Every human being aspires for health and wellbeing. One person thinks human wellbeing means just his wellbeing, for another person it is him and his family, for another person it is him and his nation, for another person it is him and the whole world. For someone else, it is every life-form on the planet. So there is nobody who is not concerned about human wellbeing or the wellbeing of another life. Only the scale and scope are different. Taking care of one's wellbeing means different things to different people. One person thinks if he eats well it is enough, another person understands that he needs to take care of his relationships, another person understands that he needs to take care of the very environment in which he lives.
Well-being does not mean just eating well. One has to take care of everything that concerns life for achieving true wellbeing. Is there anything on this planet that does not concern your life? Whatever happens to this planet will eventually happen to you. So when we talk about wellbeing it is not just about taking care of your physical body. One needs to also take care of the very body of the earth because our body is apart of that.
So without taking care of the atmosphere and the ecological situation around us, how can we live well?
The very body that you are is just the food that you have eaten. The food that you ate is the very earth upon which you stand. So it is important to understand that you are just a piece of earth, or the earth is your larger body. Everything that you produce, buy and use in your life is something that you have dug up from the planet. The rate at which we are exploiting the resources of this planet today is extremely high. If there is no compensatory activity on the same scale as we exploit whatever we use on this planet, then we have a recipe for disaster.
Most people tend to believe that the closes relationship they have on this planet is either with one's partner, family member, a dear friend or an animal. However, if you think about it with a deeper sense, you will realize that we all have a much deeper relationship with plants and trees than any other life. There is a very intimate bond between a human being and plant-life. The reason is that our respiratory systems depend on plant-life to function. What we exhale, the plants are inhaling and what the plants exhale, we inhale. Only one-half of our respiratory system is in our body, the other half is in plants and trees. If one consciously experiences just that, there would be a deep sense of love for the natural world.
"Right now, ecological concerns are being looked at as an obligation to fulfill. If we would to raise our level of understanding and involvement with the natural world, we would see that ecology is not an obligation, it is our life."
Once you lose connection with nature, your body will slowly lose its integrity and stability. When you use the body and the mind in certain ways it gets disorganized. This disorganization can lead to disease and weakness and ultimately destabilization of the system itself. The main reason people need vacations today is to reorganize or “charge” their system. But if your life is set up in such a way that your body is in constant contact with nature, your system will be able to reorganize itself and you won’t have the need to escape from your life.
Strengthening the integrity of our system is therefore very important for our wellbeing. Studies in Norway have shown that illnesses drop by 60% by living in close relationships with plant-life. Extensive research by NASA has also revealed that plants can remove up to 87 percent of air toxins in 24 hours. Plants are therefore essential for building a strong immune system. By breathing in certain substances from plants our bodies increase the level of natural killer cells - which are important for our immune system to fight viruses.
When you start exploring the meaning of living in absolute harmony with the natural world, you will naturally start experiencing life consciously. Consciousness is a dimension that lies beyond our physical and psychological boundaries. It is not an idea or philosophy that one follows, but rather the fundamentals of our existence. Conscious living is simply about understanding the interconnected nature of all things and acting with greater clarity. Plants and trees are fundamental to connect with because they hold the wisdom we need to elevate our consciousness and wellbeing.
By making conscious choices when designing & building our physical world, we can help to rewild and restore the natural world and create a wonderful future for ourselves and the earth. The more we help nature to recover, the more it will harmonize and enhance our wellbeing.
“True health is a consequence of being in tune with the natural world on a daily basis.”