Week 2 - Saving the World (Community & Connection, Part 1)

Saving the world sounds a little ambitious, so let me explain. We're going to do a little exercise to help us appreciate the things in life we tend to take for granted. Let's imagine a meteor is heading for Earth. We've known about it long enough that we've already got all the people - friends, family, everyone - already safely taken care of. And the animals, too.

But we have just 3 minutes left to save whatever else we want from the world that will make it possible for us to survive and thrive wherever it is we're all going. But only 3 minutes. What I want you to do is to spend the next 3 minutes writing your list of what you'd want to save from this world. Think about this seriously. If you can name it, you can save it, even if it can't be neatly contained in a box. With exceptions: you can bring the Grand Canyon, for example, but not the whole Earth.

To help you keep time and know when your writing time is up, I suggest you listen to this 3-minute video as you write. Come back here when you're done and I'll have more to say.

No really ~ go do it. Then the next part will make more sense. 

So ... what did you save? Did you save things dear to your heart? Of course you did ... family photos, high school annuals (or their modern equivalent), mementos from your childhood, and your children's as well. Did you save seeds? Did you save water? Did you save soil? How about recipes? Or sources of farming knowledge? Did you save tractors? Did you save baskets, boxes and mason jars?

Did you save the great works of art. literature and music? Did you save the things we would need to recreate them, or to create new ones? Like art supplies, musical instrument, pens and paper.

And what about lesser things that make life easier and interesting ... mozzarella, marmalade, books, bicycles, hairbrushes, hats, scissors, soap, axes and hammers? What about matches and blankets?

And what about the things we sometimes think of as negative, but still serve a useful purpose? Like stop signs and sewers? Like mosquitos and plastic shopping bags? 

And what about modern technology ... iphones, ipads, radio and GPS? With everyone so plugged in these days, it's hard to imagine a world without them now.

If you've done this exercise on your own, you've probably missed a few essential items. Three minutes is not a lot of time to capture everything. But here are two interesting things that happen when you do this exercise as part of a group. Firstly, other people think of things you've forgotten, things you wish you'd thought of, things you meant to think and would have eventually thought of. The second interesting thing is a sense of relief that someone else thought of it when you didn't. That humans can survive better as a group because we see things differently and all those ways of seeing can make life better for all. Another interesting thing to think about.