“Interdependence”
The Mandala Project: #109: “Interdependence” - created October 18th, 2024
We live in a culture that supports and encourages the ideal of self-sufficiency, and most of us spend our lives striving for it. It’s a myth.
And believing it comes with a steep price.
In the “up to me to make sure I’m okay” mindset, my modus operandi is to figure out how to do things without support. Don’t need help. Don't want to be indebted. And I definitely don’t want to need anything/rely on anyone because where does that leave me if the answer is “no”?
Fierce independence is how I affirm that I’m strong, capable, and the ‘one’ in charge of my well-being.
And if I can get there without giving anything up, without compromise or trade-off, even better.
LOVE DOES NOT AGREE
This Mandala emerged last week while spending time on a beach with beloved friends.
As it came into being, I was conscious of the presence of love in the space, a background hum, reliable and trustworthy.
The steadiness of waves meeting the shore, the October sun still warming the sand, the sound of loved ones’ voices in rich conversation, occasionally pausing to toss an offering my way: just the right pebble, a piece of green sea glass, a vibrant orange stone that came from who knows where.
I love that it arrived on the 27th anniversary of my sobriety, a reminder of connection and the collaborative magic that is ever at work in our lives.
The mischievous Kate Godin collaborating with the magic-making (and love to Allyson Woodrooffe for capturing the moment).
Giving up alcohol is a move I celebrate with deep gratitude, but it took several false starts to get there. For a long time, I was determined I could do it alone. No support group kumbaya we’re in it together-ness for me thank you.
I do not need help.
The drinking continued, I felt increasingly isolated and disconnected, and even as I watched it systematically destroying everything that mattered to me, I would not roll over.
Then, one day, love broke the spell. I was listening to Elton John being interviewed by Oprah Winfrey about addiction, and he said, “Do NOT not get help because you think other people will see you as weak. Because your pride will kill you.”
That was a sword of truth, the right thing at the right time, and I was able to hear it. Fierce independence was shut down by fierce love.
The rest of that story lives here: The Adventure Begins When the Hero Takes a Stand
INDEPENDENCE IS A FANTASY
One friend on the beach that day was Philip Shepherd, author of several books, including “Radical Wholeness: The Embodied Present and the Ordinary Grace of Being”. I interviewed Philip on the podcast a while back, and we talked in depth about one of his teachings that opened up my perception of interconnectedness:
“Self-achieved independence is the fantasy around which our culture has gathered, but you can't point anywhere in the universe to an instance of independence.
Everything depends on everything. Everything leans on everything. Everything affects everything.
When we view the world through the conceptual mind, we turn ourselves into a thing, but the self is not a thing. The only way you can feel the aloneness of your self is when you desensitize yourself to the relationships that hold you.
With every breath, you're taking into your body the exhalations of forests. Every time you breathe out, you offer in exchange a gift of carbon dioxide that, in time, will likely become wood in a tree.
You bite an apple, and that apple becomes you, becomes your flesh and blood, your capillaries and your eyelashes. And that apple is what you experience as your energy when you walk down the street. It's the world becoming you as you're becoming the world.
When you stop feeling the currents of the present coursing through you, you forget that you are a process, nourished by and participant in all the processes of the world.”
RECLAIMING CONNECTION
The cost of believing you’re independent is that it leads to the belief that you are alone and unsupported. Check your fear list; it’s on there.
Once I started to let go of the idea that figuring it out on my own is better, I began to perceive how incredibly held I am, and not just by other humans. By everything. By trees and stars and air and earth and water and fire and helping spirits from realms within and outside of this physical one.
We are never doing this life alone, no matter how much it might seem so at times. You’re held in an interdependent, interconnected web of support, and when you choose to believe that, you begin to see evidence of it everywhere.
Subscribe and download “The 5 Essential Skills for Unshakeable Confidence”.
Want to collaborate to create some magic in your life?
RECENT BLOG POSTS
The Mandalas are now available to share as beautifully printed note cards, offering you an evocative way to engage with the mystery and guidance of the natural world.