Connection and Separation

The theme for today is "Connection and Separation"
Which came first, connection or separation?
This is a trick question,
or a koan,
like the chicken and the egg.

As humans, we constantly orbit this theme,
moving in and out of connection
closer and further, seeing and feeling it from many angles and distances.
We have many words for it
but so much is at stake
that they scare us
and it may be better not to say their names.

The knowledge is wonderful
and the knowledge is painful
and we see as much of it as we can bear.
Where can we find the strength?

Last week we talked about the relational attitude
which is a way of organizing oneself
listening to the world and self with respect
but relationship itself is a given,
not something that's earned or learned
though we may need to re-learn it
or unlearn some things in order to remember it.

Separateness is a basic myth of human life:
not wrong, but it's part of a much bigger story.

To what do we belong?
We belong to the earth, and to our place in it.
Modern people are anxious and terrified from forgetting this
and forgetting that they forgot.
We belong to our body.
We belong to our many selves.
We belong to our friends and groups.
All these belongings may be taken for granted
until perhaps, we face their loss.

Indigenous traditions have a myth that there are three worlds:
The upper world of Heaven
the lower world of Earth
and the middle world of Humankind
which is where we live.
It is said, there is suffering only in the middle world
perhaps that is because we are a dynamic, constantly changing mixture of Heaven and Earth.
complex, ambiguous, ever compromising.

We live in the in-between.
The middle is where the "I" lives.
In a world constructed by our ability to imagine and "identify".
Below it is the "me", my body, my "self" that I don't directly experience
parts that have been lost or cast out
that become objects or shadows to the "I".

Sometimes this "I" zone contracts - gets to be too narrow.
The "I" contracts, losing conection with
and awareness of the above and the below, Heaven and Earth.
This is a state of suffering.
But we still remember something outside the "I" zone.
Maybe we call it "soul".
Imagination - creative knowing - the dream we call "intelligence"
is what preserves our potential for belongng
and is the doorway for reconnection
with the greater reality around.

Yet it takes courage to step towards reality
to go through the door
to the already here now.

The World really IS out to get you.
It wants to take you back!

All healing is homecoming.
Returning to belonging in this place that welcomes us.
Our minds can remind us of the inventory of our ways of belonging.
But there are no tricks, quick fixes, clever insights that can accomplish homecoming.

One of us expressed a basic, and subtle,
insight about the connection of self and world:
 

Stay with the image
Don't interpret it to be something else.
You can trust the image.
There is healing in the image.
There is soul in everything.
Everything is soul.

Try this some time - it may take a while
but you will encounter just the "medicine" you need.

The poet, David Whyte expressed something similar
in his poem, "Everything is Waiting For You"

Your great mistake is to act the drama
as if you were alone. As if life
were a progressive and cunning crime
with no witness to the tiny hidden
transgressions. To feel abandoned is to deny
the intimacy of your surroundings. Surely,
even you, at times, have felt the grand array;
the swelling presence, and the chorus, crowding
out your solo voice. You must note
the way the soap dish enables you,
or the window latch grants you freedom.
Alertness is the hidden discipline of familiarity.
The stairs are your mentor of things
to come, the doors have always been there
to frighten you and invite you,
and the tiny speaker in the phone
is your dream-ladder to divinity.

Put down the weight of your aloneness and ease into
the conversation. The kettle is singing
even as it pours you a drink, the cooking pots
have left their arrogant aloofness and
seen the good in you at last. All the birds
and creatures of the world are unutterably
themselves. Everything is waiting for you.