I’m wondering if one of our greatest desires and greatest fears as humans is to be seen.  We desire it because ultimately we don’t want to feel alone–to feel like the contours of us, the little and big things that make us us, in mind and body and spirit, won’t be loved or appreciated.  Noticed.  But it’s our greatest fear, too, I think, because what if the seer doesn’t like what they see?  What if I don’t like it, and the image I want you to have of me can’t match what you’ll see if you really see me?

I wonder if this is what feels so amazing about meeting soul friends–people cut from your same cloth.  They see you so much more instinctually than average, with so much less work, because seeing you is partly like seeing their own selves.  You don’t need so many words to explain yourself.  Fear comes in because you feel so exposed to them–so unable to hide–and maybe you’re both trying to avoid the same inner darknesses so you get all uptight and lash out (even if just inside) when one of theirs rears its head.  But in so many ways you feel safe with them, like they can be tender with what’s vulnerable in you, because the same things are vulnerable in them, too. 

Is it possible to be soul friends with the universe?

Sometimes I feel so connected with everything that it hurts.  Sometimes I feel like I’m in love as I walk under an enormous tree, as I look up at the sky when the sun is just rising, or sit in a crowd of people.  I want to make love to it all, and not in some twisted, literal way.  It’s the longing to express how much I appreciate it all, how beautiful and amazing I find it, or even how ghastly or terrible.  So my connection isn’t about feeling like everything is lovely.  It’s about feeling like everything is so rich, so shockingly textured and colored and sounded and smelled.  So there.  So true.  I want to honor it all deeply.  To say how much I see.

So I write.  I do other things, too, like try not to rush too much of the time, like turn the radio off, or point things out to the person I’m with.  But my writing is my most intentioned way of saying to what’s true around me:  I see you.  I honor you.  I won’t blindly pass you by.

But as any soul relationship goes, I feel the universe sometimes avoiding me.  Is it afraid of being so seen?  Is it shy?  Does it have some major thing to hide?  I yearn to connect with It, to study, to write, to paint, to take pictures, to somehow make sure the richness of It all gets seen and remembered, but in so many ways I feel thwarted.  The work of running a household and sustaining life becomes a decoy–all the toilets that must be scoured and dishes that must get washed and mouths that must be fed and money that must get earned and health insurance companies that must be talked with for hours at a time, repeatedly.  The cars that have to be serviced and doctor’s appointments that have to be gone to and clothes that must be bought and of course laundered, repeatedly.  The doing doesn’t end.  And then there’s the cultural myths that degrees and production and power and fame are what’s truly important anyway, so all the stuff of sustainance is only a baseline that must be far exceeded for any worth at all to be achieved.

These things distract me.

Or so it feels.  They feel like the universe veiling itself, dodging me, dodging the best intentions of all of us who feel so alive to it, so eager to be awake to it and in deeper communion.

Must we settle for crumbs of connection?  Is the universe so cagey, or is there another way to see it–this situation, this living in urban America (or wherever else you happen to be) in 2006?

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve a baby to get up from a nap.  And a house to clean.  And an empty fridge to fill. 

Sigh. 

Universe?  I love you.

This entry was posted on Friday, September 8th, 2006 at 10:12 am and is filed under Psychology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.