Perspective comes in many forms. As we near the end of a momentous year, many are overjoyed with the possibilities filling the empty cylinder of 2025; others see nothing but shapeless demons waiting to pounce.
Today, I want to suggest a different kind of perspective, one whose center is grounded in humility.
Memorial Day weekend of 1977 arrived with an intergalactic big bang as the first of George Lucas’s blockbuster Star Wars movies landed in American theaters. On that weekend, space travel at the speed of light, Jedi Knights and the “dark force” captivated moviegoers.
However, a little more than three months later, a mission of real intergalactic importance began. On 5 September 1977, NASA launched Voyager 1, a ship devoted to cosmic curiosity. Nineteen months later, after traveling 3.7 billion miles, the planetary pathfinder neared Jupiter. But before beginning its exploration of the gas giant and its moons, the little rover turned its camera back to where it all began and made an historic photo of what came to be known as “the pale blue dot,” tiny in the cosmic void. A photo that should inspire nothing but humility.
Here is that photo.
Look again at this dot. This is here. This is home. This is us. Everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you have ever heard of, every human being who has ever existed, lived out their lives on it. The multitude of our joys and sufferings, a thousand self-righteous religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and gatherer, every hero and coward, every builder and destroyer of civilizations, every king and peasant, every couple in love, every mother and father, every bright child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of ethics, every lying politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived here – on a speck of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
The Earth is a very small stage on a vast cosmic stage. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all the generals and emperors, so that, in glory and triumph, they might become the short-term masters of a fraction of a grain of sand. Think of the endless cruelties inflicted by the inhabitants of one corner of this dot on the barely distinguishable inhabitants of another corner. How often they disagree, how eager they are to kill each other, how hot their hatreds are.
Our posturing, our imagined importance, the illusion of our privileged status in the universe – all of them are worthless before this point of pale light. Our planet is but a lonely speck in the surrounding cosmic darkness. In this vast emptiness there is no hint that anyone will come to our aid, to save us from our ignorance.
“A fraction of a grain of sand,…a lonely speck in the surrounding cosmic darkness.” We’re on our own here. Now, 45 years later, Voyager 1 has left the solar system we call home and has soared through interstellar space more the 15.5 billion miles. A long way. It only has to keep going for about another 5.8 trillion miles to reach one light year away from us. That’s 5.8 with eleven zeroes after it.
Think about that and our tiny, pale blue dot when the crystal ball comes down in Times Square a little more than a week from now. Think about that when whatever happens in 2025 brings you either joy or despair. Think about that whenever you look into the eyes of a smiling child.
Despite our infinite smallness, our aloneness, despite all the harm we have done to each other since first walking the earth upright, I am filled with hope for our next trip around the Sun. In the vast void of space, we cosmic Lilliputians have survived, even prevailed, against astronomically fearful odds. We have proven capable of great goodness. I believe that whatever evil may lurk around the next corner, that spirit of goodness, our better angels, will see us through.
Can you believe that, too?
However you celebrate these holidays, may they be filled with happiness, good health, and a fervent desire that all of us will do whatever it takes to make this pale blue dot a better speck in the universe for ourselves and our progeny.
Happy Holidays!
