If you light a lantern for another, it will also brighten your own way.
-Nichiren
This quote came to me yesterday from my sharingbuddhism.com subscription (it is free and each day you get a new quote to help nudge you awake and speed your way toward enlightenment). Yesterday, though, I wrote about life feasting upon life. It is the way of this existence and humans are predators, too. Even vegetarians eat life. Just because it is a plant does not mean it does not have a soul or is not connected to Spirit, Source, God, the Universal Consciousness, the One, and anything else you might call the larger power we are all a part of. We assume in our arrogance that plants are somehow exempt from spirituality because they are not animals.
By now you are probably asking, “What is with her? What does this have to do with the quote? Is she going to digress herself into the last century?” I do that, I admit. Digress a lot. But, too bad; this is my blog. (<==== attitude problem)
Because we eat and require other life forms in order to survive, we have a responsibility towards them. In fulfilling that responsibility, we fulfill the responsibility to take care of ourselves. The more we take care of and protect other life (including humans), the more we protect ourselves. We are not separate and apart from the impact our presence has on other life forms. What we do to them, we do to ourselves.
We have nearly decapitated ourselves with the oil spill in the Gulf. And we are all responsible. We are also responsible for coming up with a solution and a better way of handling our energy needs. The Hudson River in New York was once declared dead. But a couple of people got together, cleaned it up, quit destroying it, and it healed.
We can do that for humans, too.
©2010 by Barbara L. Kass
Eternal Presence 