Friday, May 16, 2008

Thoughts on a cloudy morning...

this morning while walking orlando it occurred to me that my dream for a peaceful and benevolent world is hindered by our seemingly insatiable need for material things. as i walk along the road and over the culvert between my pond and the many little beaver ponds strung out along the waterway down to the lake, the connectedness of the natural world once again is seen as so very real.

and i wonder why we humans find it so difficult to connect with each other in truly meaningful ways. i think about the natural disasters that have befallen myanmar and china and the central united states and see the huge outpouring of aid to support these victims. it seems that we do feel the need to aid and support our fellow humans in these events, but why then do we--those of us in the developed world anyway--seem to go right back to our little private enclaves and not even truly know our neighbors. there is some sort of broken link here to my way of thinking, and this behavior shows both our need to connect and our fear of connecting.

and i can also begin to understand the reasons why the gap between the rich and the poor grows wider every day. isn't it really a connecting thing? if we were truly connected with each other, could we allow poverty? could we allow some of the earth's people to live without fresh water or proper sewage management? could we turn our heads from our neighbors? and on and on... now don't get me wrong, i am all in favor of having one's own space, a room of one's own as virginia woolf so appropriately put it. but that space isn't for hoarding away what treasures we can beg borrow buy or steal from the world, but rather to consider our own place in the grand scheme of things, to think and to dream and to recoup our energy to go out and try, at least, to connect with the world; and to reap the amazing benefits that come from such connecting.

it seems to me that a true connectedness among humans would bring a wonderful feeling of wellbeing to each and every one of us. it would also bring a harmony to this world of ours that is fraught with wars of all kinds.

can we do this folks? can we start to truly connect with each other in meaningful ways?

i hope so.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I don't know if it's an age thing Georgia but what you wrote here is what I think also.
I have never been a person who "needed stuff" to feel right so maybe I have that in my favor from the start. We are not all like that.