Imagine floating 400 kilometres above Earth, watching our planet spin slowly beneath you like a blue marble suspended in infinite darkness. For 178 days, astronaut Ron Garan had this extraordinary view from the International Space Station, and what he discovered there has profound implications for every single one of us down here on the ground.

The View That Changes Everything

From his orbital perch, Garan witnessed Earth's most spectacular displays: auroras dancing across the atmosphere like living brushstrokes painted by an invisible hand, lightning storms flickering across continents like camera flashes at a cosmic photoshoot. But it wasn't these breathtaking phenomena that left the deepest impression on him. It was something far more sobering, the gossamer-thin layer of atmosphere that wraps around our planet like a protective shawl.

"That delicate, luminous layer," Garan reflects, "is all that stands between every living thing and the deadly vacuum of space." Seeing this fragile boundary firsthand drove home a truth that's easy to forget when you're caught up in daily life: our planet is simultaneously the most resilient and the most vulnerable place we know.

The Big Lie We Tell Ourselves

What Garan calls "the big lie" isn't some conspiracy theory; it's something far more insidious and widespread. It's the fundamental misconception that underlies virtually every decision we make as a species: the belief that economic growth should take precedence over everything else, including the very planet that sustains us.

From space, Garan saw no borders, no national boundaries - just one interconnected home. Yet down here, we continue to operate as though the Earth is merely a subsidiary of our economic systems, a disposable resource to be exploited for profit. We've got our priorities completely backward, and it's leading us toward potential catastrophe.

Getting Our Priorities Straight

Garan's revelation points to a critical restructuring of how we think about progress. Instead of the current hierarchy - economy first, society second, environment as an afterthought - he proposes a fundamental reordering: Planet → Society → Economy.

This isn't just environmental idealism; it's a practical necessity. Without a stable climate and healthy ecosystems, our societies crumble. Without functioning societies, our economies collapse. Yet we persist in treating economic indicators as the primary measure of success, even when they come at the expense of the very foundations they depend upon.

Consider the absurdity: we celebrate GDP growth whilst ignoring the depletion of natural resources that made that growth possible. We prioritise quarterly profits over long-term sustainability. We treat carbon emissions and biodiversity loss as "externalities", costs to be borne by someone else, somewhere else, at some other time.

The Interconnected Crisis

From his celestial vantage point, Garan could see what many of us miss whilst we're focused on our immediate surroundings: everything is connected. Climate change isn't just an environmental issue; it's a driver of social inequality, economic instability, and geopolitical tension. Resource depletion doesn't just affect commodity prices; it triggers migration, conflict, and humanitarian crises.

The paper-thin atmosphere that so struck Garan during his time in space is already showing signs of stress. Rising temperatures, shifting weather patterns, and increasing frequency of extreme events are all symptoms of a planet being pushed beyond its limits. When that fragile boundary is compromised, everything beneath it suffers the consequences.

A Paradise in Need of Protection

What makes Garan's message so compelling isn't just his unique perspective - it's the quiet authority that comes from having literally seen our world from the outside. His words carry the weight of someone who has witnessed firsthand what astronomers and astrobiologists are increasingly recognising: Earth is extraordinarily rare.

In a universe filled with dead rocks, gas giants, and hostile environments, our planet is a remarkable anomaly. A world where conditions align perfectly to support not just life, but an incredible diversity of life. We exist on what Garan calls "a paradise in the cosmos," yet we're treating it like a business to be liquidated rather than a home to be cherished.

The Urgency of Now

This isn't a distant, theoretical problem for future generations to solve. The challenges Garan observed from space. Climate disruption, resource depletion, and social inequality are accelerating. The longer we maintain our upside-down priorities, the more difficult and expensive the solutions become.

But there's hope in Garan's message. Recognising the problem is the first step toward solving it. When we truly understand that our economy is a subset of our society, and our society is a subset of our planet's ecosystems, we can begin to make decisions that actually make sense in the long term.

A Blueprint for Change

The question, of course, is how we translate Garan's profound insight into practical action. This is precisely what The Envisionation Biosphere Restoration Plan addresses, offering a comprehensive framework for implementing the planet-first hierarchy through what we call Empathy Economics. Rather than treating environmental restoration as a cost centre, this approach recognises it as the foundation of sustainable prosperity; aligning economic incentives with ecological health and social wellbeing. By embedding empathy into our economic models, we can create systems that naturally prioritise long-term planetary health whilst delivering meaningful progress for communities worldwide.

A Call to Awareness

Ron Garan's space-borne epiphany offers us more than just a new perspective. It provides a roadmap for survival and prosperity. By putting the planet first, we're not sacrificing economic progress; we're ensuring it has a foundation to build upon.

The view from space reminds us that we're all passengers on the same spacecraft, sharing the same life-support system. It's time we started acting like it. Our paradise in the cosmos is counting on us to get our priorities right. Before it's too late.

Based on insights and public reflections from astronaut Ron Garan, as shared in interviews, books, and global talks following his time aboard the International Space Station (ISS).