Today, I spent a lot of time thinking about cellular communication. Our bodies are made up of trillions (yes, trillions) of individual cells (if you don’t believe me look it up). While it’s true that cells are specialized to perform certain functions for the body, all cells work towards one common goal: sustaining life. In order to accomplish this monumental task, messages are being sent and received all over your body through chemical and electrical forms. These messages are going from organ to organ, cell to cell, and even from a cell to itself.
Of course it makes sense that cells need to communicate. How else would they know what function needed to be performed? To break down a molecule or to form one? To transport a molecule when it’s needed? However, what I got stuck on was the part where cells often talk to themselves. A cell will release a chemical and then immediately re-uptake that same chemical and react on it.
At first I thought the whole idea of an individual cell communicating with itself was kind of weird, but then I started thinking that I could probably take a hint from this characteristic. (Sorry for the extra long intro. We have finally arrived at the topic I wanted to talk about.) If a cell has to talk to itself in order to sort out what needs to be done, I probably need to do the same thing.
I’m not talking about having a two sided, verbal conversation with myself on the bus. I’m talking about taking the time to go over information and communicating with myself when I need to. Sometimes I’ll begin thinking about an idea and I won’t have the time (or concentration) needed to give the thought the attention it deserves. Sometimes I know what I’m thinking but I don’t know why. Sometimes I think about something I want to do but I don’t put in any effort to do it. All of these ‘sometimes’ situations deserve to be talked out.
Imagine that, like a cell, I write out a message and send it to myself. I already know what the message says but when I reread the message, I’m reminded of why it’s important or what the point of it is or what kind of impact it might have on me.
Even this idea (the one I’m blogging about right now) started out as a scribble on my lecture notes. The thought was fleeting and I might have forgotten about it, except for the message I left myself in my notes. While this blog post might not be that important, I think the idea is and I’m glad I took the time to think about it.
Item 1 on my list of essentials:
-Thinking out all of my thoughts completely and preferably in the form of writing
(I also feel the need to mention that individual cells only release signal that is to be re-uptaken because the cell usually receives signals from the outside. If the cell releases chemical signal that is meant for itself, then it only needs one mechanism for signal reception instead of two. I was simply using the cell as inspiration.)
Essential Sustenance for Contemporary Aliveness 