When America defeated Trump, the whole world danced in the streets. We have faced fresh horror every day for four nightmarish years. All we got from the leader of the free world was lies, contempt, indifference to suffering, incitement to violence, and a quick descent into fascism. That’s almost over. Even though the plague Trump ignored rages more fiercely than ever, Americans deserve to celebrate for bringing him down.

So now what? Two more months of Trump doing as much harm as he can. Local stop-gap measures until national leadership can bring the virus to heel. Coming up on January 5^th, there will be a crucial run-off election for two Georgia Senate seats. If Democrats lose even one of those seats, Senate leader Mitch McConnell will continue to block any help for increasingly desperate Americans and small businesses. McConnell could stop Biden from accomplishing much of anything at all.

But what has already changed is the mood. Trump made people despair. Now we feel like humanity might yet manage to survive. We know, however, that can only happen if we change the way we live, fast. Masks, distancing, and temporary shut-downs are part of our new way of life, maybe for a couple more years. The more basic change involves American consumerism.

The same capitalist system that produced Trump as its avatar has convinced us that we need new stuff all the time. That stuff requires energy to make and distribute. Burning fossil fuels to get that energy is broiling the whole planet on our watch. No alternate energy system can keep up with us if we don’t stop consuming at our present rate.

The current global economy assumes infinite growth, which is not health; it is cancer. Greed isn’t going anywhere. But basing our whole civilization on greed is killing us. We need to turn toward sharing instead of accumulating, toward healing instead of destroying, toward compassion instead of selfishness, toward making do with what we have instead of making more.

Such a turn depends on a change in our culture that no government can bring about by itself. Culture is formed by a billion choices made by individuals: what we watch, what we say, and what we buy. Already social media make clear that our attention – which can focus on only one thing at a time – is our most valuable asset. Let’s use this time of new hope to focus on things that nourish and heal us. Let’s make kindness fashionable.

Change isn’t up to Biden. It’s up to us.