Ep.56 Is Fear Holding Us Back From Evolving (beyond Homo sapiens)?

Welcome to ReConnect with Plant Wisdom. I am your host, Tigrilla Gardenia, Nature-Inspired Mentor and Leadership Coach. In this podcast, I share ancient and modern knowledge, from biology to spirituality, about the wondrous ways plants can help you lead a Naturally Conscious Life.

Hello! Hello! Hello! Everyone! Welcome back to another episode of Reconnect with Plant Wisdom. In general. When I set up and try to create an episode for you, I usually start off with either a question. Somebody asked me a concept that keeps coming up in a naturally conscious community just something

or something that maybe is a whisper of from the plants. And that’s kind of what this this episode really is. It’s a whisper from the plants. It’s a whisper from the plants that’s not going to be so much a look. My! My episodes, as you already know. If you’ve been here for a while, and not exactly completely linear, because after working with plans for so long. The connections go out in multiple directions.

and as I speak the connections become clear. Let’s say it in that way. And so what happens is that I start to go off on a connection and then have to bring it back and roll it back into the discussion. So this episode, which is episode 56

is going to be this type of conversation. So I hope you are ready for a exploration into a topic that

just. I’m not hearing many people talking about. I mean, I’m hearing people talking about it in one well, in one realm, but not necessarily in the way that I’m talking about it. So my goal with this episode is to open a discussion with you. Okay, this is I. I’m I’m letting you into the inner workings of my mind into the way that I

kind of see aspects of the world. And when things kind of don’t gel with the way that that other people have interpreted them. Where do I pull from the science to try to understand? Where do I sit with the plants and try to get to a better understanding and definition, and then I hope I will bring it into why I think this is so important

in your life and my life and everybody’s life. So today’s episode, which is Episode 56, I think I I’m gonna title is Fear holding us back from evolving

now that in and of itself really seems normal, right? Tons of people talk about this. But look.

let’s take this from a biological perspective for a second. And then we’re gonna extrapolate. Sorry I hit my microphone.

We’re going to take it from a biological perspective. And then we’re going to extrapolate out. We’re going to extrapolate. Yeah, that’s a good word for it. We’re going to extrapolate out. So here’s the thing.

Plants and animals have tons of different species.

right? Right? We have, you know, if you look around your own home. Most likely you have plants or animal friends, plant friends who are of different species altogether. Now for those of you that are curious as to exactly what from a biological perspective, a species is. I’m gonna read to you. One of several definitions.

A biological species is a group of organisms that can reproduce with one another in nature and produce fertile offsprings.

If you’ve, you know, even when we’re talking about many different kinds of species, you hear the the Latin nomenclature that we use, that is usually the genus.

and then the species, the genus.

and the species are the 2 most common. It really actually goes much farther. It actually believes it or not starts with life, then domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, family genus and species. So there’s a lot of definitions in there, and you know that we’ve had this whole conversation. Of that. We’ve renamed the kingdom to the Kin home. So maybe I’ll do another episode about that. That would be fun for you to understand. Kind of the entire discussion. Actually, I’m gonna write myself a note kin home.

because that was an entire discussion we had inside the naturally conscious community that was quite fascinating, of how we ended up with kin home instead of King dumb for for that particular level.

So when you’re thinking about species which is the lowest level on the rung, you know of this whole list, the most recent quote, the most recent rigorous estimate for the total number of species in eukaryotes is between 8 and 8.7 million.

Okay, this is these are organisms whose cells have a membrane bound nucleus. I know that sounds very complicated for those of you that are not biologists, but basically all animals, fungi and plants, and many multi, no, not multi, unicellular organisms. Sorry. So all animals, all plants, all fungi, many unicellular organism, which means that if you just divide by each one of those kin homes, animal kin home, of which we are a part.

Plant, kin home, fungi, kin home, and probably all the other kin homes that exist.

