Food for Thought: Happy New Year, the Questions

Happy New Year Everyone, 2009 is gone and it's not coming back. We've entered a new year and a new decade. This is the fourth decade I'll be alive to witness (80s,90s,00s,and 10s) and I'm grateful for that. There are many who did not make it this far. I look at each New Year as an opportunity for each person and consequently the world to make themselves better. But unfortunately there is also the possibility for things to go the other way also. Which is why I'm always left with so many questions for the new decade: both glisteningly positive and darkly negative. Questions that both excite me and scare me senseless. If u r the type to be frightened by such dark questions, don't read any further; these are the "frightening questions" Samuel L. Jackson spoke of in the movie "Pulp Fiction":

From a personal perspective:

• I'm scheduled to graduate in May, will I make it there? Or will I be hit by a bus before I get there?
• Will I get a job doing something meaningful? Or will I become another paper pusher who resents their job everyday?
• Will I actually find love? Or will I stop believing in it all together?
• Will I remain optimistic in my everyday perspective and endeavors? or the 'real world' tarnish my values and view on things?
  
• Most importantly, will I become a man and role model that everyone can be proud of and look up to? Or will I become a disappointment to those who helped me to become the person who I have become?

From a political and global perspective:

• Will we make the breakthroughs in energy necessary to continue our way of life? Or will anarchy arise as the world fights over the last remaining resources?
• Will the US improve its healthcare and education systems to compare with the world's elite? Or will we continue to fall behind other developed countries in these important areas?
• Will we make big strides towards curing AIDS, Cancer and other widespread problems? Or will a new and adaptive epidemic threaten the health of our entire society?
• Will there be movement towards peace in the Middle East? Or will war threaten the most sacred lands in the world?
• Will we able to prevent terrorist and suicide bombers from killing more large numbers of innocent people and unsuspecting soldiers? Or will they have more extravagant tricks up their sleeves that we are not ready for?
• And most importantly, is this the decade that conflicted nations will find some sort of understanding with one another and work towards cooperation and peace? Or will some event spark the apocalyptic nuclear war that could threaten all of mankind?

These questions run through my head and obviously the answers are not available to satiate my curiosity. Therefore all I can do is try to uphold my responsibility towards giving these questions the positive answers rather than the negative. We have a duty before God (whichever is the center of your faith), my family, and everyone else to try to make the world a better place. We as a people must strive to achieve things in the 2010's that I could not in the 2000's or prior. As in the "Six Million Dollar Man" show from the 70s, "We have the technology." The question is, will we use it for the right things? Our future is waiting for the answers...