Seek wisdom over knowledge. Knowledge is of the past, wisdom is of the future.
Lumbee

As our cultural trends yearn towards the ideals of "green," "sustainability" and "eco-consciousness," be it out of a sense of necessity or a sense of responsibility. It amuses me the see how much our goals seem to strive towards old wisdoms of the indigenous cultures. I believe, if nothing else, a basic re-introduction to the culture and beliefs of the Native Americans would provide strength to the journey and light to the path we take towards these trendy goals, hopefully helping them to endure.

Let me start by saying that referring to a Native American (American Indian, Amerindian, etc. ) culture or philosophy is vague at best and borders on inaccurate. Native Americans are an exceedingly diverse aggregate of peoples and lumping them together is like referring to all Africans, all Europeans, or all Asians as one culture. Still, there is a certain perspective that I call wisdom, thousands of years old, which pervades the groups as a whole and to which I am referring.

Everything the power does, it does in a circle.
Lakota

All native beliefs were based on an understanding that man is part of nature and that his health and the health of all things depend on balance and harmony. Like the body, the world depends on relationships between many different parts. Not only the planet and animals work this way, but the universe, life and nature itself are all examples of this law. As an example today, if you treat your land with heavy chemicals your health will suffer from the pollution; when we poison the sea with industrial waste, the sea poisons us with the fish we eat.

There is an interdependence in all things that begins with the parts of the human body, and extend through the family system to our societies and our planet as a whole. One part can never be separated from the whole no matter how much control, influence over or distance from the others it may seem to have. By keeping close to heart and in the forefront of our minds the consequences of all things, it is easy to accept and understand that our responsibilities towards others means taking care of ourselves, and to disregard our own well-being means to burden others. It becomes easy to understand how taking care of others is an important part of taking care of ourselves. It becomes difficult to be selfish or selfless when all actions are really both.

Man has responsibility, not power.
Tuscarora

Our world thrives when we understand and respect the relationships that bind all things. It is our ability to change the course of rivers, to level landscapes and alter the life in oceans thousands of miles away that shows us, not our power, but our responsibility to nurture these interrelationships. Anything we have power over, we can easily nuture or destroy; and when what we do to it we do also to ourselves we see power becomes responsibility. Not a responsibility as in an debt or obligation stemming from our supremacy, but responsibility in the same sense that we are each responsibile for our own actions and our own futures. For us to thrive we need to learn to thrive as the world about us thrives, not in spite of it.

Before eating, always take time to thank the food.
Arapaho

The old wisdoms always taught gratitude. While we may think that we are masters of the animals we raise for food, we are arguably indebted to them. They nurture us and clothe us no differently than a mother would. The world offers everything that we need to survive and to thrive. It is only when we express and live out our gratitude from this understanding that we learn to take care of those things that take care of us. In doing so we ensure that these things will continue to be there for us -- just as we will continue to be there for them.

Perhaps more than a change in habits, we need a change in perspective. From there the green or sustainable living that we are beginning to realize our lives have always depended upon, will become natural, effortless, and causes for happiness rather than sources of inconvenience.

If our culture is to survive we may need to return to old wisdoms, shift our locus of pride and recognize that mastery of our planet is in learning to thrive as it thrives. We must recognize that change must first take root in our own backyards; and we must learn to teach these values to our children. It is not enough to cross or fingers or to wait for someone to hurry up and do something.