Diversity Is Life

The conquest for sameness is at the root of all of the problems America is facing today.

I open my mind’s eye and see the resurgence of racism and white supremacy. I see the open persecution of native american, black, and gay, peoples. I see the mass extinction of animal species taking place now, and I cannot help but see that trying to enforce sameness is at the root of all of these.

Take it even further out, and I see institutionalized education systems and religions, cookie cutter beauty standards, and expensive, white marriage ceremonies before age 25.

We recognize our biological needs of having enough, and our emotional needs of being enough, if not met, manifest in feeling bad, either emotionally, or physically, or both. And yet, we go about addressing these needs in our own unique ways.

As much as we try, we will never be exactly the same as any other person that has been alive, ever.

Why is this?

Diversity is Life.

Where there is life, there is diversity.

Ecosystems exist with a vast array of different species living, interacting, and multiplying. Take away even a single species and the ecosystem is forever changed... Take away many species, and the ecosystem collapses.

Evolution itself happens as a result of differing concepts, ideas, and life forms interacting together.

It’s quite intriguing for me to observe as a medical intuitive that this quest for sameness has in fact led to a plethora of problems in our own gut microbiota; we are now scientifically finding that a healthy gut functions best with a diverse range of friendly bacteria. In the past this was obtained through bacteria naturally present in the soil that made its way onto our food, then into our guts… in our present, however, this intricate richness is mostly void, lost in the black hole of sterile, processed foods.

To end diversity is to end life itself.

We are living in a dying society, unable to hold space for differences.

We are all guilty of losing touch, and of forgetting. Let my words carry you towards remembrance, as I remember with you.

I am consistently amazed at how much of a fight it is, to enforce sameness. Sameness goes so against what life itself is, that you see a person must literally fight life itself to achieve sameness.

Sameness is a fight, one that eventually leads to death.

We fight weeds that grow between rows of commercial seeds. We irradiate the produce once it’s harvested, killing the bacteria that was thriving on its surface.

We fight the our natural tendency to be different. We have a critic living in our heads that tells us what to do, or not to do, in order to blend in and avoid being bullied.

We fight to pluck eyebrow hairs, we fight the urge to wear that one dress because it’s “weird”,  and we damn other people to hell if they don’t share our religious views.

We fight people who are not of our race. We attack and throw slurs and we get guns and hand grenades and tanks and...

Did it ever occur to us, that we could opt out?

What’s the worst thing that could happen, if we could cultivate within ourselves, a space for differences?

If instead of condemning the person who’s muslim, we just took a breath in?

If instead of restricting our diets, we allowed ourselves to eat what resonates?

If instead of graduating from high school then going to college then getting married then having 2.5 children… we just took a moment to reflect?

But beyond all this, if we allowed ourselves to be exactly as we are, without the need to act upon the whims of the “I”... Life itself, would change.

Life doesn't have to be a fight. Life itself is not war. Life is not unidimensional. Life is not closed. It doesn't have to be.

Life itself is peaceful, diverse, and expansive.

When we fight the diverse expansiveness that is life, life becomes a fight.

And ultimately, when we fight life, we fight ourselves.

It is time to stop running in the battlefield, and turn inwards.

It is time to see beyond the external circumstances to which we have no real control, and reclaim the only real power we have... that is, the power we have over our own minds, and the power our minds have to shape our own lives.