The Other Hungry Caterpillar

Along with the April showers came long stretches of fresh green grass, blossoming cherry trees, and dogwoods looming over newly sprouted tulips. If you stop and listen, you can hear the birds sing joyfully — spring is my favorite time of year!

Usually at this time, you would only find me in my yard digging, but not this year. Every time I thought about digging, a picture of the mass grave at NY’s Hart Island filled my mind — I just couldn’t dig after that.

Sitting under my favorite tree in the backyard, I sipped a cup of coffee and thought about the situation with the pandemic. Almost everyone’s life has been turned upside down in a matter of a few weeks or even days. I had been finding it difficult to make sense of all that is happening in the world. Deep in my heart, I felt that there’s more to it than an infectious disease. With the coffee in my hand and thoughts about the world swirling through my mind, I dozed off.

“Learn how to see. Realize that everything connects to everything else.” I recognized that face — it was Leonardo Da Vinci himself. 

“When we tug on a single thing in nature, we find it attached to everything else,” said John Muir.

I couldn’t believe my eyes. Surrounding me were inspiring people from throughout history and the modern world, along with my soulmate, the tree!  

Compassionate people from various fields of study and time periods have said so much about humans and their connection to the Earth. Think of the following quotes as a conversation between these people rather than a collection of their most famous sayings. I’m merely trying to thread these pearls together by reusing their words of wisdom.

“The atoms of our bodies are traceable to stars that manufactured them in their cores and exploded these enriched ingredients across our galaxy, billions of years ago,” said Neil deGrasse Tyson. “For this reason, we are biologically connected to every other living thing in the world. We are chemically connected to all molecules on Earth. And we are atomically connected to all atoms in the universe. We are not figuratively but literally stardust,”

I remembered Dalai Lama saying ”When you talk, you are only repeating what you already know. But if you listen, you may learn something new.” I decided to follow his advice and listen.

Chief Seattle – “Man does not weave this web of life. He is merely a strand of it. Whatever he does to the  web, he does to himself. All things share the same breath – the beast, the tree, the man… the air shares the spirit with all the life it supports.”

Nikola Tesla – “Our entire biological system, the brain, and the earth itself work on the same frequency. The day science begins to study non-physical phenomena, it will make more progress in one decade than in all the previous centuries of its existence.”

David Suzuki – “Our very being, essence, health and happiness depend on Mother Earth.”

Rachel Carson – “Man is a part of nature, and his war against nature is inevitably a war against himself”

Jiddu Krishnamurti – “To have compassion means to have passion for all the things not just between two people, but for all human beings, for all things on earth, the animals, the trees, everything the earth contains. When we have such compassion, we will not despoil the earth as we are doing now, and we will have no wars.”

Wendell Berry – “To cherish what remains of the Earth and to foster its renewal is our only legitimate hope of survival.”

Tree – “As a baby, a human being is so happy, cozy, and comfortable within the tiny space of his mother’s womb. Six feet of land is all he needs once he dies. But somehow, between the first breathe he takes — and the last — he seems to be needing a lot of space, a lot of things, a lot of  everything. In that process, billions of trees – mother earth’s lungs, and homes to many species are cut down. Millions of animals are killed, land and oceans are filled with trash, there is plastic everywhere and lets not forget  the oil spills. Everywhere you look, there is pollution. There is no clean air, water, or soil any more for any species to breathe, drink or live on. We trees have been having hard time breathing; we don’t feel the air is anything close what it should be; it must be the same with every living being. I don’t know what to say when it comes to water … because ‘there is not  much to talk about!” With the rising temperatures and the changes it brings to the climate, we are not sure when to go dormant or when to make new growth. A few people make themselves comfortable by turning the knob of the thermostat but most of their sisters and brothers don’t have that option; they suffer, struggle and some even die. This rise in temperature is affecting not only living beings; it affects everything on earth. Isn’t it strange, it has the power to melt huge glaciers but not some hearts…”

Thich Nhat Hanh – “People say walking on water is a miracle… but  to me walking peacefully on earth is the real miracle”

Prince Charles – “Forests are the lungs of the planet and we are on the verge of switching it off”

Dalai Lama – “If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito”

Maya Angelou – “People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

Looking at me, the tree asked, “Do you see a connection between what Thich Nhat Hanh, Prince Charles, Dalai Lama and Maya Angelou just said and what human beings are going through right now?” 

