We step aside to let someone pass, smile at a child, chat aimlessly with an acquaintance or even with a stranger. Many of us have the impression that daily life is an unending series of unpleasantnesses. But think about it for a moment. Nearly every encounter with another person is at least neutral and usually pleasant enough. But what is unpredictable are unique, specific events that will be good or be bad.
Life has overall patterns, but it is also inherently ambiguous.
Which is basically how Unitarian Universalists create their spirituality we look for overall patterns in which we can live, but we also live with ambiguity from moment to moment. I believe that this spiritual tradition is probably a closer approximation of reality than many religions, especially those that demonize ambiguity. How the patterns of a system take shape can be shifted significantly by the smallest of our actions. This means that we may find ourselves committed to small tasks, which by themselves may seem like a useless effort to bail-out the Titanic. But what Chaos theories suggest is that if we persist in doing those small things to make the world a better place, any one of us may be present at a crucial moment in the creation of a new pattern, and what we will have done is shifted a pattern significantly for the better.