Ying Ying

Grass and trees have spirit草木有灵

Ying Ying

Culture

Religion/Spirituality

In traditional Chinese culture, nature is considered as a whole, including all living and non-living things, with a common essence and interconnected relationships. However, over time, I believe modern people find it difficult to understand this relationship between humans and nature. I will introduce a theme: all plants and trees have spirituality. This reveals the symbiotic value system between humans and nature, where people gain energy and spirit from nature and use it to enrich themselves. I am not simply expressing the fact that plants and trees have spirits; I am also expressing that this spirituality permeates the human soul.

I have created an adult storybook to help modern people understand this emotion from a Chinese perspective and establish a description of the relationship between humans and nature. In my adult storybook, I will use four related stories or legends to express my concept. I will use these myths and Chinese traditional customs and stories, as well as modern scenarios and methods that readers can understand, to describe the emotions, characters, and stories of ancient people. This will help readers understand the concept that plants and trees have spirits. I want to use these stories to describe some of the lifestyles and ways of thinking of ancient adults. I want to create a fusion of images and text, combining some abstract cultural information and elements related to Chinese traditional myths and spirituality of plants and trees, as well as some small stories related to Chinese life. Then, I will introduce my adult picture book. I hope to express that the relationship between nature and humans is mutual, where nature can heal humans, and humans can gain energy from nature.