One Dream

The way is not in the sky.

The way is in the heart.

~Buddha

Throughout the vastness of our universe there is a tiny speck that we call the Sun, and 93 million miles from the sun lies a tiny blue planet that we call Earth, and that tiny blue planet is home to over 7 billion people. Seven billion people... in my entire lifetime I might just might meet a few thousand, and most of them will be forgotten soon after we meet. I will meet so few, and yet I am connected to the rest in ways that I can't begin to understand. What happens to someone halfway around the world affects me. I cry with them, I rejoice with them, and I grieve with them. Why? I don't know them, odds are I will never even know anyone who knows them, and yet there is an invisible tie that binds us together. One dream that we all share.

One dream, a dream of happiness, a dream of peace, a dream of prosperity, and a dream of hope. Sadly, as I am reminded each morning, dreams are fleeting, and easily forgotten if we don't take the time to focus on the dream and how it made us feel. It is easy to forget, to get distracted by our own lives, and let that universal dream slip away. We begin to focus on what makes us different, and not what makes us the same. We begin to fear others, to worry that they want to take away our dream, and so we lash out, we attack, oppress, demonize, all in the name of preserving our dream. This is the biggest tragedy in the history of mankind.

We can't seem to get past the surface and see the soul underneath. We focus on the color of your skin, the language you speak, the god you pray to, and the gender you love. For some reason that became important to so many people, it became a reason to judge, a reason to hate, and a reason to kill. WHY??? I have never met anyone in 35 years on this planet that has made an impact on my life based on their nationality, race, religion, or sexual orientation. Instead the impact has come from their hearts, their minds, and their souls. What lies on the surface should stay on the surface, it is not a good enough reason to hate, and it is not enough reason to love. Look DEEPER!

Look deeper, look for that spark in their soul where the universal dream lives. Find that spark, see how similar it is to the spark that lives in you. We share the same dream, WE are one people, WE are one mind, WE are one heart, and WE are one dream.

Troy