I borrowed this title from Coop America (they were using it to describe their 2005 ??) and pasted it on the front of one of my new notebooks.  It seems that both here at home and at the Zen Monastery Peace Center, this is what 2006 will be.  I loved the winter issue of the Living Compassion quarterly newsletter, but most especially these lines:  “But if we did it with the attitude of mind that this makes us ‘the good, right person,’ or if it causes us to hate people who are not doing ‘the right thing,’ or if we do it because we feel guilty if we don’t – well, we would actually have the world we have right now.  And this is not sustainable.”

I have always had a deep affinity for the natural world and its creatures, especially the rooted, winged, finned, and furred varieties.  (Human creatures have been more of a challenge to embrace.)  So from the moment I began to learn that our environment was in danger and needed defending, I was a defender, an advocate.  I’ve always wished I were brave enough to be a tree-sitter for a few weeks or months.

So it comes naturally to take steps in my life to care for the earth and her creatures.  Just this week we put in an order for a Toyota Prius; when it arrives we will contribute 80% less emissions into the atmosphere and more than double our current gas mileage.  We have had our home engineered for solar; we aim to be off the grid by mid-2007.  We are taking it slowly only because of the cost.  We will need to purchase some more energy efficient appliances before it will be feasible to live off the sun’s energy.

And, already we have reduced our PG&E bill by at least one-third, to a monthly total of less than $30.  We are replacing all of our lighting with low-wattage, energy efficient bulbs and tubes.  We have unplugged all contraptions that “sleep” or have lighted dials and signals.  We have quit using our clothes dryer; in the summer clothes go outside on the line and in winter they are on our large wooden drying racks in front of the wood-burning stove.

All of this feels good to the one in me who cares.  It also feels prudent and inevitable given what is happening to the world’s oil supply.  And, yes, sometimes it feels right and smug, but I know that is not the motivation for doing it.

Yet the real bold, new steps on the path to sustainability are not the ones I’ve already mentioned.  The true bold steps are the ones that sustain center, the ones that keep me connected with the oneness of all that is.  So, for 2006:
1.  I will say “yes” to every Living Compassion/Zen Monastery Peace Center practice opportunity in which it is physically possible for me to participate.
2.  I will initiate and maintain a weekly, in-person practice day with Living Compassion/Zen Monastery Peace Center.

These are two of my Your Best Year Yet goals.  Showing up for practice is my best hope of sustaining center and thus doing my part to care for the earth and her creatures.  Oh, not the best hope!  The ONLY hope!  As one of this week’s Peace Quotes said, from the Talmud, “To save one life, it is as if you had saved the world.”  And whose life do I have a chance of saving?

The only one who is not sustained in this endeavor is egocentric karmic conditioning.  It is appalled as it increasingly recognizes that it is on the endangered species list.  It is one species I do not need to save.