We still get to millions and millions of species in each one. Okay.

so before I go into my thinking, let me just kind of break down a little bit more the biology to make it really easy to understand cause there’s a lot of confusion around species. And I don’t think we’re gonna hit. The confusion in this discussion most of the confusion goes when you’re looking at many of these kin homes like the plant Kin home that has so many different kinds of species, and they’ll find line between one species and another, especially when you use that very broad definition that I had about being able to breed

is, it’s not always clear. And the way that plants interact with one another as well as animals and others is that there’s a constant interbreeding that’s happening which means new species are being born every single day.

So basically, Darwin’s most basic theory of evolution. Again, I’m going basic basic on purpose. If you wanna have more details. If you wanna get into this more than you know you. As you know, the naturally conscious community is the place for you to go, because this is where we have these types of conversations. But basically.

Darwin outlined this process where a species could change over time, believed that that evolution was really a slow and gradual process that played out over ends right? So a species are always constantly changing, and new species are being formed in this slow pace of evolution. It’s really hard for us as human beings to see this, because if you were to look at the beginning of time to where we are today we, as homo sapiens as the species that we are, are like a blip in time, in biomimicry. There’s this wonderful kind of graph that always gets shown which I love. That shows like, if you look

at 3.8 billion years of evolution, which is our planetary evolution. And then you look at that. And you go to where humans, as the modern day humans began, we began in the last kind of 2 min of this 24 h story. So if you look at 3.8 billion years and squeeze it into 24 h.

and you you map out how all these different species came to be, or at least even the gene, even the kin home. And you go from that level, and you come all the way down. Homo sapiens are like a teeny, tiny little blip at the very end.

So you know, we haven’t really been here. So therefore it’s really difficult for us to look at exactly what the evolution of the species is.

And the thing is that humans, modern day humans, you probably who was watching this, not the plants that are with you. Your plant friends, Hi, Hi, or the animal friends around you. Hi! Hi! To you, too, or the divine friends that are there. Hello to everybody. Basically humans us. We Homo sapiens all belong to one species

of which, as I just said, the scientific name is Homo sapiens.

we and we differ from other species, such as gorillas and dogs and dandelions. And you know, worms of all sorts like we are a unique cpan, unique, sepiant, a unique species. Homo sapiens is currently the only member of the genus homo that is alive. Okay.

only one species of human.

The thing is. this wasn’t always the case.

So if you go down and you start looking. And you do any history, any anthropological history or paleoanthology? And you look at

the human family tree, the genus. So remember, species is the last piece of this puzzle, and it’s the most individuated, let’s say the genus which is like the grouping homo, goes back about 300 million years, where Homo sapiens, we are about 200,000 years old

from again biology. I am not talking about divine and spiritual realms. There we will have another to come to Dom and her, and we can sit down and look at the spiritual physics, and we can look at whatever it is. That is your philosophical traditions and religious traditions. And we can have lots of discussions. Because I love these discussions.

For right now, we’re gonna kind of. Mix a little bit the philosophical premises that I’m going to bring out with our biological research. Because, you know, this is reconnect with plant wisdom. So we’re taking in what the plants are giving us.

So the genus homo is maybe probably about 3 million years ago. Let’s extend it to the entire Hominin family. And maybe we’re gonna get to 6 million. Okay, we’re getting somewhere in that realm based on the current information we have, humans could be a little bit older, a little bit younger, all possible in the 3.8 billion years of life on this planet.

And yet and yet

in all that homogeneous 3 million years. There were dozens at some point, dozens of different species within which is already small when you compare to other genices.

but still relatively large. Given how young we are. Okay. Fine.

But what happened to them all?

Why is it that we only have

Homo sapiens left? Why is that now?

I could tell you that there is a philosophical argument that I have heard in Damanhur, and we’ve had this discussion in a few other circles around the idea that the sapiens species is relatively aggressive.

Not me, of course. Me me no, but relatively aggressive, and therefore you know, likes this whole competition model. Now, if you remember my one of my recent episodes, we were talking about relationships. And I went through all kinds of different relationships. So we as humans have this.

we we kind of focus us human, as in Homo sapiens focus a lot on this competition factor which is not really the dominant paradigm in a lot of other parts of the natural world. But let’s let’s leave and leave that out for a second.

