Promise Ahead
A Vision Of Hope & Action For Humanity's Future

Author: Duane Elgin
Format: Paperback
Length: 224 pages
Publisher: Morrow
ISBN: 0688171915

Item #: BPA

Price: $13.00

Order fulfillment provided by The Simple Living Network. Order by phone 800-318-5725 or 509-395-2323.

Here is a breathtaking view of the future that is relevant to anyone seeking to navigate through out profoundly changing world. Based on thirty years of research by one of the foremost thinkers about the future, Promise Ahead is the sequel to Duane Elgin's bestselling 1981 classic Voluntary Simplicity, which changed the lives of thousands and was called the "bible" of the simplicity movement by the Wall Street Journal. In Promise Ahead, Elgin looks beneath the headlines to reveal the deeper currents that are now changing our lives.

Elgin sees two powerful sets of trends converting in the coming decades. The first set he calls "adversity trends." These include a massive human population, global climate change that threatens our food supply, the mass extinction of species, the rapid depletion of crucial natural resources, and civil unrest caused by global poverty. The second set he calls "opportunity trends," which include the quiet revolution toward simpler and more soulful ways of living, the use of the internet as a tool for social awakening and change, the growing efforts toward reconciliation of racial, gender, religious, and other differences, and the emergence of a new paradigm of perception that views the universe as a living system of which we are an integral part.

The outcome of the intersection of adversity and opportunity trends is uncertain. However, if the human family mobilizes itself to meet this time of unprecedented challenge, we have the prospect of making a dramatic leap forward in our evolutionary journey and will have a very promising future.

Promise Ahead calls to all of us to do our part in transforming the world by becoming practical activists in our own lives and taking control of how we consume, communicate, relate to others, and see our role in the larger universe. It is a call to action for each individual and a beacon of hope to all.

Excerpts:

Living with purpose in a living universe. The shift to a new paradigm also brings a shift in our sense of evolutionary purpose. We are shifting from seeing our journey as a secular adventure in a fragmented and lifeless cosmos without apparent meaning or purpose, to seeing it as a sacred journey through a living and unified cosmos. Our primary purpose is to embrace and learn from both the pleasure and the pain of the world. If there were no freedom to make mistakes, there would be no pain. If there were no freedom for authentic discovery, there would be no ecstasy. In freedom, we experience both pleasure and pain in the process of discovering our identity as being of both earthly and cosmic dimensions. In the words of Australian aborigines, we are learning how to survive in infinity.

Reviews:

Promise Ahead is essential reading for people flooded with information yet filled with confusion. Never before have humans had to function responsibly and gracefully as citizens of the whole earth. Thankfully, Duane Elgin has the courage and the credentials to provide us with a visionary and plausible road map into the deep future.

• Vicki Robin, coauthor with Joe Dominguez of Your Money Or Your Life

Promise Ahead is a corrective to the negative messages about the state of our world that are prevalent today. Elgin provides a compelling blueprint for the future that is both hopeful and doable. This book deserves the attention of our entire society.

• Larry Dossey, M.D., author of Reinventing Medicine and Healing Words

Duane Elgin already lives the future he writes about. Elgin writes with personality, passion, and persistence. The result is a well-reasoned and plausible promise that includes some mighty big challenges. Duane Elgin is calling us on a hero's journey where we can all be heroes.

• Robert Johnson, president, Institute for the Future

Promise Ahead is a powerful message for our time, a seminal contribution to the new story, and essential reading for those dedicated to creating a world that works for all.

• David C. Korten, author of The Post-Corporate World and When Corporations Rule The World

Promise Ahead is a book for the twenty-first century with a clear message: a sustainable planet is not an unreachable goal. Elgin articulates an operating manual of possibility and hope.

• Elizabeth Dowdeswell, former director, United Nations Environment Program

Duane Elgin's vision of our possible future is both well researched and reasoned and offers us a rare treasure -- grounds for hope.

• Sam Keen, author of Fire In The Belly and To A Dancing God

Promise Ahead offers us a new framework for our conscious evolution. A gem to inaugurate the twenty-first century.

• Barbara Hubbard, author of Conscious Evolution and The Evolutionary Journey.

About The Author:

Duane Elgin is a researcher, author, and speaker with 30 years of experience in exploring the co-evolution of culture and consciousness. He is the author of three books: Promise Ahead: A Vision Of Hope & Action For Humanity's Future, Awakening Earth: Exploring The Evolution Of Human Culture & Consciousness and Voluntary Simplicity: Toward A Way Of Life That Is Outwardly Simple, Inwardly Rich. He is also the author of two reports: Global Consciousness Change: Indicators Of An Emerging Paradigm and Collective Consciousness & Cultural Healing. In addition, Duane co-authored (with Joseph Campbell, Willis Harman, and others) the book Changing Images of Man (Pergamon, 1982).

Duane was formerly a senior social scientist at the Stanford Research Institute (now SRI International), where he co-authored numerous studies on the long-range future; for example, Alternative Futures for Environmental Planning: 1975-2000 (for the EPA); Anticipating Future National and Global Problems; and Limits to the Management of Large, Complex Systems (both for the President's science advisor). While at SRI International, he also participated as a subject in a range of scientific experiments on parapsychology over a period of several years. Prior to SRI, Duane worked in 1970-71 as a senior staff member for the joint Congressional-Presidential Commission on Population Growth and the American Future. From 1981-1989, Duane was the founder and director of the non-partisan and non-profit organization Choosing our Future. The mission of COF is to revitalize citizen participation through the innovative use of tools of mass communication. COF conducted research, took legal action with the FCC, developed a pilot "electronic town meeting" (aired on ABC-TV in San Francisco), and organized a "community voice" organization to produce televised forums for citizen dialogue and feedback. Duane has an M.B.A. from the Wharton Business School and an M.A. in Economic History from the University of Pennsylvania.

Related Resources:

Voluntary Simplicity Toward A Way Of Life That Is Outwardly Simple, Inwardly Rich - Revised Edition
      By Duane Elgin (Paperback)

Collective Consciousness & Cultural Healing
      By Duane Elgin (Report)

Global Consciousness Change Indicators Of An Emerging Paradigm
      By Duane Elgin (Report)

Living Legacies How To Write, Illustrate & Share Your Life Stories
      By Duane Elgin & Coleen Ledrew with foreward by Angeles Arrien, Ph. D. (Hard Cover)