The Individual and the Collective: A Meditation on Our Porous Nature

I was teaching a retreat a few years ago when a mother shared a really moving story with me. She said that right before the retreat, she was tucking her daughter in for sleep when she had a sense that her daughter was thinking something. So she asked her what she was thinking and her daughter described a really vivid image — the exact same image, it turns out, that had just gone through her mind before she asked her daughter what she was thinking.

It was one of those moments where the common sense of separation totally dissolved. 

We usually think that our thoughts are our thoughts. And in this moment it was really clear to the mother that it wasn't entirely her thought. It was just a thought that was thinking both of them at the same time, so to speak. 

This experience really stuck with me because this particular retreat started off really moody. We had a big group of people at the retreat center, and the weather was dark and the energy of the group felt a little bit sluggish, a little bit weighed down. I felt it just as much as anybody. 

We're all working through this content. We're all feeling so much. And there are moments in life where we recognize that we're actually porous, that we're deeply affected by others, by the environment, and by the entire world. 

Just feel that for a moment. Notice these boundaries that we call the self — maybe the physical borders of our body, or the more subtle borders of our minds. We imagine that we're totally unique and autonomous and even isolated in these boundaries. And yet there are moments in life where it's clear that there's something else going on.

This has some interesting implications. On the one hand, it's amazing that we don't have to be alone — that because we're porous we're not just living our own individual life, but we're living out a life in a collective. We're participating in the life of the world's soul, you might say. But what can be a little scary about that is there's a lot of vulnerability involved. To be porous is to be touchable, reachable, and influenced. 

Notice that for a moment as you breathe. As you feel, you can just notice in this moment what side of the spectrum you seem to be favoring. Do you feel more individual in your experience? Independent? Or do you feel more communal, more merged? 

It's not that feeling independent is undesirable and that feeling communal is desirable. If anything, what's powerful is to just notice this spectrum that's playing out moment to moment. There are times when we feel incredibly self-conscious and closed in on ourselves. And in those moments we can feel very isolated. And there are other moments where we feel totally relaxed and at ease, and our sense of self just expands out, seemingly forever.

The invitation, then, is to bring more attention to your porous nature, so you can notice both of these features. You very much are a unique self with unique gifts to offer those people in your lives, to offer to the entire world. And you're also very porous. You're always a self in relationship to other, in relationship to the whole. And on that level, you're very porous. You're very permeable, you're vulnerable, and yet the vulnerability is what makes possible intimacy and the deepest love. When we return we're going to do a little bit of an awareness practice around these qualities of our experience.

Here’s a meditation you can follow to experience this for yourself.

Start 

Take a moment to allow yourself to just settle in, to arrive more fully in this moment. Notice the shape, the posture of the physical body in this moment, whether in stillness or in motion. Just notice the impact the posture has on this moment, the way the posture of the body colors your experience. 

And you can bring awareness to the emotions. Just notice how you're feeling emotionally in this moment. The quality of emotion in the body. How intense emotion is — maybe very intense, maybe very felt. Maybe very dim. Imperceptible. And you can notice where in the body you're sensing emotion. What volume of space the emotional energy takes up. How it's moving, how it's shifting moment to moment. How do you feel? Just allow yourself to investigate this directly through your awareness.

You can also notice thoughts in the mind. You don't have to get lost in the content of the thoughts, but you can just notice the flow of thought. Whether there are many thoughts, few thoughts, no thoughts. and notice how this colors your experience in this moment as well. Feel the body. Feel the mind. Sense in to the personality the unique person that you are. Just notice what it feels like to be you in this moment.

And then allow awareness to expand, to become more permeable, more porous. Starting with your surroundings. Notice where you are in this moment. And notice the energy, the quality, the essence of the room where you are, or if you're outside somewhere, just allow yourself to soften and be aware of the influence that your immediate environment has on you. Notice the influence you're receiving from your environment.

Now bring awareness to your closest relationships: family, friends. And notice if any of those people are struggling right now. Notice if those struggles weigh on you. You're concerned for them. You're hoping they'll prevail in these challenges. And notice if any of them are on a roll, so to speak. Things are amazing in their lives and you feel a contact high from their success — a vicarious joy.

Open up your awareness to the mood of your nation. Whatever country you come from, whatever country you currently reside in, just see if you can sense into the mood of the nation as a whole. Feel the way you participate in that mood. You affect it and you are affected by it. You give and you receive influence. 

At the most basic level you can sense into your own aliveness in this moment. Just feel that you're alive: breathing, sensing, awake. And you're not the one doing this. In a sense, life is being done to us. It's this gift we continue to receive with each in-breath, with each out-breath. You can open up your awareness to all of life. the vitality in us and through us all that quickens us, that animates us.

Feel the way, in this moment, that you deeply participate in the life of the whole — all life on the planet and all life beyond. Feel how deeply connected you are, and how profoundly unique you are, all at once.