How to Save Your Life on the Dying Planet Earth

Welcome to the human race, population 6.6 billion-plus and rising exponentially on a fixed playing field of diminished natural resources filled to capacity with cutthroat players and rabid fans from the modern and third world countries of the planet earth. The earth is the only game in town, the only game you and I will ever know. The earth is on your team, my team, and our team, yet we are racking up more flagrant fouls and red cards against the third rock from the sun than ever before. Mother earth wants us to play fair and to follow the rules, but we act like big bullies dominating pickup games in our own backyards and trampling the true spirit of the game. We are losing the game of life. We are getting our butts kicked in lopsided fashion. On the topsy-turvy turf known as planet earth decent and ordinary citizens of the world are in for a crushing and humiliating defeat, and there is absolutely nothing anyone can do to stop it. The fate of mankind floats on the whims of the world's premiere power players, the political heavy-hitters and corporate head honchos calling one-sided shots from VIP sky boxes and who, like every two-faced big shot and big gun who came before them, are running the planet into the ground. The game is fixed and the jig is up. No one can stop them and no one can beat them. Why not join them? Leave the avant-garde thinking and rebelling to the artists and philosophers and take your place at the twisted trough of greedy ignorance and corruption. Stick you head in the proverbial sand and start doing a little point shaving and hand slapping of your own. Life is short; why not grab the gusto while you can? Become the consumer champ wealthy winner you were born to be and join the billions of planetary space cadets reaching for the short-sighted dream of half-baked high society on a dying planet doomed for distinction in the soon-to-be defunct cosmic big leagues.

Firstly, I am not a space cadet. I am a realist. I see the world as it truly is, a planet in a solar system in a galaxy in a universe that has existed for billions of years. I have a very limited ability to understand the universe and absolutely zero influence to change it, yet millions of my fellow earthlings insist they have the power and the knowledge to justly pontificate about who's who and what's what. They have all the answers and that's that. It is enough to make a reasonable man vomit. The key to saving our lives on a dying planet is to stop puking lies and start telling the truth. Stop following the leaders and start blazing our own trails of reality. The paths are there if we look for them. Finding them is no easy task. The sidelines are filled with endless parades of human dreams and desires, millions of year's worth of earthly diversions and temptations that have plagued mankind since the beginning of time. As Alexander Pope wrote, "To err is human, to forgive divine." I do not believe in faith or a higher power but I do believe in forgiveness. I believe in the truth that as human beings we are all going to make mistakes. To save our lives on a dying planet we must accept our weaknesses and powerlessness and admit that we are all tiny and barely significant ripples in the natural order of things. We must rejoice in the meaninglessness of our lives! We must resist one-by-one our high-and-mighty thoughts of self-importance and change step-by-step our vain rituals of self-indulgence until one day we are free to see our lives for what they truly are: illusive, momentary plunges into the unfathomable briny deep blue sea of human existence.

Secondly, my life is as equally meaningless as yours. I may have a biological predisposition to scour the gridiron and scream "foul play!", but this does not make me any more or less of a small fish in the big pond. I am an American expatriate living, teaching, and writing in China, a socialist country where I am able to enjoy a quiet and simple life in the busy and bustling city of Shenzhen, a free trade zone (FTZ) where big-money deal-making and labor intensive manufacturing are providing white-collar jobs and the city life for millions of migrant Chinese workers and their families. Shenzhen is a sprawling metropolis of six main districts awash in the modern wonders of architectural design and construction. The cityscapes are jam-packed with towering high-rise apartments and the glistening polished steel of sky-scraping business centers; newer sections of the citified districts are chock-full of plush shopping malls, smart superstores, and posh hotels all built to satisfy the lavish appetites of high-class shoppers from the next generation of chic Chinese consumers. As an English teacher I am but a slim spoke in the giant wheels of Chinese commerce. I can neither afford nor condemn China's socialist market economy; it is simply a fact of life in an historic heavyweight of a country first transformed by its own Cultural Revolution and now shifting into high gears with revolutionary developments in the new age of free enterprise and globalization. In China, the west is winning. Everywhere I look I see Chinese people from all walks of life under the influence of Western civilization. The way they dress and shop and dine, the way they play and work and strive and dream of a better life, are all part of the new and improved People's Republic of China where socialism and capitalism are finding remarkable ways of getting along and creating the best of both worlds. Yet, improving the lives of average Chinese citizens hungry for economic reform comes at a huge cost. With growth and progress come the inevitable byproducts of greed and corruption, pollution and overpopulation, and other social ills and abominations of civilized societies whose systems inherently leave the poorest of the poor behind. At the crux of the problem lies power, for as Lord Acton wrote, "power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." Amid the bona fide and double-dealing development deals stand the unseen titans and henchmen of the political and business underworlds raking in more wealth and prestige than most average workers would see in a hundred lifetimes. This is the game and these are the rules in the wheel-and-deal world of free-market enterprise. You are either in the loop or out of it. People who want in can get tangled in the avarice and lose their souls to the great and powerful golden gods.

Thirdly, I am not a powerful man, but I do have the power to think for myself. I see the world for what it is and what it has become. Our terrestrial real estate has become a complicated case study in evolutionary mismanagement. Spaceship earth is running out of room and ozone and the oil reserves needed to provide fuel and energy for the next generation in the bleak and not-so-distant future; mounting religious tensions from all corners of the globe are also threatening our very survival as the current dominant species. Religion is killing humanity. It does not matter which religion you belong to or what you believe in, organized religion is the wrong way for the inhabitants of mother earth to go. From the earliest cave dwellers to the latest rocket scientists, religion is, was, and always will be, as Karl Marx bluntly stated, "the opiate of the people." Most of the mortals residing on the planet earth are afraid of the truth. Reality is a blunt sword they refuse to accept. As living creatures our very survival depends on our willingness to change the accepted yet outdated religious beliefs we desperately cling to despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. This is not an easy thing to do. Medieval Christians once believed the world was flat; today, we know it is round. The Catholic Church once insisted the earth was the center of the universe and the sun, moon, and stars circled around it. Today, we know the geocentric model of the universe is false. What other clerical falsehoods are we bound to expose in the next 500 years? In China, most of the people I meet do not believe in gods or religions. They believe in life and the chance to live it well. They believe in being good people and working hard to make a better future for themselves and their children. They believe in truth and the freedom it brings. They believe in reality.

Lastly, I do not necessarily believe in hard work or the future, but I do believe in truth and reality and the freedom that comes with it. Shakespeare wrote, "To thine own self be true." I do not have all the answers but at least I have the freedom to write what I believe and to share my beliefs about life and the world with others. For me the truth is having a job that does not hurt others, a monogamous relationship with a woman based on love, kindness, and mutual respect, and a peaceful place where I can rest and relax and contemplate the natural order of things. There is truth in running water and good plumbing and the luxury of taking at least one hot shower a day. There is truth in having enough drinking water and fresh food and a clean place to cook and enjoy it. Truth lies in the sober and simple everyday moments of our lives. I may be poor but I have everything I need. I may be powerless but I have no delusions about the truth of my life. As I approach the half-century mark of my existence on the big blue marble I now see that having power and money or a purpose and a destiny is not what really matters; what truly matters is how we spend our time, our precious minutes, hours, and days, in the bright and glorious sunlight of the magnificent planet we call home. The harsh, earth-shattering realities of global destruction may soon be upon us. It does us no good to make up the lies we tell ourselves to validate our faults and failings as travelers and caretakers on the dying planet we all need to survive. To thrive, we must be honest with ourselves and the planetary players who share our briefest of sojourns along the way. In the end, no matter how we play the game, the truth always wins.