Max Ehrmann wrote Desiderata as a young man — it's a prose poem he called 'A Late Luncheon' when he first composed it in 1920. It sat in his drawer for years before he published it.
When it finally surfaced publicly, it became perhaps the most beloved inspirational text of the 20th century. Hundreds of thousands of people have read those words at the exact moment they needed to hear them.
This line — "You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars" — cuts through every feeling of smallness, of not belonging, of being a mistake.
It doesn't say you're equal to the trees. It says you're no less. The distinction matters. Trees don't have to earn their place. Neither do you.
You have a right to be here. Not a special right. Not a conditional right. A right. As fundamental as gravity.
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