Real-time
World
“It’s
an amazing thing when you finally settle in to knowing that you’ll never fit
in. The difference between the rest of the world and you; you feel too much about
too many things. And most others feel not enough about too few. Keep standing
out. Keep showing the crowd what beautifully flying free is all about.”
J.
Raymond (Empath Survival Guide)
So many
people feel they don’t fit in. Regardless of where they are in life, young or
middle or old, some folks never feel they belong to a tribe. It’s a feeling
that signals both personal depth and loneliness. Belonging is number 3 on
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Human Needs, right after food, clothing and shelter, and
safety. We need to feel that we fit in somewhere, and that we belong to someone—it’s
not a wish, it’s but a need. There’s a difference. And, it doesn’t have to be a
large group of others that we belong to; it can be only one other person. We’re
warm-blooded mammals, not intended to be loners. As a culture we’re seeing the violent
consequences of being bullied and outcast.
All
that aside, one of the explanations for feeling outside the tribe is that you
are real. That you are a feeling, heart-beating, eye-contact person who wants
and needs to connect with others on a personal basis and not by way of a
screen. That sort of person is not “trending” these days. But don’t give up! I
think there are others out there who feel the same way—in fact, I know there
are, because I’m one of them. And I know many, many people who are tired of the
loss of human contact that living in the virtual world brings. We’ve had nearly
three years of low-contact, zoom-gathering, and social-media-dependency attempting
to substitute for person-to-person interaction. It works for some, but for the
majority of us, it falls woefully short. We need to talk to other humans, not
machines, face-to-face, and see their response with our own eyes.
It feels
like a thirst. Recently, I went to the Kentuck Art Festival in Northport, AL. It
was packed with thousands of people. My first instinct, because we are now
pandemic-programmed for 6 feet of separation, was to cut wide berths and hold
my breath if someone came close. But I was also uncharacteristically drawn to
complete strangers. As an introvert this is an unusual feeling. I must have had
conversations with thirty people I had never laid eyes on before. Even sat
shoulder-to-shoulder at a picnic table and shared food with them. We are
desperate for human contact.
If you
are a misfit, don’t give up. Your tribe is out there. Just feel proud that you
are strong enough to recognize what you feel and know that you need other
people. Understand that whatever you’re feeling, others have felt and do feel,
and that you are far from alone. We are living through weird times, so being a
bit weird is normal. We still exist in flesh-and-blood bodies in a real-time
world; there is nothing virtual about us. We crave reality. Feeling misfit is
probably a sign of health. Take a deep breath, draw a golden field of positive energy
around you, and then go out there and be you. Fly free. You’re good enough for
me.
In
the Spirit,
Jane
No comments:
Post a Comment