“A small invisible virus killing thousands of people all around the world by making it hard for them to breathe… it has made ‘walking peacefully on earth’ so difficult … does it want us to face all these so that we will never forget? Or is that this virus is in fact a vaccine that could save us from a catastrophe?” I wondered; still I kept quiet!

Tree – “For Mother Earth, all beings are her children and all are equal. May be this is her way of communicating with human beings to let them know how every other being has been feeling these days; how she herself has been feeling. We are all on the lap of our mother earth… together and she keeps us with her even after we die. All she is asking is, for all of us to stay in love, peace and harmony. Is that too much to ask?”

Carl Sagan – “Anything else you are interested in is not going to happen if you can’t breathe the air and drink the water. Don’t sit this one out. Do something. You are by accident of fate ALIVE, at an absolutely critical moment in the history of our planet”

Mahatma Gandhi – “Earth provides enough to satisfy everyone’s needs but not everyone’s greed”

Stephen Hawking -“We are in danger of destroying ourselves by our greed and stupidity. We cannot remain looking at ourselves on a small and increasingly polluted and overcrowded planet.”

Thich Nhat Hanh – “There is a revolution that needs to happen and it starts from inside each one of us. We need to wake up and fall in love with earth. Our personal and collective happiness and survival depends on it“

Stewart Udall – “Plans to protect air, and water, wilderness and wildlife are in fact plans to protect man”

Tree – “Its not enough if some are already doing it; every single human being needs to be part of it.”

“Darkness must pass

A new day will come 

And when the sun shines

It will shine out the cleaner”

J.R.R. Tolkien 

 “Start where you are 

Use what you have

Do what you can…”

Arthur Ashe

 Swami Vivekananda – “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.”

Ronald Reagan – “The greatest leader is not necessarily the one who does greatest things. He is the one that gets the people to do greatest things”

Ken Robinson – “The role of a creative leader is not to have all the ideas; is to create a culture where everyone can have ideas and feel that they’re valued.”

Nelson Mandela – “May your choices reflect your hopes, not your fears”

Maya Angelou – “You can only become truly accomplished at something you love. Don’t make money your goal. Instead pursue the things you love doing and do them so well that people can’t take their eyes off you. Making a living is not the same as making a life”

Steve Jobs – “Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me… Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful … that’s what matters to me”

Bob Marley – “Money is numbers and numbers never end. If it takes money to be happy, your search for happiness will never end.”

Marcus Aurelius – “Very little is needed to make a happy life. It’s all within yourself; in your way of thinking.”

William Morris  – “The true secret of happiness lies in taking a genuine interest in all the details of daily life”

George Moore – “The muse was with us when we were poor but when we were rich she dereated us”

Seneca – “Establish business relations with poverty. The man who has anticipated the coming of troubles takes away their power when they arrive”

Although  Seneca amassed great wealth in his lifetime, he was careful to regularly practice poverty, so he’d be prepared should he ever lose it all.

Seneca – “No man is more unhappy than he who never faces adversity. For he is not permitted to prove himself.”

Marcel Proust – “Happiness is beneficial for the body but it is grief that develops the power of the mind”

Rumi – “There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power”

Kahlil Gibran – “Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls. The most massive characters are seared with scars”

Carl Jung – “The difference between a good life and a bad life is how well you walk through the fire”

Abdul Kalam – “Difficulties in your life do not come to destroy you, but to help you realize your hidden potential and power. Let difficulties know that you too are difficult. All birds shelter during a rain… But the eagle avoids the rain by flying above the clouds. Problems are everywhere… but attitude makes the difference”

Helen Keller – “Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired and success achieved”

Martin Luther King – “The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times  of challenge and controversy”

Van Gogh – “Normality is a paved road; comfortable to walk but no flowers grow”

Oscar Wilde – “Many of the great achievements of the world were accomplished by tired and discouraged men who kept on working”

“First they ignore you,

Then they laugh at you

Then they fight you

Then you win.”

