I am becoming aware of the magnitude and preciousness that is the human journey. How there is so much contextualization that we are given as we are formed into adult human beings. I think how different my life outlook would be if I was born into a tribal society and how different my outlook on the world would be in that scenario. A wisdom culture that values elders and understands the impact that the individual has on the community. The active use of the catalyst of interdependence within the collective to become more fully oneself.
Someone recently asked me what I thought the purpose of friends was, I had an answer before I thought I would, I just kind of blurted out, “to help us become more fully ourselves.” I think that’s a really true statement and I stand by it. I believe that is how we become more fully ourselves. Through relational connection and the building of trust with others as we journey. It’s a vulnerability where we realize the gift we carry through the process of sharing ourselves with the community.
I just think that’s a beautiful thing and the distortion of this powerful, beautiful mechanism for growth and becoming (codependency) is so sad. It’s taking that powerful energy between people and structures and twisting it to enslave all parties involved. The ideas that I have found helpful in my journey into something else have been personal responsibility, (I am taking ownership for my own life), the context of a lived experience which does not encompass the whole, (I know in part and understand in part), the subjective experience of truth inside a lived experience which will coalesce into a greater truth, the truth to which Christ bore witness to in front of Pilate that Pilate could not understand. Pilate was living out of the truth that he could see and what was real to him (empire, violence, pleasure, domination and scapegoating).
Boundaries are rad. The edges of my garden, so to speak. I’m growing things here. I’m cultivating things in my garden and if I didn’t have clear markers then anything could just come in and do whatever in it. Pigs could root around in my tomato patch or folks could unknowingly walk over the seeds I’ve planted and crush the fragile plants in their infancy. There’s so many reasons why humans cannot function in a healthy way without a conception of their own boundaries. This idea of a boundary free existence is a function of codependency. We have edges (inside this story).
I’m not saying we don’t exist in a boundless state like Rumi (and other mystics) talks about, or that I have a full conception of what reality is or how it functions. I’m talking about the incarnation I am living in. The story of Joel. He needs boundaries to flourish and become. He’s got plants to tend to and things inside his precious heart that deserve being protected and nourished. The urge to have someone else tend to my interior garden for me is a function of codependency. It is interdependent when I choose to allow someone to come into my garden and build trust with them by showing them the plants I’m cultivating and allowing them to show those plants deep care and affection. (This is just a huge garden metaphor I guess.) There is a big different in that energy though. The power is not given away in these conditions.
Vulnerability and trust. Brene freakin Brown is rad as hell. She has this whole talk on trust and vulnerability, the way I’ve found to distill this in my own life has been the practice of “small trust, small vulnerability”. I think we are always doing this or not doing this in relationship to different folks and things in our lives. I can choose to engage in the world from this framework from a place of awareness or ignorance. I think this is a way of practically deciding how far into the garden I want to let folks come.
This also is wrapped up in the duel concept of an honest question and a true apology. An honest question is one in which I can hear any answer in return. I don’t have an ulterior motive in asking you the question. For instance, if I ask if you are doing okay and I’m actually saying “If you aren’t doing okay, we have a problem” that’s a manipulative question. It’s meant to control you. The intention is violent. God help us. A true apology involves an acknowledgment of harm down, remorse and empathetic understanding of the pain experienced, an actual articulation of how the behavior is going to change in the relationship. Without the last part, it’s just (usually) manipulative posturing. Also, from my experience sometimes a lack of awareness, tbh.
Curiosity, beauty, and wonder are so powerful. I think these all work together to build the life that I want. Showing up to folks with curiosity is a practical way to practice nonviolence in relationships. I think it also lends itself to depth and actively works against ulterior motives. It’s also why it’s not (fully) allowed inside a codependent framing of the world. Beauty and wonder are energies that allow me to be drawn into awe and inspiration. I think most of us really want to live inspired lives. It’s the struggle to get there that has a lot of us paralyzed I think. Interacting with beauty in whatever ways we can is an incredible way to draw us into something deeper and beyond ourselves. This lends itself to the cultivation of wonder. I think these are also mystical ideas in a way. The unknowing that lends itself to awe. Contemplation and reflection and play. Digging into this deeply good creation. Allowing myself to play in the process. It’s a gift to me. These are some of the functions of becoming more truly myself in my lived experience.
I think allowing myself to explore the formation of myself and the ways in which cultural context has shaped my language and the ways in which I engage with concepts like “individuation” and the “collective human experience” has been helpful. The ways in which I have attempted to help others through self erasure in the past and how destructive that is to myself and others. Codependency has a whole slew of twists on the truth that will set me free. Taking a pure thing and defiling it just enough that I am trapped inside a reality that feels really true and vital and is in fact a distortion. I think this is why codependent dynamics inside relationships have felt like love, (when my lens for reality was codependent). It’s insidious as fuck. I hate it so much. It’s evil. We are so beautiful and powerful and to see that kind of enslavement of humans throughout generations through structures of power and narrative systems we develop around reality and culture is sickening to me now. My unasked for advice is to keep cultivating the deep place in you that desires beauty and wonder. I fully believe that it will lead you to the truth that will make you free.
structures of home 