2020!! I think just mentioning 2020 is enough to suggest where I am going with this post. This year has been like any other year to be honest, except that it seems like the end of the world is here. Many have been predicting the end of the world for so long now that it is actually HERE.
One would wonder, is it really end of the world though? Yes, it is. I think owing to the imagery set by various religious beliefs and thanks to Hollywood movies – we expect the apocalypse to be more dramatic than a pandemic. Nuclear war, zombie attacks, asteroids hitting the planet, aliens… But a virus is what has brought the most intelligent species on the planet to its knees.
End of world it is, but first what is world? We have this habit of seeing the earth as the world but in reality earth is just another planet – it is the humans and the other life forms that make the world what it is. So it is the end of the world as we know it. That is what it really is.
The way we have been walking upon the planet, the way we have been doing “our” thing with quite a disregard for other inhabitants of this planet, the way we are – has gotten us into this predicament. Think about it, with all the technological advancements and all the wealth in the world – we are running against time and still have not found a solution to the problem that is this pandemic.
Vaccination will take its time and even that is not a proper solution – it will come with its own price; the side effects and the scale at which these vaccination drives will need to be arranged will pose a bigger problem. In the meantime, we have no solution but only protection as a means to safeguard against the spread of the disease. Lock-downs were a good method of protection but most countries failed at it, because not all of us can sit tight. We failed – “to err is human”.
To err is human… Is this going to be the reason of our downfall – the idea that as humans we are bound to make errors? I think it is appreciable that we are aware of ourselves, and that we can see the imperfection and limitations of our ways eventually land us in error. But I think for the mistakes we make in this pandemic, the price we would have to pay, as a humanity, will be far more than what we had to before.
End of the world does not seem like such a bad thing if we look at it with a positive outlook. The positive aspect of it is that, the old ways will have to come to an end for a new world to be established. We could choose to see this as an opportunity for evolution. Evolution of human intelligence, emotions, and most definitely actions. Do we need to slow down? Probably, but we most definitely need to become more understanding of the harmony that needs to be brought back.
It is because we are in disharmony with the our surroundings and in turn with the planet, our home, that we did not realise how much of a mess we had made – in and around us. Only when we were forced to sit in and stare at ourselves in the eye did we start to bring changes in our “normal” lives.
It is like mother earth put us in detention and its about time we make amends. The good thing is that we can! We still can.
Insach 