“See first with your mind, then with your eyes, and finally with your body.”Yagyu Munenori

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“However, in doing so, it is worth noting that yoga had been transformed in one sudden leap of evolution. In fact, with no historical precedent: from a practice generally related to transcending the body, yoga was now a means for living more comfortably within it.”Adam Keen,Ashtanga, seen on Instagram

We let ourselves slide backward from the catamaran into the water—you first. The sea was surprisingly warm, soft like a breathing body. For a moment my stomach clenched—that fear that arises when one comes into contact with an all-encompassing dimension. Then I lifted my gaze and woke up in the world we come from.

The reef was a garden without soil, a labyrinth of color and movement. Corals shaped like fingers, fans, nodules, and blossoms—luminous, fragile, ancient. Tiny fish darted past like flashes of thought. I heard only my own breathing inside the resonant tube of the snorkel.

You pointed at something—a turtle. In the crystal-clear water above the reef, the sea appeared like a calm mirror beneath whose surface a millions-of-years-old ecosystem maintained its own precisely attuned rhythm. The diversity of forms and colors unfolding there is the result of an evolutionary process that works slowly yet effectively—a balance shaped by adaptation, symbiosis, and continuous change.

“Six out of seven sea turtle species live here.”

At a time when biodiversity is declining in many parts of the world, Australia stands as an example of concrete, effective conservation measures. The establishment of protected areas, the monitoring of nesting sites, and legally enforced fishing bans have produced tangible results—at least with regard to sea turtles.

The turtle we encountered—most likely a green sea turtle (Chelonia mydas)—moved with remarkable elegance. Its golden-yellow belly reflected the incoming light; its movements were calm, even, almost weightless. Its behavior appeared both purposeful and graceful. This species has existed for over 100 million years; it has survived mass extinctions, continental drift, climate change. Encountering an animal so deeply rooted in the planet’s history relativizes one’s own presence. For a brief moment, we followed it through the reef.

It was quiet, even though life was raging. A vital carpet stretched across the seabed, built by tiny creatures that drew limestone and color from the water. Beings without eyes, without voices, yet endowed with a persistence that allowed continents to come into being.