Worship: the key to appreciation and connection

I had this thought this morning, that worship is the key to life. Now, I know when I think about worship, and maybe others join me in this, I think of churches, I think of sitting in pews. It's sort of a ritualistic thing that I’ve done, and that's one approach to worship, I think. The other that comes to mind is supplication, where we're bowing down, we're becoming less than the object of our devotion, minimizing our importance, and making the object of our devotion more important. And that's an approach I’ve done, as well.
 
But there's a third, which sort of gets intermingled with the others, but I don't think it's really thought of in the right way, or it's not understood completely, is maybe a better way of saying this. But the other part of worship is praise. And praise, in my opinion, is really the heart of worship. Really appreciating deeply, with great gratitude, the other. 
 
I think that's really important because everything is other. When we think of worship, we tend to exclude everything else except one, especially in the Western world where we have a single deity.
 
I believe that the living world worships constantly. It functions in a state of great appreciation for the other, with immense gratitude, and curiosity, and awe at what the other can manage that it itself cannot. And that is true for every single living thing on the planet. We all, every living thing on the planet, has this superpower, something only it can do. And so worship is the process of noticing that in the other and being deeply, euphorically, joyously happy that that exists, and then expressing that feeling. That's what praise is about. It's not hollow. It's not sanctimonious. It's the actual recognition of the gift the other offers and being aware of how astounding that is and how precious.
 
So think a moment about how that would change your life. If you notice the water coming out of your tap and how amazing it is. Water is just astonishingly awesome. Or you notice the cricket on the front step and begin to really appreciate how amazing a creature it is. How perfectly oriented to its place on the planet it is. How much it contributes to life on the planet. And if you don't understand that, then maybe a little research is in order. Every living critter contributes to life on the planet. That in itself is awesome and worthy of a song of praise.
 
To begin to live our days with a deep appreciation of the tree in front, of the rose bush at the side of the house, of the way we're able to communicate using technology. Ah, yes. I could say more about technology, but I still appreciate it when it truly serves, and I would be very sad to lose the internet. We are gifted all the time with amazing things. When we take the life in our world for granted or dismiss them as unimportant or beneath us in some way, we not only diminish our relationships with them, we diminish ourselves. We only become part of the cycle of life when we're in gratitude, when we appreciate the other, when we're open and responsive to the needs of the other, which only comes through gratitude and appreciation.
 
By being blind to the magnificence of life, we create our own sense of ennui, our own sense of loss, and being more or less a boat adrift in the sea because we're not connected. Connection only comes through appreciation, through gratitude, through wonder. 
 
Those avenues of expression allow for reciprocity. We are not, as a species, very involved in reciprocity amongst ourselves, let alone the rest of the planet. I do find that other cultures other than the Western culture, however, tend to be more in tune with reciprocity, at least in terms of their own family or their tribal or community situation. But it sort of gets tattered at the edges when it expands beyond immediate experience. Not always. We're very generous to other people and cultures under strife and stress. That opens up a little piece of reciprocity. But that pore opens and closes. It's not a constant stream.
 
I think we feel that a constant stream of giving would be depleting in some way. And I think that's true if we think of it as a constant stream of giving. But reciprocity is a circle. It's a cycle. It's a give and a take. It is NOT a give and take, it’s a give and receive – receiving is very different from taking. We tend to think of it in a linear process. I give, you receive, but it's a nonlinear process. You give and I give to somebody else and receive from a third party. 
 
It's that open exchange, open responsiveness that keeps those juices going. And that, for me, is an act of worship. Reciprocity is definitely an act of worship. It is really recognizing both the gift and the need in the other and stepping in to fill that gap, however that looks.
 
I do believe that being in a space of worship is a key to life. It is what stimulates our sense of meaningfulness, of purpose. We begin to feel a part of the whole, so our sense of belonging is stimulated. We feel so empty, us in the Western world, especially the white us in the Western world. So much at sea, so much at a loss for knowing why we're here. And that's only because we don't understand our place, our ability to be in relationship, to be singing the praises of the rest of the world around us. 
 
If we all sung each others praises, then I believe the song of the planet that C.S. Lewis once called the song of the spheres would be something that our planet would resonate with, and we would become a voice in the universe that truly champions life and resonates the glory that life offers us in terms of our own experience.
 
To think about it, how would being in a state of worship change your life?