Gratitude and Climate Change

This is NOT your usual Thanksgiving gratitude exhortation. (Disclaimer: I am a gratitude advocate and practitioner. Gratitude can be a difficult pull when there aren’t good choices. You’ve got to wrap your head around the problem and find the nugget of truth that resonates for you.) Fiery blazes in California, increasingly fierce flooding along the East Coast. Welcome to the new normal. Curse the darkness or light a candle, either way it’s happening. And at warp speed.

I’m grateful people are starting to get seriously concerned about climate change. I’m grateful for all the little acts we have done so far. AND I know we need to do more and on a larger scale. Each of us must step up and do anything and everything possible within our field of influence to modify this looming disaster.

Reflecting on WWII and our collective response and sacrifices at that time, we have a blueprint of how a society can step up and make changes. Changes unimaginable before the war. The time is now, we are here. The climate will be bad for some but disastrous for many. Weather immigrants will be the new migration population. This will happen both within and throughout countries. If you thought the current immigration woes were bad, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

There’s the political will and the collective will and both need to be involved. If the political component isn’t there, we as a society must lead our elected leaders into this new territory. Kicking and screaming if need be because NO ONE will be unaffected.

I am grateful to be living in a time demanding not just my awareness but my heart and mind. The time is now. We are here. Our children and their children will be living our choices. What will those choices be? We can use the gift of gratitude along with our hearts and minds to create a future that doesn’t fuel further damage. A future that will not be just livable, but will allow us all to thrive.