This Is Your Planet

This Is Your Planet, These Are Your People

On this first day of Summer, while the southern hemisphere is settling in for their winter retreat, the northern hemisphere is planning to spend more time outdoors. With the solstice in swing, it warrants a space for acknowledging our role on this planet. When considering our personal origins, countries, states, or regions may come to mind. For this exercise, I want to zoom…out! I implore us to take on the identity of being a citizen of the planet.

In exploring this identity, we should first look to our co-inhabitants, as they are often a mirror to our own existence. Though humanity has evolved and progressed to be incredibly intelligent, animals and other organisms play a vital harmonizing role in life on Earth. After all, humans are not Earth’s only representatives. Say a visitor from another planet materializes. They would quickly learn the vastness and beauty our planet has to offer. On the grandest of scales, all living things have a common identity in being what life on earth is. If you were sent to Mars and found yourself alone with a dog, you’d be relieved to have a friend.

It’s no wonder research shows the well-being benefits of animal-human interactions. Emotional intelligence is not uniquely human, and connecting with the natural world helps us to better understand an array of life’s processes. Through evolution comes an expansion of knowledge. This expansion acts as a catalyst for growth and understanding of the innate. What is both known and unknown is shared contextual information among inhabitants. In considering this identity, how would we hope to be perceived by a visitor to our planet? How does the actual perception differ from our desired one?