Rebuilding Rob

Merry Christmas from the blogosphere! I hope you all are having a very wonderful holiday season. And if you don’t celebrate any holidays this time of year, happy Friday eve!

Today’s prompt isn’t necessarily holiday-related per se, but it is a celebration of the greatness of humanity—and at its core, that’s what the holiday season is really all about. As WordPress continues to recycle old prompts, I pulled another prompt from The Coffee Monsterz Co to respond to today. It asks: 

What is a positively amazing thing about humans?

This is an interesting one for me, as I tend to think quite lowly of humans most of the time. But I think the reason I do is because we have these flashes where I see exactly what humanity is capable of. As a lifelong Star Trek fan, I’m coming at this from a specific point of view: if Star Trek is about nothing else, it’s about humanity’s potential.

Today, I’m naming three things that are positively amazing about us.

1. Our Diversity

It’s truly mind-boggling that we can inhabit every corner of this planet, look slightly different—different skin tones, different features—and yet remain identical at our core. As a teacher, I saw this firsthand when I taught Native American creation myths to high schoolers. The parallels between those stories and the tenets of Christianity weren’t just interesting; they were a revelation. It’s astonishing that groups of people, separated by oceans and centuries, could arrive at the same universal truths. We aren’t just a collection of different cultures; we are a single story being told in a thousand different languages.

2. Our Determination

As humans, we are a stubborn bunch. We fight for our freedom, our lifestyles, our families, and our friends. We are a tenacious breed. When we set our sights on a goal, we pursue it with a literal and figurative ferocity that defines our species. We don’t like to give up; we simply find a way to endure.

3. Our Capacity for Growth

This is the trait that both inspires and frustrates me most. We are a species of “almost.” We’ve conquered the air, explored the depths of the sea, and taken our first fragile baby steps toward the stars—all because we decided it must be done. Our history is a map of us achieving the “impossible.” If we can engineer a way to walk on the moon, we clearly have the intellectual machinery to solve the problems here on Earth. The potential is there; it’s just a matter of will.

I know this might sound like pie-in-the-sky, Gene Roddenberry-style ultra-humanism. But the fact is, human beings are capable of extraordinary things. Unfortunately, we are currently living through a chapter where those in power seem more interested in our divisions than our potential. As a left-leaning blogger, it’s no secret where I think the problem lies, but the frustration remains the same: we are often steered away from our best selves by people who don’t care about the “Final Frontier” of human kindness.

But we don’t have to follow that script. My Christmas wish is that we reclaim that goodwill for ourselves. It’s the “canned cliché” stuff: peace on earth, goodwill to all. When we realize we are more alike than unlike, we can move mountains—even the ones built by those at the top.

“Be your best self.” That is my challenge to everyone this year.

Live long and prosper… and to all a good night.

Thanks for stopping by Rebuilding Rob. Be sure to like, 👍 comment, and subscribe to my blog below. It’s greatly appreciated! Also, feel free to follow me on social media as well! Check out my most recent posts as well as some earlier, related (and perhaps, not-so-related) posts:

• A Trekkie’s Christmas Wish: The Audacity of Human Potential
• Dark Windows and Crowded Driveways
• The Old Man and the 26 Copies of X-Men #1
• A Festivus for the Rest of Us: Finding Confidence in the Giving
• Going with the Flow (Without Getting the Shaft)

The article “A Trekkie’s Christmas Wish: The Audacity of Human Potential” first appeared on Rebuilding Rob.