Recycled Atoms

I am currently reading Bill Bryson’s A Short History of Nearly Everything and the section on atoms and quantum states has had me deep in thought the last few days.

Spiritualists have for years stated that we are all one – and now science can prove it. You see, every single thing in the entire universe is made up of atoms – just one infinitesimally small little atom that manifests into every sentient and non-organic thing in existence. It is both boggling to the mind and humbling.

What had me thinking this past week is that these atoms are recycled and what that implies.

Atoms never cease to exist – they only transform their combinations to make new things. That means that all the trillions and trillions of atoms that make up you and me were once stars, or trees, or other people. That is a big realisation. And one that may hold some solutions to our human lives.

Within every atom is a memory – because atoms are quantum in nature they hold both nothing and everything at the same time. This means that they possess both the blueprint of what came before and at the same time an empty canvas of what it will become. We see this property in action within our own DNA, where individual and generational memory is passed through to our physicality, our traits and our personalities.

Atoms not only hold memory but they also act as holograms – mimicking their fellow atoms behaviour no matter the distance between the two. So if atom A is set to a certain speed or rotation atom B will of it’s own volition move and spin as well (but in an opposite direction).

But let’s think bigger – lets truly grasp the concept that every atom within you and I have in the past and at the same time been within us, while also mimicking the actions of our respective atoms. Let’s understand that when the term ‘we are one’ is used – it truly means that we are one.

You may wonder then that if we are all made from the exact same material, operating at the same time as both single and separate – how is it that we are not just one big blob with a single personality? Well just like the addition of one proton and electron changes an atom to hydrogen, so too does the addition of a billion different factors change atoms into you and I.

Fast forward a few billion years from the original expansion of the universe and we now see millions of different people, animals, flora and so much more in existence. While we may all have different manifestations, we ourselves are quantum,  meaning we are both separate (in our bodies and experiences) and at the same time one expansive energy.

All of this has had me thinking two words: compassion and honesty.

Because we have shared atoms and are sharing atoms – your pain is my pain. Your triumphs are mine and your failures are mine as well. Your fears, your regrets, your hopes – everything that you have tried to hide or suppress lives within me. And everything that I have hidden lives within you. I am both a reflection and an action of your self just as you are to me.

It is the reason we are moved to tears when listening to music or watching a movie. It is the reason a stranger will risk their life to save another. It is also the reason we hold unreasonable anger and hatred towards people we have never even met.

We are caught in a web of energetic exchange at an atomic level that filters up from our very DNA through to our bodies, our minds and our beliefs. It moves beyond our individual selves and permeates into our families and our societies. When there is no conscious thought (the one prerequisite for a quantum state to become certain), we truly act as puppets; slaves to the conversations that our atoms are having with each other. An enormous maelstrom of mirrored behaviours that aren’t necessarily truth, but rather un-programmed quantum conditioning.

Compassion and honesty.

If the atoms within us all hold the same memories of love and pain, have in the past and in the future be the manifestation of love and pain, then how can we judge another?

If the yearning within our hearts is something we feel must be hidden, should we rather not expose that vulnerability? Because it is unquestionable that what lives in my heart lives in yours as well.

Recycled atoms – every feeling, thought, experience and more is swirling within all of us, shared by our atomic ancestry. I mentioned earlier conscious thought and how that one act will ensure a transformation from a quantum state to a certain one. I am asking myself now what the world would look like if we all consciously directed the properties of the atoms living within us.

If we could learn to honour each person on this planet as if they were ourselves (because ostensibly they are), can we truly see that when we cause harm to anyone, be they human or animal, we inflict that harm on ourselves. That every single thought and action we allow to flow through our beings will return to us through the atomic interplay that is inescapable to our existence.

The enormity of it is staggering – but so is the simplicity.

We as sentient beings can literally alter anything in our world – as we have already. We have taken the very atoms that created the cosmos and gone onto build new elements, technology, economies, poisons and even genetically modified food.

What if we used our creative genius to create love? To create true renewable energy? What if just a few of us consciously embody the sacredness that should exist everywhere? Could we reach the tipping point where other’s are influenced and uplifted merely by existing besides us?

We can choose to feel disdain and irritation towards the beggar who has interrupted our day, or eat a steak and ignore the suffering that brought it to our plate. We can do all these things and more as we have for too many centuries. But the time for excuses is over. The majority of humanity is educated enough to know that every action (or non-action) taken has direct consequences on ourselves and our shared environment.

When food is consumed who’s every atom screams with pain – and we introduce it to our bodies. When violence is witnessed and the memory haunts our minds and guilt plagues our bodies because we did nothing. When bereavement, loss and fear is kept separate to society so it must instead become a darkness that none will enter. When the earth itself is plundered and broken and our feet walk upon it without remorse.

These things have consequence. On every level from the tiniest of atoms to the psychology of nations.

Compassion and Honesty. We are each capable of imbibing them both, because if just one of us has, we all can.

So I ask you to speak your truth, because half-truths and deception fosters the illusion of separateness. And I ask you to practice compassion, because every human experience, no matter how different to your own, was once yours and will be yours again.