All Comments By Pauline Tesler

Eloquent and true as far as it goes, but I think it applies well to the domain of human beings and animals but fails to account for the suffering of this planet, which seems real to me. Or rather, it would be difficult to apply the test and readily sort truth from fiction and metaphor regarding Gaia. Is the Gaia hypothesis only a lovely metaphor ? Or is the earth itself suffering when it's systems fall apart, rivers dry up, trees die and burn? This is not the same as saying Germany or a bank is suffering. This planet is not an abstraction or a metaphor. Yet I still think the author is on to a valuable distinction. 

Thie idea that accepting how things actually are in the moment is the condition from which change is possible makes such sense--these ideas are not in conflict but are two parts of the same reality, the yin and yang of skillful action.

My daughter seems to have in her DNA a natural sense of abundance and a lovely non-attachment to things. She has always given away money to anyone who needs it though she doesn't have much herself; she won't buy new things until she has given away what she already has; When I offer to give her household items because we are downsizing, she most often just says she doesn't need anything. This is effortless for her, just who she is. This is not how I am by nature; I learn from her.