There’s a lot been said of the ultimate reality that there is no such thing as separateness, and in the end, we are all one.   I think Gene Roddenberry said it best, though, through one of his characters in the TV series, Deep Space Nine.

In this series, Odo is a member of the Star Trek crew on a space station somewhere in the far reaches of space.  Odo is not human; he’s a shapeshifter — meaning that his body is actually a fluid that allows him to change shape at will.  His usual shape is humanesque, probably to best be able to relate to the more typical humanoid life forms with whom he works.

Odo presumes himself to be the last surviving individual of his species, because he just happened to not be on his home planet when it was destroyed.  This gives him a great sense of loneliness, even though he is highly thought of and certainly embraced by the other crew members.   He is indeed a stranger in a strange land, adapting to his environment the best way he can.

Every evening Odo must take time to regenerate; to rest, much like humans.  His resting begins with standing in a container and letting his fluid self simply melt into a liquid in the container.  He becomes formless.  Those resting hours completely regenerate him, recharge him, and he emerges from his rest renewed.

The above is background I give that leads us to the remarkable episode in this series that absolutely takes my breath away whenever I  remember it.  Odo discovers that he’s not the lone survivor of his species.  He finds a small community of shapeshifters on a planet, and his emotional response is palpable.  On the planet where this community lives, they’ve found a dry lake bed that serves as their communal resting place — and they gather every evening and enter this place, and their shapes liquify, actually melt, into the lake bed.   They form a lake of being.  They’ve literally, physically merged together to form one being, so to speak.

Odo arrives at this shapeshifter lake and recognizes it for what it is.  Again, his emotions are palpable as he slowly walks into this liquid and becomes one with the entire group.  Odo lost himself in the lake,  and found his greater being and rested in it.  And he emerged completely renewed.

When the episode concluded, I had to sit in stunned silence and give myself time to absorb the message.

• I thought about Odo’s loneliness, and his bravery to continue with his life and wanting to make a difference in spite of it.
• I thought of the other life forms that sensed his pain and continually reached out, trying to show him his connection to them, and how Odo, while aware of and grateful for their efforts, nonetheless could not shake the loneliness.
• I thought of his unspoken and unspeakable joy upon finding that community and being able to reunite with them.

And I thought:

We humans sometimes feel the very same loneliness for a connection that goes beyond hand-shaking, greetings, and hugs.  We humans who are blessed to have a significant other where we can express our desire for complete union via lovemaking, who during the act of making love actually feel an unspeakable yearning to completely merge / join / unite with our lover — we humans would love to actually lose ourselves in the other person and find our greater being.  And we can feel sad because that total, absolute physical immersion with those we love so dearly just can’t be done.

For me, the symbolism reaches even beyond love for another human being —

• I can sit under a tree, leaning against it, and there I can sense love in the tree for me, and vice versa.  I can sit there in utter stillness, hardly breathing, willing myself to be one with the tree.  I can know a metaphysical union and take delight in that, and still have that familiar sadness.
• I can stumble upon a field of daisies — an acre of them — and immediately get into the middle of this and lie down.  I want to be with it, I want to be in it, and yes I want to be it.
• I can enter a body of water and float on my back for hours, with my hands clasped behind my head for a pillow, and if the water is calm enough I can fall asleep like that, and I feel like I could be there forever.

Sound to me like I best lose myself and find my greater being in nature, and arise completely renewed.

I suppose everyone who viewed this episode could take from it all kinds of messages, and  I think this is the greatness of Roddenberry.  I don’t consider myself a “trekkie” but I have an huge respect and admiration for Roddenberry’s entire team that so successfully wove into the fabric of Star Trek, some awesome wisdom about the nature and diversity of life in all its various forms, and the underlying needs and desires common to all.

The TV series is gone, Gene Roddenberry is gone, but the wisdom found in the story lines has been there forever.

Related posts:

• Words Worth Sharing
• Into The Unexpected
• I Gotta Stop It, Already!
• Life IS Art

Tags: discovery, Gene Roddenberry, inspiration, message, Star Trek, union

Categories: Random Thoughts