Our only home - by Dalai Lama

In his new book, the Dalai Lama makes an appeal to humanity and makes it clear that taking care of the planet is nothing more than taking care of ourselves. Since the last decades of the 20th century, several humanitarian, political and religious leaders have been drawing attention to the fact that that the time for our reaction against the deterioration and depletion of natural resources has passed: we are late to reverse the effects of human action on nature. Among them is His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, who has been directing his worldwide preaching less to the issue of meditation practices and Buddhist virtues and more to the need to take concrete actions to care for the Earth. Now, in his new book, Our Only Home, written with Franz Alt, he makes it clear that taking care of our planet is nothing more than taking care of ourselves. In his words, we need this “wise selfishness” at this moment in our history. After all, we cannot live without nature, but nature lives very well without us. It is not, then, just a matter of preserving trees and animals: we must preserve ourselves and preserve life for our children and grandchildren. Therefore, as long as human beings do not see themselves as part of this nature – exactly like insects, plants and rocks – and do not realize the interdependence of everything that exists, we will not take environmental issues seriously. We will always have a condescending stance towards all destruction and see everything that surrounds us as just a useful resource. But the time has come: more and more people are becoming aware that we need to do something.