We are our environment

For every need of man, Mother Earth and her environs have given the resources which need not be adulterated

• 5 June is World Environment Day

By Surya Vishwa 

Four days from now, on 5 June, some people on this planet will stir up and do various activities, mostly talking. They will dedicate one day in 365, to reflect on the issues concerning the ‘environment’ and talk about the need of taking action to save the environment from the abyss man has plunged it to. Some will take some action. Others may follow up on the words or action taken previously on this day. Some would forget. 

We have to be thankful that on this one day a segment of the human species does at least remember the ‘environment.’ The land and seas are drowned in our plastic and the poisonous sting of human advancement is everywhere. Yet we forget. 

The initiating of a World Environment Day (WED) was mooted in 1972 by the United Nations at the Stockholm Conference on Human Environment held from 5 to 16 June and in 1973 the first annual day dedicated to the environment was commemorated under the theme ‘Only One earth.’ Every year this day has been commemorated giving prominence to different issues the planet is faced with, the theme for 2023 having been ‘solution to plastic pollution.’ The theme for this year, 2024, as set by the United Nations is ‘Land restoration, desertification and drought resilience’ while 2025 is to look at ‘ending plastic pollution.’ 

Yes, there will be no doubt some tree planting and other relevant events that we will skip along non biodegradable refuse strewn roads to get to on 5 June this year too. Some of us will drive there and contribute to the mass inhalation of air polluted with man’s murky convenience.

There will be conferences, both local and international alongside various YouTube activist presentations and zoom events that will tell us the obvious; that we are killing our only home and ourselves every minute of our existence and that we should be darned retarded to not do anything about it.

Those who speak in these panels will post pictures of their smartly dressed selves on social media and quite surreptitiously monitor who has ‘liked’ these or not. Others will speak of whatever it is they are doing to sustain this human home. Then soon it will be 6 June. 

Time will tick on and the ‘environment’ of the natural world will continue to be treated by man as if it were his slave; to poison, abuse, plunder and pollute. We will go back to our brick made knowledge industry cells and seated under air conditioning continue to preach and pontificate on sustainability.

Now let us imagine we are asked, say from an alien from outer-space; ‘what is the environment?’ How will we answer? In this textbook defined life that we are instructed to live, we might feel nervous to respond out of a tutorial. But let us do just that. 

Let us answer according to the experiential reality of life – and death. Let us try to free our minds from the clinical apparatus of instruction. 

The environment is what keeps the heart in our body beating

The environment, we may then say, possibly with cross border air pollution from our neighbouring country bruising our face, is the expanse between the sky and the earth where our first birth cry is recorded. The ‘environment’ we might further add, is what keeps the heart in our body beating. If the ‘environment’ goes on a hartal; if the rivers shrink or are blocked off by human rubbish, if the rains evaporate and the earth refuses to sprout and there is no longer clean air, man will not be able to feel so superior. His wee little brains used to destroy this planet will be decimated along with his carcass. And when that happens no amount of artificial brains, artificial rains and artificial food or artificial vaccines will be able to prevent what happened to the dinosaurs happening to people.

Over the four billion odd years that nature has existed it has perfected the skill of removing from its surface living beings who cause more harm than good. And across the history of the ‘environment’ no creature has credibly earned in full throttle the title of ‘pest’ as much as man. 

Modern man is a maniacal narcissist threat to the ‘environment’. This is so ever since he dipped his image in all its educated glory in the sheen of exploitation and saw the environment mirrored as his profit vending machine, falling ardently in love with this vision. Time has meandered since that first infatuation and he now sees his horrendous caricature quite clearly as he leans forward in his ailing comfort.

Some aspects of this phenomena is aptly described in the book Mankind and Mother Earth by Arnold Toynbee, first published by Oxford University Press in 1976. The following two sentences from this book explains it all.

“A human being feels as if he is the centre of the universe because his own consciousness is, for him, the point from which he views the cosmic, spiritual and material panorama. He is also self centred in the sense that his natural impulse is to try and make the rest of the Universe serve his own purposes.” In these two lines we have our entire earth based biography on how we have turned the pristine luxury of ‘the environment’ bestowed by the natural world to all creatures, into a death call. Now we have this self-same man trying to doctor his errors using his favourite current buzzword ‘sustainability.’ 

We have forgotten that it is the ‘environment’ where our flesh and bones would be put to rest, either as fodder or as ash. We have forgotten that it is the waterways of the environment that flows as blood in our veins. And we have to struggle through the fog to remember that it is the ether which in synchronisation with foliage that pulsates as oxygen empowering our lungs.