Why is it that Homo sapiens, the entire genus of Homo only has one species, which is Homo sapiens.

Now.

over the years I have asked this question to plants, because obviously working with many different plants, and especially as I was trying to, as I am always looking, to identify plants, both as the individual being that that specific plant is, as well as being able to be respectful of the species or genus when it applies.

and I have to say that it doesn’t always apply like there are some plans that don’t necessarily, at least in my experience, working with them directly, don’t necessarily, you know.

I don’t wanna say they, and identify themselves as like, you know, as the same species, but at the same time can manifest many different kinds of characteristics, and through different mutations can have various colors and different other aspects of the thing. But again, humans not so much.

And so I got to thinking about this, especially as I was thinking about. What is it that it’s going to take for us as humans to really evolve our divineness. So, moving out from today, the the nomenclature that I talked about is a scientific nomenclature which is, of course, very much grounded into the physical. But given the fact that I

different realms and live in a spiritual community, the spiritual realm is the one missing from that list.

And again, understandably so from a scientific perspective, it’s like, How do you quantify this? But if I think about the whole concept of Homo divinis, which was my original concept. Thought process was, well, how does Homo Sapien evolve to something like Homodibinus, or what? Someone like Harari talks about about Homodays. And then I started to think, well, wait a minute. Is that really the evolution that we want? And then why am I thinking about this one species of human

when again, in conjunction with the plant kin home, I see all these other species.

And so I started to realize that I was like. Is it possible that this thing that I was thinking about is homo divinis is really more homo sapien divinis? In other words, the divine state

that a human being, the existing human being, evolves into. It’s it’s almost like, I feel like there’s this missing link where, you know, there’s this thing between homo

and then, so the genus homo, the species in our case sapien, and then the divinis is the sort of next level which is the divine line which could have many different kinds of aspects. So this is where my mind has been playing around. And I started to realize that there’s this gap.

because in the human realm we only have this one species inside of it.

and it just feels so bizarre when we think of ourselves and exclusionary also. And how can one species really express everything that is inside of that genus? So if you look at everything that is actually physically, let’s just talk for a second physically within us in our possibilities.

Then isn’t it possible that one species is part

only allowing one species to emerge? And I’m going to get to. Why, I said those specific words of only allowing, could that be the thing that is holding us back from the expression of all these different aspects. It’s almost like we stopped at Homo sapiens. And not only did we stop if you think about humans and the way that we talk the way that we act, the way that we behave and the way we label things which I’m going to get to in a second.

It’s almost like we’ve we’ve stunted ourselves that there should be more homo species underneath this genus.

and it is when we have this full expression of all of our different capabilities in all of these different species, that we can arrive to a more divine state and a more exalted state, because now we have full expression, and we can then bring that full expression into the world of form and from the world of form, then we can reconnect back in to all these other subtle states.

The first time I connected with a plant and actually received a response I got chills. It is such an invigorating sensation when you break through like that, and realize just how connected we are, and that we are nature

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It’s it’s a it’s a very difficult concept for me to put into words. And and there are times these are those times when I, some of the friends that I’ve had really friends and colleagues that have had really great conversations about this. It’s like I. I need to invite them, and I will be inviting them more often, because I do think that these are more philosophical conversations that we could have. It’s it’s almost like. For example, my name, Tigr, as you know, is a small South American feline, Leopardis, Tigrinus.

and Leopardo Tigrinus just recently was declared. So they just discovered that there’s another species of me.

so I have 2 leopardos tigerinas, and then oh, unfortunately, I can’t remember the name, and I’ll look it up, and I’ll post it for you. But basically leopardo stigrinos is now seen as one that that inhabits mostly certain areas and has a series of characteristics. And then there’s these slight differences for another species that is still a Tigrino.

