All Lives Matter : Part 2

All Lives Matter : Part 2

I shared the story about my encounter with the baby lizard.

As I thought about the tiny creature, how my unexpected arrival into its surroundings had startled it and how its initial reaction was to run as fast as it could in a direction away from this unknown enemy. Then its turning around and staying still and watching what really was that foreign entity, a truth dawned upon me. 

What the lizard had demonstrated was this universal behavior stemming from an inherent perception of existential threat. In the world of relative existence each of us poses an existential threat to the other. There are no exceptions to this rule. 

When an intelligent mind senses another person posing a challenge to what his/her intelligence stands upon, the raw reaction is to draw a boundary. To protect themselves. 

Similarly people with specific ideologies do not feel safe in the presence of someone who has a different ideology. 

It is one thing to move ourselves away into our own space. It’s entirely another thing to start a mission to destroy the other person who your mind has perceived as a threat. 

The little lizard had turned around and waited. I stood there watching it and it had stopped in its tracks watching me with cautious readiness to respond. Neither did it reflexively jump on me nor did I feel threatened such that I wanted to kill it. I did not want it crawling on my body and certainly it didn’t send a message that it wanted me to get any closer. What did we both do in our own ways? We let each have our space. We respected each other’s right to exist. The universe allowed that space for both of us. Space was never a problem with the universe. 

Once the initial threat was assessed and overcome, we moved past each other. Keeping ourselves and the other safe in our respective spaces. 

This is not something that can be taught or learned. The lizard knew it. We humans certainly must have it inside us. What makes us behave contrary to what is within us? Why do we exhibit that “ unnatural” tendency to deny the other a right to exist? Deny freedom to another. Expect something out of another. 

It would be unnatural if that lizard expected me to feed it or take it with me inside my home. It would be unnatural if I expected the lizard to be trapped and become an item of display inside my house. 

The only time it becomes legitimate to kill is when it is for food. When mosquitoes enter our home and bite us they do so because their food is our blood. Mother Nature has created it that way. When we kill a mosquito it becomes justified because we have a right to protect our blood. The fight is justified and whoever wins in that fight retains the right to seek food or kill its opponent. Animals kill when they must feed. 

On rare occasions animals turn rogue and kill randomly. When humans attack animals or other humans they do not always follow basic principles. Very few killings would happen if existential threat is understood and overcome. Alas. 

Then the thought occurs. May be natural and unnatural are merely concepts created by human minds. Rogue and civilized are probably just names given to distinguish two behaviors from each other. Both are part of Mother Nature. 

One thing however is obvious. These pairs of opposites have a vector that is assigned a conventional direction. A human mind that begins to move towards the spiritual core moves from rogue to civilized tendencies. Mind that remains in a direction that has not specifically turned towards the core will not have the vector moving in that direction. It will be all over the place and try to make its own laws and own rules and own set of principles. That’s a mind that enters into a zone of chaos and creates chaos for everyone around itself. In that zone existential threat remains at its highest level persistently. 

I’ve been there. Done that. And been lucky to see another kind of life. Only when a human learns to overcome existential threat, he can observe lower species exhibit civilized behavior. Johari ki gati johari jaane.It is beyond amazing to recognize. That lizard had a lesson for me. I guess I’ve made some progress as a student.