This planet teems with life. It’s been changing everything from the atmosphere to rocks for 4 billion years. It’s everywhere. It’s in crevasses in the Antarctic to the bottom of the Marianas Trench to the clouds above – it’s absolutely in every nook and seemingly uninhabitable cranny. Where conditions are friendly, it’s absolutely run amuck – it really is everywhere. Human life alone is everywhere, but add in the forests and the deserts and the plains – our planet is overflowing with it in all of its dizzying variety. It is so abundant. Life is the best thing the known universe has going on – look at it go! It fills my heart with wonder. How can we be sad for too long, when there’s all this insane life berserking all over the place?
And our crazy bodies, cells that have learned to live together and do magnificent things! Lungs that breathe, blood that pumps, stomachs that turn food into fuel, cells that turn proteins into eyeballs – seriously, it’s all too much. Too much miracle.
And on top of that – a whole bunch of this life has learned how to love! Mothers for babies, people for cats, people for other people, wolves for other wolves – love is just the best, and it is everywhere too. When there’s death (which is also everywhere), our hearts are broken. Most of the rest of the time, we are awash with love like we are awash in life. We experience so much of it, we don’t even notice it half the time.
And on top of that! Things can be beautiful! A sunrise. Waves on a beach. A mountain. Coral reefs. All this life gives so many amazing things to look at.
And then! Human intelligence. Our clever little monkey brains are always solving problems and making things. We’re sending robots to Mars. We’re turning the whole planet hotter. We’re writing our business proposals and building our buildings and growing a bajillion bushels of corn. We’re making machines with all the information there’s ever been, that are capable of learning and making things with that knowledge. We’re nuts out there!
Exclamation points!
And to think, just 2 years ago all I thought about was when I could get drunk next. When I could smoke my next cigarette. All I thought about 5 years ago was what a pathetic and miserable person I was. Wishing to die. Not seeing any of this.
One of the best ways I’ve ever spent 30 minutes is hearing this essay from Michelle Thaller on Meditative Story, and doing the accompanying meditation at the end. They have done a better job with this than I could ever dream.
https://meditativestory.com/MichelleThaller/
“This is also the universe trying to know itself; there is nothing less perfect about your real, authentic self, no matter your expectations. You can just let go. You can even let go of the shame of not being able to let go. Don’t let this be another way to judge yourself. The loneliness and fear and insecurity are still here with me – and always will be. And they are also part of the lesson the universe is trying to learn through my tiny life. The universe doesn’t care about the definitions, limitations, and expectations you’ve put on yourself. You are part of it just by existing. And so is everyone around you, as well as everything around you – every bird and flower, and rock and wave.”
As far as we know, we alone have the ability to look at the stars and observe a dozen supernovas in the course of a night. To our knowledge, only the beings on Earth have the gift of life. Humans disregard and devalue it, but life has given us every gift we have ever known.