Living a full life. Understanding life. Loving life.

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“You must understand the whole of life, not just one little part of it. That is why you must read, that is why you must look at the skies, that is why you must sing, and dance, and write poems, and suffer, and understand, for all that is life.” Jiddu Krishnamurti, an Indian spiritual philosopher, (1895 to 1986), said this. This might be true in some respects, and yet, in other respects, it is not entirely necessary either. Take the tree, as an example. A tree just grows where it is. It does not travel around. Life, more or less comes to it, without it needing much to search for life, nor to understand it. The tree doesn't need to go to life. It can just be itself, in that life, without needing to do too much else, other than this. Birds nest in its branches, worms live near its roots, enriching the soil it lives in. Insects, bees, other small creatures can find a home in its branches. And yet, also a tree's roots reach out looking for moisture. Its canopy reaches up towards the sky, looking for light. It can create new instances of itself. It can live next to other trees. It's not alone. Balance in life is important too then. At the same time, though, we can also so live from our own “small” part of life that we embrace, and understand the whole of life then too. And yet he makes a good point too. We should not withdraw from any part of life either. We should try to live from as much of it as we can, but not obsessively so. Life lives in you, ever ready to show you it all, itself, fully shared with you, and yet too, life lives out of you, (outside of you) seemingly so as well. You live in life, and life lives in you. Life lives from you, and you live from life. The inner and outer life must reach together, not apart, and that’s why just doing what he says (on its own), trying to embrace all of life just outwardly, always brings limited understanding, because we need to embrace all of what life offers us, inwardly too, to live a full life of love, both inwardly and outwardly lived, and understood from that love in us, living us, being us. Photo Credit: The photo used in this article was sourced from the free media site, pixabay.com We are not trees, but we can learn a lot from them, just the same. A tree can show us what life's really all about.