Happy and Fulfilling Relationships: We Can Learn Much from Mother Nature

In recent years there has been a growing realization that our misuse of the natural world is likely to rebound on us with disastrous long-term consequences for humankind as a species and, in the short term, for our health and balance as individuals. We cannot live in isolation: we are part of the living world and we depend on it for our existence. Anything that threatens the natural world is a threat — direct or indirect — to us too. We are part of nature and nature is a part of us.

Let us therefore enjoy nature in all its rich diversity — not only the radiant dawns and glorious sunsets, but the timeless miracle of a blade of grass, a snowflake or an autumn leaf. Understanding nature helps us to understand ourselves. We are the pinnacle of all creation, but that does not give us the right to destroy it. We owe the natural world our interest, our respect, our attention, our love and our care. Only then can we hope to live in harmony with the world around us.

The same applies to the way we treat animals. Of all our contacts with nature, our relationships with animals are the warmest and most spontaneous. Animals are nature, in all its primal innocence. Through human contact, domestic animals become humanized; they meet our needs for uncritical devotion and companionable silence. Their calm acceptance of suffering and death is an example to us all. Animals are beautiful and gentle; they gladden the heart and delight the eye. Their speed and agility, their cunning and intuition, their keen senses, are a constant reminder of the wonder and wisdom of nature.

Every home needs an animal. Children especially need a companion, always patient, always available, never too busy to share their games and fantasies, their joys and sorrows; warm, faithful, welcoming, consoling; never criticizing or telling tales: the perfect confidant and friend. And - most vital of all - pets enable children, who always feel to some extent dominated and protected by adults, to assume, by virtue of their superior intelligence, a dominant and protective role themselves, and to accept the consequent responsibility.

However, an animal should not be kept as a mere toy or a replacement for human love. If we do not look after a cat properly, she will not only eat mice, but also birds, useful animals like lizards and frogs, and even our neighbour's goldfish. How often do pet owners think only of their precious darlings, and ignore their responsibility to others? We must be kind and compassionate to animals, but within reason. Naturally, some animals are harmful or dangerous and may need to be kept under control: excessive kindness to a wolf might result in cruelty to a whole flock of sheep; failure to kill a rabid dog might even result in the death of several people. But our whole attitude to the animal world should be governed by respect, compassion and loving kindness. Animals are living allegories for human strengths and weaknesses: they can show us how we, as human beings, should not behave as well as demonstrating love and other good qualities. Thus in observing and understanding them, we can learn a great deal about ourselves.

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