A thought provoking book about how we can learn to appreciate the earth and others by changing the story we tell ourselves. The philosophical questions are approached in a way that lets us learn along with the narrator as he makes his discoveries with his teacher...a gorilla. The presentation is so digestible and the big picture idea of how our culture is divided into takers and leavers feels so profound. The leavers let others grow and become themselves and the takers need to destroy and stamp out the competition to conquer. I love the idea that we can make a difference by thinking hard about how we tell our story.The narrator of this extraordinary tale is a man in search for truth. He answers an ad in a local newspaper from a teacher looking for serious pupils, only to find himself alone in an abandoned office with a full-grown gorilla who is nibbling delicately on a slender branch. "You are the teacher?" he asks incredulously. "I am the teacher," the gorilla replies. Ishmael is a creature of immense wisdom and he has a story to tell, one that no other human being has ever heard. It is a story that extends backward and forward over the lifespan of the earth from the birth of time to a future there is still time save. Like all great teachers, Ishmael refuses to make the lesson easy; he demands the final illumination to come from within ourselves. Is it man's destiny to rule the world? Or is it a higher destiny possible for him-- one more wonderful than he has ever imagined?