Planetwalker Quotes

“As you walk look around, assess where you are, reflect on where you have been, and dream of where you are going. Every moment of the present contains the seeds of opportunity for change. Your life is an adventure. Live it fully.”
― John Francis, Planetwalker: 22 Years of Walking. 17 Years of Silence.

“Silence is always with us. But we do not choose silence, silence chooses us. If you are called to be silent on your journey, recognize the invitation as a great gift. It is a gift to be shared with others. Your relationship to silence is one thing that will define the uniqueness of your journey.”
― John Francis, Planetwalker: 22 Years of Walking. 17 Years of Silence.

“As my father stretches to understand my journey I realize that maybe you can’t change the world by your actions alone, but you can change yourself. And when you do, the world around you may change by attempting to understand you, as we all try to understand each other.”
― John Francis, Planetwalker: 22 Years of Walking. 17 Years of Silence.

“The geographical pilgrimage is the symbolic acting out of an inner journey. The inner journey is the interpolation of the meaning and signs of the outer pilgrimage, one can have one without the other. It’s best to have both. —Thomas Merton, 1964”
― John Francis, Planetwalker: 22 Years of Walking. 17 Years of Silence.

“I watch the blue jays, 50 or more, that come down each day swooping easily from limb to limb with raucous laughter, feet curled under. And in the quiet I hear the voice of the river passing among the rocks and over stones, everywhere at once, making its way through steep green canyons to the sea. I try to catch the words mingling with the shushing of the trees. Perhaps this is where our speech began. Maybe long ago before there were words, there was only the river and the people listened to the water…and the quiet whispering.”
― John Francis, Planetwalker: 22 Years of Walking. 17 Years of Silence.

“From this new place lessons come, or perhaps realizations. The first is that most of my adult life I have not been listening fully. I only listened long enough to determine whether the speaker’s ideas matched my own. If they did not, I would stop listening and my mind would race ahead to compose an argument against what I believed the speaker’s idea or position to be, which I would interject at the first opportunity. Giving myself permission not to speak, not to attack some idea or position, also gives me permission to listen fully. Giving myself this permission gives the speaker permission to speak fully their idea or position without fear of rebuttal in a way that I could not have imagined.”
― John Francis, Planetwalker: 22 Years of Walking. 17 Years of Silence.

“How interesting it is that men seldom find the true value of life until they are faced with death.”
― John Francis, Planetwalker: 22 Years of Walking. 17 Years of Silence.

“The environmental crisis is an outward manifestation of a crisis of mind and spirit. There could be no greater misconception of its meaning than to believe it to be concerned only with endangered wildlife, human-made ugliness, and pollution. These are part of it, but, more importantly, the crisis is concerned with the kind of creatures we are and what we must become in order to survive. —Lynton K. Caldwell”
― John Francis, Planetwalker: 22 Years of Walking. 17 Years of Silence.