17 min read

Last Updated on August 5, 2015

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The above video is part of a series produced by Conservation International.

Whilst I applaud their efforts to give a broadcasted and much needed[*] voice to Nature and some of the many significant elements of this planet (water, soil, oceans, rain forests, etc.), I question their level of comprehension of Mother Nature, and I can only wonder at what agenda is playing out through a message such as this. [*Of course, Mother Nature already has a voice, and it is resounding all around and through us in every moment, but it generally requires an open heart to hear/see/feel/know/perceive it.]

In this video, the producers have “The Mother” (using voice of Julia Roberts) saying that She doesn’t need human beings, etc. Here’s the full transcript:

Some call me nature. Other’s call me, Mother, nature.
I’ve been here for over 4.5 billion years. 22,500 times longer than you.
I don’t really need people, but people need me. Yes your future depends on me.
When I thrive, you thrive. When I falter, you falter. Or worse.
But I have been here for eons. I have fed species greater than you, and I have starved species greater than you. My oceans. My soil. My flowing streams. My forests. They all can take you, or leave you.
How you choose to live each day, whether you regard or disregard me, doesn’t really matter to me.
One way, or the other, your actions will determine your fate. Not mine.
I am nature. I will go on. I am prepared to evolve.

Are you?

At the end of every video in the series displays the slogan, “Nature doesn’t need people, people need nature”.

I appreciate that this may seem like a catchy, impactful and meaningful thing to say for people at odds with Mans’ destruction of the environment. Yet, is it true, and what impact does this level of thinking actually have? What’s more, who have Conservation International consulted before deciding just what it is The Mother would say to Man about Her living Earth, and Her relationship to Man?

Polarisation

With regard to Man’s role in the world, I see two predominant polarities arising in the mass consciousness at this time. One is the anthropocentric view that holds Man at the centre of the world.

Anthropocentricregarding humankind as the central or most important element of existence, especially as opposed to God or animals.

The other is the view expressed in this video: Namely, that in light of all that we are doing to destroy life on Earth, the Earth would be better off without us. That man is like a parasite living off of the Earth, and the Earth’s expense and detriment. Rid the Earth of Man, and the planet will be a better place.

The first of these polarities is one of the key justifications for our using the Earth as little more than a resource to pillage, rape, and profit from, in a self-centred and greed-crazed way. It results in Man viewing itself as superior to and separate from the Earth and the many other expressions of life on Earth. It often leads to what could be described as collective pathological narcism, endemic hubris, and collective megalomania. My investigation, albeit limited, into this view of Man suggests it is a thought-form that was seeded into the psyche of Man from a stream of consciousness that infiltrated the Earth from off-planet. Although I will refrain from getting into the details of that here.

The other polarity often results in a pathologically nihilistic approach to Life, and our individual and collective role here. It can result in a despondency to Life and the major challenges facing Man and the Earth. It’s a thought-form that all too readily allows the power-hungry few among us to undermine the significance and power of the many. It can also result in a “What the f^#%, just do what you like, ’cause it doesn’t really matter any way… the Earth will just get rid of us eventually…” attitude. Those with enough heart to not think that way, may instead simply find themselves feeling powerless to act in any significant way, with regard to reducing the massive destruction Man is waging upon Earth.

As mentioned, this video campaign is siding toward the Man is of no significance to the Earth paradigm.

Missed the mark, the middle way

Personally, I think they have missed the mark in a potentially significant way.

There is a middle path. A path as ancient as the Earth itself. One based on the principle of absolute and universal reciprocity. One that does not fall into the delusion that there is such a thing as an Earth that is separate from Man, and Man that is separate from Earth.

Man and Earth are one and the same phenomenon. Just as your feet and your hands are not separate things. They are one and the same phenomenon, which you perhaps identify as my body. In the same way an apple tree eventually produces apples, the Earth eventually produces human beings. When Apple not only believes it is separate and independent from apple-tree, but thinks it’s actually superior to apple-tree, it has made a mis-take on reality. A serious delusion on the part of the apple. Similarly, for apple-tree to relate to itself as being separate from and superior to apples, and to not have any need of apples, is also mistaken. Both of these analogical scenarios—as hypothetical as they may be—are pathological and life-degrading.

