How long can we deny that when we look at trees, what we are really seeing is a complex network of arteries, veins, vessels, and capillaries? How long will we tell ourselves that each organism is separate unto itself? That the appearance is only coincidental? There are those who believe that the entire Earth is just one living organism. The typical definition of life is an entity that can grow, respond to stimuli, reproduce, and maintain homeostasis. The Earth does all of these things. Is the Earth alive? I think it is.
When I look around me in winter and early spring, I see the
truth. I am not beguiled with colors and
scents in the season of death. I see the
trunks and branches and twigs of the trees and I know that they are the vascular
system of the Earth. I am aware of the
atmosphere, and I know it is the lungs of the Earth. The waters are the Earth’s blood, and the
countless numbers of plants and animals are the many individual cells of the
Earth.
 |
| The veins of the Earth. |
The mimicry is fascinating.
The macrosystem and the microsystem are strikingly similar, only
different in size. If you are a cell on
the Earth--just one cell--what, then, are the cells to you in your own
body? Do they seem more important
now? On the microscale, each cell in
your body is a separate living thing that, of course, depends on you for its
existence. On the macroscale, you are a
separate living thing, a cell, that depends on the Earth for your existence.
We can feel small and puny and useless with this
information, or we can appreciate the divine beauty in each and every cell in
our body. What we do to the body, we do
to the cell. Each of us is a tiny Earth
housing its many cells and maintaining homeostasis. If we watch the rhythms of the Earth and
develop a real understanding for them, we can come to know the mysteries of our
own bodies. What happens to one, happens
to the other.
