After decades of slow but meaningful progress, the world finally hits “peak cancer” where total deaths begin to decline due to a wave of medical advancements, stronger and more equitable healthcare systems, and healthier lifestyles. As a result, millions of humans are afforded longer lives and more time with their loved ones.
We live our best lives when we actively choose the life we actually have, rather than yearning for some different, more “ideal” one.
So much of personal growth is working to make implicit memories explicit. We revisit past repressed traumas so they don’t act on us unconsciously anymore. But social change work is often the same.
So many of us who want to do good in the world come from a paradigm of excess positivity. We go, go, go. We keep saying “yes” even when we don’t have the time, energy, or genuine desire to do so. We make ourselves unwell trying to do good in the world.
The world achieves the universal phase-out of all F-gases, potent climate pollutants. This monumental effort, driven by the Montreal Protocol, averts up to 0.5°C of warming, creates a cleaner, safer, and economically beneficial global infrastructure, and confirms humanity’s ability to solve major environmental challenges.
Though much of the global population had already transitioned to electric vehicles, all the world’s governments now formally ban manufacturers from selling cars that run on fossil fuels, creating a historic milestone in the fight against climate change.
It may not be as big and shiny as your friends and colleagues. It may not garner the acclaim as others. It may not be sexy. But you have something important to create and contribute. You are creative, in your own unique and much-needed way.
We are most able to make significant changes to our habits when we do so in relationship with others. Our new habits have a better chance of sticking when we allow others to witness, encourage, and celebrate us, and hold us accountable when we need it.
Between the 1970s and 2020s, global meat production more than tripled, making it one of the most significant contributors to the climate crisis. However, in this imagined milestone, conscious consumers worldwide mindful of the environmental, health, and animal rights implications of their eating habits finally succeed in reversing this centuries-long trend.
We often even perceive the world as getting worse even when it is actually demonstrably improving.
