Mother Nature Tells Us The Meaning Of Life

Posted on 6 January, 2013 by mrjoe

Raindrops falling into a pool….

Why are we here? What is our purpose for being placed on this planet? Those are probably the most asked question of all time. Maybe we can find some answers to those questions by observing Nature.

Watch raindrops for instance. They fall from the sky, enjoying just a brief time of being an individual drop before they fall into the great pool and join countless others, until one day their essence is pulled back to the sky where all raindrops began. Hopefully, as they fell they landed on a plant and gave it life, or quenched the thirst of someone who needed a drink. I think they would tell you that their purpose was to give themselves to plants and people, but also to splash and babble along the rocks and enjoy as many afternoons in the suns as possible.

Birds wake before the first light and perch to give thankful songs to the sun as it rises. Birds are also loving parents and they care for their young as well as any species on the planet. Not only that, they sing throughout the day, and cheer up anyone in earshot. I think the birds would tell us that the meaning of life is to be thankful, to care for those you love, and to leave a song in the hearts of those who need it.

Flowers lift their happy faces when the sun passes over. They fill the field with fragrance and color, and they offer pollen to the bees, nectar to the butterflies, and a smile to those who walk among them. To flowers, the meaning of life is to offer what you have to give, and brighten the day of those you encounter.

Trees stand each day with leafy arms raised to the heavens. They give shelter to any who would rest with them. They offer protection from the storms, and they give food to those who need it. Even in death, they give warmth and light to those who would gather around them. Being quiet servants is the reason for life if you’re a tree.

The sun rises each morning, and brings all the color for the day with it. His warm yellow rays pierce the dark and warm the fields. Faithfully each morning he rises and shines light, and warms the world. To the sun, the meaning of life is to be faithful to those who depend upon you, and give them warmth. The meaning of life, according to the sun, is to provide warmth and to shine a light into dark places.

The Universe – or one song – is the greatest symphony ever, and to play our part, we are to play the particular note that we are destined to play to the best of our ability. Flowers smile, birds sing, the sun ads warmth, and during our time, we listen to the voice inside ourselves and answer it to the best of our ability. We add our note to the symphony.

Our meaning is to live the life we were meant to lead, and do it to the best of our ability. We look deep inside, find our gifts, ask for our purpose, and our note is to live to the best of our ability. Along the way, we should protect, smile, praise, and try to shine a light into dark places.

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Plant Yourself

Posted on 15 December, 2012 by mrjoe

Fully planted…

Throughout the spring and summer and deep into the fall, seeds go wherever the wind takes them. Some tumble to the ground, some twirl from the treetops, and others float like feathers on the warm afternoon breeze. But one day, there is a hint of change in the air, and the seasons of drifting and groundlessness comes to an end, and the seeds must choose settle down. They must plant themselves.

Planting is a solemn and serious event for a seed. After all, all of the freedom and drifting becomes a thing of the past. Up until this point, life was only about possibilities, but now they’ve chosen. Making a steadfast commitment is essential if a seed is to ever amount to anything. It’s the time when they tell the world, this is who I am, and this what I’m committed to. It’s when they say, I will make a stand right here or die trying.

Like seeds, we all must make the same decisions. One day, in the past, present, or future we all must make a commitment to something bigger than ourselves. We must decide upon a career, choose a mate, or fully commit to a dream that’s lived in the back of our mind. We must plant.

Planting is not going through the motions or being wishy-washy about something. It’s a full-on belief, a commitment. Planting is when you believe in something so strongly that you cannot and will not be deterred. It’s when you firmly stand your ground, and know you’ve made a commitment to either succeed or die trying. It’s when we tell the world and ourselves that simply drifting along is no longer good enough; instead, we’ve decide to grow into all we can become.

Few great relationships, stellar careers, or wild dreams ever grow out of random luck. Most people who have done something truly remarkable, can point back to a time when one crucial decision was the beginning – that moment when they planted.

On these glorious winter days, the trees stand silently, and the songs of birds and insects have quieted, and just below the surface of the cool damp soil, the seeds have burrowed in. Now the natural world waits in hushed anticipation for them to spring forth and announce their intentions to the world.

This is also the time of year when we traditionally grow silent and look over the coming year with resolve. This is, perhaps, the perfect time to fully commit in various areas of our lives: our jobs, a relationship, or even that dream. Or maybe this is the time in our lives when we decide that we cannot grow where we are, and we must decide to plant in a different location.

Whatever the case, this is a wonderful time to plant – a wonderful time to decide to grow into what we are meant to be. Ask any seed, and they will tell you that a time of great growth and an eventual harvest cannot come until you truly commit.

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Let Water Be Your Teacher

Posted on 9 December, 2012 by mrjoe

Water rushing over boulders

Glorious water – brewed in the heavens in dark, stormy rolling clouds, and sent to us in brooding gray skies. Water is all around us. It patters the roof and drips from green lush leaves on rainy spring days; in the frozen winter, it drifts from the sky and covers the ground in a thick white blanket. It’s the glistening droplets of morning dew and the dense fog that settles like smoke in the valley. Water is wispy thin cirrus clouds that turn orange and pink as the sun sets below the horizon, and it’s the gauzy film over the midnight moon.

On distant mountain peaks, where the winds howl their praises to the creator, water is stored. Then under the bright midday sun, a single drop is thawed, and it joins others, and they begin to trickle downward. As other trickles join, and a small stream is born and it babbles as it gently falls over rocks and boulders. The stream unites with others, and now a river races down the mountainside, roaring with enthusiasm.

Finally, in the valleys below, the water pools, and there it becomes the center of life. Water sustains us, cools us, and also gives us life lessons.

