The Oxygen Cycle

With your permission, I would like to take us back to a scary place:

6^th grade science class

Braces. Awkwardness. Cooties. Scratchy voice. Hair growing in places it never grew before.

Sorry, if that makes you squirm. For 6^th graders who are reading this, those are all compliments of your pre-teen development that adults “miss” dearly.

Now, call to mind your 6^th grade science teacher and you might remember them introducing the Oxygen Cycle. Oxygen (O2) is generated as a waste product of photosynthesis. This O2 is given off by plants and then taken into the lungs of animals/humans to sustain their lives. Animals/humans give off carbon dioxide (CO2) as a waste product and that is soaked up by plants.

Now that I have you really smiling a big pre-teen, mouth-of-braces, grin, I will share what this cycle really has to teach us.

Oxygen. For us, it represents everything that sustains and supports us in this life.

Call to mind the oxygen in your life – the people, the communities, the Higher Power, etc. that sustain you.

Take a few deep breaths and take in that oxygen that sustains life – literally and figuratively. Physically and metaphysically. Spiritually and in 6^th grade form, pairs of oxygen atoms connected by a double bond.

Give thanks for the oxygen in your life.

But life cannot exist simply by breathing in. We must also exhale what is not needed. For us, that is CO2, carbon dioxide.

Call to mind the carbon dioxide in your life – the elements of life that do not serve you being the best you. Things that hold you back. We all carry this CO2 – fear, self-doubt, selfishness, trauma – as it is part of life, part of the Oxygen Cycle.

Give thanks for the carbon dioxide in your life.

Yes, as important as it is to give thanks and breathe in the O2 of our lives, we can work toward a place of gratitude toward CO2. We can also work on the practice of long, slow exhales and ways to release  our CO2.

There is nothing inherently wrong with the carbon dioxide in our lives as long as we have ways to release it. If left to build up in the body, CO2 causes a medical condition known as hypercapnia which can be fatal. (For those that are curious, COVID-19 does cause respiratory failure but not elevated CO2…but this blog is not about the pandemic, if you have been paying attention.)

Practice today, in the name of 6^th grade science class and the Oxygen Cycle.

Deep breaths in – soak in that oxygen.

Deep breaths out - let go of your carbon dioxide.

Practice a loving mindset and heartset with both actions.

One last thought. It is profound to me that the same CO2 waste product we expel is a life-giving force to the plants around us. Staring at my photosynthesizing relatives, I wonder if they have this same reflection as they watch us gobble up the O2 waste product they were all too eager to release.

Life is beautiful in that way. Not only do we participate in the Oxygen Cycle, but we do so inter-connected to each other in a way that sustains life for us all.

As an added bonus to this week’s piece, I have recorded an 8-minute guided meditation using the Oxygen Cycle as our guide (geez, my 6^th grade science teacher must be proud right now! Or ashamed. Either way, here it is: https://youtu.be/q27YEwPaQk8