There’s a beautiful story of a boat in the middle of the ocean in which three men are stranded. They draw invisible lines down the boat, dividing the space so each man has his own third of the boat. Although the lines were just imaginary, each of the men stayed in his section of the boat. One day, two of the men look over and they notice that a leak has sprung in the third part of the boat, and water is now flooding in. They panic and shout at the third man, “Stop up the leak! The boat’s going to sink and we’re all going to drown!” But the third man turns to them and said, “Oh, don’t worry, it’s only leaking in my part of the boat.”

I love that story because even though there were “lines” drawn, we all understand that a leak in any part of the boat brings the whole thing down. That’s the situation we are in on our planet today. The collective boat of our healthy, sustainable, physical presence on Mother Earth is sinking. It is up to us to plug up that leak.