A quote by way of Intro:

“Oh what a catastrophe, what a maiming of love when it was made a personal, merely personal feeling, taken away from the rising and setting of the sun, and cut off from the magic connection of the solstice and the equinox.  This is what is the matter with us.  We are bleeding at the roots, because we are cut off from the earth and sun and stars, and love is a grinning mockery, because, poor blossom, we plucked it from its stem on the tree of Life, and expected it to keep blooming in our civilized vase on the table” – DH Lawrence.

Yesterday, I found myself thinking about what allows us to feel connected, a part of something larger.  I was struggling to encapsulate this notion in a single word or phrase — connection seems very general, spirituality very ridden with connotations.  I think what I am wanting to capture is the notion of Big S self, the self that transcends our small egoic desires for pleasure and avoidance of pain, the self that exceeds a sole focus on little s self.

Big S self is encompasses everything.  It includes the people I encounter – recognizing that there emotions are not materially different than mine, that it all just one big cosmic ledger, not many small records parsed up by individually.  It includes the plants and the animals that I meet or eat — do I recognize the benefits that I derive from these gifts to me?  Everything that I consume and interact with is a gift; sometimes I ignore it, thinking only of what’s next for “little s” me.  But in truth, I could not be here but for the gifts of the earth and others with me.

For whatever reason, much of our society seems to be structured around a different paradigm: a competitive win-lose.  It certainly has some masculine characteristics.  I think of the ways that boys always try to one-up each other: “Oh, you can do that? Well, can you do this?” Men often seem caught in demonstrating their intelligence through debate and conversation that hardly feels conversational.

This notion is visible in the ways that we relate to the earth as well — as least much of the Western world.  We look at plants and animals from a position of subjugation, cultivating for control.  In a way, it speaks to this inner child too: run by our insecurities, seeking power and accumulation to push back the worries of inadequacy.

One could argue that this is not just an outgrowth of attachment concerns, but rather an aspect of our evolutionary programming.  The argument put forth by the book Sapiens states that humans – the point when our brains expanded and we ascended to the top of the food chain – were still living from a psychological position of an animal in the middle of the food chain: fearful, insecure, worried about being eaten.  Noah Yuval argues that unlike top predators (for instance, lions) who slowly evolved to their position of power and possess a certain relaxed ease in their privileged place (think about a pride of lions laying around in the shade with seemingly not a care in the world), humans ascended in a cognitive leap and thus while our brains facilitated greater power, our emotional and survival systems (the amygdala and limbic areas) did not make a similar transformation: beneath our highly powered pre-frontal cortices, we are still scared, easily alarmed animals.

So I am not sure if it is fair to call this a masculine paradigm?  Or just a human paradigm?  In truth, I suppose one can find many women acting out these same insecurities in different types of competitions than men.

Regardless, the problem with this paradigm is that it requires a loser.  In order for me to feel good about myself, it requires that someone else be put beneath me.  Life becomes a constant struggle, a battle for position, grasping for assurances to my ego. I see a lot of our wounded inner child in this position — the deep fear that I am not inadequate leaves me constantly trying to placate this belief.  I also see a lot of our fear of survival, trying to protect through domination.

So what is the alternative?  It is not an easy path.  To embrace a win-win paradigm means to recognize that other’s joy is the same as your joy; we are not separate.  We have to transcend the amygdala which is programmed to ensure our survival — facilitating muscle reactions and cortisol release long before we are consciously aware of a threat.  For example, have you ever jumped out of the way of something before you even realized you were going to move? So let us not underestimate the challenge of our programming.

It seems that we must bring both mindfulness and an open heart to this challenge.  In order to begin shifting the story back to one of collaboration and unity, we must be mindful of the myriad ways that our little self pops up, worried about survival, needing validation.  When we can bring mindfulness to our interactions, pausing and responding rather than reacting to life, then we can choose an open hearted path.

A friend recently posted a quote from one of his teachers, Vishwa Nattt, that captures the essence of this position: “Finding a way to bring joy to others might be the best game we humans have”.  This so beautifully highlights the way that my joy is not all that matters — in fact, it is the capacity and opportunity to bring joy to others which directly transcends our “small s” self.  When offering and supplying joy to others becomes a joyous game, then we have entered into the win-win paradigm.  No longer is a loser necessary.  No longer are we acting to placate our ego.

The ultimate gain from this move is a sense of cosmic connectedness.  We come to find peace within our presence in a circle of life, that is always so much bigger than “small s” self.  This is a new story — or more accurately, an old story re-birthed.  As the opening quote suggests, when we recognize our place in the web, when we see that all is the same, then we can return to harmony, to sustainability, to love – in the fullest sense of the word.

So I wonder how you all might seek to connect to the notion of Big Self?

I leave you with a couple experiential suggestions:

  1. Close your eyes, and bring your hands up to your eyes in the shape of glasses, when you re-open your eyes, imagine that these glasses allow you to see on an atomic level, to witness the flows of all different forms of energy.  Wander around wherever you are and observe the world in this way.
  2. Make an intention to find a way to bring joy to someone else.  It could be a stranger, a loved one, or someone who you have been struggling with.  Imagine that their happiness is the same as yours and see if you can bring them joy.
  3. Consider your own death and dissolution back into the earth.  You can find a death meditation on-line, or just close your eyes and imagine the process of your body decomposing, and your eventual re-distribution amongst the other molecules in the universe.  Really let yourself go.
  4. Find an object and envision its’ history.  Where did it come from?  Where was it made?  What historical incidents preceded it?  What were its components before they became this object? Connect with the story of everything around us.

Let me know if you try any of these experiments!