Today the world celebrates Earth Day.

On this day, we raise awareness about looking after our environment, which is facing dire issues like never before.

In other words, we celebrate Earth Day to remember the importance of our planet.

With the increase of global warming and swift weather changes, plants, animals, and yes, humans, are facing a huge threat that’s capable of changing the dynamics of our planet forever.

As we celebrate the ground beneath our feet, we should also open our eyes to the problems that the only inhabitable planet is facing today. Each one of us should start taking baby steps toward helping the environment to right its course. We need to start considering recycling, planting trees, reducing the use of plastic along with many other things that can save the annihilation of our planet.

Throughout the years, many prominent people in history have raised awareness about the importance of taking care of our earth long before getting to this hazardous stage. Henry David Thoreau published Walden in 1854, which spoke about his experiment in simple living with nature. Kahlil Gibran spoke about the Earth in The Prophet, while Albert Einstein ascertained that nature is the key to understanding everything better.

Perhaps, if we read what these people had to say, we would be reminded of how pivotal it is to care for our home.

Below are 20 quotes that gave me goosebumps upon reading them:

“Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s needs, but not every man’s greed.” ~ Mahatma Gandhi

“The earth is simply a too small and fragile basket for the human race to keep all its eggs in.” ~ Robert A. Heinlein

“Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives.” ~ Carl Sagan

“Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.” ~ Albert Einstein

“I believe in God, only I spell it Nature.” ~ Frank Lloyd Wright

“Find your place on the planet. Dig in, and take responsibility from there.” ~ Gary Snyder

“Heaven is under our feet as well as over our heads.” ~ Henry David Thoreau

“Forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet, and the winds long to play with your hair.” ~ Kahlil Gibran

“What is the use of a house if you haven’t got a tolerable planet to put it on?” ~ Henry David Thoreau

“I only feel angry when I see waste. When I see people throwing away things we could use.” ~ Mother Teresa

“He that plants trees loves others beside himself.” ~ Thomas Fuller

“Our environment, the world in which we live and work, is a mirror of our attitudes and expectations.” ~ Earl Nightingale

“The Earth is what we all have in common.” ~ Wendell Berry

“There are no passengers on Spaceship Earth. We are all crew.” ~ Marshall McLuhan

“We won’t have a society if we destroy the environment.” ~ Margaret Mead

“They kill good trees to put out bad newspapers.” ~ James G. Watt

“I’m not an environmentalist. I’m an Earth warrior.” ~ Darryl Cherney

“The wilderness holds answers to questions man has not yet learned to ask.” ~ Nancy Newhall

“Now I see the secret of the making of the best persons: It is to grow in the open air and to eat and sleep with the earth.” ~ Walt Whitman

“Imagine a fish without water. Can it survive? Now imagine a world without trees. Can men survive?” ~ Anonymous

Like Darryl Cherney said, we must be Earth warriors. We must defend our planet the same way we would defend a belief or opinion of ours.

Let’s start taking care of planet Earth—without it, there would be no continuity of existence.

Relephant: 

10 Tips: How to live Zero Waste.

4 Things I Learned from a Tree. {Earth Day Offering}

Author: Elyane Youssef

Editor: Emily Bartran

Photo: Alex Holt/Unsplash