Intimacy is a clue to our universal oneness. By intimacy, I mean physical proximity. Consider the term “personal space”…loosely defined as the physical comfort zone between ourselves and anyone else. Take into account how this personal space varies based on the relationship we have with individual people. The more we trust someone, the smaller our need for personal space becomes. In rare occasions, our personal space becomes synonymous with another person…and we no longer are separate people. We actually feel the other person. We hurt because they hurt. We feel joy because they are happy. We feel lonely when they are not present, and complete when they are with us. Yet who ever this rare person is, they once were a complete stranger. The experience I describe is not unique…it is all too rare, fleeting, but pervasively true.
The question this truth reveals is whether the separateness we experience from strangers is true or just a widely accepted illusion? Context is another clue to answering this question. What makes a person a stranger is the cultural assumption they are driven by their own interest, guided by values of their own choosing, with no inherent responsibility to provide us with any consideration. Such a person cannot be trusted without knowing more. Therefore, when dealing with strangers our need for personal space is at its maximum.
Now contrast this generic stranger with the litany of strangers we see on the evening news. Seeing something tragic or wonderful happening to a stranger on our TV screen can invoke very powerful emotions within us, depending on how we relate to this complete stranger. These feelings come from the same place as the emotions that join us to people we trust. They too are all too rare, fleeting and pervasively true.
All that remains are the strangers we don’t relate to…or do we? Who amongst us doesn’t cherish the air we breathe? Or the water we drink? Or the warmth we feel when sheltered against the elements of our environment? What stranger can you imagine that doesn’t seek safety and comfort for themselves and their families? Who doesn’t have high aspirations that their children will live more fulfilling lives than they did?
We are one humanity because at the heart of this life, even at the moment of apparent individuality, our deepest hopes and aspirations are synonymous.
