Modern life accelerated the trend toward isolation even before the pandemic, and now the symptoms of loneliness, weakened relationships, depression, and anxiety have only deepened. One reads that a young generation knows only about digital online connections, impersonal transactions in place of actual human relationships.
Humans are social creatures and struggle to adapt to isolation. People need to connect at every level for their own well-being. Consider the various support systems that are open to us, from church, family, community, and all kinds of support groups online. Most people don’t realize it, but a person’s chances of surviving a heart attack are directly correlated with how many kinds of support they have. Someone who has little or no support is much more likely to not survive than someone who has a great deal of support.
Homo sapiens arose somewhere in Africa around 200,000 years ago. By 30,000 years ago sophisticated cave painting emerged. Seven thousand years ago animals were domesticated and the land was farmed. During all that time, Homo sapiens lived as part of the web of life.
But if you look deeper, it takes a connection with yourself before the true meaning of connection emerges. How connected are you? Everyone needs to ask themselves that question. Nature itself is a web of connections. Trees in the forest communicate with each other chemically, and beneath the soil, the forest has its own nervous system. The web of life exists totally because of connections. In a tree, a mushroom, a deer, or in you, no cell is an island.
From a scientific perspective, the web of life is inescapable. We are fooling ourselves by being blind to this fact because you and I are intimately connected to the planet. With every breath, you inhale atoms of oxygen once breathed by Buddha, Jesus, and Confucius, and those atoms were probably in China, Italy, or the Arctic yesterday.
The most life-supporting connection you can make occurs in consciousness—it is known in India as Ahimsa, or reverence for life. That is also your deepest connection to yourself if you choose to embrace it. What is reverence for life? It isn’t a religious concept but a state of awareness. In this state of awareness the following things come naturally:
- You are friendly to everyone and an enemy of no one.
- You trust other people.
- You respect all ways of life.
- You feel the beauty and wonder of Nature.
- You do nothing to spoil Mother Nature.
- You make choices that benefit the whole of life.
Is reverence for life inspiring? Yes, but at this moment it is also a survival mechanism for a planet in peril. I am not saying this with blame in mind, and I know that all of us are numb to bad news about climate change. I am pointing out the solution, which isn’t radical or even new. The solution is reverence for life, starting modestly with each person.