Dear Mother Nature,

I appreciate your support. Everywhere I go and every step I take I always find you. Your warmth of greatness and kindness gives me hope and keeps me safe. However, some of my choices and decisions have caused you harm and given you deep scars. I am a part of you. I promise to make you a part of me and help you heal.

Thank you for your vegetation. The forests, woodlands, meadows, and wetlands provide numerous essential elements for human life. Your vast environment provides us with oxygen, sustains us with food, and provides medicine to heal our bodies. Your timber provides wood for our shelter and your natural fibers create our clothing.

Thank you for sharing your landforms with us. Mountains, valleys, canyons, plateaus, and shorelines are all landscapes that I can explore on my own two feet. I come as I am, and I appreciate your encouragement and comfort. You test me in ways I don't understand, but when I get to the other side, I feel stronger and more grateful.

Thank you for the natural symphony and the stars at night. I find inner calm by pitching my tent in the forest and listening to the natural soundscapes. I can be both aware and mindless when lying on my back under the vast canvas of the black sky. These periods of darkness and light are sometimes dismissed as mere hours of the day, but when I calm down, I understand how vital they are to exist.

Thank you for your abundance of color. In the morning, the magnificent spectrum of colors that the rising sun provides a fresh start to writing my story. On clear days, your extensive blue-bird sky seems never-ending. My eye can see as far as my imagination will allow it. On other days, the unembellished tones of the clouds provide an opportunity for a different perception, creating an interplay of lightness and darkness.

Thank you for your seasons. From year to year, from day to day, and from moment to moment you never look the same. This constant change helps me accept that I too am ever-changing. Whether it is due to aging, the choices I make, or outside factors, change is a part of life. Seeing it with you helps me see it within myself. You are beautiful even on your stormy days, I feel your warmth even in the bitter cold, and your brightest days fill me with the energy to continue through the highs and lows of each of your seasons.

I envision that we will continue to get to know each other on a more intimate level. This is important to me because I want to better understand you and to learn how to help take better care of you. This is important because you are a gift, you are priceless, and you can provide and teach. You are a being that fills me with hope, curiosity, and desire. The more I learn, the more I explore, the better I understand how I can no longer take you for granted. Our repeated violations against your air, soils, forests, rivers, lakes, and biodiversity are unacceptable.

I acknowledge that I haven't always made the greatest decisions for you, but I hope that I can help by walking more lightly, continuously giving back, and listening when you have lessons or messages to impart. I pledge that as an individual and as a member of the collective movement, I will do all in my power to protect, defend, and love you.

With gratitude (and a whole lot more),

Immanuel