Coming Up for Air

You probably haven’t noticed (or maybe you have) but I’ve gone almost a full week without posting here.

Gasp! What’s happening to me??

Actually, I’ve spent the last week being pretty much consumed with tasks in front of me that I believe HAVE to be done NOW, solving problems (or trying to, anyhow), etc. It’s taken all my attention, and when I’m not doing that, I’m too fatigued to do anything else.

When I go into that mode, my line of vision really narrows. People will say things to me and I won’t even hear them. People will go in and out of the coffee shop where I hang out to write, and I won’t even know they’ve been there. I get really focused, and even when I think, “I haven’t written in my blog in a few days,” I can’t think of what to say–plus, there’s this thing over here that needs writing, that they’ll pay me for if I write it. So that’s why I haven’t been around. 🙂

So this morning, when I woke up feeling just about as mentally fatigued as when I went to bed, I realized it was time to come up for air–to take some time back in the real world and stop trying to do the math with the things in front of me. I decided that whatever writing I did, it was going to be what I wanted to write, not what I felt I needed to write. I opened up my blog…and…

Nothing. I had nothing. I sat here in the coffee shop, honestly wanting to write something profound here, but realizing that I’d spent so little time thinking about this stuff that I didn’t know what to say even when I afforded myself the time.

Just about this time another coffee shop regular with whom I’ve chatted a few times came and sat at my table on his way out the door and asked how I’d been doing. My first impulse was, I don’t have time to talk to this guy; I have to write in my blog! My second impulse was, What am I doing? I’m sitting here writing nothing, and I haven’t talked to this guy in awhile, even when he’s here. Besides, I don’t have to write anything, remember?

My third impulse, the one I acted on, could best be described as the effect of ipecac syrup on one’s stomach. When he asked how I was doing, all the conversations I had been having in my head all week came spilling out my mouth almost involuntarily. (Sorry for the analogy–it’s the best I could come up with.)

For the next hour and a half, we talked about everything from the weather to life history to politics and social issues (in a friendly way). 🙂 And when my friend got up to leave, for some reason I almost can’t explain–I felt better. I hadn’t solved any problems, hadn’t done any work. But I felt this sense of…relief…in just having a normal conversation with someone outside my immediate circle. And the fog in my head cleared, and I knew what profound thing I was going to write in this blog.

Are you ready for it?

We need each other.

I was reminded in this experience that we aren’t built to be the rock-solid, fiercely independent, self-sufficient people our Western culture tells us we should be. We are all interconnected. I think we should sometimes show some wisdom in who we connect with, but when we close off and get unto ourselves for too long, we lose perspective. I’m reminded that I know people like this–people who are lonely but will not reach out to others, people who shut off all outer conversations and keep their own counsel. When we do that for too long, it eventually shows up in our beliefs and opinions that we aren’t reasoning clearly anymore. That’s what I mean by needing each other, by being interconnected. We bear one another’s burdens, and keep clearer perspective by participating in community, at least to some degree.

I didn’t spill my innermost problems to this guy, because I didn’t know him well enough to do that. I have others for that kind of thing. But I didn’t have to do that, either. I talked to him at the level of friendship we’ve reached, and that was enough. Just being connected for awhile–was enough.

People suggest that the Internet and social networking is unhealthy because it isolates us, that it’s not the same as human contact. I can see the point, but on other levels I disagree. Yes, we must be careful in a virtual world where someone can pretend to be someone else…but humans are still the ones doing the talking. I know for myself and a lot of others who have been in some form of spiritual transition where there weren’t a lot of people to talk to, the Internet connected us with others who felt the same way. I think there’s a reason why the fastest growing industry on the planet is communications. It’s another way for us to connect, to make our world smaller. It can certainly be unbalanced, but the fact that it’s growing the way it is proves that being connected is one of our deepest human needs.

Today, it wasn’t the Internet; today it was a friend in a coffee shop. Other times, it has been one of you blog readers I don’t know who have made my day with just the right word of encouragement. But either way, it’s the connection that helps keeps me sane.

That helps keep us all sane.