IntraConnected: MWe (Me + We) as the Integration of Self, Identity, and Belonging
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Kindle Notes & Highlights
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When we live as a solo-self and ignore these important yet invisible connections, we experience our identity as centered predominantly in the body, and we feel relationally connected only to those who are like-me.
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Our bodies are made of molecules, which are assemblies of atoms, which are comprised of subatomic particles, which are ultimately densely packed quanta. This means that even before our bodies were conceived, even before complex life forms evolved, there was the emergence of probability and certainty from possibility and uncertainty—form formed from a formless space of being, the sea of potential, into higher degrees of commitment, into form as certainty.
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When we differentiate and do not live with linkages, as the intraconnected nature of a living system, the system as a whole suffers. Our mental construction of a solo-self may be analogous to a cancer in modern society, cultivating and reinforcing renegade growth of separate, disconnected selves, now running amok, out of sync within the larger system of our biosphere called Earth.
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With awe and the other “transcendent states” of gratitude and compassion, and perhaps with many other experiences suffused with love and connection, we come to realize the reality of a larger sense of life, a larger selfing that is broader than the body—one that, in this bodily form, can at first feel overwhelming, hard to understand, daunting.
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This is our journey: to integrate our relational self with our inner self—a journey we can choose to embark upon to escape the prison of modern culture’s message of separation. This message is revealed in the sense of disconnection we too often feel, which imprisons us in the experience of a shrunken version of belonging as a solo-self. The great, empowering, hopeful, good news is that self-construal is an active, lifelong process, however we might measure and name it, shaped by messages we receive and concepts we believe.
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Belonging is a birthright, not a luxury. In belonging, we retain our unique, individual features while being connected—we join, we are part of, we gain membership, we become a “we” without losing the “me.” In these ways, the term “belonging” means the deepest facets of integrative joining—not merely fitting in or just going along to get along, and not losing our individuality under peer-pressure to become a part of a group.
Kevin
BeAutiful quote
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Reciprocity is an investment in abundance for both the eater and the eaten. That ethic of reciprocity was cleared away along with the forests, the beauty of justice traded away for more stuff.… If the Earth is nothing more than inanimate matter, if lives are nothing more than commodities, then the way of the Honorable Harvest, too, is dead. But when you stand in the stirring spring woods, you know otherwise. It is an animate Earth that we hear calling to us to feed the martens and kiss the rice. Wild leeks and wild ideas are in jeopardy. We have to transplant them both and nurture their return ...more
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What these all may share is the deep process of linking. When we love an individual in various ways, we link with them. When we love a place, we link with it. When we love an activity, we link with it. Linkage is a flowing into belonging, a membership, a joining that seems a natural aspect of love.
Kevin
beautiful quote
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In the quantum world, relationship is the key determiner of everything.… In this world, the basic building blocks of life are relationships, not individuals. Nothing exists on its own or has a final, fixed identity. We are all bundles of potential. Relationships evoke these potentials. We change as we meet different people or are in different circumstances. (p. 139)