Natural Diversity Leads to Healthy Living

Are you essentially a natural creature, or, the product of a technological and mechanical system?

Most people read this statement and think, "Of course, I am a natural creature." Yet we live in boxes, drive machines that pollute the air we breathe, and consume foods that we know are harmful. Then, we teach our kids to do the same. We don sunglasses to hide our eyes from the sun, burn fuel to keep our indoor environment at a steady 70 degrees all year, and buy tons of furniture and appliances for our comfort.

It is very difficult to step outside of the paradigm we have created for our lives, and see how, in everything we do each day, we separate ourselves from the natural world. As a society, we have so separated from our natural selves that we value life-longevity instead of life-happiness. To pursue life-longevity as the main goal, we have created our capitalist society and the modern medical establishment; to pursue life-happiness as the main goal, the honey-bee created the hive.

A honey bee's vision and only concern is the health of the hive. Bees will eat each other, kill a queen, commit suicide by stinging invaders, and banish their own brothers and sisters for the good of the hive. The honey bee shows its full commitment to the principal of everlasting spirit; bees willingly sacrifice their temporary bee-bodies so that the hive will remain. The hive itself is ever-regenerating, spawning thousands of new bees each day.

Bees live fully in the natural world, traveling for miles around the hive to collect honey, pollen and other goodies for the hive. Bees depend on their local surroundings for the health of the hive, and plants -- especially vegetables and fruits -- rely on bees for pollination. Bees and plants have a symbiotic relationship, so when one-third of the bee population world-wide dies in a single year (2007), that makes an important statement about the health of the plants that feed us.

There is tons of bee research going on to find the source of the problem. But the intuitive answer is the simple one: monoculture. Our society farms foods for profit: Larger crops are easier to harvest and produce more money, chemicals increase production, and honey bees are used as a crop production tools. By focusing on large crops, we have systematically removed plant diversity from the ground.

This discussion leads me to a simple conclusion. It is my goal to prove the following statement, by growing a diverse mini-culture in my 3-acre backyard. If I can do it, so can every other household:

"Bees require a diverse group of plants, especially herbs and medicinal plants, in order to maintain a healthy hive. And like the honey bee, people require a diverse diet also."

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