A STORY - NO MAN IS AN ISLAND

Every person has their own unique story, isn't it so?

Like any life story, mine has many nuances and can be told from different angles. It seems a book could not contain it all.

Pieces of my story are written into various posts, so I won't repeat them here.

One whose story includes much pain, emotional or physical, might wonder at the purpose of pain, if such could be found. In my case, the build-up of emotional pain led to physical pain, giving rise to a life quest (therein lies the purpose?), and the end has not yet been told.

Last week I had an acupuncture session, and while signing in was asked to name my level of pain, from 1 to 10. It brought home again that pain is all perception.

While assessing my backside, the Hispanic acupuncturist exclaimed, 'Wow! You are mucho tight!'

Muscle tightness and inner tensity, an accumulation of unprocessed emotional pain, has written the pathos into my story, and the cycle continues. For example, in tightness there has not been freedom to relax in relationships, which has isolated me. That evokes emotions of sadness at not feeling more connected, and in hindsight regret at how I was towards others. Those emotions keep me in tightness.

​I am aware of releasing, letting go, meditation techniques, etc., and have seen progress as my awareness expands. In the course of the journey, I've also needed for my well-being seclusion or the ability to back up from interactions, at times, and from this I've gained understanding and compassion towards others who need and feel the same. It has led me to greater equanimity.

Perhaps it is not the pain itself but a person's response to pain that matters from a larger view perspective. That thought is nothing new, yet following it could lead to new discoveries.

My childhood pain of not fitting in, partly due to neurological anomalies of the autism spectrum and misophonia, grew into teenage anger and rebellion. This would fill several chapters. In eighth grade my class was singing 'No Man is an Island,' but I refused to sing, thinking, 'I *am* an island. The song came from this poem:

No man is an island,
Entire of itself,
Every man is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thy friend’s
Or of thine own were:
Any man’s death diminishes me,
Because I am involved in mankind,
And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
It tolls for thee. - John Donne

Added to the mix were the deaths first of my older brother at 19, then my younger brother at 17, then my mother, then brain surgery of my wife, then our divorce after 25 years of marriage, all nine years apart. Dad at least made it to the 90 year mark he aimed for, but I was left with lingering regret at not connecting and communicating more deeply with my family. It also saddens me that I didn't learn of the diagnosis of my autism and misophonia until late in life, realizing the difference it could have made in my relationships if I had known.

An advantage of being later in life is the vantage point of hindsight. I can see how my deep attraction to mysticism and desire to 'know God' and 'higher Truth' drove me along a certain path, while my Gemini intellect kept my search aloof and philosophical and the pain of isolation and loss hindered me from experiencing the feeling of divine union my heart longed for.

Without naming it, this became my life quest — to dissolve the inner tensity which acts as a barrier to a full experience of oneness while in the body. And yet I realize it cannot be forced, and will come as a natural happening in the Flow. If there is a measure of my quest, it might be to ask myself the question and consider, 'How often do I feel the Divine Union, and act from it, and not just know it is there?'

Until the inner tensity is dissolved, like Paul I see through a glass darkly.

"For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known." - 1 Corinthians 13:12 (King James Version)

​"To see “through a glass” — a mirror — “darkly” is to have an obscure or imperfect vision of reality. The expression comes from the writings of the Apostle Paul; he explains that we do not now see clearly, but at the end of time, we will do so." - Dictionary dot com

There could be many interpretations of the verse. My awareness is ever expanding, so my understanding is ever changing.

Currently I apply 'seeing through a glass darkly' to experiencing a distortion of 'what is', when it is sensed through the conditioned lens of perception.

'Knowing as I am known' and 'face to face' once meant in my interpretation a direct encounter with God, an entity outside of me.

Now it means the full experience of myself as the One Being, the cosmos of consciousness, in divine duality.
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What brings more light into my awareness💡 is zooming out to recognize the larger picture. At times while doing this, I get a sense of the Continuum, where the relevance of purpose is lost in Being, and my heart feels at peace.

​I am also interested to read your story.

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​The image is by an artist 👩‍🎨 unknown to me. If you have any information, please pass it on, so I may ask permission.

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Venkateshwaralu Desaisetty
There is still a lot of I in you.

​Gary
Yes, of course.

I am the One Being in divine duality.

How could there not be an 'I' in an Individual?

Those who think they have no I, while functioning in the body, see not clearly through their self delusion.

But, tell me more, please. I like to hear your version and am up for expanding my awareness.

Venkateshwaralu Desaisetty
The I itself is the maya we have to realize, all parts are played by one only

​Gary
Yes, that is how 'I' mean:

I am the One Being, in divine duality.

Gary's life story gives his One Being aspect an experience of individuality.

Recognizing that the One Being is beyond time, space, and words.

Realizing there are no personal pronouns or possessions in the One Being.

Illusion means something is not as it appears.

And it is so, nothing perceived over the senses and/or intellect is the actuality.

Self identity also is not as it appears.

A truer view, though not perfect, is that I am the One Being, in divine duality.

That means something to me that cannot be fully expressed in words.

On the other hand, Gary is having a human experience, and denying it would be ignorant, unintelligent, imbalanced.

But if you see any imbalances in my current position, please tell me.