Invoking the Connection

We are a part of the Universe and this fact is either known to us only as Knowledge or as an Idea but not really as an experience to us.

This aspect, which is out of our experiential realm, does create great damage in our everyday life; we are totally living unconnected with the environment causing a great damage to it and thus causing damage back to us.

Many people talk to make us understand the dangers of our way of life, though such talks and writings causes some kind of awareness, it seems we are not in reality aware of it in toto and what to do to save us. We may perhaps know certain responses like reducing the use of vehicles which cause danger to atmosphere through its emission of carbon monoxide, reduced use of electricity, restriction in the use of water and so on. And we expect that such initiatives should lead to continued availability of the natural resources leading to a conducive environment for human existence. But, year after year, the deteriorations are only increasing despite our so called efforts. We have, of course reasons to defend. We can say that all such efforts are really insufficient to alter the state and we need to do more and so on.

What we really need is to understand that we are all at the moment considering our existence as something separate, individualistic and in fact inimically isolated to the environment and to the Universe. We have not yet fully realized that we are parties to the Universe and we have to partner to the universal processes. This is the process we need to take on immediately. Such an initiative from our side will create a total change in our way of living and alter our current turmoil with the environment. We will inherently know what we have to do and how we have to live which alone is the solution to the current problem we are facing. Any initiatives other than this will always be short of achieving the desired goal. If we have to do that our current belief that we are individuals, separate beings will have to change and a new belief that we are part of the Universe has to come in; and our primary task is to partner with the Universe.

Is this too far away from reality? An approach to this answer is in checking our own experiences to see if we have experienced this. We have, sometimes, in our life experienced this one-ness with the Universe.

When we have felt a kind of sadness which cannot be explained properly when we see other human beings suffer in life, when we felt indescribable joy and energy when we are in the midst of nature, when we cuddle with our pets without inhibition, when we felt the soft touch of grass and flowers, and so. All such occasions have felt for more than ourselves, we have perceived more than what the 5 objective sensed have sensed, we have felt we are a part of a larger whole. It has mildly communicated to us our reality of interconnectedness. But we have moved away from such feelings and experiences by thinking bringing rational thinking.

We are also crippled by our inducted belief that we are not one with the Universe but are one above the Universe. Evolutionally, we set out to use the environment around us for our benefit to survive and then to thrive. However, in the industrial era the heroism of humanity was thought to be in manufacturing dream machines to artificially regulate every aspect of our life. The image of the hero was the enterprising man to mine, manufacture, build sky scrapers, machines, cities, etc. With rise of our expertise in this area we have now come to see ourselves as masters of our environment; our environment existing for us to use it, people included. A reflection of this attitude is in the disdain we have for rituals for nature like worship of the rain gods. Our belief in our own ability to predict rain, get water from dams and canals has reduced our reverence for the power of nature in the form of rains. Rains are no longer to be prayed for, they are now to be forecasted. It has also changed our relationship from being connected to it and partnering with it, to using it.

So, we have to resurrect our belief of oneness, see the systemic connection, feel interconnectedness, relate with responsibility and move to an attitude called holism.

We have such connection with the Universe in us. It is natural in us. But without realizing it, we cut the links and loose the interconnectedness at several locations.