I have recently become enthralled with YouTube videos that aim to convey the mind-stopping vastness of our universe.
Frankly, it’s amazing to me that astronomers even can measure these distances.
There are quite a lot of these on YouTube, and probably more and more are being created every day. I thought I would show a few that successfully created a moment or two of captivation for me and a forgetting of my “self”, in a good way.
A few favorites:
This first one, by Real Life Lore, is overall just a great video.
This one is very cool because it compares the size of different stars in the universe to each other using an extremely small map scale overlaid onto New York City, giving a constant reference point in order to better grasp the mind blowing differences in size between stars.
Although I don’t think this one has the best narration/voice, I really liked the way it started at the infinitesimally small, expanding to the size of the known and unknown universe.
Finally, this was a creative video that shows the distance between the planets and our own solar system, and compares this to the distance between our solar system and the closest stars. It is perfect for helping understand just how much space there is compared to matter in the universe (way more space than you think).
So why am I sharing these videos on a mental health blog?
Well, one of the things that creates great amounts of stress and emotional angst, is an overblown sense of our own importance. It is a natural part of human development to get attached to our temporary bodies and minds, and we are almost all born into a family in which we feel like the center of the universe. After all, why would those around us seem so affected by us and bend over backwards (hopefully) to ensure our survival, if we were not essential to the planet and universe carrying on? Even if those who raised us are cruel, why would they bother traumatizing us if we weren’t so significant that we needed so much negative attention?
But while this egocentric view of ourselves creates pride and comfort in a way, is also a deadening burden. After all, we all have finite capacities and abilities. We don’t get to choose our aptitudes, or the environment and family that were born into. And all of us are alive for a mere blink in cosmic time. Like a pop-up window on an annoying website — now you see it, now you don’t — our physical bodies exist and then they don’t, and the planets and stars and galaxies continue on and on and on. It is possible that entire species and civilizations have evolved and become extinct on other planets in only a fraction of time that the universe has existed. If we ponder how long life is been around on earth compared with the life of the universe, it was actually only a fraction. And most of that time life was mere bacteria. The amount of time humans have been around in the universe is analagous to the amount of time a typical Tupperware container develops mold in our fridge before we discover it and toss it out. And each one of us as individual human beings is only around for a fraction of that time.
As Sadhguru says, “In this cosmos our galaxy is just a speck. In our galaxy, the solar system is just a super speck. In our solar system, the earth is a micro spec. In that micro spec, you are a big man.”
I don’t fully understand the reasons (how much is built evolutionarily into our psychobiology, and how much is socialized) but I think that many people are walking around with a lot of anxiety about the supposed importance of each of our individual human lives. We feel a burden to “be someone” (as if we aren’t already), to accomplish something, and to somehow achieve indirect immortality by leaving a legacy.
And while it’s perfectly healthy and admirable to want to do something meaningful with our lives, the nearly constant comparison between what we are doing and what we think we should be doing, or have been able to do, is burdensome, exhausting, and anxiety provoking.
I for one have taken solace in, from time to time, taking stock of how small and brief human life is. Paradoxically, I don’t feel as small when I take the time to do this. It helps me let go of the burden of having to justify my existence with sufficient achievement, and instead focus on simply being a part of the universe. It helps me focus on simply being a conscious “piece of life”, rather than simply a collection of personal experiences. It helps with focusing on the present rather than the “story” of my relationship with past and future that make up “me”, this small supermicro spec in the universe.