Interpersonal Relationships as a Spiritual Ideal

by Laura Ellen Shulman




How to strike the balance between community and individuality?

Think in terms of how people live...

    The problem with communities, whether it be where we live or our various faith communities, is that, while bringing people together, they, at the very same time, separate people in one community from people in other communities.
    We are both connected as a single human race (and, even more, as one with the entire earth, the entire universe) but also just as much unique individuals. Life and history seems to be a constant struggle to maintain the balance between these two truths. When we get too out of balance in one direction, we react in the other extreme. When society rules begin to strangle the individual, certain individuals break the rules just to demonstrate their independence. But, when anarchy reigns, people become uncomfortable and put up new boundaries for the sake of maintaining a peaceful community (a community which is not peaceful is hardly a community). Interesting. Look at that word: comm-unity, with unity. It implies that the many individuals are one larger individual community in the same way that a family is a singular unit.
    Even on the individual level, we spend a part of our days out in the community, serving and being served (working and shopping) and then we return to the sanctuary of our homes, of our bedrooms, of our sleep where we are alone.
    I wonder if some individuals have a greater need for community while others have a greater need for being alone. Yes, I think the variety of our life styles bears this out. The problem arises when a community assumes that everyone in the community needs to conform to the community to the same degree - when individual differences are not taken into account. Communities make it very hard, emotionally and sometimes even physically, for individuals who need more freedom to break away from the community or to expand their community beyond accepted borders (e.g., intercultural, interfaith relations or "assimilation" into the larger community).
    How can we maintain our individuality even while we continue to live in some level of a community? And how can we expand our sense of the community we live in (to be more inclusive of those who are more different from us)?
    We live in a family community, a neighborhood, a city, a county, a state, a country, a hemisphere, the world, the solar system, the galaxy, the universe. And we live in all these "communities" at one and the same time! The question is, how far do we see? Are the walls between our communities brick walls that keep us separate or are they screen fences with doors and open windows through which we can visit with one another in the larger community?

The "Sphere of Existence":

    Each of us is as a sphere whose center is the smallest immediate point of our consciousness and the circumference is infinitely far away. Our awareness can expand infinitely outward to encompass more and more of what is, broadening our horizons, enlarging our understanding. Being infinite, this sphere of our existence includes everything that is. Beyond the very center, where we reside alone, our existence merges with that of family and friends, of that part of the world which we encounter, which enters the sphere of our awareness. Expanding outward ever further we become aware of our unity with all humanity, with all life, with the universe, with a reality beyond even that - to the place where everything is one in the single sphere of all existence, of all that is.

    And we call this sphere "God" and we and everything are it!

    At the very core of our own consciousness where each of us exists unaware of anyone or anything else and no one else is aware of us, we each exist in our own world (the womb and the newborn's limit of awareness). As our awareness expands our world expands to include others and others include us in their world (I am in you and you are in me). And our worlds, at that point, are one.

    One sphere, many centers - go figure.

    One sphere, many centers?
    We each stand alone but in becoming aware of others, of other things in the world, we include them within the scope of our perception/world and, in being aware of us, they include us in their world and so our worlds overlap and intermingle, becoming one world/sphere (world community). But each world started from a different point, a different perspective (a different person). And in between the world community and the individual person are countless more or less limited communities of various sizes, the larger ones encompassing the smaller ones (as family "communities" live in a neighborhood community and neighborhood communities exist within in a larger city).
    This entire theory can be imaged by drawing a series of concentric circles. The center of all the circles is the same center and that center is the individual. The various circumferences represent the smaller and larger communities that individual is a part of. If the individual can expand his/her sights to the circumference of the greatest circle, s/he knows his/her existence as an individual within the largest community which includes all other individuals.
 
