The same is true of our natural environment. Our clinging to a sense of ourselves as separate individuals, and the selfish behavior it enables, blinds us to our intimate connectedness to the environment. The devastation of our natural environment clearly reflects a failure to appreciate its tremendous value and importance. In the case of our planet, the need to develop feelings of closeness is particularly acute because we can now see all of the devastating effects of exploiting the earth as if it were a lump of rock that has no relationship to us. There might be many other habitable planets in the universe or in other galaxies, but they are of no benefit to us. It is this planet that we need to keep habitable.
Essentially the same problem arises, whether it is in our relationship to other human beings, to animals or to the planet — and the solution is the same: cultivating a much broader awareness of the chains of causality that link us to others, and cultivating the feelings of closeness that can inspire us to act.
Ogyen Trinley Dorje
from Interconnected; Embracing Life in Our Global Society