Great Expectations

So I have been wanting to write these thoughts out for a while now but just can 't seem to get them together to make sense. So why not just type and see where my mind takes me, and whoever is reading this for that matter.

Lately I have begun to think that we as a society have set our expectations for our lives way too high. Most of the things we stress about don't even matter. Like why do we debate about half of things we do. Currently I have CNN on and they are talking about Sandra Bullock's adoption and how the race is an issue. Does it really matter? Seriously? An innocent child just got adopted by an Oscar winning actress who has a ton of money and wanted a baby. I can think of a million things worse. Why focus our attention on an issue like this? Maybe race wouldn't be such an issue if we didn't make it an issue so much.

Ok, back to my original though of great expectations. I believe our society often loses sight of the big picture. If you think about the other 6.6 billion people on this planet, I am sure your problems won't seem like problems at all. Of course I know we all lose sight of this, including myself. However, I feel like we need to be reminded of how great a simple life can be. My happiest memories do not involve any material things, it was the people and location that were the biggest factors. Different people and places are what this world has the most of and are which make me the happiest. Its not the perfect birthday cake that made the birthday special, it was the people I shared it with.

When I was in the Dominican Republic, people were all outside, enjoying each other. They didn't have tv's or computers to isolate themselves from each other. For entertainment, they had to interact, but walking down a dirt street in a small town in the Dominican Republic, was where I saw some of the happiest people in my life. Our bus driver for the week always had a huge grin on his face. Even though, half of our group could not communicate with him, just a smile made our day.

All of this "stuff" in our lives is blocking the view of the big picture.