Resolution

I don't make New Year resolutions. I generally don't keep them so I accept defeat. I'm never going to be perfect, I just generally try to live my life according to my own moral code.  

This is an opportune time to look back over a life beginning as the second world war ended. I acknowledge the many huge changes I have seen. My life today bears little resemblance to my life as a child, teenager & young adult. In many ways it is a much better life, certainly more comfortable & more informed. However it is hard not to hanker after a less complex, simpler life. Or is that just "rose tinted spectacles?"

I find myself dwelling on the lack of resolution I see around me & in the world. Change for the better is rarely simple. It demands a willingness to see a different perspective. It demands sacrifice & hard work. It demands seeing the world and everything in it as an interlinked & co dependent bio system. Every choice an individual or a group or a society makes has consequences. We just aren't very good at thinking long term what the consequences of those choices might be. 

Just take plastic. Bakelite was the first plastic, invented in 1907. It started being mass produced & widely used when I was born, after the second world war. Then again there was a boom in the 60's & 70's when I was in my late teens & twenties. We all took it for granted. No one gave a thought to the possible problems caused by the amount we were using & it's disposal until the late 1970's when the National Marine Mammal Laboratory concluded that plastic entanglement was killing up to 40,000 seals a year. Annually, this amounted to a 4-6% drop in seal population beginning in 1976.

Think about war. Every war's outcome is uncertain. A military victory does not guarantee a stable and lasting solution. History shows the consequences of war are complex and unpredictable & often unintended. Perpetuating the cycle of violence may well create new conflicts. War does not resolve problems, people resolve problems by talking & negotiating. 

I do believe that we, as a species, have the intelligence & capability to resolve the many problems that beset our world today. In order to do that we have to let go of the things that are the root causes of the problems. I'm not going to list them, I think that deep down, we do all know what is wrong with our world. The trouble is that many of us are not ready to face up to the actions needed to resolve them.

We could create a much better world for everyone & everything in it. We just have to resolve to do it.

 

Now.