The Biophilic Fabric of Stories

Recently, a friend of mine came to visit me from Turkey. Her name is Maral which means ‘doe’ (female deer) in Turkish language. Maral has a particular fondness for deer folk. Hence, she asked me whether I know of a place where she could see deer folk in close distance in Dublin.

Phoenix Park came to my mind where hundreds of deer could be witnessed quite closely. However, our plan was to go to Glendalough, Co. Wicklow for the next day. I knew that there are many deer in Wicklow forests but ‘’they would not come close to human folk’’ I said. 

The next day, while we were visiting the monastery ruins in Glendalough, Maral and I could not believe our eyes. There was a stag grazing at the gravestones. He seemed not to be aware that he was surrounded not only by many curious human eyes but also exposed to many phone screens who were putting digital stamps to this moment. 

At one point, he was so close to Maral that Maral felt an overwhelming urge to touch his soft reddish skin. However, I intervened and spoiled the moment. The stag’s antlers were scraped. It seems to me that he had a recent fight with another stag and he could be aggressive, more than ever since September-October was the rutting season for them. 

My logic had so many reasons for that neither Maral nor anyone else should touch the stag. However, my gut -and also Maral’s gut I suppose- felt that the stag at that particular moment needed that touch. He seemed lost. A gentle touch might do good for him in his lostness. 

This incident made me realise that when it comes to interacting with wild animals, a thick veil of fear cinches me up because I don’t know anything about them other than they are known as ‘dangerous’. You might say, ‘’Of course, you would be scared because they are dangerous’’. Dare I ask; ‘’Are they really dangerous? They might. But to what extent? And in which kind of relationship? 

We crave for diverse sensuous experiences

In traditional tales there are so many encounters of humans with wild animals. Goddesses depicted snuggling to lions, carrying vultures on their shoulders; witches who had snakes curled on their heads, necks, shoulders, arms or on their laps; wise men who communicated with hawks, raven or crows while holding them gently on their palms.

Are all these scenes a virtual reality of human imagination or can they be reflections of an ancient way of being a human on this planet? 

In his book ‘’The Spell of the Sensuous’’ [1] David Abram emphasises the fact that human bodies co-evolved with other fleshly forms, such as animals, trees, all kinds of herbs, plants, fungi, moon and sun for hundreds of thousands of years. He indicates that our ancestors’ bodies practised a sensuous relationship with these other life forms in such rich ways, so our nervous system craves for diverse sensuous experiences, encoded in our genetic inheritance.

However, since our lives are mainly surrounded with human beings and not many other living species, we fool ourselves by expecting all kinds of diverse sensuous experiences from human-human relationships as if the only place to encounter otherness is in another human being but another human cannot possibly provide all that otherness. 

Earth’s Ancient Language 

A recent neuroscientific study [2] showed that being near natural water is one of the powerful ways to soothe and relax our nervous system. Just looking at a body of water can decrease our heart rate and our blood pressure.  Another study [3] revealed that neurologically when we view the green or blue spectrum, we stress less. All these findings are indicators that our bodies prefer to communicate using Earth’s ancient language which dates back over four billion years ago and which is rooted in relational existence with other life forms.

Since human species existed on this planet we have spent 81% of our lifetimes in caves, and only 19% in homes and less so in cities [4]. The amount of time that our bodies and subsequently our nervous system spent as a member of the Earth is far more than the time when we became dis-membered from Earth and treated other living beings as our commodities. No wonder why our bodies favour Earth’s ancient language. 

Do you know who else speaks that language? Traditional stories.  91,3 % of our lifetimes we as humans have carried information in the form of oral language and only 8,7 % of our lifetimes we used written language. This means that human bodies have listened to the stories far more than they have read them. That is the reason why we relax the moment we hear a good story. Our nervous system recognizes the ancient familiarity and gets aligned with it.

At the core of our existence, are we not all biophilic?

Have you ever heard of the term ‘’Biophilia’’? Biophilia is our innate tendency to interact and communicate with other life forms on this planet. Ecologist Edward O. Wilson coined the term [5].

Fifty thousand years ago, our ancestors would probably find it unnecessary to use such a term because interacting and communicating with other life forms was inevitable for them. 

In those days, our ancestors perceived mountains, rocks, rivers and the land as an extension of their bodies. Everything in their surroundings was alive and relatable so they respected every creation on the Earth, under the Earth (in the soil) and over the Earth (in the celestial realm). This animistic perception enabled them to sustain a direct emotional connection with all living beings. 

Nowadays, we can witness this kind of emotional relationship with non-humans in indigenous communities who still keep their animistic worldview or we can sense and feel the animate world while listening to traditional tales. 

In myths from many different cultures, our ancestors personified rivers as goddesses. When a river flooded, that could be a sign of the sorrow or the rage of the river goddess. Thunders were usually expressions of sky gods and lightning would be their revenge arrows. Snakes were mostly revered as the wisest and dragons as the loyalest creatures on Earth. 

In folktales, all sorts of animals, water sources, mountains, rocks, trees would be personified as guides. They would give advice to protagonists or help them to get out of a challenging situation. In all these examples a form of emotional communication exists between humans and other living beings. 

Human communication with other life forms encountered in traditional tales has been a longtime focus of social sciences. Studies mainly interpreted this relationship as symbols of the human psyche. Dare I ask； what if this form of communication was not imaginative and symbolic? What if our ancestors have understood the languages of other life forms and they then translated it into their own mother tongue? What if these translations diffused into the stories and were carried from generations to generations as pearls of wisdom? What if at the core of our existence are we all biophilic?

I don’t have evidence-based answers to these questions, so I leave you with a hunch. On the other hand, I know for sure that traditional stories such as myths, fairytales and folktales emerged from the interconnected web of life when humans lived as a member of the Earth. They are woven with the biophilic fabric of life. Therefore，they could offer us many hints, signposts and clues on how to remember our kinship with non-human beings, and how to be aware of our natural existence. All we need to do is just listen to them wholeheartedly.

References: 

[1] David Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous 

[2] Richard G. Coss, Craig M. Keller, Transient decreases in blood pressure and heart rate with increased subjective level of relaxation while viewing water compared with adjacent ground, Journal of Environmental Psychology, Volume 81, 2022

[3] Notes from Zach Bush; https://zachbushmd.com/

[4] Notes from Andrew Smith; https://www.andrewsmith.ie/blog/

[5] Edward O. Wilson, Biophilia