Messages from Mother Earth

A sunflower, for example

Marie Loh, England

(Submitted by the author)

A sunflower, for example, looks the same as any other sunflower; its visual rhythm is always the same: an outer circle of golden yellow leaves, an inner circle of dark brown bushy matter. You could find out the exact mathematical calculation for reproducing a picture-perfect copy on a computer. So if you took a photo of a sunflower and loaded it onto your computer, what is visually displayed on your monitor has a mathematical and scientific calculation running behind it. It has its own rhythm.

Messages from Mother

Ankya Klay, Norway

(Submitted by the author)

She spoke to me softly … "Go out and walk on my land and you will receive answers to your questions." I listened to her message and learnt that whenever I am in a place of indecision or not-knowing around a question, She will provide me with the answer. For it is in getting out of my mind and into my heart that the answers are to be found.

Broadcasting

George Washington Carver, USA

(Submitted by María Elena Bigorra, Mexico)

Nature is an unlimited broadcasting station, through which God speaks to us every day of our lives, if we only will tune in.

The Cracked Mirror

Wangari Maathai, Kenya

(Submitted by The Office of Wangari Maathai)

Mount Kenya used to be a holy mountain for my people, the Kikuyus. They believed that their God dwelled on the mountain and that everything good - the rains and clean drinking water - flowed from it. As long as they saw the clouds (the mountain is a very shy mountain, usually hiding behind clouds), they knew they would get rain.

A New Glasnost for the Planet

Mikhail Gorbachev, Russia

(Submitted by the author)

It may seem paradoxical, but despite having borne witness to the countless humanitarian and environmental disasters of recent decades, I am an optimist. But being an optimist does not mean simply looking at the world through rose-tinted glasses, like Voltaire’s Candide, and declaring everything to be for the best, despite an endless array of misfortunes.

Butterflies

Rabindranath Tagore, India

Butterflies do not count in months, but in moments, and they are not short of time.

After midnight

Amelia Earhart, USA

After midnight the moon set and I was alone with the stars.

Harmony

Jane Goodall, England

There will never be peace unless we learn to live in harmony with the environment. The key point is greed - the driving force behind the rich world’s actions.