I'm Absolutely Certain of Something....But What?

On occasion, I try to bring myself back to reality. It's easy for all of us to ascribe more importance to ourselves and our lives than is reasonable; after all, we like to think of ourselves as important. We want to matter. I hate to break the news, but we don't. At least not much.

Those of you who have children have a longer 'imprint' on the earth. You influence your kids and you tend to be deeply ingrained into their memories. So, your presence on this earth has a built-in tenure; you'll have an impact longer than you'll be around. It will take awhile for everything you believed, everything you wanted for this world, to be irrelevant. Those of us without kids, though, must realize that we are destined for a more immediate obsolescence. There are no children to ascribe to us a greater value than we actually have. No offense intended...but you have to admit your kids probably value you more highly than anyone else does.

Ultimately, whether we have kids or not, the impacts we have on this earth and the people in it are negligible. I'd like to believe that is not true, but...faced with reality...I think it is. Granted, there are those among us who have an impact far beyond our selves. Unfortunately, particularly lately, the impacts are horrific...not something we would want to be associated with us.

So, does it matter that we care for the planet, try to focus our societies in directions that serve humankind, or look out for our fellow humans? I cannot say why, but YES, it matters. We're not important. None of us matter a great deal. But collectively we do...for some reason I cannot explain, I believe we still matter. Our impacts, as individuals, may be short-lived, but our collective actions can define societies.

If you read what I write on any king of regular basis, you'll find a surprising degree of confusion and much uncertainty among my pronouncements of absolute certainties. Take it all with a grain of salt. I use this blog to try to sort it all out for myself...and it hasn't quite come together yet.