Fish & The Marine Life Can Be Our Teachers

According to Wikipedia, “Fish are gill-bearing aquatic craniate animals that lack limbs with digits.” In fact, they are considered to be the first vertebrates on Earth. Fish provided the very basic blueprint for all kinds of body structures. There are more than 32,000 known species of fish in the world and as far as species is concerned there are 3 classes of fish: Agnatha, Chondrichthyes and Osteichthyes. There are many amazing things in their characters, lifestyle and appearance which provide us positivity for life.

We need to learn that every living thing in the world is special and unique in its own way. Although we consider fish a food, we must not underestimate their inner qualities. I used to have an aquarium and I loved to observe them: what they do, how they eat, how they treat other fish that were different from their type.
Trust me, it gave me the impression that they were more peaceful together in that little “prison of an aquarium” than many of us in free communities in human society.

My pet goldfish were amazing; they were beautiful inside out. The lifespan of a goldfish is about 30 years, and scientists discovered that these fish do not have stomachs. They produce significant amounts of waste because they are unable to store the food for long. So, now we know why we need a filter to keep their water clean—the only reason behind their small feeding session.
Maybe that’s why the collective noun for goldfish is “a troubling” to call their group “a troubling of goldfish.” Throughout our lives, some people may appear to be troublesome and we need to keep patience with them instead of getting annoyed. We never know, perhaps they have a valid, justified reason to act such a way, and they don’t have any control. So, we need to learn to be kind to everyone.
Goldfish are very intelligent having the ability of learning to recognize different faces. Goldfish researchers approve that they can distinguish between different shapes, colors, and sounds too. We need to be inspired and enhance our enthusiasm for learning.

Learn from the vigorous fighters, the swordfish, who despite being one of the fastest and most powerful fish in the ocean, never misuse their power. They don’t use their sword-like bill to spear the innocent; they just slash their prey for food purposes because they don’t have teeth. We should learn to stop misusing our power on the innocence of the world.

In life, we need to know the things or ways which will keep our mind sane and wise allowing our brain to work better. Be inspired by the swordfish that despite being cold blooded, “they have a special organ near their eyes which keep their eyes and brains warm so they can see and think better.” If a simple sea-fish can avail such an option to make their mind work better, we should find better ways to keep our sanity in a tough world like ours.

Despite the name “electric eel,” electric eels that produce 600 volts of electricity are not actually eels; they belong to the species of knifefish. This teaches me that we must not claim to get an idea about something only by listening to its name, title, or merely by knowing very little about it. The idea that “Electric eels can’t see what they’re shocking. They’re mostly blind,” should open our eyes to the realization that people can shock us without even realizing it themselves. Indeed, humans can be blind enough to not see that they are hurting others. So, we must be careful, and of course, we should never be one of those blind people to “shock” or hurt others.

Seahorses are rare with many qualities like their ability to swim vertically. They are blessed with natural camouflage with which they can change their color to match their surroundings. We get both a positive and a negative lesson from this. We must learn to adjust with our surroundings by compromising, and for that we may need to change the colors of our regular habits. If it is for the sake of happiness and peace, why not? But the other lesson is that there are people around us who change their dark colors to hide their actual malevolent self. We must be aware of this.

The men in modern times should learn from the male seahorses on how to be devoted and loving to their spouse. The male seahorses’ devotion to their partners reaches its highest peak when, unbelievably, it is the male who gets pregnant in the amusing world of seahorses! Yes, I, being a romantic poet by nature, certainly interpret it this way: the male seahorse loves the female seahorse so much that when the female deposits her eggs into the pouch of the male, he fertilizes them, and carries them till they are ready to hatch. What a caring devotion of love! Researchers are so right to discover that “Seahorses mate for life and when they travel, they hold each other’s tails.”

The men of our world should help their wives during their pregnancy period with some mental support through their love and care, if nothing else. In a hard and competitive world, we need to improve our ability to multitask by learning from the seahorses’ eyes “that can move independently of each other. So, while one eye looks back, the other can look forward or sideways.”

Another amazing thing from the water world is that “the embryos of tiger sharks fight each other while in their mother’s womb, the survivor being the baby shark that is born.” Looks like “survival of the fittest” applies in the mother’s womb of a tiger shark too. We humans need to obtain our rights to survive in peace in the womb of Mother Nature.
Some people call tiger sharks “swimming garbage disposals” because they eat everything including other sharks, venomous sea snakes, even manmade objects like license plates, leather jackets, rubber tires, and huge cans. We can forgive them for having such gluttonous broad diets, however, because whatever they eat moves from the mouth to a J-shaped stomach initially. But when the digestion process begins, the unwanted various items typically never get past the stomach; the shark either vomits or turns its stomach inside out and ejects unwanted items from its mouth.
Although this happens under the ocean, which we usually cannot see, know about this fascinating occurrence. I imagine that today’s war world is like a tiger shark that keeps eating its victims. I wish the war children could be the unwanted victims who never could get past its stomach so that they could be ejected and survived somehow.

