to renew, restore, and sustain it. You can print moneynto bail out a bank but you can't print life to bail out a planet. Atnpresent we are stealing the future, selling it in the present, andncalling it gross domestic product. We can just as easily have anneconomy that is based on healing the future instead of stealing it. Wencan either create assets for the future or take the assets of thenfuture. One is called restoration and the other exploitation. Andnwhenever we exploit the earth we exploit people and cause untoldnsuffering. Working for the earth is not a way to get rich, it is a waynto be rich.
The first living cell came into being nearly 40 million centuries ago,nand its direct descendants are in all of our bloodstreams. Literallynyou are breathing molecules this very second that were inhaled bynMoses, Mother Teresa, and Bono. We are vastly interconnected. Ournfates are inseparable. We are here because the dream of every cell isnto become two cells. In each of you are one quadrillion cells, 90npercent of which are not human cells. Your body is a community, andnwithout those other microorganisms you would perish in hours. Eachnhuman cell has 400 billion molecules conducting millions of processesnbetween trillions of atoms. The total cellular activity in one humannbody is staggering: one septillion actions at any one moment, a onenwith twenty-four zeros after it. In a millisecond, our body hasnundergone ten times more processes than there are stars in thenuniverse - exactly what Charles Darwin foretold when he said sciencenwould discover that each living creature was a "little universe,nformed of a host of self-propagating organisms, inconceivably minutenand as numerous as the stars of heaven."
So I have two questions for you all: First, can you feel your body?nStop for a moment. Feel your body. One septillion activities going onnsimultaneously, and your body does this so well you are free to ignorenit, and wonder instead when this speech will end. Second question: whonis in charge of your body? Who is managing those molecules? Hopefullynnot a political party. Life is creating the conditions that arenconducive to life inside you, just as in all of nature. What I wantnyou to imagine is that collectively humanity is evincing a 20 deepninnate wisdom in coming together to heal the wounds and insults of thenpast.
Ralph Waldo Emerson once asked what we would do if the stars only camenout once every thousand years. No one would sleep that night, ofncourse. The world would become religious overnight. We would benecstatic, delirious, made rapturous by the glory of God. Instead thenstars come out every night, and we watch television.
This extraordinary time when we are globally aware of each other andnthe multiple dangers that threaten civilization has never happened,
ot in a thousand years, not in ten thousand years. Each of us is asncomplex and beautiful as all the stars in the universe. We have donengreat things and we have gone way off course in terms of honoringncreation. You are graduating to the most amazing, challenging,nstupefying challenge ever bequested to any generation. The generationsnbefore you failed. They didn't stay up all night. They got distractednand lost sight of the fact that life is a miracle every moment of yournexistence. Nature beckons you to be on her side. You couldn't ask forna better boss. The most unrealistic person in the world is the cynic,
ot the dreamer. Hopefulness only makes sense when it doesn't makensense to be hopeful. This is your century. Take it and run as if yournlife depends on it.""}}}
