If only we grow
“Let’s break up.” Thus vowed Michelle, who has been Michael’s girlfriend for ten years.
They met one another at college and had always studied together.
Michael, landed a job at the Bank of Ronalds upon graduation while Michelle, who finished her bachelor’s a year earlier than her boyfriend, became a corporate lawyer at Simons’ Chambers.
Both were very certain that they were each other’s Mr and Mrs Right while they were climbing the career ladder in their late twenties.
“Why?” he asked. “You know we’ve been planning to get engaged next month, don’t you?
“What’s going on? I thought uncle and auntie have been asking when we are getting married.”
Michelle, a second-generation Chinese immigrant, kept her silence.
Losing his patience, Michael, the son of Sir Wilson Widdecombe, who owns five investment banks and hundreds of luxurious properties around the world, probed further.
“No, it ain't dad and mum,” she finally replied.
He suddenly regained control of his emotions, took a deep breath, and smiled.
Speaking with a modern RP, he look intently into her eyes and asked if he was the problem.
Again, she replied with a resounding “No”.
She shed no tears but gave him an indifferent look.
In the next few minutes, she explained that she has lost interest in him. That it would be best for them to terminate their relationship before things get worse.
The feeling the couple had expressed towards each other is commonly known as love.
That is romantic love, and it is a short-lived one subjected to humans’ fickleness and limited to few people other than ourselves.
Our compassion and love for others should move beyond our families and friends, or just our partners.
What is true eternal love?
True eternal love exists in the symbiosis of all beings on Earth.
To acquire the power of true eternal love, we foster a spiritual connection with the living planet and develop a set of beliefs and rituals that instill us with long-term values of preservation and regeneration.
Building a community of a shared future for mankind and ensuring the continuity of human civilisation is no longer our goal.
The broader and more far-sighted goal is building a community of a shared future for our planet Earth and an ecological civilisation.
As we celebrate the Lunar New Year, and Beijing Winter Olympics 2022, let us remind ourselves that we are also ringing in a new era including the non-Homo sapiens.
While our descendants conferred power upon us to tackle the momentous challenges, and humbled by the fact that we are little more than a microscopic blip in the universe, we must believe in the possibility of moving the mountains if only we work together.
Before embarking on that journey, we need to resolve our internal conflicts.
Humans, sometimes succumb to short-termism, are paradoxically hubristic and cowardly.
Most of us, in fact, believe that we are intelligent creatures and hence averse to anything that downplays our cleverness. However, this only betrays our ignorance. The stronger our inertia, the harder it is for us to grow. Only those courageous enough to endure the pain resulting from the self-incision of mental tumours make great strides in their personal growth.
Yet, knowing that we might fail, our intellectual hubris turns us into cowards.
Our fear of failure is, unfortunately, a product of ignorance, the opposite of knowledge.
We shall explore how this plays out in the bigger picture.
How many times have we been told that we are small fry in the humongous economic machine, and we are going to pass on one day anyway?
Willy nilly, most of us are indeed small relative to those who wield political and economic powers, with whom we often associate “extraordinariness”.
However, small ethical actions, which include self-improvement, accumulate and lead to paradigm shifts.
Never underestimate the power of small.
Admittedly, we are going to pass on one day in the literal sense. Nonetheless, we can live on if we choose to, depending on our temporal visions.
Think in seconds, live for seconds.
Think in minutes, live for minutes.
Think in hours, live for hours.
Think in days, live for days.
Think in months, live for months.
Think in years, live for years.
Think in decades, live for decades.
Think in centuries, live for centuries.
Think in millennia, live for millennia.
When humility, which stops feeding ignorance, and long-sightedness are turned on, momentous shifts occur.
Ultimately, it is the daily decisions we make for ourselves that impact the world we, and our descendants, live in tomorrow. Making a difference inspires hope, inspiring hope makes all the difference.
The flame of hope is ignited together by the billions and billions of ordinary people. The future of planet Earth’s ecological civilisation is not beyond our imagination nor distant. In fact, it is right under our noses — here and now.
希望之火是由亿亿万万的平凡人去点燃的。地球的生态文明的未来并不在我们的想象之外，抑或遥远。其实，它就在我们的此时此刻。
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