This post came from a comment that was made on my Symbols and Labels post from earlier this month. The commenter asked ‘One thing I don’t get is how is everything related‘.
What follows is my take on connectedness or relatedness.
The idea of the connectedness of all things is not new and something that ancient peoples (and when I use this term I mean those who have gone before … our ancestors … not cavemen per se!) were fundamentally aware of.
We are the stuff of stars! – Carl Sagan
This quote has often been used to show that all life on our planet is made up of the same stuff that stars are made from – eg carbon, nitrogen, oxygen etc. That in itself connects us but when I speak of connectedness I’m speaking about the spiritual.
Connectedness to me is more spiritual than scientific/cellular. The Yucatec Mayan Code of Honour states:
In lak’ech
I am another yourself
If you think about that for a moment, to me that embodies connectedness of all living things. If we for one moment considered that we are all the same – fundamentally – leaving aside religion or culture – at our base level we are all identical. We all breathe, love, bleed, feel pain, joy, jubilation and anguish.
THAT is what connects us at a fundamental level. We are the SAME.
Basic laws of nature dictate for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. If I do something good, then it follows that something of equal good will flow in the opposite direction. Conversely if I do something bad … you get the idea.
I have a belief in a Universal Energy, a Universal Consciousness shared by all living things. Other religions have a shared view:
“The kingdom heaven is within you”, “As above so below”, “man is made in the image of God”. To me this means that Universal Energy flows as a connecting thread through all living things.
Many people have tried to define the soul. To me, the soul is made up of our feelings/emotions, our experiences, and the wisdom/knowledge we gain through our life’s journey. At death this energy (comprised of emotions, experience and wisdom) is released back to the Source – the Universal Energy. Your life energy is on loan and at some point you have to give it back. Best then that you leave this life better than when you entered it.
You can also think of connection like this: every time I breathe out, microscopic particles of ‘myself’ are released into the air. This happens with every living thing that breathes. (If you doubt this, just think of virus transmission.) This means when you breathe in, you breathe in these microscopic particles of all other living things which then become a part of you. This therefore makes all other living things our brothers/sisters whether they be human or animal … or plant for that matter.
If you’ve not seen the movie Avatar yet, there is a very good representation of connectedness there – the inhabitants of Pandora not only know on a spiritual level that they are connected to their environment, but physically do so through their hair. Their greeting ‘I see you’ is a kind of translation of ‘Namaste’ – I honour your spirit – I see you and you are another me.
Once we accept all living things are connected it makes it easy for us to honour all life – and conversely to realise how abysmally we treat the fellow inhabitants of our Earth Mother, ourselves and indeed Her. She is not here for us to use and abuse but to nourish, respect and love.
How have you shown the Mother you love her today?
If you doubt we have an impact on our surroundings, I share this photo with you. Always struggling, this plant has travelled with us wherever we have gone. Recently I performed the Giveaway Ritual on this plant and this was a new leaf that emerged.
We can and do impact our environment because of this connectedness.
I was recently introduced to the work of Dr Masaru Emoto and his amazing research with water crystals. He found water from mountain streams formed the most beautiful crystalline structures; polluted water showed distorted crystals – or formed no crystals at all. His water crystal research also showed that the shape of frozen water crystals is affected by words, thoughts, music and prayer. The research shows how we can impact the world around us and how important it is that we do so in a positive way. Given out Mother – and our own bodies – are primarily water any negative emotions, thoughts, words or actions are going to impact our world and ourselves negatively. This is connection. And the reason we should strive every day to turn the negative to the positive.
Thank you for the question and I welcome open discussion.
I see you – I honour you – In lak’ech – Namaste
© Earth Goddess Wisdom – www.earthgoddesswisdom.com
Many do not concept their connection to each other, let alone the universe.
To me the relatedness in the human race is interesting, one school of thought says every homo sapien comes, ultimately, from Mitochondrial Eve. No matter what hair, eye and skin colour we are, we all apparently share a gene from her. That says, in my understanding, that we are therefore connected in ancestoral spirit as well.