A TREE

A tree doesn't want to be a tree, it has to be a tree. In its own way it's determined to be a tree. Not the best tree it can be but the tree that it is. And of the billions of trees in the world, no tree is exactly the same. Sure, pines are pines, but every one is in some way different from the others. And it doesn't matter if pines are different from oaks. They're not aware of their differences, it simply doesn't matter. Trees have awareness but only as it pertains to being a tree. There's no award for biggest, tallest, prettiest or most likely to end up in a fireplace. They don't know when they're born and they don't know that they will die. 

A bird doesn't know it's a bird, it simply is a bird. It has no choice nor does it want one. It doesn't envy other birds or doubt what it is. It flies like a bird because that's what makes almost all birds unique, but it's not aware or proud of its ability to fly or its uniqueness. Being a bird is its full time job, its raison d'etre as it were. Perhaps to survive as a bird it notices things like the color, size, song, etc.of other birds, and knows of the danger from other species who might know it as a food source, but this awareness is only a means of maximizing its own birdness. Also, creating other birds like it is a key component of being a bird. And being a bird is apparently enough for a bird.

We humans know we're not trees and we know we're not birds, even though sometimes we'd like to fly like a bird, and we've actually figured out how to do it. Our self-awareness, whenever it may have begun, means we spend a lot more time wondering about what it means to be human than actually just being a human. We also spend a fair amount of time disowning our humanity, and the humanity of others like us. Somewhere along the line we got the idea that since being human and surviving as a human was so difficult there must be something inherently wrong with us. In fact, we even created stories and mythologies explaining why we are so bad and how we can be better. Being human isn't easy, even though that's what we are.  Perhaps we should spend more time just being human and learning to accept and respect our humanness, and less time trying to figure our why we're human. Trees don't do it; birds don't do it, but we just can't help ourselves.