The time for soft words has passed.
The fires in our mountains.
The storms wrecking our coastlines.
The shrinking windows of food security and clean water.
These aren’t just warnings.
They’re symptoms—of a planet pleading for our attention and loving care. They are the trembling voice of a living Earth caught in a fever dream, asking us to wake up.
They are the consequences of a civilization built on the lie—the Great Untruth—that we are separate from nature. That infinite growth is possible on a finite planet. That we can take without giving back and survive.
We know better. And if we didn’t before, we do now.
As Dr. Rupert Read says in Truth to Action: The Transformation the Climate Crisis Requires, a powerful conversation hosted by The Way Forward: Regenerative Conversations, we are already in the early stages of collapse. Not decades away. Not something we can leave for the next generation. It’s happening now.
Read offers the chilling metaphor: if midnight is the point of no return, we are at five past midnight. Which means the future we thought we had time to plan for is already changing underneath us.
But here’s the deeper truth: it’s not too late for transformation. Not if we act. Not if we speak. Not if we stop pretending and start choosing. And that begins by facing the truth—not with panic, but with love and courage.
Because as Read reminds us, awareness alone isn’t enough. A climate majority that understands the crisis doesn’t guarantee we’ll do what’s necessary. Silence still dominates our public conversations. Especially in communities like mine, communities of relative comfort and privilege, where the illusion of “business as usual” still lingers in the air.
I’ve come to see that silence—our failure to speak honestly with our neighbors, our children, our leaders—isn’t neutrality. It’s complicity. And the cost of that silence is far too high.
That’s why I’m choosing to act locally. To bring this conversation home, in a way that’s grounded in community and heart.
One of the ways I’m doing that is through Earth Listening Circles—simple, powerful gatherings where we can pause the noise of everyday life and really listen. To the Earth. To each other. To what’s shifting around and within us.
These Circles are not about blame or shame. They’re about courage. About feeling what’s been buried. About grieving what we’re losing—and rediscovering the agency we still have. They’re a space to make sense of this moment and to imagine what comes next.
I’ll be weaving in what I call the Four Great Truths from the One Cause project—especially the truths of Interconnectedness and Stewardship. Because the more we understand how deeply woven into nature we are, the more natural it becomes to care. To take responsibility. To begin again.
In parallel, my wife Ann and I have been exploring what it means to respond to this moment in how we live. We’ve started to reimagine our home, not just as a shelter, but as a model—what we’re calling a “Loving Homestead.” A small-scale, relational, resilient experiment in living more simply, regeneratively, and interdependently.
We’re still discerning what it will look like and who it may include. But we know this: whether the global systems succeed or collapse, we’ll need community. We’ll need each other. And we’ll need values strong enough to guide us when certainty falls away.
The deeper question we’re holding is: Do we keep pretending the world will stay the same, or do we prepare—body, heart, and soul—for what’s coming?
To pretend is to choose the default path—the slow, grinding collapse of systems that can’t sustain themselves. To prepare, to respond with heart and intention, is to shape something different: a life of meaning, connection, and service, even if it’s harder, even if it asks more of us. It’s the path of joy through truth.
This moment also calls us to speak. Especially to those we love.
Read’s words echo in my heart: “There’s still time to choose transformation before collapse. But the window is narrow.”
That’s not doom-mongering. That’s love in action. And speaking it clearly—with our children, our neighbors, our communities—is one of the most radical acts we can commit.
During another recent webinar hosted by The Aspen Chapel titled How Do We Respond to the Time We’re Living Through?, I was shaken and stirred by a story shared by Andrew Harvey, one of the speakers.
Harvey recalled a conversation between Winston Churchill and his granddaughter, Edwina Sandys. She had asked her grandfather what leadership looks like in impossible times.
Churchill replied that real leadership requires four things:
To face the extremity of the danger without illusion, false hope, or magical thinking.
To be brave enough to tell the truth, even if it costs you love or approval.
To call on others to draw on their deepest courage, wisdom, and joy.
And perhaps most powerfully, to evoke a vision—an exalted goal—so compelling that people are willing to risk everything to help bring it forth, even if it may never be fully realized.
That’s what this moment demands of us.
Not easy answers. But truth. Not perfection. But participation. Not guarantees. But love strong enough to move us anyway.
Harvey went further, calling this moment not just a crisis—but a sacred opportunity. A dark night of the soul for our species, through which we might shed the false self of consumer culture and awaken something deeper, fiercer, and more aligned with Life itself.
He calls it becoming “Love’s sacred warrior.” And though his words are strong, they resonate with the clarity of someone who has lived through the fire.
So I return to the same question I asked at the beginning. It’s a question I carry with me into each Circle, each conversation, and every decision we make about our future:
What does Love ask of us now?
It’s not an easy question. But it might be the only one that matters.
I invite you to sit with it. With your family. With your community. With your own heart.
And then, when you’re ready, join me. Join us.
Let’s stop waiting for permission to lead the change.
Because if not us, then who?
Resources & Invitations
▶️ Watch the Full Conversation with Dr. Rupert Read:
Truth to Action: The Transformation the Climate Crisis Requires
A powerful call to courageous truth-telling and transformative action in the face of collapse, hosted by The Way Forward: Regenerative Conversations.
▶️ Watch Andrew Harvey’s Soul-Stirring Talk:
How Do We Respond to the Time We Are Living Through?
Hosted by The Aspen Chapel, this conversation dives into the deeper spiritual invitation of our moment in history—with wisdom from mystics, elders, and the fierce clarity of Love.
🌀 Join Our First Earth Listening Circle (Local Western NC):
If you’re ready to explore these truths in community and listen for what Love is asking of you, I invite you to join our first local Earth Listening Circle:
Details & RSVP here.
This isn’t about having the answers.
It’s about making space for real conversation—rooted in truth, grief, imagination, and hope.
