The Art of Possibility - In Favor of Fireflies

Hope seems like a word I can’t remember—forgotten, but never lost. Most of us seem to be floating lost in the sauce of a country that used to be united.

With rocketing housing costs, egg prices so high the chickens must be in laying in the stratosphere, and the cost of going to college requires robbing a national bank, it’s not difficult to see why people are losing hope.

Within his first week in office, our new president has decided the U.S. should no longer be a member of the World Health Organization (WHO), revoked our membership to the Paris Climate Agreements, disbanded the office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI), and a dozen other things that leave cause for concern.

Regardless of his intention, it doesn’t instill me with much hope for the future of our country, or the world. Despite this, we must hold on to hope and remain prejudiced in favor of optimism.

The answer lies in the art of possibility—how despite all odds goodness can still prevail. We must remember that even in the darkest moments, hope cuts through.

“What is this optimism?” said Cacambo.

“Alas!” said Candide, “It is the madness of maintaining that everything is right when it is wrong.” (Candide by Voltaire)

The Art of Possibility

How is it possible that the arctic tern, through it’s annual migration pattern, travels over 44,000 miles from the North Pole to the South and back again each year?

How is it possible that there are more micro-organisms living within a teaspoon of soil(1x10^9) than there are people living on the continent of Africa.

How is it possible that there are over 100 million times as many bacteria in the oceans as there are stars in the known universe (which is already a freakishly large number)?

How is it possible that there are more molecules of water that exist in an eight ounce cup than there are cups of water in all the oceans of the world?

How is it possible, that if we were to tag any particular atom within your body and trace its lineage back through the stars, we would find ourselves in the core of some giant nuclear furnace, billions and billions of years ago in an amalgamation of living elements that we came to call a star.

How is it possible that more than ninety-nine percent of the mass that composes your body—all the things that make you, you—is composed of just six elements—oxygen, carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, calcium, and phosphorus.

Four of those are the most common chemically active elements in the universe. Hydrogen, oxygen, carbon, and nitrogen are also the four most common elements of life on Earth.

In other words, we are not simply in the universe, the universe is in us—it is indistinguishable from us.

How many vast improbabilities had to align for you to be here, in this exact form, at this precise moment?

Maybe there’s more to the gravitational pull that keeps the planets in orbit. Maybe there are so many things that you have yet to understand.

The battle between light and dark

I’ve always believed that light and dark exist in an existential equilibrium with each other. An essential, complimentary base pair equivalent in power to matter and anti-matter.

They say that everything comes down to love or fear: every emotion, every action, and every thought. It is precisely within these moments that we must decide to move towards apathy or understanding.

It is easy to see all that must change within this world, but harder to be the one who changes it. Today’s age is filled with countless challenges and plenty of controversy, but the truth remains simple: the measure of the human spirit is forged within these fires. Our battles are won in the arena. In the day-to-day actions we take to ensure the light never leaves us.

“Many people seem to think it foolish, even superstitious, to believe that the world could still change for the better. And it is true that in winter it is sometimes so bitingly cold that one is tempted to say, “What do I care if there is a summer; its warmth is no help to me now.”

Yes, evil often seems to surpass good. But then, in spite of us, and without our permission, there comes at last an end to the bitter frosts. One morning the wind turns, and there is a thaw. And so I must still have hope.” (Source: The Letters of Vincent van Gogh)

In favor of fireflies

In the quiet of a summer night, when the air is thick and blanketed with darkness, a lone flicker of light emerges as a quiet defiance against the unknown.

Bioluminescence, the chemical reaction within their bodies, is a process of transformation. There is no heat, no waste—only light, given freely, a beacon to others. It is a language of invitation, a sign that something beautiful waits in the night.

Like hope, this glow does not demand to be noticed. It does not overpower or force its way forward. Instead, it appears softly, in pulses and waves, a rhythm of promise.

One firefly flashes, and then another, and another, until the grass and the trees become constellations of possibility. Another lonely soul lights a path lit by their own desire for something different to exist within the world. Each tiny spark a whisper: You are not alone. There is something worth moving toward.

Suddenly, the night isn’t so dark and the path is more lit and it becomes just a bit easier to find your own way within this world.

Hope works much the same way. It does not erase the darkness but gives it contrast, making a way forward visible. It does not guarantee ease, but it offers direction. And just as fireflies shine brighter when they gather, hope grows when it is shared.

Perhaps that is why we are drawn to them—to their fleeting brilliance, their quiet persistence. They remind us that even the smallest spark can light the way.

How beautiful it is to see a firefly erupt with light that dissipates the darkness with a blatant disregard for how vast it is. Whoever you are, however lonely, the world offers itself to your imagination.

We can grieve the possibility of life lost as we move towards self-annihilation, or we can gaze at the stars and wonder how we can make the most of how things are. 

We can choose hope, and find a new way forward using our light, not our darkness to guide a path.