"24/7 and 365, you made another day, made it alive"

I popped out for a short run this morning. I don't usually use headphones, but today I thought I would look for a playlist to keep me company. I chose the Spotify Mood Booster. (It was not a great weekend). As I was jogging along, I was reflecting on the past year. What was I feeling this time last year?

• Anxiety
• Fear of the unknown
• Concern for family & friends

BUT with all of those emotions, I also felt overcome with the sense that we, humanity, were connected and in this together. That we had this time to hold each other up, to show care, compassion and selflessness.

To realign priorities and to make changes.

While I was thinking this, a song on the playlist came on, by Sia, I'd never heard it before this morning:

"24/7 and 365

You made another day, made it alive

Made another day, made it alive

So today, baby, remember it's okay

We're all floating through space (floating through)

Today, baby, remember you're okay

We're all floating through space (floating through)

Floating through, floating through.."

And that's how I feel a year later: 24/7 365. Made it through another day alive. (As a friend pointed out to me this morning - that's better than the alternative! Yes, very true, and I'm so grateful).

But I don't feel that connection to the world anymore.

I feel disconnected.

Some days I even feel forgotten.

Each man for himself.

Keep your thoughts to yourself.

Don't say anything in case you offend.

Each man for himself.

In it alone.

Just floating through space.

Getting through another day, alive.

As soon as those words filtered through my brain, I remembered "The Pale Blue Dot" - and I know that while I may feel disconnected for the moment, I'm not forgotten.

I am a small piece of a significant whole, and the whole is not alone.

"Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every ‘superstar, ’every ‘supreme leader,’ every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there — on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam."  

- Carl Sagan -

I am grateful for a new day on this mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.... on this pale blue dot.