Water is tireless but never demanding. It’s one of the softest substances on earth, but because of persistence, nothing can withstand its force. Year after year, decade after decade, century upon century upon century, it flows down the mountain, turnings boulders into rocks, rocks into pebbles and then pebbles into sand. Soft, gentle water levels mountains and dig canyons into solid rock. Softness and persistence, not rigidity, are the keys to accomplishing great things.

Water shows us how to overcome obstacles. A stream stops for nothing; it goes around large trees and over boulders and under ledges. Dam a river, and the water will pool and grow until it eventually flows over the top. Water touches every crack and feels for every crevice as it searches for a way to accomplish its goal of finding the sea.
Water shows us the importance of being needed. If you’ve ever been truly parched, and you’ve raised a cool glass of water to your lips and felt the water flow through your body you understand this. Water is essential to all life. It swells the seeds and grows forests. It can also ravage the countryside and level great cities.

Despite its importance, water also shows us humility, as it is always content to settle into the lowest of places. Water also teaches us that there is wisdom in allowing rather than always using force. Try to grab a handful, and it rushes through your fingertips, but cup your hand and it rest softly there.

Most importantly, perhaps, water shows us that life is fleeting. Falling from the clouds, an individual water drop has boundaries and individualism, but after its short life as a droplet, it falls into a pool and loses its individuality. Eventually it must return to the source where it and all other raindrops began. It is a fortunate droplet that falls upon a seed and gives life. We should let our time an individual be an awe-inspiring example of how to spend time on this planet.

Finally, water knows that if we seek clarity be calm, for clarity cannot come when there is agitation. Nothing is more beautiful than water that gathers at the foot of the mountain and grows still and reflects.

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Intelligent Crows

Posted on 2 December, 2012 by mrjoe

One of the local crows swooping in to eat.

I share this old farm with a bunch of crows. About five or six of them call this hilltop home, and at any given time, you can hear them cawing off in the distance as they are getting into some sort of mischief. I like it when they stop by my place; they’re quite comical as the mill around the pasture, pick pecans from the trees, or just torment some unsuspecting bird or squirrel.

The crows have gotten to the point that they accept me, maybe not as a friend, but at least as a source of food. Sometimes, as I’m working outside, they perch on a nearby tree branch and yell at me. I’m beginning to learn that that three “caws” in succession means, “Meet me at the barn. Bring food.” If I have anything for them, I’ll give in to their demands, and by the time I get back to the house, they’ve already swooped in and started eating.

I feed other birds too. Hummingbirds, for instance, have grown accustomed to stopping by the patio for sips of nectar on warm summer days. They’ve gotten so used to me, in fact, that I can sit near their feeder and they will fly within a few inches of my face. Cardinals perch in the grapevines and blissfully eat to their hearts content with me standing a few feet away. Chickadees and titmice flit around here and eat the seeds that I’ve put out for them, and jays and woodpeckers will play in the birdbath. But there is something different about the crows.

Crows have and aura about them, and intelligence that can be sensed as you interact with them, and the more I’m around them, the more I notice a nonverbal communication between us. It’s almost as if we’re always playing games with one another.

It’s common knowledge that crows are some of the most intelligent creatures on the planet. They have complex family and social structures, they communicate with one another, they make and use tools, they have funerals when they’ve lost one of their own, they play games with each other, and they even watch and learn how to interact with us.
A murder of crows is more than a bunch birds, and every time I watch them, I think about their intelligence; I wonder what must be going through their minds as they go about their business. Are they as curious about us as we are about them, and do they talk about us as they perch in the trees?

I think if I could understand them, they would be telling me that they have much of a right to this hilltop as I do, and they would tell me that my actions not only affect me, but them as well. They would tell me to make wise decisions: not to put poisons out that would harm the environment, not to deplete food sources that we all need. In short, I think they would tell me to be responsible and neighborly … then they would ask me to put more food out by the barn.

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Silent December

Posted on 25 November, 2012 by mrjoe

An oak stands silently.

The year has grown old and cold and silent. In March the natural world is youthful and exuberant; in August it has a warm glow, but a walk with a December day is a reflective time with an aged year.

December is solemn, a year with more of a past than a future. It’s a time of crackly old footsteps and shadows stretched long across the brown fields. This time of year, the sun is a thin yellow smile – a mere hint of its previous warmth. Now, the natural world retires early, leaving a long still night and an icy moon and pinpoints of distant stars in an ink black sky … and perfect silence.

No longer do crickets fiddle through the night, nor do cicadas drone from the trees on sultry afternoons. The chorus of frogs at water’s edge has silenced, and the birds no longer sing joyous songs from leafy branches on bright days. The trees stand like silent sentinels, no longer murmuring to the wind as it goes rushing by.
With each passing day, the silence grows more complete, punctuated by the distant call of geese in the morning mist or the lonely cry of coyotes in the and the haunting cry of owl patrolling the night on silent wings or even the dry rattle of leaves along the path.

Dark December is a sleepy world. Nature has dimmed the lights and lowered the heat and covered the world in a brown blanket of leaves. The trees stand together and doze, the frogs and turtles have burrowed deep, and birds work with hushed songs so as not to disturb the sweet slumber. Nature has pulled the life deep into her warm heart, holding it closely until it can become young again on warm spring days. Wise December knows that in the spring and summer possibilities are found in the flowers and in the leaves, but in the winter, promises lie beneath the surface, they hide in the dark ground, and deep in our imagination.

So we walk alone in a quiet, contemplative world we call December, full of grays and browns and stillness. The leaves are down from the trees, and the view up the path is far, and even the heavens have opened up before us. We set near the fire on the long crystal nights and turn our thoughts inward.

In time, the world will buzz with life again, and the birds will sing and the flowers and trees will fill the air around us. But for now, we can enjoy old December, and his perfect silence and glorious solitude.

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