So it’s still a T video that has, though slightly different characteristics. And that gives kind of a more northern versus a Southern, and I thought this was beautiful, that being said, there’s also the Margai and the oceans, which are very close species cousins. So we’re all kind of cousins one within another, and that gives us the opportunity to express these slight differences, and

which is the part I love. It allows us to express our connection, to place

and our connection to place our connection to our environment, our space. The fact that we are a part of the environment is a big part of what we’ve been missing as human beings. It’s our disconnection to nature, which, therefore, is our disconnection to our own true nature, our own plantness and rockness, and all these different aspects. So it’s like, it’s as if

for leopardos, tigrinos divinus, to develop this kind of divine level connection. You need to have all these other species that allow the full expression of this genus.

whether we’re talking about an animal in that case, or Rosa Hofemia like whatever we’re talking about for them, for for these to reach their divine levels, we need this full, full expression. And so what happened to the various sapiens like to the various homo species below them.

And lately I’ve been watching a lot of there’s a show. I I watch it on Youtube. I’m sure it was on television at some point or is on television called Born differently.

And I was watching this. This is several years ago, probably about

5 or 6 years ago, when I first started to watch the show. I was watching with, you know, sitting with spider plants and several other plants, and I was watching, and I kept getting this sort of nudge, as we were now born differently, as a show that shows people that we would today label as handicapped.

Just just put that in air quotes

handicap is the way that these that that originally watching the show, you would think of these people.

But the think about this is that it shows

that these people actually that these people have these beautiful, rich, amazing lives and capabilities that have only been able to emerge, thanks to the fact that they have this other, this other situation that today we call it a handicap.

So it I kept thinking about different plants that I have seen have to adapt to certain conditions and to grow in certain areas, and how that has developed into the species that we revere today.

So today, we see many different types of species of plants that we think of as amazing, beautiful, we, we cove it, we, we study. We have all these different aspects and connections to. But if you go back to the origin, to the first emergence of that species, it came through usually a situation of drought, or some kind of extreme condition that then pushed the plant to develop different aspects of themselves, and to prioritize certain things and diminish certain things. Now in a plant, when we see this in a plant, we think amazing like, look how this plant has adapted. Look at all of these new characteristics we think of this with, we use a lot of terminology and a lot of words that are in the positive realm.

But when the exact same thing happens to a human. So in embryo, maybe there wasn’t enough oxygen, or there’s not enough space, or there’s not enough things. And the person is born.

We label it a handicap

not diversely abled, which is the term that I currently use today, not an adaptation

in a survival instinct, an ability to morph into a different form of human

that could, according to Darwin’s own definition of evolution, eventually continue to morph with subsequent

sometimes, when you use biological terms. And you’re talking about humans. It sounds a little insensitive, or it sounds rude. But hopefully, you’ll understand why I’m saying it as that species continues to breed, or, you know, regenerate or have children.

That particular characteristic enters into the Sapien, and eventually could be that that sapien turns into something else. So, rather than having one form of Homo, we might eventually arrive to have a second one. And isn’t that amazing? Like what capabilities are we?

Could we potentially have that we? Because we’re so afraid of not knowing of of not wanting to be outside of the norm.

We kept thinking that we’re going to hold this back. We’re going to medicate you. We’re going to give you therapy. We’re going to isolate you. We’re going to make this seem as if it’s a one off.

We don’t revere any of these differences

and look at, and I’m not saying we should trigger them on purpose, because that doesn’t work either. That’s not the way the natural world, I mean. Sure there are some horticulturists that are trying to do that. And botanists and molecular biologists that are doing that. But that’s not really what we’re talking about. Let’s go from the natural approach using Darwin’s kind of definitions. And such.

isn’t it possible that many of the things that today we’re labeling with. All these negative labels are really a whole series and of characteristics that are expanding. You know, autism down syndrome. Who says that these are handicaps. What if they’re diversely abled that? Should we allow this to be exalted?

Should we see the amazing skills and gifts and talents and and capabilities, physical as well as mental and emotional and spiritual, that these individuals have what that be amazing and enriching to the overall sapien landscape with the possibility of us having more expressions of the enormous amount of capabilities within us from a chromosome level, from a DNA level, from so many different aspects.

