Sent on by
Ravi Dhebar
Send Your Own Message

To All Whom It May Concern (and this should concern all of you),

The world has changed immensely from the time I was born until the time I am writing this letter to you all. I don’t fear the new changes that will happen over the course of the next few decades, for I will be old enough to know how to withstand radical changes. But I am cautious that the truly important changes will be too slow to transpire, or be non-existent completely. There will always be new phones and new gadgets, but a healthy planet is not something I can promise you, and that is what worries me.

Beautiful places we could have made memories in might not even be more than a footnote in a geography book by the time you read this. And for that, I am sorry. I am sorry that we could not usher in a new of respect and love for the environment strong enough to withstand the perceived “drawbacks” of doing so. I will never admit defeat while I still breathe, but the uphill battle against the current oligarchy we live under needs to be multi-generational. Every generation has their fighters, and at this moment I can’t claim to be close the front line. But I have done my best to stay informed and vigilant in an era inundated by misinformation and intentional deceit. In your present day if there are still avenues for like-minded individuals to discuss alternative viewpoints that stray from the mainstream narrative, then I still have hope for subsequent generations.

For you stats-hungry types, I urge you to check out a few metrics and compare them with current data, accurate as of early November 2017. Carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere have reached 406.94 parts per million, the highest amount in over 650,000 years. 16 of our 17 warmest years ever have occurred since 2001. Some of these basic figures were put together by NASA (The National Aeronautics and Space Administration, just in case this organization is dissolved by the time you read this.) How’s the ozone hole doing? With any luck, this question comes across as peculiar since hopefully ‘the ozone layer having a hole in it’ has not been an issue for many years now. As of typing, the hole in the ozone layer is already the smallest it has been since 1988. There are plenty of alarming statistics, but there is no need for excessive doom and gloom when there are countless committed individuals out there working to fix the root causes of many of these issues. Positivity and working for your fellow human to protect the environment rather than squeeze profit out of it is somewhat of a hard sell for many in this society. This is where the focus should be, I know you’re capable of blessing this movement with your contributions!

I hope you are not stressing about the uncontrollable factors that shape parts of your life. But I also hope you are relentless about changing the controllable factors, both for your own sake as well as the planet and your fellow human. Change often comes from the will of many people, this is true, but that movement is often started by a single person changing something important within one other person, and so on.

Mother Nature desperately needs our help; by the time you read this, I hope we as a species have done enough to facilitate future generations in carrying on this pinnacle task. Thank you.

Share on:
 
Send Your Own Message

More Messages to the Future

 

Dear Ellis,

So, dear heart, I am doing everything I can as the situation worsens.

 

Dear Tomorrow,

I promise composting in my house and getting an EV for my first car.

 

Dear Kai and Leah,

I want you to feel awestruck like I do. It is important to feel small sometimes, to feel the weight of reality, to recognize the scale of a challenge, to see where you fit and what you are up against. This is the case with climate change.

 

Dear Future Self,

It was 2020, the year I realized that life is fragile—not just mine, but the entire planet—through immense consumption, pollution, greediness, ignorance, false bliss. This wasn’t the way I wanted to live my life, so I promise to actively make the change.

 

My Dear Paloma,

I’m going to commit to raising you with your eyes open. Being aware as much as we can, how to better our environment together.

 

Dear Tristan,

I am doing this to protect you, the food, water, air and biodiversity of a country that I love.

 

To anyone who has heard my music,

I promise to care about the planet.

 

For my children,

If we haven’t done enough and the world you’re living on is apocalyptic or if you’re living on another planet then I’m deeply sorry and just know that I believe in you and I know that you are both strong and smart enough to handle anything.

 

Dear Kiya,

Fighting for a system that rewards care for people and planet over profit.

 

Dear Evie of 2050,

I can feel the change happening — many people are working to transform the world.

 

We will look back on our time here and ask, “What did I do?”

If we truly live our present moment, maybe you’ll have a future.

 

To my brother’s children,

We wondered about how we might be able to eliminate plastics from our day to day routines, and recycled literally everything. We were amazing, you should have seen us. Now and again though, we wondered if these were the right questions.

View All Messages

Send Your Own Message