Happy Friday my MG friends! Today’s topic is all about the small things. This morning in my Cell Biology class we spent the lecture chatting about how insanely complex cells really are. My professor shared some research she found and to sum it up, these two scientists were concerned with what a cell actually looks like on the inside. For those that have taken even high school-level biology, you probably have a mental picture that pops up when someone asks what a cell looks like. It probably is a circle, with some DNA in the nucleus, some squiggly lines around the nucleus, representing the ER, a stack of pancakes that are supposed to be the Golgi and so forth. We all have probably drawn this simplified version of a cell. Well, in their quest to find what it really looks like – on a molecular level – they found that it is absolutely jam-packed with structures each with their own specific function to the cell. I promise the biology lesson is almost over. To be able to look at this tiny little thing, it took an entire room of super computers, each processing insane amounts of data and information just to get this one depiction of what a cell actually looks like. This is insane to me. The amount of money, I’m talking millions of dollars in hardware, all for this super computer to get even just one picture of what it looks like it crazy. I left the lecture just wowed by the fact that this microscopic, itty bitty, little thing took so much power, time and effort just to be able to get a picture of what is inside it.

So what’s the point of talking all this biology? The point is that the little things matter. I mean, we should know the significance of the little things by now. After all, it was a virus so small that it can’t be seen with the naked eye or even most microscopes, that brought the world to its knees the past 2 years. We should be able to recognize that the little things matter and yet we still get consumed in what is big, flashy, and eye-catching. This translates further than just viruses, bacteria and cells. A lot of times we struggle to appreciate the little things. Whether it is in relationships, friendships, or just your life in general, it is so easy to overlook the significance of something because it seems so routine and common that it cannot possibly be special.

Let’s reflect back on a year and a half ago. In March of 2020 the world was shaken up. Families were isolated, some were forced to be completely by themselves, going with out seeing another person for weeks, kids were pulled from school, and so much more. We all have had our own experiences and struggles with 2020 on. Because our sense of normalcy was disrupted, we were forced to see the significance in the small things-things such as going out for drinks, how much fun a baseball game is live, the importance of in-person family functions, seeing people’s entire faces, and so on. As the world has attempted to resume normalcy, I can already see evidence of how people are taking the small things for granted.

I get it. It’s not easy to always recognize the everyday things. I am guilty of overlooking too. If there is one thing we should take away from this experience with a pandemic, it is that we need to do better. We as individuals, as communities, as nations, as a world need to do better. We spend so much time on wishful thinking. Don’t get me wrong, I am a proponent for positivity, but we need to go further than wishful thinking. We need to take time for what I like to call “joyful recognition.” It is easy to get caught up in the “could be’s, what if’s, and one day’s” it’s not always easy to get yourself to appreciate the right now. There is so much value in small things. Take this weekend to be fully present with where you are at.