Just the other day

Image: Madison

Just the other day, I was wondering how and in what ways our humanity is shared, if at all it is. As we traverse life, do we do so solely through our own experiences and consciousness or is there a way we are connected to and through the experiences of others.

I considered how diverse our lives can be; how different and yet how similar human experiences are. I considered the extremes present in our world, poles of wealth, health, well-being, opportunities, exposure, intellect, understanding, sanity and even consciousness. I thought about how these contrasts don’t always exist in opposite ends of the world, oftentimes they subsist side by side, on different sides of a city or a street, or even within a family.   

It made me wonder how much impact our circumstances have on how we experience the world, how we live out our lives. Are the experiences of the elite so far placed from those of the down trodden?  Those of the powerful from the weak? Those of the learned from those of the ignorant? Surely the range of emotions these different groups undergo must be radically disparate; shouldn’t they be?

And yet throughout history, we have found many moments that inextricably bind us together. Even when we may not have experienced it before; we feel what someone else is going through, we empathise.

Contemporary consumerism will suggest many things that should make us stand out, to be different and unique, feeding off many of the same insecurities, fears, ambitions, desires, dreams and hopes that many of us have. It seems to me then that we are just numerous parts of one humongous entity called humankind, where no one is really by himself, but part of a larger organism or organ or system, like neurons firing off tirelessly in the nervous system; useless alone but finding meaning only as functioning parts of the whole.    

Can we really do without each other, even when we don’t depend on each other? Even if for vanity sake alone, for is it not lack that validates the exuberance of wealth or would the rich still feel as rich if there was no dearth from which to draw a contrast?  Or would the learned still feel as knowledgeable in the absence of bountiful ignorance? Is disposition not an offspring of the vicissitudes of life?

Yet, regardless of station, all destinies seem to be intimately linked; bound throughout the ages in the infinite symphony of life; unfolding in cycles as we contemplate our existence. We are responsible for each other whether we like it or not, we are responsible to each other, whether we accept it or not; all of us, tiny specs on fate’s radar.