The Holistic Holiday at Sea (Taste of Health Cruise) was a great experience for us once again. This was our second time and we already plan to do it again next year. It is an unmatched opportunity to enjoy memorable vegan cuisine, see informative lectures from world class experts, exercise your mind and body, visit new places, and meet interesting and inspirational people.

One evening at dinner we were sitting with Dr. Neal Barnard of PCRM and Christy Morgan, The Blissful Chef, having a conversation about the various ideas and tactics that the vegan community uses to spread it’s message. There is a level of dissent that can be troubling at times, and Christy in her blissful wisdom likened the players to the spokes of a wheel. They may not all line up perfectly, but they are unified in trying to accomplish the same goal. Moving things forward. Creating progress. We may have different ways of getting there, but we are getting there.

T. Colin Campbell, in one of his lectures, expressed optimism that we may now have reached the tipping point - and I wholeheartedly agree. We are so much further ahead of where we were just a few short years ago. Our message is reaching people, and whether we choose to stress health, compassion, religion, or the environment, the end result is the same. The more we influence others to adopt a plant-based diet, the better off we all are. The synergistic benefits of a vegan diet are potentially world changing. We may be idealist, optimists, cynics, or critics in our approaches, but we can all agree that our goal is a better world, one that may soon be within reach.

Let’s keep that wheel turning and we’ll get there someday.