Establishing Perspective

I think that what we truly lack today is a sense of perspective. Not "learn from your past" or "live for the moment" or "plan for your future". I mean more accurately perhaps a sense of scope, a sense of our place in this universe and how we act within it.

There are approximately 300 billion stars in our galaxy. There are quite possibly HUNDREDS of billions of galaxies. That alone should be a pretty convincing argument for some sense of humility, but our minds cannot even begin to process that number. Let's start small shall we? Quarks. As far as we know, based on experiments and evidence, we are composed entirely of up quarks, down quarks, and electrons. That's it. Most of that goes into creating Carbon. Our best guess (without jumping to supernatural conclusions) is that we have evolved from lower creatures into what we are today. An intelligent animal which is slowly overpopulating and overpolluting the earth. We orbit a giant ball of gas which is undergoing nuclear fusion and will run out of fuel in 5 billion years. Not to worry though, in 3 billion years our galaxy (which we are not in the center of, rather we live on an outer spiral arm) will collide with the Andromeda galaxy. Now I know that picturing the gravitational forces of hundreds of billions of stars ripping each other apart is impossible without one's brain bleeding, so rather than that I'll recap. We are infinitesimally tiny. We exist on the fine line between utter insignificance and nothingness and lean towards nothingness, and as far as anyone who cares to look for hard evidence of these things can tell, there is nothing out there that thinks we are special. In all the terrifying, beautiful, awe-inspiring, chaotic silence of the cosmos there is nothing "moving over the waters of the deep". But this is not a theological debate right now.

Most people like to feel important. I like to feel important. In fact, I am very important, but only within a very limited context and to a very limited audience. If you have a significant other, chances are good that you are pretty important to them and your existence really matters. Many people (I'd venture to say most people) live their entire lives at this level of focus. A very localized, relatively simple worldview. If we zoom out to, say, a country-wide view, that person's feelings are suddenly less important. Will the U.S. crumble because Barb no longer loves Dave? No. In fact, Barb's love (or lack of love) for Dave has very little influence outside a small community of human beings. Human beings who are part of possibly the most influential species to ever inhabit possibly (though not likely) the only planet supporting life. And yet apart from our ceaseless radio waves pouring into the cosmological abyss, we do not affect anything outside of our own solar system. If all of the human beings disappeared from earth at one time...The next closest star would not even notice. Perhaps the moon would encounter a slight gravitational wobble from the sudden lack of nearly 7 billion tiny bodies, and then all would go on as before. The human race, a gravitational hiccup to only our nearest celestial neighbor.

Well now, don't all your problems seem trivial?