There is a vital thing to learn from the oldest multicellular animal on earth, the jellyfish, the body structure of which is 85% and 98% water. The jellyfish doesn’t have a heart, lungs or a brain; still they survive contentedly because this is the way they are born. They don’t need lungs because they can absorb oxygen right through their very thin skin. Since they don’t have any blood, there is no need for a heart for them to pump it.

They have a nerve net just below their epidermis from which they use signals to respond and the outer layer of skin is very sensitive to touch. So, now we know what works for them as a brain replacement. We have to accept the reality with which we are born. There is surely some alternative or replacement out there for anything we lack. We must never get disappointed or frustrated about what we don’t have. Learn to be happy with what we have instead of being sad about what we don’t have. This is one simple way to attain contentment in life.

I can clearly imagine that if I ever interview a jellyfish, it will say, “Look at me! I am living a happy life without any lungs, heart or a brain. You, human, should be on cloud 9 thanking God for everything you have.”

The starfish is not a fish; they are actually from the sea urchin species (again, a lesson that we must not be misguided by based on a name or title). Usually this beautiful creature has five limbs; yet there is a rare group of them having more than five. They are incredibly unique to be able to digest food outside the body as well.
We need to be inspired from the sea star/starfish because they can regenerate. Here is what the scientists say: “A sea star that has the ability to regenerate amputated limbs must first undergo a repair phase to heal the exposed wound.” The process can take several months or even years. In my life, happiness has been amputated several times and at first, I had to undergo a repair phase like the starfish to heal the wound. And indeed, I regenerated, and we all need to learn to regenerate after many physical or emotional damages or spiritual loss in a lifetime.

Over-weight people should be inspired to be sporty and energetic knowing about the stamina of the largest animal in the world—the marine treasure known as the blue whale. They are the oceanic mammals whose “hearts alone weigh as much as a car,” and the beat of which can be detected from two miles away. Their tongue weighs as much as an elephant (Yes, it does!), and according to Wikipedia, the longest whales ever recorded were 33.6 and 33.3 meters (110 and 109 ft.) long. And both were females. Despite their heavy weight and size, they don’t feel depressed about being overweight; rather they really can scoot traveling from the polar region to the equator with the cruising speed of 5MPH and they accelerate up to 20MPH when necessary.
Leafy sea-dragons look like seaweed and because of this physical appearance, they don’t have any predators in the environment. The predators cannot detect them as a source of food because the sea-dragons can be very well camouflaged with the surroundings of the oceanic beauty. Their only real threat is humans because the pollution we make in the water creates so much trouble for them to survive in their natural environment.

In today’s world of confusion, good and kind people are still enclosing us, blended with our surrounding like those leafy sea-dragons that our social predators cannot notice—we need to look for them for a better world.

So many positive things the marine world and animals have to offer us. We just need to keep appreciating and learning. We should be encouraged to know that if a little fish like salmon travels the distance of a marathon which is around 30 miles every single day, we surely could go far beyond imagination through our good deeds. Researchers say, “Much of this swimming is done upstream and is waged against competing currents.” Very athletic indeed!
Now is the time we should break out of our laziness right away! The pupil of an octopus eye is rectangular, but the octopus’s head is round—so what? An ocean-mate of the octopus never starts bullying him for that! We humans should stop attacking others simply for something unusual we find in others.

If the marine animal humpback whale can be famous for its singing, why can’t we appreciate any good music to stay cheerful, even if we cannot sing? And if squid can have 3 hearts, how could we become so heartless and cruel to our own human species? Our heart full of love and care is essential for humanity.

Author: Munia Khan

Author of- “Beyond The Vernal Mind” (published 6th September, 2012) Publisher : Xlibris Corporation, USA “To Evince The Blue” (published 29th October, 2014) Publisher : Xlibris Corporation, USA “Versified” (published 23rd October, 2016) Publisher: Tiktakti Publishing Company, Tel Aviv, ISRAEL “Attainable” (Published 2nd June, 2020) Publisher: Authors Place Press, CO, USA. “Fireclay” (Published 3rd March, 2020) Rushmore Press LLC, Rainbow Boulevard, Las Vegas, USA “The Half Circle” (Published July 15, 2020) Rushmore Press LLC, Rainbow Boulevard, Las Vegas, USA "Art-Alive" (Forthcoming publication 2025) Xlibris Corporation, USA