Statement

Look at your reflection in a mirror. That person wasn’t there a decade ago, not a year ago, not even yesterday – not really. For many biological and ecological reasons you’re literally not who you used to be, yet you’re still you. This is the Art of Becoming – the most fundamental truth of our universe.

Why?

Nothing is ever truly new. Everything – from the device you’re reading this on to the changing behaviour of the stars in the night sky – is just matter and energy reshaping itself. What is happening is more than nature’s greatest recycling program. Running since the Big Bang, when everything we know exploded from a point smaller than a pinhead, the Art of Becoming is an unrepeatable process of advancement, of forever moving on. 

Think about it: The iron in your blood once forged in dying stars. The calcium in your bones perhaps part of ancient sea creatures. The water you drink might have once been dinosaur pee. Everything is connected in this cosmic dance of transformation.

Your existence is like a movie, not a photograph. Each frame flows into the next. The “present” is just the editing point between what was and what will be. You’re never finished becoming. Neither is anything else.

How?

That mountain you see? It’s eroding. Before it began eroding it was not there! That cloud? Water vapor performing its endless sky ballet. Water? Ah yes, the miracle of the introduction of hydrogen to oxygen within the laws of nature and worked upon by evolution.

Remember asking “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?” Well, neither. Both are just stages in an endless process of becoming. Just as you didn’t suddenly appear – you emerged through millions of years of evolution, then nine months of development, then years of growth. And you’re still becoming.

And our Earth? It’s been in the becoming business for 4.5 billion years. It started its run of becoming as a dust and gas cloud. Since it has hosted countless species that rose and fell and while some of that was due to local changes, mostly it is a reaction to outside changes. The universe is mind-bendingly huge – 93 billion light-years across (that we can see), and it’s getting bigger faster than ever. Every second, our Earth is becoming something slightly different. Just like you. Just like everything. Right now, never before have the plant and animal kingdoms, as we know them, been so threatened; never has it been so cold. But here’s the thing – Earth will keep becoming something else with or without us. That’s why smart humans, seeking to spread the risk, are already planning a second home among the stars.

Here’s where it gets serious: Humans often act like we’ve got it all figured out, like we can amend nature’s laws and control evolution’s playlist. But we’re making rookie mistakes because we’ve forgotten something crucial – we’re part of this process, not its masters. When our parents share their wisdom, they’re trying to guide us on a path that’s both ancient and brand new. Nobody has ever been exactly who you are, yet countless others have faced similar challenges.

Conclusion

Understanding the Art of Becoming means accepting that we’re part of something vastly larger and older than ourselves. Long before humans invented religions to explain existence, the universe was doing its thing. The true forces shaping our world aren’t supernatural – they’re natural, evolutionary, forever experimenting and they’re everywhere, all the time, forever becoming something new. You’re not just reading about the Art of Becoming – you’re living it. Every heartbeat, every breath, every thought is part of your own becoming story. What will you become next?

This tale is subject to change