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Taking Action
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A Pattern Language / TIKKUN OLAM /
Buildings must always be built on those parts of the land
which are in the worst condition, not the best.
"We must treat every new act of building as an opportunity to mend some rent in the existing cloth; each act of building gives us the chance to make one of the ugliest and least healthy parts of the environment more healthy -- as for those parts which are already healthy and beautiful -- they of course need no attention....This is the principle of site repair."
Personally, I have no idea whether Greenberg's comments are reasonable or not.But interesting, interesting.
"Recently, I bought a beautiful pineapple. It was quite large and had a crown of thick, very green leaves. When I unpacked it at the monastery, I decided that it should go in the fridge until it was to be used because the heat and humidity was causing fruit to spoil very quickly. But it just wouldn’t fit. It was too large for the shelf. So I proceeded to saw off the crown and left it sitting on the counter. A few moments later, the Sensei came into the kitchen to make lunch. He saw the cluster of pineapple leaves on the counter and, without the least hesitation, reached for a black bowl. He placed a kenzan in it, arranged the pineapple crown and filled the bowl with water. Turning, he walked directly to a bookcase in the kitchen, on top of which stands a rupa of Kwannon, the bodhisattva of graceful compassion. He set the bowl next to it and we both moved back to see it.
It was beautiful."
"Our society is produced in such a way that we create hungry ghosts very young, every day, by the thousands, by the hundreds of thousands. They are everywhere, wandering around without anything to believe in, without anything to love, without anything that looks true and good and beautiful.
I don't know whether during the first half of the twenty-first century we can handle this problem of drugs, of the hungry ghosts that we produce. We have to call on people in all walks of life—parents, Church, teachers, businessmen and others -— to stop and look. This is very important, stopping and looking at our present situation and considering how to start transforming garbage into flowers."
Quotes Kipling's The Glory of the Garden
"Our England is a garden, and such gardens are not made
By singing:-- 'Oh, how beautiful!' and sitting in the shade"
"In 2004, the Norwegian Nobel committee made a revolutionary decision. In awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to an environmentalist for the first time, the committee broadened the concept of peace. The message the committee sent was this: If we want a peaceful world, we have to manage our environment responsibly and sustainably. We also have to share natural resources equitably at local, national, and global levels. ...
One of the most important lessons we learned is that citizens need to be empowered. They need to feel that the life they want for themselves and their children can be achieved only when they participate in protecting and restoring their environment and expanding what I like to call "democratic space." They can't wait for others to do it for them; they need to take action themselves. Otherwise, the best theories about how to preserve ecosystems for use by humans and other species will remain just that: theories.
On a recent visit to Japan, I learned the concept of mottainai. One meaning in Japanese is "what a waste." But it also captures in one term the "Three Rs" that environmentalists have been campaigning on for a number of years: reduce, reuse, and recycle. I am seeking to make mottainai a global campaign, adding one more "R" suggested by Klaus Töpfer, the head of the UN Environment Program: "repair" resources where necessary."