Hey everyone. This is a thread I decided to make that in my opinion serves a good purpose. We all get caught up in our daily lives, with doom and gloom, with politics, war, stress, gossip, racism, disease, sexism, religion. The list goes on. We seem to forget the insignificance of these matters in the grand scheme of things. Many of us forget, or simply fail to see and appreciate life for what it is. I've decided to post 80+ pictures I've gathered that I think (well, hope, at least) will cause you to take a step back from your lives for a moment and appreciate existence. To appreciate our beautiful planet and all the life and scenery it hosts for our enjoyment. Life doesn't have to be as complicated as we make it.

This thread may not get any attention at all, but if I can just affect one person's perception for even a minute, then that's all I care about. I hope this thread is allowed, and that I'm not somehow breaking any rules by posting a bunch of pictures. Some of them are quite large. I apologize. It would have taken too much time to resize myself. Thanks for viewing though. I hope you enjoy them.

The Earth In All Its Glory

Here is our known universe.



Lets look a little bit closer.



Somewhere, in the vastness of it all lies a speck of light. This speck of light is our galaxy.



In this galaxy lies a sphere of rock, floating, suspended in a beam of sunlight. This is our home.

Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there--on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

-- Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot, 1994

What beauty could this speck of dust possibly hold?











































































































































































This isn't even scratching the surface.

We have reached a turning point in our existence.

We are given the power and the knowledge to choose our destiny.
We can embrace our purpose, live with meaning, and leave all trivial matters in the past where they belong:





Or we can end it all.



How will you choose to live your life?

Fantastic photos. Thanks for sharing them.

Some stunnig pics all of them in fact,got me scatching my head wich one's going to be my desktop bakground
S&F

Two words. Thank You.

we only get 2 choices?

WOW beautiful pics!

Are they all real? Some looked like they could be PS and if not WOW! I'd like to know where the pic of the sky was taken where the rock was balancing on a smaller rock. That is a beautiful place!


Our planet is beautiful.. People just simply don't appreciate it. There is something to be said about stopping and smelling the roses!

It's a really pretty day here which is nice since we havent' had a winter. I have my front window open with a nice breeze, it's 60F outside. It's been in the upper 80s lately! I can see the river and the sky is crystal blue. I was woken up by storms but it's cleared up quite nicely. There is a craft fair in the historic village where I live and I might walk down there later this afternoon. It's just too nice out not to enjoy and appreciate it.

Stunning pictures, S&F

I enjoyed every single one of them.

There isn't a day that goes by where i'm not in awe at something in the sky or here on the ground.

This place holds so many special gems that I find it hard to imagine how we have come so far in destroying it.

There is still hope for this place when we are long gone.

Beauty feeds the soul, and you have set before us a feast. We live on a beautiful blue ball, filled with wonders. Thank you, I am full

Thank you for this thread ..I just sat in awe looking at each picture our earth is so special and beautiful ...
Peace,sugarcookie1 S&F

I'm happy to see you guys have enjoyed it

What an excellent thread.

I wonder how the world would be if everyone got this message?

My first S&F go to you!

Flagging this one .. would love to know where you found such pictures. They blew me away.

How will you choose to live your life?



I choose Christ!

great homie, great