A Look at the Pandemic

I find myself asking what are we learning from this historic pandemic?

Some thoughts and resources . . .

Humanity is far better off when everyone is working together, rather than forming tribes and forcing people to care for their tribe rather than caring for humanity, especially when we look at the world population. In America, we experienced this humanity/tribe effect before, during, and after the Civil War and World War II.

Tribes and the evolution of humanity are so well explained in the popular book Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari—see my June 9, 2019 blog post, and in Sebastian Junger's book Tribe—see my July 8, 2016 blog post. Both books can be helpful in understanding where we are as a global society in the midst of this pandemic.

One last resource is equally powerful: the podcast "Making Sense" with Sam Harris and his May 1 conversation with Yuval Noah Harari. It has so much good pandemic perspective information on what is going on around us during these difficult time.

Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging

Be it a family, a classroom, a school, or a larger community, Sebastian Junger's latest book Tribe has so much to say about building lasting, purposeful communities—small and large—and humanity. This is particularly important as we reflect on the shootings in Minnesota and Dallas.

One of my favorite excerpts from this short and powerful book is basic advice he quotes from the George Washington Law Review, a 2015 survey of more than 6,000 lawyers.

“. . . human beings need three basic things in order to be content: they need to feel competent at what they do, authentic in their lives, connected to others." (From pages 21-22)

Here is a seven minute interview with Junger on the PBS NewsHour: