Do you ever say “nothing is perfect”? Have you ever questioned this verdict? Do you truly believe it? I don’t. Last night, not managing to bring myself to cooking anything for dinner and not being fond of deliveries either, I simply sliced up an apple and spooned 100% hazelnut spread on it. It was pretty perfect to me. Then, here is this pomegranate I have been watching for a few days now but I don’t have the heart to rip apart and consume – it’s too beautiful as it is, perfect without making an effort to be anything.
The state of the world is overwhelming and I am overwhelmed by it. It’s difficult to shut my eyes or look away and ignore what’s going on. The news, social media platforms, governments and international organizations shout about the mess we are in. Still, not much happens to change the status quo. Seemingly. Under the surface there are wonderful initiatives, cooperations, institutions and individuals who are committed to save us from our self-destructive ways. The work they do is hardly known about, often deemed needless, pointless and hopeless. The impact they make is hardly perceptible, they deliver only tiny results, they focus only on a slice of the issue, depending on their expertise, so how could they change anything? I am not the first to say it but it still needs to be repeated or screamed about, depending on the receptivity of the audience - Imagine if we all do just a tiny bit, if we all focus on only one slice of the mess, what changes we could achieve! We are 7.9 billion people here to work for one single purpose, that is a livable world, and we have 7.9 billion ways to realize that. To this, I feel we need more conversation about the positives, which doesn’t mean ignoring the facts.
I had a brief chat with an environmental scientist recently and I asked him if he thinks there is hope for us. “Oh yeah, if there is not, then well, nothing would matter, eh? We evolve, just very very very slowly.” These people work in the background, unless you consciously look for them and engage with them, you may not even know about their existence. Or, when they get a bigger coverage, despite having the knowledge and decades of experience behind them, we decide they don’t know what they are talking about. People’s need to immerse themselves in negativity is immense. Even the word, perfection, comes with a negative connotation. This is something bad to aspire after, something that can potentially destroy your life. But what if we start focusing on its positive meaning?
I tend to think that we use above phrase in excuse of our laziness to act and change whatever we are unhappy about in our lives. Thankfully, we can start with small things like acknowledging how perfect a moment, a smile, a laugh, a hug, a kiss, a message from the right person, a pomegranate, a piece of music, a day spent in bed, and even a heartbreak is.