According to the book, Life Lessons, there are two root emotions in this world that
everything else stems from – Love and Fear. All positive emotions stem from a place of Love,
and all negative feelings stem from a place of fear.

Kübler-Ross, 2014

Ultimately, if you really stop to think about it, every problem that exists in the entire
world is due to fear. Hatred, insecurity, jealousy, prejudice – they are all fear-based. Most often,
fear is driven by ignorance. Ignorance is a lack of knowing or understanding. It does NOT mean
that a person is stupid or incapable. People don’t know what they don’t know until they are
open-minded enough to be made aware – to learn beyond what they know to be true with their
present beliefs.

Globally, fear causes wars. It can cause murder – the killing of innocent lives. Ultimately, war occurs because one party believes that its way of living and its belief system is
superior to another belief system. The need for power is rooted in fear and insecurity.

How far are we, as global human beings, going to take this? Don’t you think there could
be something to learn from those who are different from we are? Besides, who told us our way
is the only right way? There are many roads that lead to the same destination. All people have
something to offer to bring goodness into the world.

This brings us back to opening our minds to forgiveness of ourselves and forgiveness of
others. Fear eats us alive and collectively it’s eating our world alive.

Until we are willing to open our minds to understanding each other’s differences so we
can learn from them instead of building up a wall to keep anyone and anything different from us
out of our lives, we will continue on this same fear-based wheel going around and round with the
same problems in our personal lives as well as globally.

We must open our hearts and our minds and forgive ourselves for our own ignorance.
That’s the beginning of a new life and collectively a new world. Step out of your comfort zone
of fear, forgive yourself, and forgive others by also recognizing that their wrongdoings, too, have
come from a place of ignorance and fear. Take a chance – a risk – to learn something new,
something different about another way of life. If we would all be willing to do this, this is where
positive world change will take place. And the root of everything positive is Love. What a
beautiful aspiration.

References

Kübler-Ross Elisabeth, & Kessler, D. (2014). Life lessons: Two experts on death & dying
teach us about the mysteries of life & living. Scribner.

Have you ever felt “off track” because you’ve been so busy, and you haven’t had a chance to eat all day? Not eating can make us feel irritable. It can also cause us to feel negative physical symptoms such as an upset stomach or a headache.

Imagine not having a choice to have food. There simply is none. There is no lunch date with a friend, no weekly planning of meals and weekly trips to the grocery store to stock up your fridge and pantry. No home cooked meal to sit down to with family. The priorities of life have drastically changed from enjoying food as a form of entertainment in our lives to where or when our next meal will come from. And when that meal does arrive, what will it consist of? Could it be from a dumpster? Maybe it’s a can of cat food. Maybe it’s only a slice of bread. Suddenly, life’s priorities are shifted, and nothing else matters. Eating has nothing to do with entertainment and socializing. Eating is only a matter of life and death.

Hunger is a worldwide problem. I’d bet we’d all be shocked to learn that there are people living right around us that suffer from hunger to some degree. Almost 800 million people in this world do not have enough food to live a healthy life. That’s about 1 in 9 people on this earth!!! Poor nutrition causes 45% of deaths in children under five years of age. What’s even more sad is that one third of the food in this world is wasted by those who are privileged enough to have it.

It’s easy to say that people create their own problems by the poor choices they make. If they’d be smarter about their choices, maybe they wouldn’t be in a situation to be hungry. Innocent children are born into hunger without choice. The breadwinner of a family could suddenly die creating an unfortunate financial circumstance for an entire family. You could lose your job due to cutbacks at work. Never count yourself out. Anything is possible. A devastating illness in a family can cause financial impact. We must be careful before we judge.

This is our world, and we are responsible for the condition it is in. If we continue to only be concerned with ourselves, what will happen if we are ever in need some day? Wouldn’t we hope that those in a more fortunate position would somehow help us?

Let’s try to be more conscious of our good fortune. Let’s give where giving is needed. Let’s not waste our food frivolously. Let us consider giving to our local food pantries; maybe add one more item per week to your grocery cart to donate to those in need. We tend to be more generous in these aspects around the holidays, but people suffer from hunger, and fret over where their next meal will come from every day of the year. Let us ask ourselves what we can do to help create a positive change. If we all step up to help, then we can change the world. It starts with us. We all have gifts within us to create goodness in this world. Let’s do our part.

Proin vel est vel odio dictum congue. Fusce aliquam risus a erat vehicula, nec molestie purus fermentum. Donec aliquam tellus nisl, sodales fringilla mi malesuada at. Donec fermentum eros et aliquet ullamcorper. Morbi lobortis quam ac velit lobortis, ut pharetra metus pulvinar.

Nunc magna elit, imperdiet tincidunt ultrices ac, fermentum ac metus. Nunc ultrices velit nec tincidunt rutrum. Nullam faucibus elit vel feugiat pharetra. Fusce semper massa in molestie faucibus. Suspendisse pellentesque, ex in sagittis gravida, augue neque porttitor sem, eget mattis nisi urna vel lorem. Proin leo tortor, dapibus a nibh id, euismod iaculis libero.

Etiam pharetra diam non diam posuere, ac pharetra metus blandit. Sed vel enim sodales, porta nunc in, sollicitudin nibh. Phasellus mi orci, cursus at convallis id, aliquet elementum nisl. Praesent fermentum tempor facilisis. Cras et bibendum purus. Morbi non luctus neque, tempus luctus nisl. Aliquam nunc elit, rutrum tristique magna semper, eleifend elementum urna.