My Home is Everywhere, Everyone is my Friend - Poongundranar, Tamil Poet, ~600 BC
We humankind have lost the plot somewhere along the way...
Yes the big events of the world are extremely depressing - genocide, wars, leaders driven to secure power rather than do the right thing...speaking up for injustice is based on religion, race and selective...
Going back in ancient history we see wars, injustice, power-hungry leaders all throughout mankind. And it seems our ape relatives, chimpanzees, gorillas etc share the same war-like and brutal tendencies as us.
Yet, never before have we had the power to wipe out our entire species/planet and never before has this power become so wide-spread.
And it is clear that with technological & bio-chemical research & advances, we are increasing our powers to wipe ourselves out at relentless speed.
But the small events are also troubling. Leaving aside the global problems, we seem to be drawing up more reasons to divide ourselves rather than unite...
The age old division based on religion is rather perplexing, as the teachings of religion is to transcend our little selves for meaning, but instead we take up religion as another aspect of our identity...
Race and language...yes there is rich history and wisdom within our respective races and languages which stretch back to ancient times & have very interesting stories, but again instead of focusing on the teachings, it becomes part of our identity.
And we have found more ways to divide..political beliefs have become a strong divisor, which is intriguing as often leaders on both sides don't truly represent our own values...
In the name of unity, heritage, we go deep into the values, customs, language, culture of our race, nation, etc - but we make it a strong part of our identity, rather than using it to transcend all of this.. Now what does science say? We humans are all of the same species, homo sapiens...which is a BIG deal, when we live on this little blue blob which currently houses 8.7 million species of plants and animals! 1 out of 8.7 million - almost close to the odds of winning the lottery jackpot (depends on which lottery)!!
(to put it in perspective, there are around 16,000 species of ants...all of whom we call ants)
We all won the evolutionary jackpot, and then we divide ourselves up with another hundred lines..
And this little blue blob we call Earth is an incredibly tiny speck in the vastness of the universe...
So what should we do? Let's have some perspective, that's all I say...
We are living in very troubling times - yes we need to continue our daily lives but we can't ignore this.
What each of us choose to do is up to us, but accepting the norms of society as it is cannot do anymore...
We cannot accept those who pit one group of people against another...we cannot accept that one group of people are good and another are bad...we cannot accept that we are superior to another simply because of where we were born and the way we live...
We are all of one kind, humankind...
We have to transcend our so called identities, we have to embrace our friends fully, and we have to reduce our anger towards our enemies...our survival depends on it.
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