In our modern world, with its technology, materialism and its consumer-society, the individual has for the most part lost or forgotten the link, bond or nexus, which exists between them, Nature and the cosmos beyond.

This bond exists because the individual is a living organism, with an organic past, and because this organism for its health and its very life, depends on Nature. It is a modern fallacy that we, as individuals, as human beings, are somehow different from or superior to Nature. We belong to, are part of Nature - to the creative, vital and biological processes of Nature - just as much as trees or a wild animal belong to Nature. Our very life is an expression of this bond between us and Nature herself.

There have, however, been several recent attempts to try and understand, and to re-establish, this living nexus between us, as living human beings, and between Nature. These recent "environmental" and "ecological" attempts mostly focus on the individual, in isolation, and on the "life-style" of the individual, aiming to show that there is or could be a personal "life-style" for the individual which is more "in harmony with Nature" and thus which aids Nature, or helps to protect Nature from exploitation by human beings. Some of these recent and well-meaning attempts go further, and suggest various types of human society which could be constructed to do these and similar things.

However, all these recent attempts are based upon a fundamental mis-understanding of the bond between ourselves and Nature. These recent attempts all ignore how we came to be as we are - how and why we have evolved. What has not been understood is the fact that we ourselves are still subject to the law or processes of Nature - we have arisen because we have evolved from Nature, and because of the biological imperative, the organic Destiny, of our ancestors.

To understand the bond which exists between us and Nature we must understand our own biological imperative - our Destiny as living organisms. This Destiny not only explains the bond between us and Nature, it also enables us to understand what the meaning of our life is - what the purpose of our existence is, here on this planet we call Earth.
 

All living things on this planet, all organisms, are subject to the laws of Nature, to the biological imperative implicit in life itself. Thus, all organisms are born; they all have the potential to grow; they all, if healthy, seek to reproduce themselves, or have descendants; and they all, as individual organisms, must die. All organisms also have the potential to change - to adapt to the conditions they encounter or find themselves in, although for most organisms this adaptation, this evolution, to be noticeable or significant, occurs over many generations. The biological Destiny which a living organism has depends on its type - on its species, and is thus determined by evolution. A particular biological species is different from other species because of evolution - it has adapted itself over a period of time to do certain things, and has acquired certain characteristics, a certain nature. This nature is inherent in a particular organism because that organism is what it is - a distinct biological type - and because of the ancestors of that organism.
 

Thus, a butterfly has evolved to have wings and fly, while a flea is confined to where it can go on, or by means of, its legs - both belong to the type we call "insects", but they are very different, distinguished by what they can do or cannot do. A butterfly has the "nature", the character, of a butterfly, while a flea has the "nature" of a flea. Fleas have evolved to suck blood from hosts for their food, while butterflies have evolved to fly in search of their food.

In the same way, we as individuals are who we are - we have the nature we have - because of our ancestors, our culture and our heritage. That is, because of our community. Our own human species has evolved, over vast periods of time, into diverse cultures, each of which has their own unique nature, their own way of life, traditions and 'view of the world'.

Contrary to what many people have been led to believe, or do now believe, these different cultures of ours are of fundamental importance because they express how Nature is manifest to us - they express how we are connected to Nature. For what is of vital importance about culture is this bond to Nature - for it is this bond which defines our own character, as individuals.  Our culture expresses, or represents, how we came to be who we are. In the simple sense, culture is an expression of the law or processes of Nature - of how Nature works, and is made manifest to us. Human culture is evolution in action - Nature labouring to produce more diversity.

We need to understand that our culture is our connection to Nature and thus our connection to the very cosmos itself. Just as we, as individuals, are Nature made manifest in an individual organism, so our culture is an organism which manifests Nature. In the simple sense, our culture is a living thing, a supra-personal organism which we are part of. The organism of our culture has lived for thousands of years before us, and it can live for thousands of years after us if those who are part of it aid it by seeking to preserve and extend it and keep it vital and healthy. The biological imperative - the organic Destiny - of a culture is to survive, to develope itself, and to evolve further.
 

