What is the universe?  It seems like I’ve been asking this question for just about as long as I’ve been looking up at the night sky.  Standing under the jewel-like starry nights, profound questions such as these seem to naturally arise, and I think in part it was these kinds of questions that led me as a child to want to become a professional astronomer.  As I’ve taught astronomy to students of all ages over the past twenty years, I’ve found that I’m not alone in asking these kinds of questions.  Nearly everyone I’ve ever spoken to about the universe has thought along similar lines: “What is all this?  Where do I fit in the big picture?  Who am I?”  Even in the midst of our modern lives and busy schedules, these kinds of questions have a way of slipping through the cracks of our everyday consciousness during our quietest moments. Our curiosity about ourselves and our place in the universe is very natural, and our ability to ask these kinds of questions and wonder about them is part of what makes us human.

A few years ago, it occurred to me that if I were asking these kinds of questions about the universe, then perhaps others might be as well, and so I made of list of all the people I would to approach for their views on the universe.  As I began conversing and having profound and transformative discussions with them, I noticed something very peculiar happening to me.  Bit by bit, so much of what had seemed so certain to me about the universe began slipping away.  The universe, it was turning out, was much, much more mysterious than I had initially thought, and it was leaving me with quite a conundrum.  Here I was, supposedly an expert on the universe as a professional astronomer, and yet after I began asking these kinds of questions, I found myself less and less able to say exactly what the universe actually is!

For example, modern physics holds that the entire universe (including ourselves) is made up exclusively of energy and matter, interacting in various ways to create the world we live in.  Yet in talking with various spiritual practitioners and indigenous elders about the universe, it seemed that very important nonphysical and yet undeniably real aspects of the cosmos were missing from our modern scientific view of it.  So it became increasingly clear that the universe is not just matter and energy but also has a profound spiritual dimension to it as well.  And yet this spiritual dimension is not separate from the material world we interact with on a daily basis.  The two are inextricably intertwined: matter and spirit, spirit and matter. We need both, because we live in a world that is both of these and so much more.

One of the results of asking these kinds of questions and interviewing people from all different fields and walks of life about the universe was my new book Cosmic Conversations www.cosmicconversations.org.  The other result was an appreciation that the universe is not only more complex than we think, but much more mysterious as well. How can the cosmos be matter, mind, energy, spirit, consciousness, love, truth, and all the other qualities we’ve discovered through our sciences, spiritual traditions, and personal lives?  To answer big cosmic questions such as these in a meaningful way, we need to ask more than a few experts and professionals – we need to start asking these questions ourselves.  “What is the universe for me?” is one of the most meaningful explorations we can have, because it begins to tie together our physical, moral, spiritual, outer, and inner lives together into one coherent whole.  Asking these kinds of questions of ourselves and those around us is one of the ways we make meaning of our world, how we find our place in the cosmos, our larger purpose, our higher values, and the truth of our deeper nature.

After a while, asking these kinds of ‘cosmic questions’ not only bring us clarity about what we believe about ourselves and the world, they also begin to slowly unravel what we previously thought we knew about who (and what) we thought we were.  This unraveling can be delicious, because as we begin to wrestle with the truth, untangling the myriad of knots that we find in ourselves, we begin to find that we are much more than we ever thought we were, and much more than we ever thought we could be.  We find ourselves drawn ever deeper into the mysteries of life, deeper into the mysteries of our inner depths, deeper into the starry cosmos, for at the mysterious center of things, we finally come home to discover that all these are one.

About Stephan Martin….

Stephan Martin, M.S., is an astronomer, educator, and writer who has taught astronomy and physics at colleges and educational centers across the U.S. for over twenty years. Currently Assistant Professor of Astronomy at Bristol Community College in southeastern Massachusetts, he is active in exploring and promoting interdisciplinary approaches to exploring the universe.  His current research and writing focuses on the transformative potential of the insights of modern science and their integration into personal experience and everyday life. He continues to lead innovative and learning programs in educational, holistic, and nontraditional learning settings that explore the innovative results of modern cosmology with the insights and practices of the world’s spiritual and indigenous traditions. He frequently lectures and gives presentations on astronomy and the wonders of the night sky at observatories, planetariums, and other popular venues, and has published a wide variety of articles on a multitude of topics that range from technical scientific research to academic papers in philosophy and humanities to popular-level articles on science education and everyday spirituality.  His new book, Cosmic Conversations, is a collection of interviews with scientists, spiritual teachers, indigenous elders, and cultural creatives on the topic of “What is the Universe?” His website is: www.cosmicconversations.org.