It saddens me to ponder how we humans are radical vandals. We spray paint over everything. We plow down any piece of land that we want to. We pull any resource that we want out of the earth and don't give much consideration to the waste that we create or the damage that we do to the planet.
I believe that this is happening primarily because we have bad habits—because we have not been following the rules that have been laid down for us by intelligent people who were our ancestors.
When we consider our ancestors, we usually think of them as savages or people who knew very little about science or medicine. Granted, they were behind us in terms of various medical and scientific technologies, but they were ahead of us in other ways.
Some time ago I was watching a man who had made a name for himself as a brilliant orator, speaking on the subject of giving a good lecture. He was noticeably obese. It struck me that although the man was very knowledgeable about scientific principles regarding oral communication, he wasn't knowledgeable about science pertaining to good health. And his lack of knowledge was putting his very being at risk.
It's the case with many of us that we focus our attention on things such as science and technology at the expense of our own health and happiness. We would benefit tremendously, though, if we focused our intelligence on matters of health and wellness.
Such focus should begin with learning to temper negative feelings and calm the mind. If we don't do so, we can't temper our passions and we subsequently become anxious and distracted. When that happens, we are prone to becoming vandals who wreak havoc on our bodies, our homes, our fellow humans, and the earth itself.
For most of us it's not the case that we intend to inflict damage on ourselves or others. The situation is usually that we do things extremely unconsciously without understanding the ramifications of what we do. As an example, think of how a child might crawl to the edge of the bed and throw themselves off without understanding that gravity will pull them to the floor and they'll get a painful bump on their head.
We should regard ourselves as collectively being in our infancy stages. And in the process of putting our emphasis on technology and progress rather than on personal development, we have slowed ourselves down.
We can pull ourselves out of this rut that we're in. We can do so by intelligently focusing on understanding ourselves and building our characters as individuals. We can learn to temper our negative passions. We can improve our behavior and master ourselves. When we do so, we will cease being so much a part of the problems that now plague our planet. And then we can contribute positive things to our communities and families, and perhaps even make positive contributions to the collective consciousness of humanity.