We are all beautifully unique beings, and we share a common humanity. What a thing! Outer appearances invite separation, but inside, we are alike in our striving, our search for meaning, our inherent need to matter. We cry when physically or emotionally hurt. We love. We have preferences. We have both strengths and weaknesses. We develop coping mechanisms. We are attracted to some people and things, repelled by others.
In The Book of Awakening, Mark Nepo describes it like this: “Imagine that each of us is a spoke in an Infinite Wheel, and, though each spoke is essential in keeping the Wheel whole, no two spokes are the same…the common hub where all the spokes join is the one center where all souls meet… In that center, we are one and the same… And that unexpected wholeness that is more than each of us, but common to all—that moment of unity is the atom of God.”
There is no redundancy here! Each one of us is important, and has a place of equality with everyone else. This, for me, has been the central teaching of my 12 Step program. I’m more and more aware of the similarities we all share, rather than focusing on perceived differences. I’m grateful for that awareness, and try to see it more and more often. The practice is especially vivid when I am only aware of how much I don’t care for another person. I’m am humbled and often gifted by learning to see how we’re alike.
I’m grateful today for seeing myself in others, and others in myself.
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