“If a seed is given good soil and plenty of sun and water, it doesn’t have to try to unfold. It doesn’t need self-confidence or self-discipline or perseverance. It just unfolds. As a matter of fact, it can’t help unfolding.
“If a seed has to grow with a rock on top of it, or in deep shade, or without enough water, it won’t unfold into a healthy full-sized plant. It will try – hard – because the drive to become what you were meant to be is incredibly powerful. But at best it will become a sort of ghost of what it could be: pale, undersized, drooping…
“In the age of ecology, we ourselves are the only creature we would ever expect to flourish in an environment that does not give us what we need! We wouldn’t order a spider to spin an exquisite web in empty space, or a seed to sprout on a bare desk top. And yet that is exactly what we have been demanding of ourselves.”