Thursday, March 19, 2020

What We Might Be Saying in a Year or So


2020 was a doozy of a year! So many of us got sick with the virus. So many of us died earlier than we would have otherwise. We lost jobs, money, and, most significantly, we temporarily lost a sense of confidence about the future.

Yet, here we are in late 2021. We got through it. So what did we learn.

We learned that we are all interconnected, whether we like it or not. We now recognize that all of us on planet Earth are connected in a giant physical (and maybe metaphysical) network. For many centuries prior to 2020 most of us were able to ignore this fact. But in a post 2020 world we can no longer ignore this simple reality... we are one... big interconnected organism.

We learned that we need to create a global healthcare system that has the capacity to respond to the next novel virus and to the one after that. We learned that we need to transcend cultural barriers that inhibit collaboration. We learned that our giant physical (and maybe metaphysical) network can be helpful in solving other global problems we face like climate change.

We learned that our ignorant government leaders had to either grow up or get out of the way. We discovered that we didn't need to accept stupid political gridlock. We learned that we still have the intelligent capacity to work with each other in order to solve problems.

In some ways, the damn virus may have done us a favor.

1 comment:

Ann Rodriguez said...

So very true! This is a wake up call to us--all of us. You stated it well and I even take a little comfort that we will have the opportunity to improve our world by working together.