Man is neither inferior or superior to Earth. Just as your brain is not inferior or superior to your heart, or your legs. These identifiable things—which only come about through our reductionistic and arbitrary, albeit functionally useful, tendency of labelling things, and relating to those things as separate entities in their own right—all represent functional elements of ONE total MANIFEST FORM or BEING.

Divide et impera—the maxim of domination

The tactics of divide and conquer, from Latin Divide et impera, have been employed in the undermining and domination of Man for eons. It has been utilised in a great many ways religiously, politically, and in warfare (also almost carried out by religions and political powers). It could be said it’s opposing aphorism is Divided we fall, united we stand. Dominating religious institutions have utilised the principle of Divide et impera by encouraging and invoking division among differing religious groups and belief systems. It’s also been employed through encouraging a sense of separation between Man and the Divine (be that God, or the Man Jesus the Christ), and between Man and the Earth. Politically it has been utilised almost continuously around the world. One, of the many, we can see it playing out in the world today is through the fictitious war on terrorism. Domineering nations always ensure they have an outside enemy, and they always ensure the people within their country are divided over numerous emotively volatile issues. The whole concept of Left and Right Wing politics is part of that same scheme, although the tactic of Divide et impera is utilised far more pervasively than just that within many countries.

In this video by Conservation International what I see being encouraged is an unnatural division between Man and the Great Mother, Gaia, Mother Nature; between Man and Earth. It makes the Living Mother sound hostile and vindictive, and as a Being or thing that is ultimately separate from and at odds with Man. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is because Man fundamentally perceives itself to be separate from the Earth that so much environmental destruction is taking place. It’s also this view of separation that may lead Man into thinking we must “save the Earth,” as though She were a victim to Man’s ignorance. All of this is, in itself, indicative of a fundamental separation or split within the psyche of Man. To put it one way, a great many people stand divided between their Heart and their rational mental process. Between logic and intuition. Between their reductive and imaginative faculties. One way in which this internal division manifests is through a sense of division and separation from Life, from the Earth, from the metaphysical backdrop of our existence. The message in this video is playing right into this, and encouraging it.

The Original Knowledge

Rather than destroying or saving the Earth—like She were some-thing we are superior to and therefore something we have control over—our challenge is to find it within ourselves, within our Heart and Mind, to co-create with the Earth, in the spirit of intelligent participation, reciprocity, and loving cooperation.

According to the ancient and indigenous wisdom of this Earth and of Man, as I have come to understand it, without the conscious participation of Man with the overall nature, organisation, and maintenance of the Earth, the ‘world’ ends, and the Earth as a Being severely regresses. Some traditions would suggest She even terminates. To the materialists among us, that may seem like a very odd, irrational, and dramatic thing to say. But what the materialist reductionistic mind-set is not yet capable of recognising is that the material Universe, including the Earth and Man’s ‘world’ are a phenomenon arising within consciousness. Not the other way around.

History—particularly the metaphysical or mystical history of this planet—indicates that those people, races, and groups with a pathologically unconscious, ignorant, or misguided relationship to the Earth are generally and eventually wiped out, one way or another. What continues on, at times somewhat secretly (i.e. beyond the conscious cognition of the majority of human beings), is the evolving and living wisdom of the Mother, as held and embodied by those who are consciously participating in Her creative emergence and evolution. This is a big subject, far beyond the scope of this present article. In the simplest of terms, it’s rather like the way in which (all else remaining equal) your body generally and eventually wipes out those bacteria that prove to be pathological, and those that are in harmony with your body (potentially as much as over 60% of all the cells in your body) carry on. There are also some potentially pathological bacteria and virus, etc., in the body, but when the balance is lost, the body (in its wisdom) takes action to restore the balance to one that is conducive to its life.

