Let's set the record straight

   Please, stand up with me and promise you will never stop doing whatever it is you love doing. Please promise you will never quit enjoying life and been positive about things that you love, just because someone else says that you’re not good for them. You know why?

 Because we are over seven thousand million human beings in this world and, even so, no one has the right to diminish you or your love for anything. Not one person, dead or alive, can do that? Not your teachers (good or bad) not your parents, not your so-called friends, not people you meet once or people you talk to a lot. No one, simple as that, can tell you what you are able to say or not, what you can feel or not or what you can think or not.

 Attention! This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t learn from others, as that is one of the most beautiful and bright keys in the world. Learning is not only about techniques and structured forms to achieve something. You can also learn by hearing someone speak about their opinions, about what they love and what they hate. You can even learn a lot from the world by looking at the people on the street, in a market or on the bus. You just have to be attentive and be open about it all, not judge it and render it “useless”. Remember, even in the most horrible person, there’s a thread of good and even in the best person, there’s evil sleeping, so don’t rush in your judgments.

 Whenever you have words, whenever you feel like you must say something, please, do. Who cares what others will think? Your need to speak and be heard and learn is much greater than fear of ridicule. Besides, we can only be ridiculed if we subject ourselves to those awful feelings. When we own what we say and do, no one can really out us down using our own words as weapons.

 Never be that person who attacks for attacking, who tries to put down someone else in order for you to be on top. First, the world will never remember you were on top, only you. So, think about this: will you be able to live with yourself knowing what you had to do to be there, to be on top of the world? Guilt is a very slow poison but once it’s inside, it will act without a doubt.

 One of the most important things is to observe and listen. You will never get too far in life if you don’t do these two things. Stop and look at every side and see what happens. People always have different opinions about things and that’s not bad. Don’t try to impose your view on others, try to understand them and see why they think that way. If you think they’re wrong or not, that’s not what’s really important. The trick is to know how to learn to take all of that that you are not to build yourself better, to make yourself a greater human by learning from what is close to you, as well as from what is far.

  And please, accept criticism when it is your turn to be in that spot. Be able to hear when people say things that you don’t believe in, thing that might even make you uncomfortable. Remember the world will never revolve around you or them, so just open up your mind and listen and learn, no judgments.

 No one, no matter your religion, your ethnicity, your sexual preferences or your eye color (anything), will ever be on a position to tell you to shut up, to stop saying whatever it is that you believe in. Because after listening, after learning, after mashing up those things with your experience and your decisions, then you can say what’s on your mind in the best way possible. In a structured way, a proper message can be send to others about whatever you believe in. And you know what’s the best about it? People will listen.

 When opinions are built on solid ground and with strong conviction, people will respect them, no matter if they agree or not because, again, that’s never been the point. People focus too much on right and wring and false and true, but it is most important to acknowledge that the world is a mix of all of that. The world is built on our truths and our lies. What would the world be with our lies? Better o worse?

 Never let your morals attack someone else’s just because your conviction is too strong. Conviction works when it is used to explain and set your message straight. It’s never good when you use it to diminish others and to demolish everything other people have built close by.

 Respect is also one of the best ways to go about in life. Because how can you listen to someone, how can you expand your knowledge and your mind in general when you have no respect for others, or worse, for yourself?

 Many people have said that the first thing is to be honest with yourself and respectful of your own being. That means that you know your limits, you know exactly who you are and how you exteriorize that and also how we behave inside, in our minds. You are the only one to be able to choose the limits of your life and whichever you chose, that’s great, but always have them in mind and remember that your rights, in law, end when other person’s rights begin.

 Some are too fast to judge someone because he or she did this or that but they fail to understand that they are seeing it all from their personal points of view. They say certain things go against their morals and decide to ignore the morality of the person that originated whatever it is that is under siege. Yes, they are people that can have doubtful moralities but there are others that seek to impose theirs on every single person they meet. How can that be better, how can that be good in any form? Has imposing ever worked among humanity?