 




Identity:

    It seems that most people get their sense of identity from the community they are a part of. We talk about "cultural pride." I will agree, it is good to have pride in oneself but not to the detriment of others. Often "cultural pride" manifests itself by placing one's own group above other groups.
    I think the best way to have self pride is to get your identify from within yourself. If we can do this then we do not need to identify with a particular group, we do not need the uplift that community identity gives us if we know who we are independent from anyone else. "Know thyself" said Socrates. This is a high ideal but once achieved, we can then know that self in a larger context that is not fenced in, not limited. Ordinary people who get their identity from their group would lose their identity if they left the group and went off on their own. One who has "found him/herself" can feel free to broaden one's horizons, to mix and mingle with people from various groups and never forget who they are.
    Perhaps it is ironic that to know oneself as a unique individual actually enables one to know oneself in relation to any others. To know oneself as a part of a particular group means that one only understands one's identity in light of that group.
    I think personal (spiritual) growth would mean that we understand who we are from within rather than from without (from our community, from society). Once this is achieved we can love anyone, not just those in the "in" group.

Similarities and Differences (a dialogue):

Perhaps the first step in communities getting along is acknowledging the difference.

    First to tolerate, then to accept and, ultimately, to overlook the differences. But too often when people acknowledge (are aware of) the differences, this is actually what causes them to build "walls" between groups rather than bridges. I think a more productive way to build bridges between groups would be to acknowledge similarities first and then appreciate the differences as of secondary significance to similarities.
    I think the secret to building good intergroup relations is to identify ourselves with the largest common denominator, with what we have in common (similarities). I think that is of primary importance. Acknowledging differences is secondary to this and can only be beneficial when the similarities have been acknowledged first. Without recognition of our similarities, acknowledging differences tends to be more a hindrance than a help.

Whenever I meet a new person I always find it easier to "connect" once the similarities are identified.

    And wouldn't it be wonderful if we could make that same connection with people who did not share such mundane similarities with us? If we were to look beyond the superficial similarities of our external experiences and recognize the more basic similarities that we all share by virtue of being human, or of being living beings, or simply by virtue of existing in the one universe... Well then, we'd be able to connect with any human being, with any creature of the earth, even with an extraterrestrial. Without this recognition of the highest common denominator, we allow room for fear of the unknown to enter. We can either say "I know you" because we share such and such in common or we can say "I don't know you" because we do not see to the deepest level of what we all share in common - our origin in God, our continued connection with God and, by extension, with everyone and everything else.
    And the similarities also become more significant because it is the similarities which continually reinforce one's sense that we are all one - that we all have a common origin and common goal.

Similarities and differences...

    Both are real but what matters is which we emphasize. It is a matter of perception. To focus on the differences is to separate yourself out from others. To focus on the similarities amongst the differences is to connect with others. The more basic the connection, the larger the group with which you connect (see yourself a part of). The more basic similarities are the most universal. It is a matter of not confusing the relative and the particular for the universal.

How could people who have totally different beliefs live together in community? Because of the diversity of the world, we can build communities with folks who we share common beliefs. That doesn’t mean everyone who lives in my town has to agree with my beliefs, it means I’m free to build a community within a community.

    I think the notion of "community within community" is the key to understanding how people with diverse beliefs and approaches to life can live peacefully in community: I don't think there are any two human beings who have "totally different beliefs" or lifeviews. After all, by simple virtue of both being human beings we already have something in common. It is the most basic common denominator which gives us the framework of our largest community. Within that community, we can and do make smaller communities with people we have more in common with. But these smaller communities should not, in my opinion, cut us off from people in other smaller communities. Nor should we be at odds with those other communities because all those communities are part of the one, largest community which, despite all our differences, unites us on that most basic level. It is by focusing on the basics that we can learn to live in peace and cooperation even as we continue to live in separate, smaller communities.

    As the Native American Sioux, Black Elk has put it:

"And I saw that the sacred hoop of my people was one of many hoops that made one circle, wide as daylight and as starlight, and in the center grew one mighty flowering tree to shelter all the children of one mother and one father."

"And I saw that it was holy."
 

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