Opening up your worldview

One of the things that first attracted me to Stoicism was its call to be a citizen of the world, to be a member of an interconnected humanity rather than a citizen or resident of a specific location.  We do, however, live in a very geographically bound world, and regardless of what people may say, the world is far from flat for most of us.  We don't often get the chance to truly interact with people from different backgrounds in a sustained and constructive way. Luckily I get to work out all of the practicalities and difficulties of this in my day job, teaching English to newcomers to Canada.  I know that you're supposed to complain about your work, and there are always a million things in each workplace to complain about, but I just wanted to take a minute to be grateful for the chance to interact and connect with my students, who bring experiences from all over the world into my classroom every day.  Working through all of those different sets of cultural expectations and practices isn't always easy, but when you get the chance to be in an environment like that it really highlights the humanity, with all of its blessings and curses, that we all take part in.