 You just have to be true to yourself and honest and respectful of yourself and others, never forgetting that you have a voice. You have a right to say and to think and to do and to stand up and shout if that’s what you want to do. And these rights you have are not consequence of the human law, but of life. You are a biological being that, for better or worse, evolved into what human being are today. Nature gave you vocal cords, the ability to stand up, the ability to walk, and run and, maybe best of all, nature gave us a brain.

 Inside that brain, there’s a universe we haven’t even begun to understand. An entire universe resides up there, inside our skull and every single person has one. It doesn’t matter if they are right or left wing extremists, if they are women or men, if they are old or young, black or white or speak English or Spanish. We all have that universe inside our skulls and we all have the capacity to decided what it is we do with it.

 Do we use it only to go forward, like in a video game, or do we fill it with information, with all of those beautiful things we like and even those things we hate? Because we are all an amalgam of those two opposites. Our own little universe can have so much and it helps us be a fully formed human being in the physical world. All that information inside that thing inside our skull, is what makes us... us. And we are not on the side of it as that universe is ours. So we can control it.

 We can learn with it, we can listen with it, we can refute and fight and struggle with it. It won’t be easy and it cannot be easy. Because life, the mere concept of life, is so vast and incredible, that just cannot be an easy thing. We will have to face our demons and we will have to meet a lot of people that we won’t like.

 But we will also feel people that, when they smile, we feel better and warm. People that make us believe there is a way out for humanity. And, also, life’s about looking around and living whatever it is that is happening around us. Enjoy your moments with your pet, reading a book, standing on the street as it rains or on a plane. Learn to feel your way around those moments, those precious moments that, after all, are only yours because when you feel something, it’s instantly personal. No one else will feel it exactly the same and you will never feel what others have felt. And that is tragic and beautiful.

 Finally, I think we can agree that this message is expected to make everyone who reads it believe they do count and that no one has the right to shut you up. Inteligence is only relative. Speak louder, make your voice be heard and never let people put a hand over your mouth. Bite if you have to bite, kiss when you want to kiss them and just fight your way to wherever you want to go. Life’s not a struggle, the struggle is to live among humanity and that’s only achieved when you take into account what I’ve just exposed. Cheers!

The bugs

Carmina Wolf was an entomologist, specialized in bees and wasps. She had travelled the world tracing this little creatures and now headed off to her final destination: a UN summit in Geneva where she would be able to present her findings to a panel of experts put together by the FAO.

On the plane from Seoul to Geneva, she just kept thinking of the potential of her discoveries. It was terrible, of course, but it also meant something could be done. Nothing is definite when you realize it on time, or she thought.

The flight was really long but she couldn't sleep so she forced herself to watch some movies, none of which ere very interesting. She took her blanket and tried to sleep with some music on but then people started making noises. It was really annoying to get to Switzerland with no sleep and now people weren't helping. She heard them open their window shades, so she pulled the blanket over her head.

She stopped ignoring them when they started to scream and gasp and talk fast and loud. Suddenly all shades were being pulled up, so Carmina took a look through the window. She certainly wasn't expecting that...

High above the clouds and higher than the plane, a fire ball appeared to be falling down. The plane was very far but the ball could be seen easily as it's light was blinding, all white and powerful. It certainly was a scary moment but, for some reason, people were generally calm.
Short after, the pilot announcing all flights were asked to change course and go south. They haven't been asked to land anywhere close but there was still a possibility to do so.

An hour later, the ball of fire looked smaller but equally as bright. Carmina thought of the people below, and how scared they must have been. She checked her on board computer and realized they were flying over Russia, a country frequently hit by meteorites. A scientist she had met in a conference had told her so. But this meteorite looked massive or maybe that was because she had never seen one.

Suddenly the pilot spoke again and, this time, he said authorities of all the countries in the vicinity had decided to ground the planes. Carmina's one had to land in Astana, the capital city of Kazakhstan. The pilot did not know for how long they would have to stay there but authorities were trying to keep the planes down for the minimum amount of time.

