You are connected to everything and everyone.
This meditation on this important fact will help you to counteract any feelings of alienation,
Loneliness,
Or meaninglessness,
And it will increase your sense of loving connection to all beings.
The benefits that you will receive from this meditation are that it provides an antidote to the feeling that you are separate.
It helps you to feel that your life has meaning and also promotes love and compassion.
Interconnectedness is not just a spiritual idea.
Quantum physics finds that we are intimately connected to all of reality.
You may feel alone and separate,
But rest assured that you are not.
Sit on a cushion or a chair in a silent place.
Imagine that you're holding an apple.
Begin to breathe in and exhale,
Being mindful of your lungs as they expand and deflate.
And allow your breath to find its own comfortable rhythm as you begin to relax more and more.
Begin to visualize the seed from which the apple came from.
See a farmer planting the seed,
Carefully fertilizing the ground.
Clouds come and go and rain moistens the earth.
For years,
The farmer tends the tree,
Which is also home to birds and insects.
Until one day,
It begins to bear fruit.
The farmer hires farmhands to pick the fruit.
They pack your apple in a crate with other apples.
The farmer drives your apple to a wholesale market.
The wholesaler buys your apple and sells it to your shop.
Another driver delivers it to the shop.
A shop assistant arranges it for display.
You arrive to the store and pick up that apple as you now hold it in your hands.
Visualize the apple tree and all the people and equipment involved in bringing this one apple to you.
You can extend this meditation by tracing every aspect of the process,
Including the people who built the vehicle that delivered your apple.
At every given moment,
You are connected to an infinite number of beings.
And we can't exist without them.
You are enmeshed in a cosmic web of creation.
Visualize yourself eating the apple,
Feeling your connection to everyone who made it possible.
And now begin to end your meditation by becoming aware of your breathing once again,
Noticing your lungs as they fill with air,
Being mindful of the feeling as they deflate.
And begin to become aware of your surroundings.
Whenever you are ready,
You can open up your eyes.