What we have lost in modern times is an appreciation, an understanding, of this living, supra-personal, organism which is our culture. Culture gives the individual their organic Destiny, and is the meaning of the life of the individual. What most people today assume is "the meaning of life" -
personal happiness, pleasure, material comfort and so on - is an illusion; for such artificial things are barren, devoid of organic Destiny. These things are abstract ideas - they are not living beings, as a culture is a living being. Destiny - meaning and purpose - for an individual, is the organic Destiny inherent in them because of their culture.

The real truth about Nature and ourselves is that our purpose, our meaning, is to strive to keep alive or advance or to keep healthy our living culture - that is, to aid the organic Destiny, the ethos, of our own culture.  For a living culture is a way of life, a way of viewing the world, Nature and the cosmos, based upon a respect for tradition and a real reverence for Nature.

An individual has been born from their ancestors to do this - to keep alive and extend the ethos of their culture - and if this is not done, than that individual life has severed their connection to Nature and the cosmos beyond. In the past, most individuals fulfilled some of this Destiny by marrying folk from the same culture and producing children who could carry on that culture - its traditions, its way of life, its ethos. These descendants contained the potential of the culture - they were a means to aid or to fulfil the Destiny of the culture: that is, keep it alive, vital, living, and developing in a natural, organic way, in harmony with Nature and the cosmos.
 

Destiny, for the individual, is vital; it is numinous; it is inspiring and life-giving. Destiny produces health. In contrast, the material and selfish illusions which today pass for "meaning" and for "living" are lifeless and devoid of substance. In the same way, modern societies which are based upon these material and selfish illusions are lifeless and devoid of substance: they have no living connection to Nature and the cosmos because they are un-cultural.

It is part of our human nature that we must belong to, or identify with, a living culture. An individual without a culture lacks a real, organic, Destiny and  has lost that which connects them to Nature. As such, they have lost their very soul - their psyche - and it is this soul, nourished by its connection to Nature and the cosmos, which can bring true happiness and the true contentment  of belonging. Lacking a cultural identity, many modern individuals are for the most part "rootless", and  lost.  They have little or nothing to respect. Yearning to belong, yet having nothing real, nothing organic, to belong to, to connect then to Nature and the cosmos, they are unhappy, and disrespectful, and this disrespect often manifests itself in disruptive, unethical, behaviour.

Furthermore, it is this connection to Nature and the cosmos which a culture gives to individuals which enables us to be truely human and so respect ourselves, our ancestors, other cultures and Nature herself. For all cultures merit respect because they are all aspects of Nature - part of that wonderful diversity which Nature has strived to produce.
 
 

Our modern belief in our own self-contained uniqueness is an illusion. This is the belief that we have a wide-ranging "freedom" to choose or determine our own destiny. The reality is that because we are organic beings, we are part of, and dependent upon Nature, and thus upon our culture, and the only real freedom we have, as part of this larger organism which is Nature, is a freedom to aid Nature or not to aid Nature. That is, to work in harmony with Nature, or be disruptive toward Nature.

Our sense of individuality, our individual consciousness, is an evolutionary adaptation. This adaptation has enabled us to evolve up from a primitive, barbaric way of life by cooperating together in pursuit of noble aims. The awareness that such consciousness brought enabled the creation of a higher, more evolved way of living - the communal living of societies, and later on, of cultured civilization. That is, our individuality, our personality, was a means to aid our culture, our identity - and this was often done through a triumph of individual will, through individuals consciously placing the welfare, the well-being, the future, of their community, their culture, before their own self-interest and their own individual survival.

However, this individual awareness could also be, and often was, disruptive - leading individuals to undermine, reject and sometime destroy their culture. Often, it led individuals to seek to destroy other cultures as well.

A living, evolving culture is an organism in balance - it can grow, and live on, but it can also become weak, ill and die, just as it can be killed by external forces.  A living culture is renewed when its folk - those who embody its ethos, its way of life, its traditions - are aware of their culture, respect it and transmit it to their children who in turn have respect and awareness and a desire to add to the traditions. A living culture becomes weak, and can die or be killed, when there is no one to embody its ethos, no one to carry on and add to its traditions, or when some external force forcibly destroys it.

