“We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect.”
—Aldo Leopold
How do you experience yourself as being in community with the non-human world?
As I mature and come to terms with the reality that I will continue to age, grow old, and one day die, I now understand that my existence here is temporary, like everything else in nature. I have no claim of “dominion (ownership) over the earth, as I was taught from the Bible as a child. Instead, I now feel a deep obligation of stewardship and a responsibility to leave the world in a little better shape that what I found it in, so that those living creatures who will follow after I am gone can enjoy good lives also. I have learned the earth does not belong to me, instead, I belong to the earth.