Connecting On Our Own
Biologically, instinctually, on a primal level, we are terrified to be alone.
We are pack animals, we are meant to gather together for safe survival. So when we are doing things alone, it can trigger our lizard brain to be hyper vigilant against danger, putting us in a state of watching for threat.
There is a difference between a violent exile into danger,
and embracing our own autonomy, our sovereignty over self, our individualization.
We don’t need to reject others and try to find safety in our hyper independence, completely reliant on self …. nor do we need to abandon who we are in order to enmesh into the groupings that we think will accept us.
There is a place in between this where we are able to navigate in and out of societies, communities and groupings that are healthy for us … while maintaining our own pursuit of personal evolution.
Being on our own doesn’t mean we are unacceptable … in fact, the opposite is true.
It goes against our instincts, but as cognitive beings, there is an evolved component to our human state that allows us to be aware of how to develop ourselves for our own good, which results in benefiting the greater good.
When you take a closer look at pack animals you will see that the most balanced, the one that pursues it’s own survival, finds it own way, is usually the leader. The other animals follow them because they have skills to survive, to thrive alone. They know how to find the water, the shelter, the nourishment they need.
Here’s how it went wrong :
As we were developing our own self, in our earliest days of childhood, we were taught basic laws of how to survive within the group. But that group wasn’t always best for our own development but rather it was best for theirs.
This doesn’t mean they did it wrong, though they often did it not right, it just means that it wasn’t designed for our thriving self.
The traditions that kept us in harmonious behavior, the laws that kept us safe, the beliefs that kept us bought in …. all kept us in the group. Pulling away from these are like tearing off a limb. For most of us it feels impossible.
This is where our greatest sufferings reside - in the conflict of being safe in an un-fostering space and longing to be alive on our own.
Here’s how it can go right :
We don’t need to cut ties and reject all that we have ever been, all we have ever loved, all that we have ever believed. Though unfortunately for some of us, this is a reality that is indeed required.
What we do need to do to move forward though, is to embrace the idea that who we are doesn’t belong to the group.
This is a huge concept that can paralyze our efforts because our instincts will also kick in and flood us with the fear of exile and certain death.
We don’t belong to the group because we are no longer children. As children we cannot be on our own, we will in fact die. We are taught to serve the group over our self, to forfeit our own being for the greater good, we are stunted in our development and don’t learn how to be on our own. So we stay in a childish mindset, an arrested maturity, a longing to belong.
It’s our job to do this for ourselves … as adults we have the responsibility to serve our own greater good for our development into the actualization of who we need to be.
What we need to do on our own:
We need to re-parent ourselves, re-teach ourselves, re-develop, re-claim ourselves in ways that the group where we originated couldn’t.
This isn’t just from the traumatic childhoods, this is from all of our childhoods.
There is a maturation process that our society doesn’t celebrate anymore, an initiation into adulthood that teaches our nervous system how to trust our own self, on our own. Not so that we can handle exile because there is something wrong with us … but so that we can reign in our sovereignty that we were designed to own and govern.
Ironically, we need to do this alone, AND together.
We need to embrace who we are independently from who others think we are or want us to be.
We also need to surround our selves with people who have gone through this maturation process, and can leave us to ourselves, and can teach us that they are supporting our individuation.
We don’t need to belong together, we need to connect to each other on our own:
Belonging comes from a deep seeded unmet need to be safe in a group. This is our under matured child self that is needing our guidance into a maturation we have never experienced before.
The goal isn’t to live in exile, neither is the goal to belong.
The point of maturation is so that we can connect.
We need to make connections in healthy, vibrant ways that produce a thriving group that we can participate and collaborate with. We are meant to have many connections - partners, lovers, friends, family, communities, projects, causes, intellectual pursuits, emotional explorations, colleagues, collaborators, and co-existent humans.
The intention is so that we can navigate in and out of solitude and interdependence.
Some journal prompts to help you integrate these concepts into being more self centered
What were you taught as a child about being alone, about breaking away from the group, about doing things differently?
When you think about wanting to belong, to fit in, to be accepted, how much of that will depend on you being who others want you to be rather than you being who you are?
Are you comfortable alone, in your autonomy - not as a rejecting safe comfort, but in a peaceful self navigation in and out of connections?