Writing this post has been a difficult task, since I am all about giving you good vibes and sharing with you positive thoughts and lately this is not my state of mind. As most of you know a couple of days ago an unspeakable tragedy stroke Greece. A wildfire that raged through a coastal area east of Athens cost the lives of almost 100 people and destroyed kilometres of forest that was the home of so many animals.

The Greek people are devastated by this tragedy and are grieving the souls that lost everything in one day. Greek social media and press are full of images and stories from the wildfires, and one can see that we all feel small, weak and helpless to conceive this disaster. I am one of them. There are so many bad things happening in the world, but the truth is I don’t relate to every single one of them. I imagine that this is a coping mechanism that the human brain develops to protect us. I sympathize, I feel sorry but I don’t suffer. This time it was different. Maybe because the disaster was so close to me, it felt that the people that were affected could have been me. Could have been my mother, my child, my friend, my pet. Although I consciously avoided watching every single footage on the internet, with the help of my vivid imagination I have already created images in my head of the last moments of those people and these images haunt me.

The amazing thing that I realized reading all these posts in the social media is that the Greeks demonstrated their huge capacity for solidarity once they realized what is going on. People opened their homes for the victims that lost everything, they showed up in the affected area with water, food and medicines, they donated blood, they offered to transport animals to the vet clinic and so on. It made me think that even in the hardest circumstances we need to stay together and help each other. By engaging in acts of kindness and solidarity we can keep the hope and heal our souls from the pain.

What can you do to help?

• You can help the victims by offering various forms of assistance. Here you can find detailed information about how you can help.
• You can raise awareness about the reasons that caused this tragedy and demand accountability from those that are responsible.
• You can help the animals that are wounded by supporting the animal welfare groups and the vets that voluntarily provide them medical treatment: Adespotologio Vets4Life Dogs’ Voice Never Walk Alone e.V. Anima 
• Here you can offer your services to the people affected.

The magnitude of this event makes the need for self reflection greater, as we are reminded that life is so precious. It is a fragile gift and we need to realize how lucky we are and to remind ourselves every single day that all we have is now, this very moment.

Like a woman, that is mourning the loss of her husband and her two children, said, “hug your loved ones every day, show them how much you care for them”!