Five years ago, I moved into a tiny, secluded cabin in the woods. Now I live in a beautiful old farmhouse on a main road, just outside of the village of Trumansburg, NY. Before, I lived in Washington, DC. At some times, I lived on the road.
There have been shifts in the last few years. Here's the thing.
A week ago I had dinner with a friend and we discussed the question, "Are we special?" It's a wonderful question, because the answer is "No!" Also, "Yes!"
We live in a society that sells a message that we are special and unique. But there are 8 billion people on the planet. I am absolutely not special. You are absolutely not special. Everything we want, everything we need, all our dreams--someone else has them. And if not one specific person, they've been shared in part by millions. We are NOT special.
Of course, also: We ARE special. So incredibly wonderous--these perfectly imperfect human bodies, our imagination and awareness, our dreams, our capacity to build and love ... that we have come to exist in this moment is an almost-impossibility that occured with total ease. We are the very definition of special. And yet we are not.
I take great comfort in not being special.
I say all of this because I am trying to define my own direction and purpose and values. Which is a melding of skill and self. How can I--how can all of us--use what we have, who we are, in order to create what we value?
Me? I communicate. I stumble, I fumble, and I often get it wrong. But one thing I know about myself, is that I have an honest vulnerability and the skills to communicate it. I'm not special. So. That must mean there can be value in my experience for others.
I am also tired of my self. Tired of being predictable--tired of my reactions, my ingrained ideas, tired of the way my wounds and traumas shape the world I see. I am even tired of the word "I," which I've now used ... almost two dozen times in this short passage (so far).
Six years ago something happened. A brutal loss of friendship and connection. An excommunication. A glimpse of my own and other peoples' limits and capacities. It was an event that sent me into therapy and onto medications, and ultimately towards a deeper exploration.
I once thought that what happened was the worst thing. Now I think it was the best.
These days, I think about all these events as clues. Breadcrumbs from the universe. A trail leading back into myself--and from there, to everyone.
Without knowing it consciously, I spent five years in a cabin searching--not for the answer, but instead for the beginning of a path. The trailhead. What did I learn, after five years of shitting in the woods and going weeks between showers? ... I learned where the path began. I didn't find the end, I found the beginning.
Why did I move into this new house? I ask myself. The answer, I think: I bought this place because I wanted to live publicly. A total reversal of my time in the woods. I wanted to leave behind the image of myself as a big child, living with caution on the outskirts of community. I bought this home to represent a lack of separateness.
A year ago, I dated someone briefly and the relationship seemed full of possibility. There was connection and ease. But it quickly became apparent that my needs were not being met, and the whole thing fell apart in a flash.
For once, I didn't feel guilt. You know what I felt? CURIOSITY. For a relationship that spanned just weeks, it was incredibly impactful.
Since then, my world has opened up. I've learned how to look. And I've learned that the looking is the important part. What's important isn't so much truth, but realizing what is NOT true.
I started looking, and the Me I found was wholly different from who I believed I was. It turns out, I have wounds from trauma I don't recall and wisdom from classes I don't remember taking. It turns out, I am precise and fumble; am curious and afraid. And I'm just like you.
The relationship I mentioned led directly into another, which turned out to be infinitely more accelerating. It revealed the love which exists inside me. That I am.
If there is one thing I've learned--that has been shown to me--and which I now believe deeply through lived experience: YOU ARE LOVE. We all are.
We spend our lives looking for love--be it romantic or familial, a place to fit in or a sense of self--we spend our lives searching for the very thing we are. Understanding that Sisyphean struggle evokes waves of compassion in me. So. Now what?
I just turned 44 years-old, and it's like I want a bicycle pump for my life. I want to inflate it, until the tube is taught. Taut. Both. Communication. Sharing. Looking deep and then bringing out whatever I find.
So. That is my intention for the next year. An endeavor to look, to learn about myself--and by sameness, to know others. And to share what I find.
You aren't separate from me. We are the same. I see it. I can't show you, in part because I don't fully understand it myself. But the trail is so clearly marked that I know without doubt that there is value in helping others find where it begins.
