Water is one of the most common substances that makes up the earth, so common that we often forget about it. It comes and goes, leaving little trace, leaving no corpse behind. Or rather, water never dies – one cannot say that water is ‘dead’; either it is there or it is not. It sometimes chooses to be in high altitude or low, and yet it adjusts itself in being fluid, frozen, steam or even dividing into distinct molecules of hydrogen and oxygen. It has neither form nor color, yet it takes the form and the color of its container. Both potent and weak, it destroys the heaviest rocks in a massive waterfall and yet stays serene in a vast ocean.
Water gives rise to life yet it is needless of life itself. All living organisms require water, but water doesn’t need itself to stay alive. Water washes everything but itself. It is complete in itself. Water can save life, yet it can take away life. In actuality, water contains the secret of life on earth. Water arrived on earth from outer space via rocks bearing ice crystals. It is conjectured that these ice crystals may have carried genetic information of life and landed on our lifeless planet, planting the seed of life in the oceans. So the water on our planet may be an interplanetary voyager which became ice in outer-space and then traveled to its next home after its previous planet died. Maybe it will do the same, traveling from this planet. Will water travel to another planet after our planet is destroyed? Is water a galactic wanderer?
On our planet, one of the characteristics of water is that it can live in the filthiest areas where many creatures would not want to live, and yet it is the purifier of all the filthiest and dirtiest things. Water can penetrate into places where nothing else can penetrate. Water makes sounds but its true nature is soundless. It is the source of all foods we eat. Agriculture and food production would be an environmental impossibility without the intervention of water.
Water can travel on earth in the form of rivers and go against gravity in the form of water vapor, become clouds and redistribute itself on the surface of earth as it works with its environment. If soft flowing water confronts an obstacle, in an unselfish manner it will smoothly go around without damaging it. Water is inherently empty of rigidity.
Water indiscriminately feeds all genders and all creatures, but it has no gender itself. It does not have a reproductive system; it is not generated and has no life-span. It seems it comes from eternity and travels to eternity. Water helps everything and everyone, yet expects no help. It is satisfied by itself. Water needs no hunting, no food, no happy times; it is observant and continues life. It is patient. It never gets bored, even if it waits for thousands of years.
Water is also a symbol of life’s philosophy. The personality of a perfect human being is the closest to water’s personality. One may even go further to say that water’s personality equates to what people attribute to God. It is a life-giver and a life-taker. It is existent and non-existent. It is visible and yet can become invisible. It participates in every living thing, yet its presence is imperceptible. It is soft and it is hard. It is passionate and it is forceful. It has form and it is formless. In difficult pass-throughs, water adjusts its shape, yet other elements and creatures are incapable of this. It is fluid and it is solid. It has no fixity in its nature. It follows the laws of nature, yet it has its own intrinsic laws. To the naked eye it seems unremarkable, yet it is the foundation of life. Water is immortal and eternal.
The defeat of water is our defeat. As we progress towards what we call a “modern and ideal society” of comfort and luxury, this selfless entity, water, is being more and more slighted and insulted. In our global shortage of drinking water, people who own cars recklessly use hundreds of liters of drinking water to wash a piece of metal on a regular basis; yet their worldly share of water is ten times less than what they waste in a world of water shortages and droughts.
The defeat of water has become increasingly apparent. Those who pick up a bottle of a soft drink, soda, or artificial juice as a substitute for a glass of crystal clear water, which is completely compatible with everyday life and bodily function, are making a serious mistake. All these sugar-based drinks and artificial extracts do not bathe the cells of our liver, skin, brain and kidneys and wash them in a natural way, as water does. Diabetes, obesity, bone degeneration, allergy, and psychological addiction, in addition to their culturally destructive aspects, are only a few of the problems caused by some of these nasty so-called soft drinks. Only in case of emergency, such as in times of diarrhea, do these sugar-based drinks have some marginal and short-term benefits.
Soft drinks have also become the tools of profiteering capitalism by tapping into our impermanent and transient consuming desires. In contrast, water has been the primary choice of Mother Nature to be the primordial and permanent “soft drink.” It was a choice, if you like, that God made.
Water is known to attack the hardest of all things including healing the hardest diseases. It may mean taking a hot bath in your own home or going to a hot spring to treat sore muscles, arthritis or skin diseases. It could mean simply by drinking a couple of liters of water per day to increase the irrigation of all tissues as well as to excrete toxins and metabolic end products primarily through our kidneys. If this irrigation and excretion decreases due to reduced water intake, then the resulting swamp-like environment inside our body is the condition where diseases manifest.
The wisdom of water in the entire theater of creation dominates life from A to Z. Those who unwisely slight and disrespect the earth’s water by taking overly long showers, washing cars, filling a huge swimming pool with drinking water, washing a few plates and glasses by using many liters of water, or substituting water with sugar-rich, artificial drinks are doomed to pay a high price in deterioration of health and life in their own personal as well as global existence. At the end, water is not hurt – we are. Water is the most charitable element that gives life but expects nothing in return. Water continues its planetary and interplanetary tasks as we speak.
by Mostafa Vaziri
Originally written June 2001, Kathmandu. Revised November 2012