The End Of Living And The Beginning Of Survival

“You will find something more in woods than in books. Trees and stones will teach you that which you can never learn from masters.”-Saint Bernard of Clarivaux


"The end of living and the beginning of survival."

What does this sentence exactly mean? For me, it is the point at which you lose the means to do anything beyond what is needed for basic survival. It's just surviving not living comfortably and enjoying life. From what Chief Seattle said, "...we do not understand when the buffalo are slaughtered, the wild horses tamed, the secret corners of the forest heavy with scent of many men, and the view of ripe hills blotted by talking wires," we can see that human had done destruction to the nature for their own good. Animals such as tigers, rhinoceros and elephants were killed without limits just to obtain their body parts. Deforestation occurs everywhere, even in Malaysia. Yes, people cut down trees to build houses and expand their city. Yes, people drove those poor creatures out of the jungle until they disrupted the peacefulness in the city. But, have you ever thought of thanking the nature before? It had made us astonished every time we got closer to nature. Until now, dozens of secret hasn't been solved by professions nor revealed to us.

Did you realize how we’ve removed ourselves almost entirely out of Nature, and, as a result, we have lost our connection to our Mother, and to who we really are inside? Most of us don’t even realize it. The lifestyle in this era—the constant pursuit of money, luxury, fancy cars, big homes, entertainment, and different bodies than we were born into—is in many ways contrary to Nature. If Seattle was alive today, he would probably tell us that we have lost the way and that we are far from home. The greatest irony is that we think we are free. We think because of our technology that we live in the greatest era in human history, when in reality we may very well be living in the darkest of ages. We all had been slaves to modern technologies. Look around you, how many people are using their hand phones right now?

It takes a strong mind to see this, an “awakened” and “freed” mind to see how our departure from Nature has really meant exactly what Seattle said it would: The end of living and the beginning of survival. The greatest minds of history certainly understood the basis of this idea. They knew that Nature is closer to spirituality than any dogma, religion or written word of man, and that it is only by returning to Nature that we can find the inner peace that all of us seek.