Thoreau in our time

Why is Henry David Thoreau still relevant in our time?

• Thoreau is relevant because he challenges us to examine the way we live our lives.
  
  
• Thoreau wanted to know how he could live as an individual in good conscience in relation to these framing questions: "How am I going to live my life?" "How do I relate to the Universe, the natural world, society, and others?"
  
  
• Thoreau dares us to exercise individual responsibility to be sufficiently "awake" to answer these crucial questions all the while asserting that one can neither live responsibly nor ethically without answering these questions.
  
  
• A cursory reading of the news demonstrates with clarity the necessity for individuals to address Thoreau's questions as a matter of individual conscience in order to properly exercise their rights and responsibilities as a citizen of our nation and the global community.
  

Thoreau's Core Ideas

We need a means to approach the disquieting issues in modern life. Thoreau's core ideas are a paradigm for dealing with these questions.

• Hear a Different Drummer. Each of us must develop a unique inner voice. A conscience that will give us the courage to think and act independently.
  
  
• Be "awake." Live in the present moment emphasizing the journey not the destination.
  
  
• "Simplify, simplify." Front only the essential facts of life so that there is unencumbered time to examine what life is really all about.
  
  
• Follow a "Higher Law." Determine how to live ethically as an individual in society.
  
  
• Live in concert with nature. Realize that there is wildness within and without. Mankind is inexorably linked to nature and in order to maintain our wildness, our spiritual health we must maintain the wilderness.
  
  
• Confront both the mean and sublime of life. We to exercise control over our own lives or we will cease to be an individuals and be overwhelmed by that indistinct mass called the social order.