Now, the evolution of individuality, of consciousness,  presents us with a choice. In a very important sense, we are at a vital juncture in our human evolution - for we can choose to understand and so aid Nature, or we can choose to undermine and destroy Nature. We can choose to aid, and respect, our cultures, or we can aid their destruction. It is a really a question of awareness - of how we view ourselves, the world, and the cosmos. We can view ourselves as just individuals, or we can view the wider cultural perspective.
 
 

The real truth of our individual lives is that we possess a cultural-awareness: an awareness beyond the short span of our own individual lives. However, the reality of our present is that this cultural-awareness, this wider perspective, is increasingly being lost in the artificial, lifeless societies of our modern world. In the past, this awareness was mostly instinctive - a product of our heritage, of our communal, our cultural, identity. And it is this awareness which gave, and which can give, meaning to our lives, just as it is this awareness which shattered, and which can shatter, the disruptive illusion of our independent self.
 

This cultural-awareness is an awareness of how we are connected to Nature through our culture and the community in where that culture lives and flourishes. It is an understanding, instinctive or conscious, of our heritage and Destiny; it is an awareness that our culture has existed for thousands of years before us, and can exist for thousands of years after us. It is an awareness that we are our culture made manifest in a particular time and place.
 

Yet this cultural-awareness is only part of what exists - it only expresses part of what we  human beings are through being a living part of Nature. For there is an awareness, a vision, a consciousness, beyond this. This greater awareness is the awareness of Nature herself, and of the cosmos beyond Nature. Each culture is Nature herself made manifest - Nature incarnate in human form, in the individuals of a particular community. Similarly, Nature is the cosmos made manifest - an incarnation, on this planet we call Earth, of the biological, or organic, imperative of the cosmos. Life itself is the cosmos striving to evolve - the manifestation, in a particular time and space, of the cosmic order which is life. When there is a conscious awareness of these relationships between the cosmos, Nature, culture, community and individuals, then there is an understanding of life itself.

This supra-personal understanding, this perspective which takes us beyond the individual, not only gives meaning and significance to our own lives, it expresses what the meaning of our lives actually is, and what is beyond our own individual lives when we as individuals die.

What is beyond us, is a whole cosmos of connections and Destinies - a living, or organic, matrix full of living organisms, ranging from the cosmos itself down to planetary-sized organisms such as Nature here on Earth, with its own intricate matrix of living, evolving individual cultures composed of living, changing individual members.

Our very aim as conscious beings, is to discover, to come to know, to understand, this cosmic organic matrix, and to aid its living, its organic manifestations, and its evolution, as best we can. This knowing and this aiding of the organic Destinies of the various organisms, and particularly of our own culture, is for us, as individuals, a further evolution - it is we ourselves contributing to evolution. It is us as individuals going beyond what we are, in a particular time and space, and so fulfilling the purpose of our existence, as living beings possessed of will and possessed of consciousness. Because of this, it is a seeking to participate in the great drama of cosmic evolution. It is us aiding Nature and the cosmos itself.
 
 

If we so aid these organic Destinies, we ourselves become these Destinies, and become incarnate in the future, in a developed form. That is, if we aid the evolution of our culture and the community in where that culture lives and thrives, we become our culture, its very future. We thus also become Nature, in evolution, and the cosmos itself - we become the very life of the cosmos. That is, we live-on after our own individual death in these things.

This living-on, however, is not given, not certain, not fated - it has to be achieved, by the individual in this life, through a triumph of individual will and through an aiding of culture and the community on which a living culture depends. If it is not achieved, then the promise of life in the individual  is unfulfilled.
 
