This open letter to humanity was written for inclusion in a forthcoming artbook by Aberjhani featuring literary dialogues in the form of letters, poetry, and original artwork reflecting on the COVID-19 pandemic. 

There is a simple and absolute law that governs everything on this planet: the law of balance. Everything sane and healthy is the result of balance. All life exists because countless cells and atoms hold a delicate equilibrium.

There is a mighty intelligent power that keeps this whole planet in balance—call it God, Divine Power, or simply Nature. It acts with an invisible hand, and its power is absolute. When there is an excess of something, that excess must be removed; otherwise the excess grows and turns into imbalance. Balance brings harmony; imbalance brings disharmony.

A hundred musical instruments and ten thousand musical notes, arranged in perfect proportion, give rise to a harmonious orchestra. Excess, however, results in dissonance. An excess of violins, for instance, would throw everything off. Therefore the surplus of violins must be reduced so the whole orchestra can be brought back into balance—into melodious harmony.

Who does this? The conductor. The Maestro.

In our case, the Maestro is Nature—the invisible hand that constantly adjusts, corrects, and restores.

One square yard of space can comfortably hold two people. Three is too many. Four people begin to suffocate. Add a fifth and they will start pushing each other out. One square yard cannot handle more than one or two people.

How many can this planet handle?

A square yard of land cannot feed more than a certain number of people. Likewise, the land of this planet cannot feed more than a certain number overall. Overpopulation produces an excess of many things—food, gas, products, waste—and these, almost by definition, become lower in quality.

Who bears the burden of overproduction? The land. The air. Nature. The entire ecosystem.

But the ecosystem is not a robot; it is a breathing, living web. It tires if it is overused. Nature cannot give more than it is able to create and replenish. One square yard of soil cannot truly feed five people; it can only feed one or, at most, two in a healthy, sustainable way.

Today, however, humans use technology to squeeze food for six people out of that same square yard. Here lies the critical point: one square yard of land is not a machine. It is a living, breathing entity. By forcing it to produce six or more times beyond its capacity, year after year, we exhaust it. The soil becomes tired, weak, and depleted.

The land—its soil—contains within itself a kind of bioenergetic value. Let’s say one square yard can naturally produce 10 tomatoes at 100% bioenergetic value each. That means this square yard can give a maximum of 1,000% bioenergetic value. This is its highest capacity; it cannot sustainably give more.

Yet today, humans often manage to produce 100 tomatoes on that same square yard. The soil still has only 1,000% to give, so that limited energy is divided among far more fruits. Each tomato no longer carries 100% of the land’s energy, but perhaps 10% or less, especially as the soil becomes increasingly depleted.

The tomato of today may contain only 5–10% of the original bioenergetic value. Your tissues receive little real nourishment; they do not grow or regenerate properly because the food is, in essence, weak and almost “dead.” This applies, to some degree, even to many organic tomatoes (depending, of course, on the health of the soil). Organic may mean fewer chemicals, but if the land itself is exhausted, the bioenergetic value is still low.

Without healthy, truly nutritious food, the human body and brain do not develop normally and cannot remain robust for long. They are often kept artificially functioning by modern medicine. Wise men and women do not run to the doctor every other day. They do not need to, because they seek to live a genuinely healthy life in body, mind, and spirit.

Advanced technology is a great gift in the hands of mature people. It simplifies many tasks and makes life easier and more efficient for those who have already grown through difficulty, hardship, and trial; for those who have learned something from life.

The downside of today’s advanced technology is that it often keeps immature people immature. Their neural networks do not develop as they should, and children do not grow properly into maturity. Brain scans show little difference in certain patterns of deterioration between drug or alcohol addiction and severe forms of digital addiction. An infantile mind with a gadget in its hand 24/7 remains infantile.

A gaming-centered society lacks pragmatism. It struggles to make reasonable choices. It lacks the capacity to use advanced technology efficiently and sustainably.

People today are acutely aware of their smartphones and the apps inside them, yet many are almost completely unaware of the nature outside them. They watch beautiful 4K videos of forests, oceans, and mountains, yet very few actually go out to experience that beauty directly.

Direct connection is what creates growth.

Without it, we get stuck in a kind of parasitism—feeding off representations of life instead of life itself. Growth occurs when a child uses a gadget to connect to a library halfway across the globe, to read a rare book in another language, using a translation tool if necessary.

“Why read at all? Why learn a new language?” the infantile voice says. “Google has all the books. Google can translate anything.”

And so a zombie-land develops and grows.

Only through direct experience in nature, in life, does a human truly evolve and grow. If there is no real growth, there is little value in our presence here on Earth. The very matrix of this planet is development. Everything is in a process of growth—from the tiniest bacterium to the giant sequoia tree.

Excess, by contrast, merely multiplies itself without evolving into something constructive or life-giving. What does not grow, in a meaningful way, becomes a kind of cancer and eventually self-destructs.

And so we return to our Maestro and the harmonious orchestra: the invisible hand of Nature that steps in and says, “It is time to bring the ecosystem back into balance.”

When humanity becomes weakened by excess—by multiplying without deepening, by consuming without truly growing in wisdom or care—life responds. Crises, including plagues and pandemics, can be seen not only in medical terms but also as symbols of a system strained to its limits, struggling to correct itself. That which does not grow in awareness and responsibility tends to deteriorate, decay, and pass away.

Excess is being stripped away, along with mountains of waste—masks, plastics, toxins, and habits that no longer serve life. The planet is, in its own way, cleaning itself. Nature preserves what is pure, or at least what honestly and earnestly strives toward purity, health, and balance. There is no reason to purge what is untainted or sincerely attempting to heal.

Nature holds close in its arms the mindful, the humble, and those who are healthy in body, attitude, and spirit. It is the great Maestro, constantly adjusting the orchestra of life, inviting us to play our part in tune with harmony and balance rather than in the shrill, exhausting noise of excess.

©Excellence Reporter 2021, Nicolae Tanase