From Charlie’s essay
But even so, we are very far from the quiet life of fungi, who spend their lives doing only what they were designed to do: sending out threads to collect nutrients and water, and sending up fruiting bodies when it’s time to procreate. Though these actions come totally naturally and without striving, fungi rule the world.
So, I’m wondering whether it’s possible to learn from fungi how to live our purpose, even as we also live as the only of God’s creatures who strive?
I didn’t strive much as a young man. I had a total “live for the moment be here now philosophy.” Oh I struggled with poverty and a string of jobs, but I never strived to get very good at them. I was a musician and I guess I strived for a while as a teenager to get to a level of musicianship so I could play in bands, but once I got to that level I seldom put in the effort to get better, even though I was really dissatisfied with where I was musically. Likewise, I’d get into relationships but did little to build and strengthen those. I’d be frustrated how they fell apart, but I never devoted serious effort or energy to keeping them together. All I wanted that I really strived for was more mushroom knowledge, and maybe that was more obsession than striving. Other than putting some free food in my belly, I really couldn’t say why I spent so much effort on learning about fungi.
That changed radically in 1993 when, all on top of each other, I got an OWI, a share of ownership in a nightclub, a divorce and a promotion to Physical Director at the YWCA where I’d been working as a fitness instructor. Okay, I guess I had also previously strived to get muscles. Though I couldn’t really say why I was doing that either.
All of a sudden I was striving in several ways constantly. I was striving to make the club work because it had so much cool potential, I strove to produce better Y programs because I was now in a position to really help others improve their health. When the nightclub failed despite my striving, I finally strove to get a real education and improve my lot in life. Once I got that education and an okay job I put striving on the back burner, limited once again to learning more about mushrooms. At least I now knew what it meant to strive. Eventually I strove to write and I still do.
I was learning a lot about mushrooms in the 21stCentury because of the Internet and having joined the Prairie States Mushroom Club. Now I know there are many good purposes for that knowledge and I believe I have a partial answer to Charlie’s question in his latest blog, “— whether it’s possible to learn from fungi how to live our purpose —“
Charlie says humans are the only creatures to consciously strive toward a purpose that is greater than themselves, but I wonder. I think he’d agree that procreation itself is not such a purpose, but making a better world for future generations certainly is. It’s in our waning years that such a purpose predominates our thoughts. It reflects a higher love that’s been also called generativity. Some fungi strive similarly, though the consciousness that guides them must come certainly from outside the fungal organism. Morels are one of the best examples of such fungi.
Morels don’t grow where you see them, but they grow almost everywhere else in the woods. When you see them, they’ve quit growing. They’ve begun to face their mortality and have commenced to strive to insure the future of the species. The morel organism lives a long quiet life partnering with a specific tree, doing what it’s designed to do – feeding the tree and feeding off of the sugars the tree produces from sunlight – mycorrhizal symbiosis. Often that partnership begins when that tree is just a sapling and continues until the tree dies. A single morel organism can be as vast as the root system on a giant spreading elm.
When its partner tree dies a morel organism is faced with a choice. It can live for a good number of years preserving its remaining energy before finally dying from a lack of proper nutrients. Or it can push out that energy in a serious endeavor to produce fruiting bodies full of spores that can live on for many decades. Creating fruiting bodies takes extraordinary effort for the morel organism. It must undergo a massive construction project of building propagation vessels (sclerotia) at key locations near the surface of its mycelial web (its underground body), then the rest of the mycelium must sacrifice stored energy to grow the fruiting body in the sclerotia. This growth must build up enough energy for the fruiting body to burst through the sclerotia and into the warm sunlight to become the delicious mushroom that we see. These mushrooms contain enough residual energy to continue growing and developing billions of spores.
Morel organisms don’t often do this. Even in productive woods less than a quarter of all recently dead potential mushroom trees actually have mushrooms, though the morel organisms were undoubtedly under many of the trees. I believe somehow or another a choice was made between a longer quiet life for the individual or giving it all in the extraordinary effort needed to ensure the continuation of the species. I have no idea how such a choice is made for fungi. I’m not about to say fungi have free will, but something made that choice. I believe ultimately it was God’s choice either way as in all things.
So what’s to be learned from this? Here’s what it tells me. When we strive properly we can create some wonderful things. The older we get the more important creating a better future becomes for some of us. We may use our energy up faster by striving, but the results can last far beyond our mortal lives. Do we live quietly for a few extra years or do we pour out our energy for the future of others? God may have made those choices directly for the morels, but He blessed us with the freewill to choose whether to strive or not. The good news for humans is that when we strive for the good of our neighbor, our community and our species, God replenishes the energy with joy.
In recent years I’ve been striving more, practicing daily with Sally to become a better musician, helping friends and neighbors, participating in worship, trying to be a better husband and sharing my beliefs with others. Yeah I still relax and party, but I generally sleep pretty well at night and wake with my energy recharged – no loss from striving. I’m certain however that, if I held that energy to myself afraid to use it, it would dissipate. It would be gone more quickly and no one after me would care. I’m thankful that love keeps me from making the wrong choice. Instead it has me striving toward a better future and my own eternal Joy.
Great pictures, Dave. Fungi are fascinating.
Thanks Diane
One thing I do know is that we humans can root ourselves pretty firmly to a certain “tree”–a place, a group of people, a job, even beliefs and settled ways of thinking or viewing life (a subset of which could be called “prejudices.”) I have been a United Methodist pastor for 34 years and have felt those roots go down into the towns and churches that I’ve served. I also can say that certain aspects of my personal life became pretty deeply rooted in particular ways of living and loving.
We United Methodist pastors know that, no matter how deep our roots get in a certain congregation or community, at some point a District Superintendent is going to call us and say, “Chuck, I’d like to invite you to come and serve as pastor at “certaintown”. Depending on how well we think our ministry has been going in “currenttown”, we might rejoice at the news, or feel immediate sadness. Regardless, there is a mix of emotions.
Then, just as the morels have to “decide” whether to become fruitful or simply slowly die, so do we. We have only limited input into where we will be asked to serve. (Especially as a single man with no significant health concerns, I have always understood that I was one of those pastors who might at times have to “fill in a gap.”) I have been very fortunate! I have always loved and enjoyed the places where the Bishop and Cabinet have asked me to serve. Some have been more challenging than others, but all have been great communities and churches. Still, at different seasons of my life, I have found that I have more or less energy to put into “fruiting.” As I will be moving soon, I must decide that, like those morels that look at their own future and decide to spend their energy–their very life–in producing more fruit, so shall I.