I Am a Process
I am a process … not a thing, not a piece of matter. What do I mean? Try reading this profound paragraph and let it roll around in your brain.
“A mycelial network is a map of a fungus’s recent history and is a helpful reminder that all life-forms are in fact processes not things. The “you” of five years ago was made from different stuff than the “you” of today. Nature is an event that never stops. As William Bateson, who coined the word genetics, observed, ‘We think of animals and plants (and ourselves) as matter, but they are really systems through which matter is continually passing.’ When we see an organism, from a fungus to a pine tree (or ourselves in the mirror), we catch a single moment in a continual development.” (Entangled Life, How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds, and Shape Our Futures by Merlin Sheldrake, chapter Living Labyrinth, Random House)
We are not one thing. We are a process of change. And so is the rock, or the chair, upon which you are sitting. The bacteria inside you number more than the cells which you think of as “you.” The bacteria are changing. Your cells are changing. Our state of being is ever changing … as is this universe of which we are one small part. Connected. To all the parts, the people, the stars, the dust …. Fun to think about with our brain, our senses, our memories, which also are a process.
Good luck, have fun!
“The truth is, that every book we read, like every person we meet, has the capacity to change our lives,” Susan Cooper.
We are all in process.
From the Publisher: “The book was dampened and inoculated with Pleurotus (oyster mushroom) mycelium. The mycelium then digested the pages—and the words—of the book, and sprouted over the course of seven days. Pleurotus can digest many things—from crude oil to used cigarette butts—and is one of the fungal species that shows the most promise in mycoremediation. It is also delicious when fried lightly with garlic and will make it possible for the author to eat his words.” Photo Credit: DRK Videography