There’s nothing vindictive or malicious about it. Life, as expressed through Man, is not as nearly as personal as many of us perhaps tend to believe. When your body eradicates the pathological bacteria in favour of the probiotic (pro-life) bacteria, it’s not a malicious or vindictive act. Life begets more Life.

A timeless perspective

According to this same ancient wisdom, Man’s conscious participation with the Mother—including the Earth, and with Creation as a whole—is best enacted through very specific behavioural protocols. Particular steps and actions we can take, essentially on a spiritual or metaphysical plane, which directly involve Man in the evolution of the Earth, and in maintaining its metaphysical, and physical, balance and order. The predicaments facing Man and the Earth at this time are essentially the result of Man forgetting its role in the grand scheme of Life. This was not simply a great mistake, but is a natural consequence of the Mother’s attempt to bring the Spirit of Man into the very core of matter, into the densest levels of Her creation, such that it might all eventually be illuminated by conscious-consciousness… by Awareness. Again, to not overly inflate this article, I am putting this into relatively simple terms, and being brief. The next natural step is for Man to awaken into remembering ourselves as Spirit, fully interconnected with all Life, recognising our agreement (i.e. purpose or intention) as Spirit here in the Earth. Many people are awakening to just that, and remembering more and more lucidly who they are, ‘where’ they are from (i.e. their genesis, as spirit), and the purpose for their being here.

So, it’s not so much a question of whether or not the Earth is better off without us, or whether or not we have a right to dominate over the Earth. Both of these perspectives strangely ignore the unequivocal fact that Man and Earth are inseparable—that essentially we’re one and the same. From on perspective, the psyche of Man is the psyche of the Earth, of the Living Mother (the feminine polarity). The Spirit of Man is the spirit or presence and emanation of the Living Father (the masculine polarity). Spirit and psyche (i.e. soul) are in the process of merging together, within the the phenomenon we know as the human body, which is an extension or expression of what we know as the Earth.

What some folk refer to as God (in the English language, at least) goes by many names. In all the ancient traditions I am familiar with this universally recognised phenomenon referred to as God (in English, but also Great Spirit, Brahma, the Void, the Supreme Source, the absolute, the Tao, Io [in Polynesian languages], etc. etc. etc.) is without gender and is neither “good” or “evil” (i.e. is beyond duality), is ultimately without name or human point of reference, and is ineffable and beyond logical comprehension.  It’s because of this that Man has often been so deeply confused and twisted in his/her understandings and beliefs about God, whether theist, atheists or even agnostic in their stance.

Mutual inter-dependance, and intelligent cooperation

The Earth needs Man, and Man needs the Earth. Any other view is pathological, meaning it will result in dis-ease and a breakdown in Man’s relationship to Life. I propose that the message put across in this Mother Nature video (above) is gravely mistaken. In some folk it will incite and feed into fear toward Life. In others it will incite rejection, disobedience, and rebellion toward Life. In some it will incite domination over Life in order to “win” and “to come out on top.” [Reading the comments below the video, in Youtube, is an interesting exercise, and provides a window, albeit relatively limited in scope, into a slice of the type of reactions this video is producing, and the varied conditions of consciousness within the video’s audience]. Whatever the case, taken at face value, I suspect it is very unlikely to elicit from Man a heart-felt response of living in devoted and intelligent cooperation and reciprocity with the Earth, with the Living Mother.

Motivating forces, and discernment

In light of the above, I feel it is worth bringing to question the deeper forces potentially playing out through an organisation such as Conservation International, in this particular instance. I don’t proclaim to have an conclusive answer for that, so I am merely suggesting people use their Heart-based discernment in all that is presented to them (including this article), and I will present some perspectives for consideration. It’s possible CI has simply made this error out of ignorance (i.e. a lack of knowledge). It’s also possible it’s not simply a superficial mis-take on reality, but the result of a deep and obscured life-degrading agenda that has made use of an opportunity to play out through CI, despite them possibly having the best of intentions. This may or may not be the case, but it is certainly something I see playing out through a great many organisations and people in the world, particular people who overtly appear to be “doing good”. This includes a wide selection of ‘spiritual teachers’ and ‘masters’, celebrities, seemingly philanthropic billionaires, religious institutions, public servants, educational institutions, medical institutions, political leaders, etc., and even regular people like me and those most likely to be reading this article.

