This photo was taken on 11/16/2022 by a camera on the Artemis 1/Orion spacecraft on its way to the moon.

This is the first view of our pale blue dot of a water-soaked rock of a planet from this distance (~58,000 miles at this point) from a human-rated spacecraft since the Apollo 17 mission of 1972.

From this view, we see…

everything that gives us life and a future, everything we hold dear to us, everything that truly matters…

there are no countries, no dividing lines on maps, no walls, no human-created barriers, no labels, no division other than that imposed by nature.

All the things that divide us were created by us to divide us…all these divisions exist only within our minds.

These things we have fought over for so long, killed countless people over, claimed as ours – they just do not exist in reality.

In reality, what you see is what you get: a single, shining, incredibly fragile oasis of life in the ice-cold wastelands of space…a pale blue water-soaked marble giving all of us – the entire human family and all our animal, plant, and fungal friends – a place to share and call home.

Now is the time we stop fighting over what we should be sharing.

Now is the time for us to stop harming our only life support system.

Imagine.

Imagine what we could do if we all just worked together toward the common goal of a better future for us all.

Dare mighty things.

Do only good things.

Ponder it.