Living Together: What Can We Learn from Nature?

Living in a chaotic world: nature has been doing it for ever!

Life has been able to adapt for millenniums in order to survive, grow and evolve in environments that are naturally turbulent and chaotic. Let us then observe the principal characteristics of each basic element of life that has made such an achievement possible: the cell.

A higher goal

A cell agrees first to work for the well-being and survival of the body as a whole; it looks after its own interests only subsequently. The cell is ready to sacrifice itself and die in order to protect and ensure the growth of the whole. Each cell in our body, therefore, lives but a fraction of the time of our entire life. Thus egoism is not a viable alternative.

Exchange

A cell is always in contact and communication with other cells. Messenger molecules wander around the whole body in order to keep track of what is going on even in its remotest part. The absence of exchange and communication, therefore, is not a viable alternative (so thank you Internet, Skype, Facebook, Twitter, Viber, etc.)

Consciousness

A cell is conscious of each moment. It is capable of adapting to any change of circumstances, however sudden, and to respond to it in an adequate manner. Being shut up in unchanging habits is then not a viable alternative (Are you ready to learn to learn, and to learn to forget what you have learn in the past , and to learn again?)

Otherness

A cell recognizes and accepts the importance of all the other types of cells. Every bodily function is important and inter-dependent. Going it alone is thus not a viable alternative (and let’s celebrate diversity!)

Creativity

Even if each cell has a well-defined role, different roles combine in a creative manner. Thus we are able to digest food we have eaten for the first time in our life, we are able to dance to a dance we are not familiar with and we are able to get ideas never thought before. Routine and absence of creativity are, then, not viable alternatives (how do you work on developing your creativity?)

Being

A cell knows how to simply be. It knows how to respect the cycle of activity and rest. Without sleep, the cell and the body would die. The cell knows how to respect silence. Rest and silence are an indispensable part of life. Relentless activity, physical or mental, is not, therefore, a viable alternative (maybe it’s time to start meditating everyday…)

Efficiency

A cell functions with the minimum use of energy. It also stocks a very small quantity of it, equal to three seconds of supply. It trusts the whole completely to provide it with what is required. An excessive consumption of food, water, energy is not then a viable alternative (it’s time to review and improve your ecological footprint!)

Links

A cell knows, beyond differences and distinctive natures, that it shares the same DNA as its peers. Liver cells are different from the heart cells. The cells of the skin are different from those in the brain. However, they all know that they share the same identity that transcends them. Separating oneself from the community is thus not a viable alternative (how many friends do you have on Facebook?)

Giving

The essential activity of the cell is to give, which fosters the existence of other cells and the soundness of the whole. There is a total commitment to giving which constitutes one half of the natural cycle; the other half is receiving. So, hoarding and stinginess are not viable alternatives (do you know about the gift economy?)

Immortality

The cell reproduces itself in order to transmit its knowledge, its experience and its talents. It does not hold back anything for itself and hands over everything to its descendants. This is how it achieves a kind of immortality. The conflict of generations, then, is not a viable alternative (how much time do spend sharing your knowledge with younger generations?)

Let’s try?

Let us ask ourselves if we can be like our cells, not at the scale of the cell in the body but at the scale of humans as part of humanity. In this way we can naturally and instinctively find the means not only to survive but more importantly to live and to blossom individually and collectively at the scale of humanity. We will then be ready for the breakthrough described by the theories of chaos. We will thus be capable of realizing our own metamorphosis and the metamorphosis of humanity towards a more complex and a more harmonious system in which each person finds his place in a natural and organic way. So let’s try?