an extraordinary privilege

i am writing from the tiny island of koh phangan, off the coast of thailand...it is so quiet here...the only sounds are the ocean waves lapping at the shore...and the chirping and warbling of beings in the jungle.
having spent a week in veitnam and three days in cambodia, many perspectives i have held have widened immensely...some outrightly turned upside down. i feel as though the time i spent in those two countries alone educated me more than all of the stale hours in lutheran high school history class, which was of course taught from the white man's lens anyway.
yesterday i read a joanna macy article in the november 2007 issue of the shambhala sun magazine that seemed to hold all that i have seen and experienced on this new year's journey through parts of asia.

"it is an extraordinary privilege to be accorded a human life, with self-reflexive consciousness that brings awareness of our own actions and the ability to make choices. it lets us choose to take part in the healing of our world. gratitude for the gift of life is the primary wellspring of all religions, the hallmark of the mystic, the source of all true art...
that our world is in crisis - to the point where survival of conscious life on earth is in question - in no way diminishes the value of this gift... to us is granted the privilege of being on hand: to take part, if we choose, in the great turning to a just and sustainable society. we can let life work through us, enlisting all our strength, wisdom, and courage, so that life itself can continue. there is so much to be done, and the time is so short. we can proceed, of course, out of grim and angry desperation. but the tasks proceed more easily and productively with a measure of thankfulness for life; it links us to our deeper powers and lets us rest in them...
gratitude, when it is real, offers no blinders. on the contrary, in the face of devastation and tragedy it can ground us, especially when we are scared. it can hold us steady for the work to be done..."

and at the end of her article, joanna quotes rainer maria rilke:

"then all the work i put my hand to widens from turn to turn."