– Mahatma Gandhi

J.W. Van Goethe – “What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals”

Da Vinci – “It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them; they went out and happen to things. I’m inspired by the urgency of doing. Knowing is not enough. We must act on it. Being willing is not enough; we must do”

Pablo Picasso – “Inspiration exists but it has to find you working”

Paulo Coelho – “The world is changed by your example not by your opinion”

Bill Bullard – “Opinion is really the lowest form of human knowledge. It requires no accountability, no understanding. The highest form of knowledge is empathy for it requires us to suspend our egos and live in another’s world.  It requires profound purpose larger than the self kind of understanding”

Rumi – “Half of life is lost in charming others. The other half is lost going through anxieties caused by others. Leave this play, you have played enough”

Carl Jung – “It is always single individuals who are moved by the collective problem and who are called upon to respond and contribute to its solution by tackling it in their own lives and not running away from it”

Harriet Tubman – “Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for stars…”

Aristotle -“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then is not an act. But a Habit”

Epictetus – “Progress is not achieved by luck or accident, but by working daily”

Steve Jobs – “If you really look closely, most  overnight successes took a long time”

Zig Ziglar – “Outstanding people have one thing in common: an absolute sense of mission”

Swami Vivekananda – “Take up one idea. Make that one idea your life. Think of it, dream of it. Live on that idea. Let the brain, muscles, nerves, every part of your body be full of that idea and just leave every other idea alone. This is the way to success. The powers of the mind are like the  rays of the sun – when they are concentrated they illumine. Do not wait for anybody or anything. Do whatever you can. Build your hope on none. Nothing else is necessary but these – love, sincerity and patience”

Seneca – “There is nothing uglier than an old man who has no other evidence of his good life except for age”

Gandalf – “Some believe that it is only great power that can hold evil in check. But that is not what I  have found. I found it is the small things, everyday deeds of ordinary folk that keep the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love”

Dalai Lama – “The planet does not need more successful people. The planet desperately needs more peacemakers, healers, restores, storytellers, and lovers of every kind”

Nikola Tesla – “… a new world must be born, a world that would justify the sacrifices offered by humanity. This new world must be a world in which there shall be no exploitation of the weak by the strong, of the good by the evil; where there will be no humiliation of the poor by the violence of the rich; where the products of intellect, science and art will serve society for the betterment and beautification of life and not the individuals for achieving wealth. This new world shall not be a world of the downtrodden and humiliated but of free men and free nations equal in dignity and respect of men”

Swami Vivekananda – “Arise! Awake! And stop not until the goal is reached!”

I opened my eyes. I couldn’t believe it was all a dream; I didn’t want it to end… so closed my eyes again.

Marcel Proust – “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes”

Epictetus – “Man is not affected by the events but by the view he takes of them”

Tree – “That’s so true. You know, over the years, I have watched many caterpillars build cocoons around themselves and stay inside for more than two weeks; locked down, isolated and socially distanced. When  they nibbled a hole in the cocoon and pushed their way out, they had all transformed into beautiful butterflies; not one came out as caterpillar. I think nature has given human beings the very same chance but with a choice… Evolve or Repeat.”

Rumi – “You were born with wings … why prefer to crawl through life?”

Viktor E Frankl – “Live as if you were living a second time, and as though you had acted wrongly the first time.

Socrates – “The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new”

Lao Tzu – “The greatest gift you have to give is that of your own self-transformation”

“Love is when God says to you …

  I have created everything for you

  And you say…

I have left everything for you!” 

                                   Rumi

Images edited by Maanas Manoj