Loving beyond knowing

"Often, we are handed half-stories about a place, person, or culture. We see the part, and we assume we know the whole.

The moment we think that a half story is the full picture, however, is the moment we lose touch with the truth of how magnificently complex every being truly is.

We can no more know an entire place than we can understand the experience of every denizen that lives there.

World of river canyon and dune, whale song and bee dance - the complexity of the worlds that we inhabit is staggering."

- Asia Suler, Mirrors In The Earth

It is good to remember that we can still practice love, kindness, care, and inclusion even when we don't have any part of the story about someone, a place, or a culture.

As one of my favorite Indian sages said "you do not see the tree, you see your tree. Each and every one of us only sees our tree, and they are different" (Swami Prajnanpad). In that sense thinking you know me or to say we understand a culture or a place or a person is the Ego view that is always tainted with projection and transference, with our own stories.

To be open to drop the armor and the judgment, to let our heart love on its own accord is a much more delicate, vulnerable, and humbling process.

To accept that we do not, cannot will never fully know anyone or anything (and that includes ourselves). That our "solutions" are never as proven as the ones that worked for 10s of thousands of years and still do.

Humility and saying "I don't know", not replacing one story with another better-crafted seducing story to just protect us, are essential steps into the shamanic path.

We need to decide if we either want to be right or if we want to create a connection. Because one will often if not always conflict with the other.

Listen to elders and ancient wisdom, they are the wisdom keepers. Keepers. Not makers. It is as old as humanity. The voices who never create separation, but always aim at our shared humanity. It contains all the seeds we need to heal if we are willing to cultivate them without interpreting, filtering, and ego-story-projecting on them.

We might be able to find truth there if we stay long enough in this ancient alchemical pot ❤️

💚🦌💚

Angell Deer