Interconnected
Take a breath. Exhale. Take an even deeper breath. Exhale. You just connected with every living thing past, present, and still yet to come. The very oxygen each one of us is presently breathing has been in the lungs and blood stream of every living thing that’s spent one second of life here. That same oxygen in your lungs has contributed to the life of every flower that’s ever bloomed, every tree that’s ever sprouted, every bird that’s ever flown, every fish that’s ever swam, every animal that’s ever run, and every human that’s ever entered this world. We’re connected to one another in a litany of ways and some of them are so simple.
Breathing is something that nearly every living organism does innately. Subsequently, it’s something we seldom give attention to and we lose sight of how it truly connects us to one another. We are all special and are all part of a cohesive unit. We are members of Earth’s tribe, where love, compassion, and connectedness keep us going.
At times we’re all guilty of looking past this important fact, focusing inward. It’s a normal response to the pressures and demands of our everyday lives. We become consumed and that blinds us to the mutually supporting and interconnected society we’re a part of. Mechanisms within society have aggressively worked to turn us into consumers/reproducers. From a young age, we’re shown an order to life; school, job, marriage, children, grandchildren. But it doesn’t stop there. We have to fill our lives with stuff, lots of it. More than we truly need. This leads to some people willingly working jobs they’re not happy at, so they can buy stuff they don’t need because that’s what they’re being led to believe will make them happy.
Happiness emanates from being around those who warm your heart, those who put a smile on your face, those whom you love, and who love you. That’s one’s family and friends, the members of our tribe. True happiness doesn’t come from the replaceable stuff we are unable to take with us. It comes from the irreplaceable people whom always travel with us, deep in our hearts. When we become driven by insatiable consuming in the face of things we do not need, it pits us against one another. It changes our demeanor, our actions, and who we are. We are inevitably blinded at how dependent we are on one another and how interconnected our world is.
Take a drink of water. Now think about where it goes. For simplicities sake, it makes its way into your blood stream, hydrating your system, and the excess is flushed out making its way back into nature. It’s then either absorbed by plants, consumed by animals, cleaned and processed for human consumption once again, or it evaporates into the air where it becomes part of a cloud then returns as precipitation, where it is again part of our cycle. This cycle has been recurring since the dawn of time. The very water you just drank, at one time may have rehydrated Plato, Socrates, Jesus Christ, Ghandi, Buddha, Mohammed, Albert Einstein, Isaac Newton or your next-door neighbor. What is currently a part of you was once a part of someone else and will someday be a part of those who are yet to come. We are interconnected and the preservation of life on this planet hinges upon us, as human beings and inhabitants of this planet understanding that very fact.
Albert Einstein said it himself, “humanity is going to require a substantially new way of thinking if it is to survive.” The time for change is now. The power resides within each and every one of us and at some point, in time, we’ve all felt it. That life affirming event that spiritually, emotionally, and unequivocally connected us; making us feel as though we’re part of something much greater than ourselves. Going forward from these moments, it is incumbent upon us to work at stretching the experiences in ways which further our connectedness. Reinforcing the positive connection through our kindness guided actions toward one another.