The ‘environment’ is what our ancestors worshipped, respected and glorified. When there was no rain they danced, pleading with the good earth to pardon them for any omissions and the fertility of the earth was soon set in motion again. The precious water would pour from the heavens and life in all its forms would smile after being resurrected from parchment. For the ancient ‘uneducated’ and ‘undeveloped’ man, there was no profit and loss calculation when dealing with the environment. There was no genocide of the insect world committed in mass industrialised scale by artificially ‘producing’ food. There was no mass bombings that split open the earth like the gigantic war-wound festering in the heart of humanity today. 

This writer will await with interest to see on 5 June any event to commemorate environment day by looking at our warring world and its impact on the ‘environment’ i.e. the impact on waterways, on air, on the earth, on the rivers and above all on humans who are part and parcel of the environment. 

Humans do not see themselves as part of the environment

Humans of this modern world do not see themselves as part of the environment. They see the environment as their subject. They wish to dissect, analyse and scrutinise the vast anatomy of the environment. To research it, cut it theoretically into small pieces and hold it under the magnifying glass.

They wish to mould the environment as they will because modern man considers his ‘science’ to be his deity and his commerce to be his demi-god. 

In comparison indigenous spiritual and cultural practices until just a few hundred years ago, across much of the world, including in Hindu and Buddhist countries had incorporated ways and means to cultivate food in a manner that respected all of life, recognising that the vast plethora of life across the planet was important for its equilibrium. Thus the non-artificial version of man, in humility, wisdom and awe preserved all of the diversity of the biological world. They did not play a mercenary version of God tossing the gluttony dice of wanting food whenever he wanted it and not when the ‘environment’ followed its own menu of when to serve what. 

We have now sojourned up to this point, where we have one day in 365 during which we talk of the ‘environment’ while considering it the commercial norm to poison the earth and consider it reasonable and logical that this poisoning is necessary as man has to be kept out of hunger (with poisoned food).

We may or may not on 5 June remember annually to emphasise that the ‘environment’ is not just the larder but also the medicine cabinet of man. 

The book ‘Saving Planet Earth,’ by Tony Juniper, based on the BBC television production Saving Planet Earth (2007) published by Harper Collins, points to there being over 2,000 tropical forest plants identified as having some anti cancer properties with only one in ten wilderness based plants having been tested for anti cancer potential. It is granted that this particular statistical reference may be changed somewhat now, in the year 2024 and we will research a follow up on this aspect soon and write in relevance to Sri Lanka.

In 2018 in a conference in Colombo for researchers and academics on sustainable consumption it was pointed out that the natural world has resources for man only to last till around the year 2050. Among the Sri Lanka focused research presented at this event was on how the use of our synthetic toothpaste is negatively impacting the earth alongside the information that the chemicals used to clean man’s pollution out of rivers has increased manifold. When I mentioned this to my 85-year-old meditation teacher he smiled displaying his perfect teeth, informing me that he uses the neem twig for dental hygiene (and that one dentist had to strive greatly to uproot a tooth). 

For every need of man, Mother Earth and her environs have given the resources which need not be adulterated. But if we use nature as we ought to then the modern ‘economy’ may collapse. If all the lifestyle diseases of today vanish and man lives in accordance with nature as those of yesteryear did then the medical industry will collapse. There would be hundreds of jobless. 

We can realise this on environment day and comprehend that the breath in our lungs, the sun that emboldens life and the rain that soothes us as well as the earth that calms the soles of our feet are but the life codes of the ‘environment.’ We can meditate as the ancient sages did on how this code is sinewed into our heartbeat where our consciousness is interconnected with every other life force upon the planet. The environment is us and we are the environment. A sick environment is but a reflection of our mind and our hearts.

With this introspection we could begin to self educate ourselves on the gaps therein of an education sector that teaches the world that A is for Apple even in landmass (such as Sri Lanka) where there are no apples growing. We can then begin to understand the pieces of the commercial puzzle that blocks our hearts from identifying, cultivating and conserving the hundreds and thousands of fruits across the planet that begin with the letter A (such as A for Aaththa – considered a highly anti cancerous fruit) and then teaching our children that A is for Aaththa.  

So, let us celebrate everyday as the world environment day and begin by praising and thanking the earth for tolerating the pompous, thankless, greedy fools that we humans have proven to be. Let us genuinely promote the environs as our food and medicinal storage, as our school, our university and our entrepreneurship training centre. We may then teach ourselves as did our ancestors that our shampoo, soap, perfume, toothpaste, our furniture, our clothes are all manifestations of the ‘environs’. We may then value that we can find a way to return to the simplicity of our forefathers to reclaim the lived in life in line with the environment and the dictates of our mother – our home – our goddess – our devi – the earth.