Using Gifts

Many people take advantage of life and the things they posses in their lives. People live in a bubble and don’t realize how privilege they are from others. For instance, there is a great difference between the poverty in the United States and the poverty in Liberia. However, the people in America take advantage of the opportunities they have and the lifestyle they live. Tools such as technology, food, religious freedom, education, gas and money are just a few items that Americans take for granted. In order to fix this problem, people need to realize their worth and abilities, and use them to their fullest potential. Instead of taking it for granted or complaining about our gifts, we should take the gifts God has given us and use them to help others and make the world better.

On Tuesday February 20, I went to see James Howard Kunstler speak about the issue of industrialization and global oil predicament that the world is about to face. He mentions how the oil problem is not going to go away only get worse. Kunstler mentioned how the peak of oil production was 1970 and it is rapidly decreasing because we use about seven billion barrels a year and we only have twenty billion left. He said that we depend too much on technology and in the end technology doesn’t produce energy. Kunstler states that people need to do something and stop ignoring the signs that our right in our faces. The people need to stop sitting back and talking about change and actually try to make the idea of change happen.

This lecture reminds me about Milton’s “When I consider how my light is spent” the speaker talks about how he has lost his sight that he took for granted. He eventually doesn’t know what to do with himself because he understands that he was given the loss of sight for a reason; he doesn’t want t take it for granted like he did with his sight. By the end of the poem the speaker realizes that he can fulfill his duty by being the best person he can be, the sense of self awareness is found. The people of the world are like the speaker, the resources we have are similar to the sight the speaker had; eventually resources will leave just like the speaker’s sight. The world must become self aware now and each individual needs to realize his or her importance and apply it to helping the world in the future.

Man forgets that all the good and bad things we have in the world are due to God. People take things for granted and many times underestimate the little qualities and attributes that they obtain. Through self awareness and acceptance of gifts individuals can better the world and they need to realize that through change and development they can take a world that is slowly decreasing in value and make it flourish as it once did.