The planet in one

The planet in one

Text by: Miguel Reyes

Photography by: Gabriel Eisenband Gontovnik

In conservation and sustainability, such repeated and diplomatic words, there are many positions and there are no static criteria for their execution. Its essence, precisely, is diversity, flexibility, balance and consensus of interests that collide. But I am not going to enter into these debates. I would like to talk here about the individual connection with nature and what I believe is the starting point to see and care for the life and beauty of this planet.

Brigitte Baptiste defines sustainability as “a careful exercise of increasing collective well-being, recognition of cultural diversity and respect for our descendants.” Of “respect for our descendants”, and I add: of common sense, of taking care of the only house we have to live in it in the healthiest way and for as long as possible. Although it is a desirable and attractive idea, putting it into practice is complex.

Connection to the earth, the true experience of togetherness beyond theory, is an awakening. It is a change of consciousness, it is remembering the feeling of the bond that we all have with what sustains us and gives life. It is remembering that by bringing nature closer we bring ourselves closer.

The Earth is alive and all lives on it are magical. That simple truth, hidden between screens, cars and buildings, has always been there. But we forget that everything is born from the Earth, that we see in the same light and breathe the same. In the midst of so much noise, the illusory division between what is nature and what is not, between nature and us, becomes more evident. When, in reality, there is no such separation.

Religions and books on spirituality have repeated for centuries that we are all 'one', that we are born and die from the same force, that everything comes from the same energy expressed through an countless diversity of species. However, the mission is to see the 'other' in oneself, connect with what surrounds us, see the outside inside and vice versa. When we achieve this, when that unity is felt for moments, we experience what some call the 'dissolution of the ego'. But then we return to the struggle, to believing that we are alone and separate from everything 'else'. In that separation of 'I' and the 'other' I see the origin of the environmental problem we are facing. In the idea that humans are at the center of this creation and, therefore, can make use and abuse of nature, in the idea of ​​believing themselves separate and superior to the rest of living beings.

“The fact that we feel so comfortable surrounded by nature comes from the fact that it has no opinion about us” -Nietzche

I return to sustainability to think about how to live in our environment and, at the risk of sounding irresponsible to scientists, I dare say that the best way to be sustainable is to be sensitive. Sensitive for the other living species, for the air and water that give us life, sensitive for the beauty of all creation, in which we are just one more species among millions, but at the same time, in which each one is unique and unrepeatable. Therefore, above all, sensitivity must be towards themselves. There is no greater power than individual action, and that individual is barely one-thousandth of this network of ecosystems.

Beyond preaching about veganism, self-cultivation, alternative methods of transportation, the previous step to all that is to feel and feel part of that whole. From there will come the answers to know what to eat and how to treat the air we breathe. Due to the consequences of our actions, which are already evident, we will know what it is best for us to do to survive, to be sustainable.

It is a job that begins with one and ends with one, comparisons are not worth it, there are no manuals or rules, there is no intellect or words that matter. Even though you try to communicate with them now, it is impossible to force them to love, it is impossible to force them to be sensitive.

Tuparro National Park - New Cinaruco area
Photography: Gabriel Eisenband Gontovnik
National Natural Parks of Colombia

In Colombia we have everything to be. It is a country blessed by nature. It is enough to repeat that the Sierra is the heart of the world, that we have two oceans, a place from another world like Chiribiquete, the country richest in birds, butterflies and amphibians, and perhaps the most biodiverse on the planet. This abundance of life, however, coexists with wars, divisions and hatred. Colombia is a country marked by violence (forgive the obvious). Fortunately – and forcefully – we are entering a new era. The coronavirus and the environmental crisis that threaten us are an opportunity to get off the illusory peak in which we believe ourselves as a species, to demystify anthropocentrism and merge with the infinity of living beings, to reestablish that connection with the essential, 'the invisible'. to the eyes'. It is an opportunity to remember that bacteria and tiny organisms, like this virus, are decisive for our survival. It is an opportunity for that awakening and to experience, even for a moment, that the outside is inside and that nature, its beauty and its mysteries, are the planet that lives in each of us.