Exhaustion has completely taken me over. Not the physical kind but the type which is psycho emotional and caused by external stressors in one’s life.

No I am not taking tales out of the home, I am expressing a feeling which I am sure psychologists the world over are grappling with at a rate higher than normal.

A few months ago I would have blamed this all on Donald Trump, the United States president, but not anymore. He now has a merry band which includes Kim Jong Un, Aung San Suu Kyi and all the people the world over who focus too little on the welfare of human beings.

As a self-proclaimed news junkie I expect to feel exhausted when I follow the news too intensely. But for the last few months I have lessened the amount of time spent following news stories but my exhaustion from this source is greater than ever.

There is something in me which is pulled like a magnet to knowing what is happening across the globe. While I now limit my number of hours of news I still grapple with the ache I feel when images of Rohinga Muslims flash across my screen or when the victims of hurricanes or gun attacks are caught with that look of despondency.

A few years ago while living in Jakarta, Indonesia, I got introduced to meditation. Years later, I am still not great at it but manage every few days to give a few moments to this potent practice.

More and more during these sessions I found myself focussed on the sadness across the globe to the point where meditation itself became burdensome.

Nonetheless I kept fudging through and alas, a few days ago I had a breakthrough. My approach was all wrong.

My thoughts should not only be on the suffering and craziness across the world, I should also reflect on the possible good which could arise from this period in time. That lightbulb moment led me to thinking and hence inspired this article.

What better time than now for developing nations to focus on setting their own agenda than when the world’s superpower is distracted by: