Is the snowflake responsible for the avalanche?
Since my last entry (see it here, or scroll down: http://rebeccahecking.com/?p=627 ) I’ve been considering how we as individuals can cope with the possibility (inevitablity?) of ecological collapse. In the last post, I pondered that our present state is the ultimate result of evolution. Our big brains, linked together through collective learning, enabled us to dominate our environment in a way that no other species has ever done. From the point of natural selection, we are an evolutionary “success.” Our species has spread across the Earth, and exploited the planet’s resources so successfully that we now threaten the existence of many other species, as well as the well-being of our own. We have been true to our nature. We are what we are. In the end, Gaia may have the last laugh as homo sapiens sapiens (an ironic name if there ever was one) flames out and collapses into extinction over the next few ten-thousand years. If we do, we would be a mere blip in the big picture of the 4.5 billion year history of life on Earth, albeit a quite spectacular blip.
Sounds simple enough. A species evolves, adapts, lives a while, and ultimately goes extinct. Of course, it’s not that simple. As blog reader Nellie pointed out a few posts ago, those of us who are awakened to ecological reality may find ourselves deeply grieving for the Earth, and the ecological tragedy unfolding before our eyes. The same minds that enabled us to create the circumstances of this present ecocide also enable us to consider meaningfully what our species has done, its implications and our own culpability in it all.
Like Nellie, and probably like many of you, I also grieve. But being the human animal that I am, I don’t grieve at abstract computer models of climate, or charts listing environmental toxins. I grieve on a smaller scale. I grieve at finding a styrofoam cup on my path through the woods. I grieve seeing a fox dead on the side of the road. I grieve seeing an oily slick amongst cattails in a wetland. My grief is intimate. Palpable. And very human. There are times when I simply sit with the grief, allowing it to wash over me like a wave.
But I find that I can’t stay with that grief indefinitely. Sometimes it morphs into anger at the Powers That Be. Sometimes it fades away and is replaced by bittersweet joy at the beauty that yet remains. That joy is sustaining. Sometimes my thinking self reasserts itself over my emotions, and I find myself asking the question I posed at the beginning of this post:
Is the snowflake responsible for the avalanche?
We are all snowflakes, along with those who came before us. And we have gently fallen into our lives, drifting down without forethought onto the mountain, only to find ourselves part of the avalanche of humanity threatening destruction. Snowflake me landed (at my birth) in 20th century America with all its messy history and cultural baggage. I didn’t ask to be born where/when I did. I didn’t ask to be born at all! And neither did you. It just happened. And here we are, snowflakes together, drifting.
When I consider this, I become more gentle with myself, and with each of us as individuals. I find my grief softening a bit, and my anger slipping toward compassion toward my fellow snowy companions. There are so many of us now. Seven billion and counting. Even the most powerful among us can do precious little to stop the avalanche, or change its direction. Humanity is an abstraction, but a guilty one, that collectively brought us to where we are now. But you and me, and each one of us… well, we’re just sort of along for the ride.
So facing the future, I will nurture the spirit of kindness within me. I will cultivate compassion toward all beings. And I will recognize that I am a snowflake, and stop blaming myself for not stopping the avalanche.
Rebecca Hecking is the author of The Sustainable Soul: Eco-Spiritual Reflections and Practices, available from Skinner House books, Amazon, and local bookstores, and also available as an e-book for the Amazon Kindle. She writes from her home in northwest Pennsylvania, where more snow is predicted for later today.
Photo Credit: flickr user ViaMoi at www.creativecommons.org
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