After several years of working, I have come to realize that my true icon painting purpose, and the reason why I travel so much offering icon painting workshops is to teach peace and to show that there is a need to change.

It is time to begin to live and work for equality and not only profit. Time to use government, religion, the internet and all educational systems to re focus our minds, hearts and behavior for a new world where waste and consumption are not the mark of success.

Leaders around the globe are concerned about the environment, they are concerned that the human race has been contaminating a perfect Eco system and ask, what should we do? About Time They ask! Many of us are aware and concerned that the calamity of human errors and the consequences we now face are growing out of our control.

The discussions are intense; sometimes diplomatically addressing who is at fault and how much fault, sometimes the focus is on whether the crisis is even real or invented by science or the simple sentiments of ‘doomsdayers’. Sometime the discussions revolve around legislation and what regulations would be fair and ‘do’able. They speak of cutting back 2 %. Don’t miss the point.

We might ASK;      How can we live this runaway lifestyle of abundance without consuming absolutely everything in the next 1,000 years?

We might ASK;      How can we stop wasting, polluting and decimating the beautiful blue planet which took millions and millions of years to evolve?

Some Say; Global Warming will be fixed One Person at a time, use what you need and do not waste, relax it is in God’s hands. Folks, shake your head we do not have time for that answer.                  This article is a Global Warning to seek New Energy

Think for a moment, 75 % of all the food produced is wasted.

The clothing industry is saturated, now overruns are being shipped by the baleful everywhere. The camera/ computer/TV industry designs things to be replaced every year each with a multitude of different plugs and cords we all detest. Half of what we throw away has been shipped across a continent or an ocean. We tare down the house and build a new one rather than fixing anything. Change the whole bathroom when the mirror is chipped. We cannot bare to live with any inconvenience and empty time is not for rest but rather to plan the next purchase.

Most of us live thinking about our self and our immediate family over a period of one day to one year. It may be prudent to be thinking how everyone will exist in one hundred years. Our human dilemma is that we do not think in planetary terms. Most of us want what we want, when we want it, with no regard for how we want it or the effect it will have for others when we get it. It is not about the individual any more!

We are on the verge of a planetary mess.

Think for one minute the carbon footprint required for your morning coffee in a country where the coffee is not grown. How do the three pairs of sneakers come to be in your closet or what resources are mined to produce your computer or cell phone and replaced every year. How about that small plastic bottle of water in hand, God forbid anyone be thirsty for three hours!

The privileged few have developed a lifestyle with no regard for what they leave in their wake. The wealthy powerful countries and their industry cannot seem to stop the consumer culture where more is better, encouraging everyone to take even more. Poorer countries have not had time to put in place adequate legislation to prevent the exploitation of “their” environmental resources, perhaps they do not see the train wreck coming.

People all over Africa, India and China are working all day to buy what they need to get by for one day. Many of them live on the left overs and second hand stuff. They walk to weekday markets and buy the overruns made by industry; TV’s, clothing, food, cars, makeup, kitchen stuff, electronics, blankets, etc. The poor actually do not buy the latest new cars, new cloths, travel to other countries on airplanes, eat imported foods, buy new sports equipment, or stock up on extra anything. Industry produces more than enough by always increasing their volume and production for the poor to live on the wasted overruns at a great cost to the environment and society. Why do companies have to have an annual increase in profits, write the loss off on their taxes and use resources as if they are unlimited and theirs? Who really pays for their profit?

We can all agree the system is out of balance.

We love ourselves too much.

The populations in underdeveloped countries mine the resources for foreigners, chop down their own forests, waste their own water, work in enormous factories owned by foreigners and package all the goods for export to foreigners. Their environments are left devastated by the industrial nations, and its citizens are left poor and forgotten with no infrastructure like hospitals, schools, transportation or housing which supports life. After a days work, they go home, eat, sleep and get up the next day to do it all again, for the privileged few?

It is time to begin to live and work towards everyone sharing the quality life has to offer. We need to use government, religion, the internet and all educational systems to re focus our minds, hearts and behavior for a new world where waste and consumption are not the mark of success but rather how well we share the planet.

The first step is to annihilate the idea of Me and Mine, then we begin to realize not only are we connected in this moment today but throughout time and space while we are on this planet. There is no Me or Mine there is only wholeness. If your “Me” is separate and isolated, scared and jealous eventually you will die without flourishing because you failed to see we are connected to everyone else.