Yes, will there be hardship, of course, like sometimes there is hardship in that, but there’s hardship in life at all levels, like each one of us experiences different types of of hardship, no matter what our capabilities are, it’s just that sometimes our capabilities are within a container that looks quote unquote, normal, and therefore we treat as as you know

us, as if, like these are the people that we should be like. And then we look at others, and we say, Oh, I’m so sorry this happened to you.

It’s so sorry like, have you watched something like born differently? If you sit down with somebody who has some of these different situations, and we were to take away the cultural norms that do not allow us to enjoy it or to create

landscapes and new environments for these people to fully express themselves. I mean, how much of the problem is the person’s individual state versus how much of it is that our society is not flexible enough to embrace and create and work with this.

And so much of this is that fear. We have this fear that this is wrong, more work. It’s sad. It has all these types of characteristics that therefore we hold our society to a whole series of barriers and boundaries that then puts these people inside, and then says to them, See, they’re suffering.

and it’s like no society is creating a whole series of different aspects. Now I understand that this is a somewhat limited discussion in the way that I’m presenting it, and I do not. I qualify this right now. Do not pretend to have all the answers.

I have been blessed in my life with so many different types of people like between my travels, between the fact that I think I just am a person who looks for those experiences and who recognizes even my own. You know neurotivergence. When I was younger, and neurotivergence that I have, I recognized it when it was much younger, but I didn’t label it as such.

I was able to work through it in a different, completely way, so I see the expansiveness of it, not just for myself, but for the people around me. I’ve had, you know, friends and and family members, and with all kinds of different aspects, and rather than looking at it, as you know, something is wrong, it’s more of wow! What are the abilities that come with this?

What are the capabilities that you have. How are you interacting with society? And where is society also failing you? Because society is built? I’m gonna give you a really silly example, because you know me. Sometimes I give super banal examples to understand this.

I have a very good friend, who is extremely extremely tall.

very tall, like, you know, 6 that can’t even speak like, you know, 6 foot 7, 2 meters, 5 like a really tall person who’s been in my life for a long time, and I remember having conversations with him about how difficult the world was to navigate for him because he was so tall. He people oftentimes talk down to one another like physically, and so he would have to like lean in closer, because people don’t think to to speak. Facing upwards.

Houses are built. I remember his dream was to have a house that was built at his size so that he could do things.

Now we don’t look at somebody. Who is that tall who is not ridiculously tall, but he is very tall for modern society. We don’t look at this as a handicap.

We think of this as a whole series of other capabilities that he has, thanks to his height. And trust me, there are. It’s super. It’s super interesting. He once carried me around to let me see the world from his height. And it’s it’s just a whole different experience. Anyways, there’s all these capabilities that he has. But we look at Tallness, especially in that level of tullness as something that is beautiful as an expression, as in abilities going the other direction. And once you start getting into people who are shorter, there comes a point where you’re short, and there comes a problem point where you’re handicapped.

We have very different labels. And so, therefore, these people, where, if you were looking at the skulls of these people, and if you were going at this from a paleontologist perspective, I’m not saying looking at the skulls. Now, I’m saying, as a paleontologist perspective years in the future we might even think of these people as different species, because they have a whole series of different characteristics from us.

but we’re not allowing them to fully evolve into their complete selves, just like where we would leave in plants right? We have several plants that are like dwarf species and large species.

We have all these different aspects, and we allow that full expression, and we don’t label one good, one bad.

A dwarf rose is not bad compared to a normal rose. A dwarf poodle from a dog. Perspective is not any worse than a regular size poodle, right? Even our own terminology, regular size, larger, smaller. We use things like regular, normal. And all these aspects, and we continuously hold back our evolution.

And I think we do this. This is a big example which oftentimes helps me to see

where where to look. And then I start going from there into, because that’s more of a societal norm. And then I I start taking from there, but steps backwards to look from society to the individual, both the individual that is experiencing this kind of bias and is being held back from their full expression because of this, such as autism or hyperactivity, or any kind of neurodevergence, for example, or even somebody who is born with 6 toes and or 6 fingers. We look at this as something negative, where maybe over generations, those 6 toes will turn out to be extremely useful for a new landscape that is developing in our world.

