Blessed Unrest
by Paul Hawken

Paul Hawken, one of the wisest men on earth in my opinion, has published a new book that I’ve just finished reading. Titled Blessed Unrest, the book describes the convergence of the environmental and social justice movements, and “how the largest movement in the world came into being.”

Paul Hawken is an entrepreneur (one of founders of Smith & Hawken) who has devoted his life to environmentalism and the journalism that reports on it. In this beautiful, soulful book, he makes the case that we are all part of the earth’s immune system each time we exercise our active compassion in the name of social justice and ecological health.

Hawken lectures tirelessly on this subject, and he writes of giving groups the task of designing a spaceship that could leave earth and return in one hundred years with an ecosystem and crew that is healthy and happy. The top designs, he writes, are the ones where the passengers of the spaceship create a culture rather than simply consume one. This requires that a significant proportion of the passengers be artists, musicians, actors, and storytellers.

Blessed Unrest is an incredibly relevant book for our time. It reminds us that now, more than ever, we need our artists to help us envision and create a totally new culture – one that remakes, restores, renews, and revitalizes society and the earth.