Seeking balance in an imbalanced world
When I announced to family and friends in January that my word for the year was “me,” the response was a mix of surprise and envy. It felt selfish to say it, and the responses encouraged me to explain to others that, no, I’m not being selfish, I’m not going to quit caring about others or doing what I can to make the world better. I’m simply going to try to remember who I am amid the chaotic, spinning world I—and most of us—have found myself in.
Shortly after my announcement, I headed south to Costa Rica for a two-week exploration of rain forests, volcanoes, jungles, and culture.
I was in Costa Rica when the US attacked Iran. I began that morning of Feb. 28 in the rainforest of Tortuguero National Park, a preserved wetland, where 5 of us in our little group floated through the jungle in a flatboat reminiscent of Humphrey Bogart’s in “African Queen.” Every single piece of clothing we owned was soaked by overnight rain coming in through windows covered only by screens. Heat and humidity were more unbearable than in the American South in mid-August. Through the pouring rain and beneath the flap of poncho head coverings, we saw toucans perched in treetops searching for breakfast, sleeping sloths, a family of capuchin (white-faced) monkeys swinging through trees. We saw crocs, giant hummingbirds, a wild baby boa constrictor, ants building homes, wild orchids. The only thing we did not see was the jaguar swimming across the river to eat the turtle hatchlings, but we were assured that he was crouched in those trees.
Costa Rica has no army, has not supported a military since the beginning of its democracy in 1948. Instead, its country’s resources go to health care, education, and social services. Some economists call Costa Rica’s government a true democracy, one that works for the people, compared to a “flawed” democracy like the US that promises freedoms but restricts true democracy with strict social policies, costly health care, and unstable social and educational programs. Often people from the US see Costa Rica as a place to send church youth to do mission work, but in truth, Costa Ricans need to host mission trips to the US and teach us a thing or two about how we live.
The phrase “Pura Vida” is more than a greeting or slogan in our neighboring country; it’s a lifestyle, an attitude, an embrace. Literally translated as “pure life,” it describes a country committed to peace, simple living, gratitude, and showing up. It’s a country that honors its rich biodiversity, aiming not to dominate or destroy its natural environment but to live “on” the land not live “off” it, as parasites do. Take the orchid plant, for instance, that settles in the crooks and limbs in the forests but does not take nutrients from the tree; or take the “strangler” Ficus vine which begins its life in the tops of the rain forests’ canopies and drops anchors to help the trees stand in the onslaught of rain and soft earth. For years, the tree and the vine coexist, creating a vibrant ecosystem for plant, animal, and bird life.
People see themselves as part of the ecosystem. They live close to the earth, with open windows and doors. Poverty is experienced differently than in the US. True wealth comes from family, friends, and the pura vida attitude. Costa Ricans are hugging people. And they hug hard.
We’ve got issues in the US. Nobody has answers. We are no longer the protective, caring power we once claimed; we are a bully culture, a way of life that has trickled down from the abusive top level to our everyday existence. We live by someone else’s example. We have begun to act like those in control.
While motor coaching through Costa Rica, I read a book titled To End All Wars, loaned to me by a friend who described it as a “life-changer.” Published in 1962, it’s the memoir of Ernest Gordon, who was captured by the Japanese in 1941. He was one of the prisoners who helped build the bridge over the River Kwai and almost died of malaria, dysentery, starvation, and exhaustion before the end of the war and his release.
Early in his captivity, he described the treatment of prisoners by Japanese soldiers as brutal: they were forced to work impossible hours on little food and endure daily verbal and physical abuse. Prisoners lost their sense of compassion for one another and began acting like their captors. Each man was out for himself, focusing his own survival. That meant that when a fellow prisoner got sick or was beaten to the ground by the enemy, fellow prisoners would add their own kick, ignore pleas for water, walk on past, not even noticing the other. They had taken on the characteristics of their captors. In a sense, they were killing themselves.
A similar thing has happened in this country. Our example of how to be an American is a bully who kicks those who are down, looks the other way, refuses water, food, health care, or housing to the needy. So many of us have likewise assumed that attitude. We lash out, we don’t trust. Anger and hatred are on the rise. We don’t protect; we attack.
Then, at Gordon’s lowest point, another soldier began massaging his legs every day and helping him regain strength and confidence. Another soldier helped move him out of the “Death House” hospital into a hut where he could at least die with dignity. Little by little, he realized that caring for one another was the only way of survival. Individual by individual, they all became stronger; they all began to live, not die.
We are so out of balance in this country. We are out of balance with our natural world, so much that even the smallest creatures, our bees and our insects, are under attack by the pesticides we spread so we can have beautiful lawns. We are out of balance with our human world, so much that an individual life, even a child’s, even a soldier’s, has little meaning. Any divergence from the so-called status quo is a threat to making America great again. As Costa Rica teaches, sameness is not balance; diversity is.
I am learning what “me” means for me in 2026. It isn’t an inward, selfish turn. It is, though, turning the lens inward on who I am and who I want to be, how balanced with my neighbors I want to be, how balanced with my natural world. What that looks like for me as I go about my daily life in this country. How my example might serve others, might serve my community and my country.
Given a chance, nature rights itself. Does humanity? I think the jury is still out. The jury is still out on American democracy. If we look south, we can see sustainability, peace, an acceptance of our place as part of the natural world, not a need to dominate it.
Barbara Presnell
www.barbarapresnell.com