It was shortly before landing that the explosion occurred. It felt and sounded awful. The plane was hit by the sound wave and turbulence was really bad. People were screaming, babies crying, food trays hitting the ground and even bags falling from the overhead compartments. Everyone was a nervous wreck so, when the plane landed in Astana, it was not a surprise when everyone applauded and cheered the moment. They were all grateful to be alive.

They were evacuated through the inflatable slides on each door, to make it faster. Then, the pilot stayed with the airport authorities to assess any damage to the plane as the rest of the crew helped the passengers to a bus, which took them to the terminal.

Carmina was tired, from all that had happened and because she hadn't slept for a single minute but when they entered the building she realized it would take even more time to rest. The place was filled with people, both incoming passengers and people who had not been able to board their flights. Her group stayed in a corner, to have better control over everyone according to a stewardess.

Everyone fell silent when every single TV set on the terminal started broadcasting images of the meteorite and how it had it the ground with violence. Although the news station was in Russian, every passenger could understand that the meteorite was big but, thankfully, not the kind of fire balls that cause extinction. However, it had fallen near Omsk, a fairly large city in Russia. Imaged of destroyed windows, trees on fire and a houses destroyed was broadcasted for the remaining hours and, against all odds, Carmina was finally able to get some sleep.

When she woke up, it was dark outside. She went to the bathroom where she met a woman crying with her daughter sitting by the sink. The woman tried to clean her tears fast so Carmina wouldn't see her but it was to no use. In her stall, the entomologist heard the woman speak in Russian to her daughter, again crying unconsolably. It was heart breaking, even without having a clue about what was going on.

When Carmina came out of her stall, the woman was not there. She washed her hands, her face and tried to comb her hair with her fingers but the result was not very good. She came out of the bathroom and walked around, watching hundreds, maybe thousands sleeping on the floor. All the screen were turned off and only security agents roamed the place, gently smiling when she stumbled upon any of them.

She arrived at the food court and realized how hungry she was. But every store was closed, which was obvious because of the time of day and the current situation. The tables and chairs that were normally for eating were now occupied by people trying to get some sleep.

Carmina decided to step outside, to a little balcony the terminal had for plane enthusiasts. It was very cold but that didn't bother her. She looked and counted the planes on the tarmac. There were at least twenty and suspected there were more on other places of the airport. Suddenly the door of the balcony opened and an older woman came out. She looked at Carmina and smiled and contemplated the place.

After some time, the woman spoke:

- It will keep happening, you know?

Carmina did not understand.

 - What?
 - It will keep happening, more and more frequently.
 - The meteorites, you mean?

She nodded. Carmina started to feel colder but was mesmerized by the odd look and mysterious attitude of the older woman.

 - This world... We just live here. It isn't ours and it certainly isn't living forever.
 - You think were all going to...?
 - Die?... Maybe. Not necessarily but it's no secret we are heading in that direction.

It was so strange. It was if... She knew more. As if she knew the same thing Carmina had suspected months before.

 - Sorry... Are you an expert of sorts?

The woman laughed and looked at her.

 - Not really, child. I'm just aware of things around me.

The woman looked one last time towards the tarmac, smiled at Carmina and entered the building. The young woman did the same, as she was feeling too cold. The words of that woman were all around her mind but it was silly to worry now. She had to sleep as the following day was a hard one.

All planes were allowed to take off so she got to Geneva in time for her speech. She wasn't able to change clothes and excused herself for her looks but told the audience it was worth the speech. Everyone laughed of course. Then the presentation began.

Carmina had been working on this for five years now, since she had finished her studies. And the findings of her research could not be contested. She announced to the audience that the bee population around the world was decreasing due to various reasons, primarily climate change but also human interference. She declared that the decline was so representative, that in some places many flowers and plants that were abundant were now almost extinct. And she announced the same was happening with crops, although no one realized it because of the amount of cereals being planted.

In short, Carmina had discovered that food, was going to be more and more scarce due the disappearance of certain insects. Without them, hunger could strike anywhere. She closed her presentation by saying that recent events had made her realize how fragile the world was but that we had time to make things right, to find our true place in the universe. And she did believe it, more than ever before.