Overcoming Feelings of Helplessness
Given the immensity of the world’s problems, why bother?
I love this quote from Patrick Stewart. “It is what you do from now on that will either move our civilization forward a few tiny steps or else … begin to march us steadily backward.”
Yes. You are going to die. Yes, there is only so much a person can do. Yes, the problems we face as a species seem insurmountable. But that is no reason to feel helpless.
Helplessness leads to apathy and apathy to despair. It has always seemed to me that despair is an illness born of magical thinking. It is the idea that only something major will be enough to create change. But big major things rarely just happen. And when they do, they seem to happen as if by magic. And because it involved what seemed like “magic” no real effort was expended by any human. All this, is of course false. Real change is caused by countless little changes adding up over time until a tipping point is reached. It only seems magical if you weren’t paying attention.
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