June 28, 2023
At noon I’m joining a demonstration at the city hall about climate change. Thinking about the predictable comments of some, mainly, “What can I do? One person can’t make a difference.”
A thought hit me. Maybe I’m still a sailor at heart. (You can’t sail across the Atlantic in a 32’ sloop and not have ‘waves’ be forever a part of your soul.) We often think of the headline-getters as those who ‘make a difference’, while most of us don’t, apart from families and close friends. But maybe we humans are more like water. (After all, we’re 70% water.) Each of us are a molecule of water, and we are always in motion, in waves. Some are in the trough, the base of the waves. Some are at the top, in the foam and wind. But all are basically the same. The ones at the top get all the attention, but they would be nothing and have no power unless they were upheld by the nameless and more numerous bits of water below.
The ‘famous’ people, good or evil, would have been unmemorable unless they had been supported by numerous others. The ‘differences’ they made were really made by a huge number of other people. They all made a difference. And those who were against them, but didn’t do anything, also made a difference by their inaction.
Everyone makes the same difference. We each choose what that difference will be. It’s as simple as that. When someone today complains that they can’t make a difference, I will make it plain that they are already making a difference to what their grandkids lives will be like. In doing nothing, they are indeed choosing what that difference will be.
What wave will you join or chose not to join. As humans we can chose. It’s impossible to not chose. In doing nothing we are choosing just as clearly. We might as well do the choosing and put our power to what we think most important. It is equal to that of anyone else, just as important than any leader who gets the headlines. They are the head or top, only because of others. Without them they are nobody. They represent us, but are no more important. You and I have as much power to make a difference as did Hitler and Jesus of Nazareth. They were at the top of their respective waves, only because others joined and joined their power with that cause. The ‘waves’ are named for those at the peak. But peak or base, we all have, as humans, the same power to make a difference. Most of us never use that power. What a waste.
We’re In stormy seas. Pick you wave and hang on. Dare to become human.
Anthony, just another particle of water, trying to ride the wave of life.
