2020 has been a difficult year for many people. But it has also been a year full of opportunity for each of us. For the first time, we had a first-hand experience of what it means to live in a global society.
We’ve been saying “we are all connected” and “we are one large, extended family” for decades, but until last year, for many people, those were just words.
We are all connected. We all depend on each other. The downfall of one people will hurt not only them, but all of us.
Global problems require a common consciousness and a willingness to work together to solve grand challenges.
At the beginning of the pandemic, on March 24, 2020, I wrote:
“We’re in the midst of the first global, modern pandemic. Millions of people could die. It’s horrible. But it could be our only hope of saving humanity in the future.“
Today, January 1, 2021, nearly two million people worldwide have died due to a small virus, 0.0001 millimeters in diameter.
It is a tragedy. A trauma to the world and to the global consciousness. But it is from trauma that we find the strength to improve.
It is said that progress is suffering plus reflection. Well, this 2020 finally gave us the space and time to reflect on what we were doing.
I realized there were so many things in my life that I hadn’t addressed in years and kept postponing. Instead of addressing them, I was distracting myself with a thousand activities, trips, and work. I was keeping my mind, my body, and my time busy in any way I could, so that I wouldn’t have to look inward and come to terms with the truly hard things in life, the tough questions that force you to face the person you are and the person you want to become.
I am grateful for this 2020. I suffered a lot, but it was not in vain. 2020 gave me a great gift that I could not have received any other way.
Thanks to this year, I was able to face with a straight back and an open heart what I had been setting aside for far too long.
It has given me the opportunity to discover who I am and what I would like to change within me. I discovered who my true friends are, and who they are not. I reconnected with my family, the most important thing in life. I realigned my work and focused on what is my true mission in this world. I created a team of good people with whom I enjoy working and creating great things together.
Finally, I found love, which fills me with joy every single day.
All of this didn’t happen overnight by magic, and it didn’t happen without pain. It is precisely the pain that forced me to look beyond my blind spot.
What is your blind spot?
What are the things you haven’t been dealing with for some time, but would like to?
I invite you to think about these questions, if you haven’t already. The answers are not easy. They may take months, or even years to come by.
Ruin is quick and sudden, but progress is slow and steady.
What is the world’s blind spot?
We’ve known for decades that we need to address the climate crisis, but so far we’ve done little about it. Not nearly enough .
This pandemic has given us a taste of what it’s like to face a global crisis, with forces of nature bigger than we are.
Soon, thanks to the amazing work of researchers, corporations, philanthropists, and millions of health care workers and volunteers, we will be able to eradicate this virus.
Climate change will be a much bigger challenge. There is no vaccine for the Earth. There is no quick and easy solution that can be applied in an instant that will solve everything.
Caring for the Earth is like caring for our spirit: a long, constant job that first requires a deep awareness, without which we can’t get out of our blind spot.
Seeing how we responded to this challenge gives me confidence for the future. We have struggled, it’s true, and there are still many inefficiencies and idiocies to be fixed. But we haven’t lost hope. We have adapted. Life goes on, and so many have used this opportunity to do some soul-searching and realign themselves with what is important.
This is my wish for 2021.
Search within yourself. Find out what’s right, and do it.
The universe will take care of the details.
