The Earth - Our Only Home

The temperature of the earth is changing. Cold Seasons have been colder while the warm seasons have become hotter. Weather patterns have changed and natural calamities have brought greater disaster to communities. The world is changing. And climate change has become the newest trend.

Global Warming is a natural phenomenon. It is important for the earth to warm else humans and other species would die because of the extreme cold. But with the kind of warming that we have now, we can all say that this is no longer normal.

Climate change or the warming of the earth’s atmosphere is caused by the increase of greenhouse gases like methane and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. This is caused by a natural cycle of the earth and reinforced by human activities such as agriculture, pollution, burning of coal and others. Climate change does not only affect the earth’s temperature but also other aspects of climate and can result to other disastrous consequences such as drought, floods and epidemic. With this we can rightfully say that everything in the world is interconnected. Everything that we do creates a domino effect that will either be good or bad.

The earth is a miracle; it was made out of very minute entities that have collectively become our home, other species and us. The world many years ago was very beautiful, filled with everything that we need and might need. It has provided us our basic necessities and have patiently developed us into the person that we are now. But then together with our change in physique and growth in intellect, we have also changed in our relationship with the earth. We have become very proud individuals that have thought that we can manipulate the earth into what we wanted it to become - providing not just our needs but our selfish wants.  The earth has taught us to do agriculture, to toil with the soil so that we may live. But instead of working with our hands, we have used technology to speed up our work but leaving our earth degrade faster. Pollution which is a product of our own hands has become one of the major culprits why our earth is slowly dying. The Earth will naturally die, but our irresponsibility will speed things up. Those who have lack in resources have become more adaptive but those who have many continued wasting and abusing what they have. We who are dependent to energy have excavated what is there without thinking that eventually it will be exhausted. When one is gone, we proceed to where it is more convenient or to where it would be easier for us to get what we want.

The earth is one of the greatest miracles while man is another – different yet connected. But the greatest question lies in where man is situated. Is he a conqueror of the earth or a steward of nature? For millions of years, the world is nothing but a beautiful place... but man has changed it. Nature has been our provider but we have failed the world. Being here is a privilege and we are here for a purpose. We are continuously developing, but our unstoppable progress has hindered our responsibility of becoming stewards of the earth. Man has grown intellectually but our hearts have become poor. We have failed the world and our abusive attitude will only lead us to destroying our own home.  

The world and the web of life is part of us. We, as the ones given with reason, are the driver of mostly everything that is present in the world. We must remember that when we exhaust one thing, we are also sacrificing another. It forever goes on in the web until we realize that we are committing suicide.

It is okay to dream for humanity. It is okay to dream for us to become better and better. But it is also important that we dream together with the earth. Dreaming for the earth and not just for ourselves doesn’t make us less.  Progress is not bad...work is good. But we are depleting what nature provides and we have degraded our own identities. We have to be responsible. We have to remember that "The cost of our action is high." The world is changing and much of its change is man’s responsibility.