 

This leads to the conclusion that beyond our individual death, there is no "heaven", no "hell", no "nirvana", no "paradise", no "Valhalla" where we live-on as individuals with the feelings, the awareness of ourselves as individual beings. There is also no "re-birth" as another individual. For these are all illusions built upon the illusion of an independent self. All there is or can be is a supra-personal awareness - a transcending, or development, to become a new type of being. This new type of being is part of, or lives, in the supra-personal organism which is our culture and its community, and which are themselves of Nature and the cosmos itself. For these are all manifestations or incarnations of the very essence of life itself, and all parts of the same thing, the same type of living, ultimate, Being.

In truth, there is no division of this essence, this Being, as there is no space dividing world from world, and no slow passing of causal time. In the simple sense, if we transcend - through our achievements and our aiding of culture, of Nature, of the cosmos - to what is beyond our individual existence, we  transcend to what is immortal: the Being of the cosmos with its many manifestations, one of which is Nature upon this planet which we call Earth. The cosmos itself, and all life within it, is then our home, and we can travel the cosmos and dwell anywhere within it. This is so, because we become the very essence of these things, which exists beyond our normal time and beyond our normal causal space.
 

There is an understanding, and insight, here which is profound, awesome and important for our future. Unfortunately, it is an understanding which many people in these times will not or cannot understand or appreciate, since it is contrary to the illusive beliefs, the illusive dogmas, and the materialism, which dominate and determine the societies of our time. As such, it is the insight, the understanding of the next thousand years, and one which will aid, or create, a more highly evolved human being.
 

The life and health of a particular culture depends on the community which upholds the ethos of that culture - its customs, way of life, traditions and so on. In a very important sense, this community is the culture.  To flourish and be healthy, such a community requires a home - a homeland where they can live in freedom according to the ways of their culture.

A living culture can only thrive in - and often actually depends upon - a particular geographical place, and all require such a place as their centre, their homeland. This is so because such a place is where the culture is connected in a real way with Nature - with the Earth itself. It is where the individual of that culture can gain the wider perspective, the appreciation of Nature and the cosmos, which is essential, and which can and often does bring  respect, harmony and well-being. Often, the very traditions and way of life of a culture are bound up with a particular geographical area. This area, this heartland of the culture, is almost always respected and revered when the culture itself is healthy, vital, alive. For it is regarded as the home of the ancestors - the home of the culture itself.
 

For a particular culture to survive, prosper and evolve - and thus for Nature herself to be aided -  that culture must maintain its own identity. The community  must value its own traditions, heritage and way of living, as they must seek to develope their culture.  They must also seek to develope or maintain a way of life which brings them, or some of them, into harmonious contact with Nature - that is, they must seek to work with Nature, and not against her, with the land, the very soil, being cared for, since the community, and their descendants, depend on its well-being.
 
 

A living, thriving culture is based upon a community whose individuals willingly accept the way of life of that culture and who thus strive to put the welfare of their community before their own self-interest.  These individuals belong to their culture, and its homeland -  they are rooted in this homeland, and their culture, as a mature oak tree is rooted in the earth: almost a part of the landscape itself which they have an innate love and a deep, wordless respect for.

In contrast, modern non-cultured societies aim to satisfy the selfish material desires of the individuals within that society. There is no supra-personal purpose which individuals can aspire to and which inspires them, and indeed no united purpose which such societies strive for - except for vague and illusive and abstract ideas like "happiness" and "security". Thus, such societies are dis-organized, de-evolutionary and do not work particularly well. They are also disrespectful of the land, of Nature - viewing it as just another "commodity" to be developed, used to make profit, or sold to the highest bidder.

We have now reached the stage of our evolution when we possess the understanding - and have developed the self-centred arrogance, the illusion of self - to either aid Nature, or to severely damage Nature. A cultured society -  a living community bound by a particular way of life, with a supra-personal perspective and a respect for Nature - is a step toward aiding Nature and our own evolution, as human beings.  Every other type of society is now, or assuredly will be, detrimental to Nature.

To create cultural societies requires us to act with understanding, to be self-disciplined, to achieve our own unique triumph of the will by seeing and acting upon the wider cosmic perspective. We either recognize, and strive to restore, our connection with Nature evident in culture, or we selfishly and arrogantly ignore this connection, and damage Nature, so destroying the future of our own species, here on this planet we call Earth.