Lao Tzu says “Living in the moment brings you a sense of reverence for all of life’s blessings”

This virtue manifests as having unconditional love and positive regard for all creatures in

the universe, starting with ourselves, this will then naturally flow out to all others.

Taoist monks are said to have absolute reverence for life. They refrain from taking any life,

even the life of a cockroach. They believe that the killing of weaker, relatively insignificant

creatures is a greater wrong. Unlike lions and tigers, small creatures have no ability

to defend themselves, so we need to be even more compassionate toward them. This teaching holds

that all life is sacred, so one must never kill or do any harm to any living being.

The world in which we live, often forces us to ignore this virtue. If there’s one word that

defines our modern lives, it’s excess and in the name of profit and excessive consumption,

we have not only been extremely cruel to all the other life forms on this planet,

but we also have been stepping on our fellow humans for the sake of our own selfish motives.

We strive to be the very best and loving version of ourselves, the version that looks

good on the surface. The one that makes for fast-paced, exciting, Instagrammable lives.

How often do we put up an image of our dog on instagram for likes, yet eat meat the very same

night? How often do we pass homeless individuals on the street without acknowledgement? Between

the business of our daily lives and going from one task to another, we forget the world around

us and others in it. We must understand that we are dependent on other life forms for our

sheer survival, and this means we must treat them with respect, kindness, and gratitude.

Living in harmony with the natural world and thus respecting all forms of life is achieved through

balancing our Yin and Yang energies. Put simply, Yin and Yang represent the opposite forces of the

natural world. Night and day, man and woman, birth and death. In symbolic terms Yin is represented as

feminine and yielding, while Yang is represented as masculine and more aggressive. In order to live

with reverence towards nature, both men and women must balance their Yin and Yang energies. The

integration of these two conflicted forces makes for a healthy soul, since there is no Yin without

Yang just like there’s no shadow without Sun. This means that if we want to live in harmony

and show love and respect to others and other forms of life, we must learn to make a conscious

effort to love and respect ourselves first. When we come to see ourselves as the pure, wonderful

and unique creations we are, we find it difficult to ignore this purity in others. Further to this,

we seek to understand and appreciate them rather than judge and criticise. In doing so, you will

find you can show unconditional positive regard not only to people you like but also to those

you find irritating or people you don’t deem to be deserving of your love or respect. All living

creatures are equally important, and they require equal respect. Trying to dominate and control all

life only leads you away from enlightenment and you won’t find peace in the midst of a struggle

for control and furthermore, a truly spiritual perspective would tell us that love is freedom.