Everything. We are everything

I have two books on the go at the moment. Which is not always a good idea. I can lose track of one as I swim in the other. But earlier this month there was a beautiful synchronicity that was impossible not notice. Firstly, in ‘The Wild Within’ Brigit Anna MacNeill writes in a chapter on ‘Elder’

“A dry summer will shift Elder’s chemistry. A cool spring will alter their yield. The presence of certain fungi in the soil, or the passage of pollinators through their blossoms, will change what they give and how they give it. They listen to the rainfall and the drought, to the tilt of light through leaves, to the underground murmurs of mycelium and the brush of wings against branch. Their body responds not just to the weather, but to the entire ecology in which they’re rooted: the deer who browses nearby, the birds who sing in their branches, the unseen life moving through the soil beneath their roots. Each influence informs what they become. Their medicine is not manufactured; it is composed, like music, in relationship.

To harvest plants is therefore to harvest a song, one sung between species, between sky and soil, between season and shadow.

Their leaves, their flowers, their berries – they’re the visible notes of a much vaster melody. And when we take them into our bodies, we aren’t just receiving chemical information. We’re receiving a story. A season. A weaving of relationships turned to nourishment.”

And then on the same day, if not the same afternoon, in ‘The Heart of the Buddha’s Teaching’ I read Tchich Nhat Hanh and he wrote

“When we look at the ocean, we see that each wave has a beginning and an end. A wave can be compared with other waves, and we can call it more or less beautiful, higher or lower, longer lasting or less long lasting. But if we look more deeply, we see that a wave is made of water. While living the life of a wave, it also lives the life of water. It would be sad if the wave did not know that it is water. It would think, Some day, I will have to die. This period of time is my life span, and when I arrive at the shore, I will return to nonbeing. These notions will cause the wave fear and anguish. We have to help it remove the notions of self, person, living being, and life span if we want the wave to be free and happy.”

I might meet you for a cup of tea. I arrive with my current emotions, thoughts and body sensations. We sit down together. You might start telling me of the unexpected death of your grandfather. You speak of him and his life and your nascent grief and I start to weep with you. I remember deaths in my family. My stomach tightens and feels heavy like there is a boulder turning inside. Now the emotions, thoughts and body sensations with which I walked into the cafe have disappeared as though they were never there. I am a changed utterly from what I was thirty minutes ago. Your loss and pain and love are a part of me. I am the ocean not merely the wave. I am the elder tree that is also the climate and the weather and the passing herd of deer.

I cannot tell where I start and where you begin. Your history is now mine. There is no longer your history and mine. We are merged by experience. You could call this deepening friendship or love, maybe ‘unity’ or oneness. Thich Nhat Hanh would have said ‘interbeing’, other Buddhists ‘emptiness’. All I can say is I am becoming ever so slightly less convinced I am a separate being living my own life and that this knowing brings me more fully in love with both you and the world.