Reflections and Recommendations for Us Humans in 2026

In mindfulness and compassion, we can care for all beings everywhere.

Reflections on Being Human

Sometimes when I feel stressed or worried, I recall that our species, homo sapiens, has been around about 300,000 years. I try to be aware that each of those billions of people experienced daily challenges, sufferings, pleasures, fears, hopes, victories, and learnings. Of course, I can’t know all that they experienced, but I stand in awe of this vast journey that has happened and is continuing to happen moment by moment.

So, as I experience challenges of aging, climate chaos, authoritarianism, pandemics, and more, I stop and become aware of breathing in and breathing out in gratitude for the mysterious gift of this life, lived moment by moment. I embrace impermanence and interbeing. I enjoy the light of our sun-star, the blue sky, the breeze, trees, family members, friends, food, sleep, reflecting, writing, and trying to embody and catalyze a compassionate-ecological community and world. What are your thoughts?

How balance care for self, family and all others? How balance happiness in the now, appreciation for what has been and fierce loyalty to the future? How balance outrage over injustice with gratitude for life itself? How balance reflection, planning, contemplation, action, study and visioning?

From experiences to ideas to words to sentences to paragraphs to pages to chapters to parts to editing to formatting to printing to a book. The first time that I hold in my hands one of my books that has just been published, it is mysterious. How did it suddenly appear when moments before it did not exist? Is it alive? Can it speak? Can it touch hearts and minds? Can it serve? Can it create a new world?

From outrage to trauma to anger to despair and back to outrage. And then there is the joy of holding the cat, being with loved ones, sunshine, trees, writing an article, designing a course, and so much more. The Great Mystery is that life is suffering and tragedy, and yet all is good, all is perfect, all is possible.

Moment by moment, here and now, breathing in and out, awareness, gratitude, resolve, speaking, writing, caring for another being, strengthening community. Repeat. To be a renaissance person today is thinking, doing, and being that is integral, holistic, multiple-perspective, multi-cultural, and multi-disciplinary.

When Dr. King was assassinated I was 24 living and working in the African American ghetto on the west side of Chicago. Rioting began across the city and the nation. Outside gangs set fires in the building of our nonprofit, but local gangs put them out. Many of us hid in the hallways of a nearby hospital. My wife took some of the children on the train to the suburbs. After that some of us decided to leave the ghetto. Most of us decided to stay. From there our mission of human development spread around this glorious, suffering world. Dr. King, we will never forget your courage, commitment and care.

In the US, we believe in government by, for and of the people. We elect government officials as public servants to do what we the people need. We pay taxes for programs and policies that care for all the people. We have a constitutional democracy. We believe in the rule of law. We believe that all people are created equal. Yes, this is who we are.

Recommendations for Us Humans

To myself and my fellow male humans: Time for the Patriarchy to go. Time to let go of egoic control and domination over women and nature. Time to drop our guns. Time to control libido and testosterone. Time for a universal ban on rape. Time for no more war. Time to stop playing violent games. Time to honor women and nature. Time to let go of fear of other races, religions and sexual preferences. Time to be courageous in the face of climate chaos. Time to establish full partnership with women. Time to let go of anger, hatred, greed and pride. Time to be generous. Time to listen to each voice. Time to forgive ourselves for our harmful ways. Time to help envision a new future for life on Earth. Time to embody compassion and understanding. Yes we can!

Please keep remembering not to normalize what is going on in our communities, country, and world. It can begin to seem like it is just the way things are. That is not true. Things were different before. Things can be completely different in the future. It is up to you and me. On the other hand please don't live in anger and despair. Be outraged, yes. Take action, yes. And always remember that life is good and we can always decide to be kind.

We must teach people to think about human beings from general principles to specific instances. We are human beings first, and then we are an age, a gender, an ethnicity, a class, an educational level, a sexual orientation, and so on. Each human being is unrepeatable and of inestimable value. Each human being is to be cherished and enabled to realize their genius, their gift, their contribution to the civilizing process, for it will never appear again in this unique manifestation.

Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., may we honor you, yes; may we thank you, yes; may we celebrate you, yes; but most importantly, may we be like you; may we follow in your foot steps; may we rise up and lead as you did; may we risk our life as you did; and may we lay down our life as you did for justice sake.

Peace is not passivity. We remember Dr. King and his peaceful marches for civil rights, social justice and an end to war. As he said: “Call it democracy, or call it democratic socialism, but there must be a better distribution of wealth within this country for all God’s children.”

Democratic socialism is homegrown American. It makes perfect sense to most people that there are some essential services that need to be provided to everyone and therefore are financed and managed by everyone through their government. These services include snow plowing, fire departments, police, waste collection, water service, the highway system, public transportation, the military, and also public education, social security and Medicare. These are all forms of democratic socialism. What do you think about this? What other services should be financed and managed by and for everyone through their government?

We must reinvent our country based on principles of social justice, participatory democracy, ecological regeneration, and peace. Yes, one Earth, one humanity, and one task to care for all of it. What can I do now and each day to care for the living Earth and all living Earthlings, present and future?

When sadness turns into fear, slow down, stop, smile, become aware of breathing in and out, give gratitude for being alive, and care for all beings including your body-mind. We must keep laughing, crying, loving, hoping, speaking, doing, reading, thinking, feeling and breathing. Yes!

White Christians who are afraid of non-whites and non-Christians, please know that we are all human, all children of God, all called to love our neighbors, and all desiring happiness. Climate change, fascism, wealth inequality and AI are opportunities to reinvent our societies based on compassion and ecological regeneration.

The ongoing attack of Ukraine, the devastation of Palestine, the recent invasion of Venezuela, and the harm being done in Minneapolis and elsewhere are illegal and immoral. Let us each call for the rule of law and humanitarian values to be honored at home and abroad.

Please join me and many others in making six compassionate vows of environmental sustainability, gender equality, socioeconomic justice, participatory governance, cultural tolerance, and nonviolence and peace. In this most critical decade how do we build a new civilization, community by community through innovative, compassionate leadership?

May all of Those Who Care create a Movement of Movements to catalyze and embody a compassionate, ecological community, country, and civilization.

May it be so.