Many of us have heard the famous expression, “Don’t go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.”
I think about this quote a lot, and how a great deal of people are raised being told my their parents, teachers, coaches, and bosses that the world owes us nothing. After 20 years of this concept drilled into my brain, I get it: I am not entitled to anything.
From all I have been told growing up, I understand that I’m not entitled to a job, wealth, success, or a happy ever after. I can work hard and play my cards right, and these things might find their way to me. But as we all know, “the world owes me nothing” and we just have to deal with that.
Every time someone spouts this saying at me, I want to scream, “Whatever--I get it!” And it doesn’t upset me that I am not entitled to these things. I understand that a lot of older generations find millennials to be entitled human beings, but I actually believe otherwise. I think we do care a lot about ourselves, but I also think we care about the world. So continue to tell me the world doesn’t owe me anything- I have heard it all before. I have got bigger things to deal with: amiss as the state of the world as it is today, I am left wondering what I, a human being, owes the world.
Am I supposed to take the same approach I have been raised with, and assume that I don’t owe the world anything? Am I supposed to ignore the well-being of this planet, and perpetuate greed and ignorance and violence and anger? Fair is fair, or some may believe. I personally do not take that same approach, and I think I owe the world quite a bit, actually.
I don’t have to owe the world anything; it’s a choice, really. It’s a choice to care about the planet and the people we inhabit it with. I owe the world my tolerance, compassion, and humanity. Because it’s true, the world was here before us. It has been surviving and thriving and producing much longer than we have or ever will. To some people, that might not mean anything. It means something to me though. I owe it to the world to see that it continues on, hopefully with whatever positive mark I can contribute to society.
One of my favorite quotes is by Ralph Waldo Emerson, and includes a piece that states, “to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition.” I loved this quote so much the first time I read it because it took some of the pressure off of being a human. It emphasized the point that we can still care and contribute to the bettering of the world, but it doesn’t have to always be in massive acts. We can contribute in the smallest of ways, that maybe only a single person will realize, yet it is still a contribution.
I’m not sure the world will ever notice my contributions, and I know that it will never think that it owes me back. But that is perfectly fine with me. I am not contributing to the well being of our planet to get something in return, but rather because it is the right thing to do. I know it is cheesy to read about how we owe something to the world, but at some point a few of us will have to fight for a decent world. Many aspects of this planet are in a state of distress, and although the world doesn’t owe us anything, we might just owe it.