I found it interesting to see who CI is willing to associate itself with for funding and for its day-to-day operations. Corporations like Monsanto, Shell, Cargill, Chevron, BP, etc. Looking at CI’s members and directors, etc., I also see high level officials from a wide range of corporations that I perceive to be playing into (consciously or unconsciously) a very degrading and vacuous game of domination in the world of Man, particularly as far as their (lack of) environmental conscious and (scope of) negative impact is concerned. I don’t mention any of this to outright discredit Conservation International, or the people behind it. On the Path of Freedom it is crucial one develop discernment, particularly in discerning what is playing out behind the veils of our ordinary perception and mass-(un)consciousness. A great deal of the life-degrading activities that play out in the world are not something the people involved are consciously aware of or consciously intending to do evil by. Rather those forces work their way into manifestation through that which is unconscious and in a place of shadow within the psyche of those people who are involved. This is human nature, for now, so there’s no one of judge or condemn or vindicate for this. Simply put, there’s no point blaming and demonising the people involved, as when such things play out, those people are simply conduits for psychic forces they are, as of yet, unconscious of. Their—and our—errors are a call for love and greater consciousness.

Again, it’s a matter of discernment, and constantly cultivating our capacity to intuit and directly perceive the world through the Heart. As far as this Voice of Nature ad campaign is concerned, from where I stand, it has missed the marked.

Addendum—Credit where credit’s due

After watching all eight of these Nature Is Speaking videos, I do applaud and appreciate much, if not most, of the perspectives they are attempting to convey. It is undoubtably a big leap for a great many people to relate to the natural world as a living being, just as living as their fellow humans and friends. I can see these videos attempt, albeit in a somewhat flawed way, to give a human voice to that living being. This is a step in the right direction. A tiny step for Nature, and a big step for Humankind.

Others of Heart with a similar response

As I’ve attempted to point our in this article, there’s a crucial (i.e. deeply fundamental and essential) element missing. What’s more, I am, of course, not the only person to notice it. As one viewer (who I’ll refer to as JEE) conveyed in her comment on the Flower video, there’s a twist at the end that is disconnected from reality. I add her quote as an addendum to this revision of my article, because it succinctly sums up what this article is drawing attention to:

Loved the video until the end. The part about nature doesn’t need people, people need nature. I believe, and so do countless Indigenous cultures, that PEOPLE ARE NATURE and NATURE NEEDS PEOPLE. Nature needs people to tend, care and celebrate [Her] abundance, or the gifts will disappear. People ARE Nature!!! I believe the underpinnings of our environmental crisis stem from the fact that people have forgotten they ARE nature.  I was going to use this video for a class I am teaching on Deep Ecology, but sadly you lost me at the end.

Another viewer responded to JEE, with this:

“People are nature…and nature needs people to tend, care and celebrate abundance?” This is the arrogance that this campaign is addressing. Don’t you get it? Nature DOES. NOT. NEED. US. When we are wiped off the face of this planet because of our depredations, nature will regenerate itself, and the abundance of which you speak will need no celebrating from the humans that just went the way of the dinosaurs.

It is this level of thinking that I am attempting to address with the above article. JEE went on to thoughtfully add,

I guess i just hold a different worldview, one that many indigenous people hold. Humans are nature; we are put here to care for the earth. Yes, it does seem that we are headed in a self destructive path, and taking so much with us. But I believe in the higher potential of humans as care takers of the earth. It might take us being at the brink of destruction of our selves before we make the mind/spirit change to resume our role as caretakers. Or die trying. Either way it will all work out in the long view.

Thank you JEE. You know who you are, and perhaps you’ll see this, since I sent you a message on Youtube with a link to this article (before I thought adding a quote of your comments—I trust you won’t mind).

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