We keep trying to pigeon hold people back into what we think today is normal. 10 fingers, 10 toes, 2 eyes, one nose, one mouth, all of these different things, and then moving on beyond that from the way that the the person acts to the way they think to the way

I invite you, even if just from an academic experiment.

2. Maybe you could do this in a meditation. You could do this through a journaling exercise. I invite you to connect with a plant partner.

you know. Have a plant, friend, whether it’s an ancient tree or a plant that has been living in your household for a long period of time. Somebody you feel that you could really connect with. If you’re not used to doing this, and I invite you to take a little time to ask about species differentiation.

To open yourself with this plant partner in a safe environment, you can come into the naturally conscious community and do it with us to really invite you to

ask your plant partner to show you, what does species differentiation mean within the plant world?

Just explore that

I pretty much guarantee you that what will come if you truly open yourself, and you remove sort of your human labels for a second you remove your aspects of this is good, and this is bad, and this is healthy, and this is unhealthy, and this is suffering, and this is living a good life, and if you just remove all of that, give you give yourself a little space where you put all of that outside of it. However, that feels good to do.

and your plant partner can definitely help you, because those kinds of terminologies don’t really exist in the Kin home and ask your plant partner to sort of bring you into a journey

where you get to see how species developed, and what does the species development and differentiation mean to that specific genus. So you could pick one specific genus. It could be specifically the plant you’re working with, or it could be something much more broad. But I invite you to just try this, see where it takes you, experiment with it. Give yourself the opportunity to have different definitions.

and then from there ask yourself. Give yourself some extra space and pull. Recall in yourself

as well as maybe other people around you other humans. Excuse me, let me differentiate because you’re working with a plant person, not with a human person. What changes in the way that you see this person’s life.

thanks to this new vision that comes to you from plants. So allow your plant partner to show you what species differentiation is, and then give yourself space to let that integrate into yourself

and integrate into your relationships and definitions of humans around you, and ask.

what changes?

What does this allow me to do, and to be especially for myself? Where is there a fear that is holding me back from the full expression of some part of myself? Because current society sees that full expression as something wrong. It has a label for it.

Where am I not able to really lean into my neurodivergence, which might give me a greater appreciation or experience with music or colors, or with a different way of expression. Where am I holding myself back? Because my species differentiation that is coming out is not normally accepted in mainstream society, and therefore is holding me back from my full expression.

I’d love to hear what comes up from you from this. I’d love to hear what you think about this whole? Am I? Am I just off? Am I? Am I just thinking way too far in a different direction? I welcome your feedback. You can leave me a comment. You can reach out to me directly. You can come into the naturally conscious community and tell me I really want to have this discussion because I am getting super frustrated, and especially when I work one on one with people, and I see how much they hold themselves back when I work with a human that is completely holding back their expression for so many of these different aspects. And I ask if we change the overall kind of way we look at this at a high level. How much more freedom will we, as individuals, feel at the individual level?

So that’s my my my request to you, I would say challenge. But it’s really more of a request.

And so I look forward to your feedback. I really wanna continue these types of conversations. Your feedback is what makes not just this podcast possible, but it really helps every single person that continuously, you know, is entering into these realms to express themselves better. So please reach out and let me know. I I absolutely love your feedback, even if you’re against what I say, or if you see in a completely different way. Actually, that’s the diversity. I love it all. I love all of the different ideas because you are a unique being with your own unique experiences, and and it is through that expression that we reach the richness of diversity that we’re all looking for.

So that’s me, Tigrilla Gardenia for this episode. I hope you enjoyed it, and I look forward to seeing you next time. Remember, resist the urge to hold back your emerging green brilliance, no matter how strange or weird it is. bye.

Thanks for listening to this episode of reconnect with plant wisdom, Intro and Outro Music by Steve Shuli and poinsettia from the singing Life of Plants. So join me to give you like our Dania and my plant collaborators next time on reconnect with plant wisdom.