What is life?

When you look at your body what do you see? What happens in your brain? Do thoughts run through your mind? Do you see words? Sentences? Pictures? Sounds? How long have you ever stopped during your day and wondered what is the force behind all your actions?

There is one view that we are purely mechanic. We are a mass of cells which make up various parts of our body and all fit together nicely to make us. A byproduct of this accumulation of cells is our minds and our consciousness and this allows us to have thoughts. We can think about the past and we can think about the future. We then exist, our bodies grow to a certain size and then we live out our days in coexistence and then after some time our bodies grow old and our cells stop functioning properly and then one day it all just stops and thats it. The body becomes cold and lifeless and we are pronounced dead.

I think about this view point and I really can’t decide if I think it fits and explains everything about life. Life on the one hand is remarkably complex and the more you observe it the more subtle and advance you realise it is. Also this mechanical point of view leaves things unanswered. I mean your characteristics, the way you may hold yourself or the way you laugh or the way you touch your nose. So many tiny innocuous actions. Are all these things passed down via genes? Is it all just a matter of physics? I look at my children and sometimes I catch them in certain poses and they are the spitting image of their Grandfather. It’s a split second thing but it is there. The way we move and the way we hold ourselves is stored in our genes? Everything can be explained by pure genetics?

Then to go a little deeper. What is the essence that is your life? If you forget your name for a second and forget all your memories and forget all your troubles just for a second and really ask yourself ‘Who am I?’, ‘Who is this life?’. What is this life driving the physical body you find yourself in?

What is responsible for your ongoing maintenance? I mean the body is in a continual state of repairman-ship but what is driving this? You cut your hand and your brain sends a signal to your body to send the appropriate cells to the wound in order to start the healing process. But why? Why doesn’t your brain just say ‘Nah… I can’t be bothered today’ or ‘It’s not my problem, someone else can deal with it’. There is something behind this. The life that is you striving to survive. But what is it about life that wants to survive?

I look around me and see so much goodness in the world and I see deep connections form between people and I swear that there must be more to this life than just the physical aspect. If all we are is just cells I just don’t see how we can grow to be as complex as we are. I will endeavour to find out.

Peace and Bliss to all.