When life becomes difficult and the “us versus them” attitudes of the dominant culture leave us feeling overwhelmed or sad, we can feel quite alone or alienated. On top of that, so much of the news we watch and the articles we read seem to contribute to digging this hole of isolation even deeper.
It helps to remind ourselves that we are, in fact, part of an interdependent web of life. All living things depend on their environment to supply them with what they need. This includes food, water, and shelter, as well as more basic physical factors, such as soil, air, and temperature. Many living things interact with other organisms, as well, to survive.
Quantum physics and Buddhist philosophy both use the metaphor of Indra’s net to describe the interdependence of all living things. Imagine an infinite web of jewels hanging in each nodule of the net, where each jewel reflects all the other jewels. When a jewel in this intricate net is touched, all the others are affected. This image vividly reflects the hidden interconnectedness and interdependency of everything and everyone in the universe.
But how can we understand this not only conceptually, but also experience it directly? One way we can get a glimpse of interdependence is through the phenomenon of synchronicity. C.G. Jung defined this as a meaningful coincidence and Jungian author Richard Tarnas described it as, “A........