(This week’s topic is one I could delve into for hours...there is so much to explore and share. The enclosed is a stab at presenting a thesis topic in one small blog, and written with love.)
As human beings, we yearn for connection. I would even assert after sustenance of food and water, connection is our next priority. Not surprisingly, there is significant supporting scientific evidence that we have a fundamental need to be connected to those around us. However, we often struggle with the “how-to.”
Armand Dimele argues that “when people go within and connect with themselves, they realize they are connected to the universe and they are connected to all living things.”
So as I inquired last week, what are those moments for you?
Did you discover where or when you are most grounded and/or connected?
My anchors are my practice, meditation, authentic connection with another being and time in nature.
I do not profess that the moment I step onto the mat or sit in my chair (or the great outdoors) I am automatically grounded or connected.
It takes time to get “there,” to be more deeply connected to myself and ultimately connected to more. Each serves as a portal, an opening. As I connect to myself in that space, I am, with time, connected to - and present to - something greater. As I lay under the starts in the sky, I am not separate, but rather somehow a part of it.
I am only one, a singular individual living my singular life. However, through my limited scope, I’ve experienced and been exposed to enough to know more than I did 10 years ago. And as I nourish and explore my own “knowing,” I’ve watched my world expand. And each time I allow that expansion, its as though I myself expand… As I connect more with myself, I realize how we are all connected to the universe and all living things.
So again, the invitation is to connect. Not to create a separateness, which we all at one time or another have accustomed ourselves to, but to find something greater, something beyond the limited periphery of just ourselves.
As Albert Einstein said, we as a human being are “part of a whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space.” As such, he continues, it is our task “to free ourselves from this prison [of separateness] by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”
My immediate desire for you, is not that you feel connected to each and every living thing that comes before you (though that can be beautiful), but to be open to new connections. To be open to seeing and knowing how others, living in their own very real world, might intertwine and connect with yours on a bigger plane and on a greater scale. No matter where you are, who you encounter or whether you think the person you come into acquaintance with is from a different world to your own, there is always a connection to be had.
Are you willing to be open to more? To seek that which seeks you? And when we speak of these unexpected connections, that rare moment when a butterfly rests on your shoulder can you know that in that moment you are connected to the world’s beauty as well?
Some things to ponder. Would love to hear what you discover.
With love and light,
Rachel