Protecting Our Interconnection
As Earth Day approaches on Friday April 22nd, I find myself wondering is it time to expand our consciousness towards a more spiritually based approach to sustainability? The term sustainable development emerged in the mid-1980s with a focus on how societies can meet their needs and aspirations while preserving the planet which is our life support system. Traditionally, sustainability is concerned with marrying economic and social development with environmental science to ensure the carrying capacity of natural systems does not outstrip human population needs. There is the added component of ethics - that being, the responsibility of the present generation to improve planetary conditions and resources for use by future generations. All very utilitarian.
The policy debates today about the environment are so technical and sterile: we speak of the environment in terms of: green-house gases, methane leaks, fuel emissions, carbon footprints, cap and trade, carbon pricing, etc. I think the 21st Century, need a fresh language and hence a fresh approach through which to understand and interact with planet Earth.
Language which introduces into the discussion on sustainability concepts like: sacredness, wonder, and the miraculous, in our understanding of, and relationship with the physical world. An expanded view of sustainability: would include the language of interconnectivity and protecting the interconnectivity between everything of which humans and the physical world are an inseparable part.
A spiritually based approach to sustainability would also acknowledge that everything has energy or a life force which can either be subjected to enhancement or degradation. This becomes particularly important with the introduction of robots in farming (e.g., Japan in order to fill labour shortages created by the country’s rapidly ageing population: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/feb/01/japanese-firm-to-open-worlds-first-robot-run-farm.
I take no issue with the introduction of robots in farming. On the contrary, I think it a highly creative solution which demonstrates human resourcefulness. However, let’s not fall into the trap of becoming further distanced from the natural world with increased mechanization. I would go further and suggest, let’s celebrate the instruments we use, the machines we use, with wonder, gratitude and delight of a sort we bring to our interaction with pets or planning our garden or tending our garden. It’s all energy, even the machines! So let’s recognize that and acknowledge it.
If you have any doubt that the natural world “feels” and that our thought patterns affect the external world, take a look at The Intention Project by Lynne McTaggart http://theintentionexperiment.com/the-books and Dr. Larry Dossey’s books documenting the impact of prayer on crops among other things http://www.dosseydossey.com/larry/goodMed.html.
When we take an interconnected view of our existence on this planet, we realize that when war and violence are visited on communities it’s not only the human population that suffers, but the natural environment as well. When our policymakers start speaking the language of interdependence – that we impact the physical environment and it impacts us – then we move beyond gestures like Earth Hour each March 19th, and beyond a utilitarian approach to the natural environment, to a deeper, more meaningful attitude of grace and humility and understanding that we are part of the natural world – there is no “us” and “it”!
Discussions between countries/communities about pollutants and projects that will have an upstream or downstream effect are also a false dichotomy or a mirage; for in reality, while we think something is not in our back yard, eventually, it will impact our backyard. We are inextricably and indivisibly linked: when you strike a gong on one part of it, the whole gong reverberates throughout. So I say, it’s time for bringing spirituality into our interactions with our environment. It’s time to replace the term sustainability with: Protecting our Interconnection as a way to remind us that this is the heart of the matter.