Outward forms & physical definitions of beauty are certainly aspects we've been all been ingrained to separate and differentiate ourselves by.... but at any moment any one of us could lose our own fragile sense of belonging... by way of some event... an accident or whatever. If we define ourselves only by our appearance, our youth, our physical power, for example, we may be in for quite a shock.
Likewise, we may think we care for others, but it is often within the narrow context we are taught... We love a lover for instance, in the context of attraction, and a child in the context of being ours.
Yet if we dig deeper or get past the guarded subtleties of I'm-better-or-worse-than-you or I'm-uncomfortable out of the way or at least keep them in check... we may quickly find that, except for the very rare individual, that we do have empathy...
Perhaps we identify underneath that we are all conscious beings and that, at the level at which we do experience empathy, one person's pain or success is, to a degree, another's.
And if we key into that, we may feel another person's success... we may feel it in our chests or in our stomachs. We have mirror neurons in our minds & bodies. If this person is on our team, essentially part of what we are a part of... we may get the same feeling as we do when watching a family member score a touchdown or beat the odds & triumph out of adversity.
One person's triumph becomes another's. To clarify, one does not have to be an extroverted, outgoing person or even a team player to get this... One can certainly get up close if that's his/her style... or if one is more introverted, one can do this from a distance. We may be attracted to some more than others.
In whatever case, we aren't going to be with, hold space with, be directly entangled with every person, every creature on the planet... but we are, on some level, entangled and respect seems paramount for sharing this space together. We are all, in a sense, equal and connected and here, and we are always changing... shedding our old selves... our dying cells.
That alone speaks to the fact that we are more than simply these fading faces. This could no doubt demand a certain courage. It also might fill a self aware onlooker with a type of inspiration.
It may not be easy to get past all our narrow infatuations with outward form... granted... I fully agree... and I am inside it too. But we may do well to know that these are our narrow or at least limited criteria, wherever we got them from, and a broader reality is shining nonetheless....
Furthermore... the truth is that any one of us can loose our currency at any moment... our social standing, our outward appearance and find ourselves in the position of being different than those around us... who will cast their vote our way?
Within a context, power is like a ball that we have been tossed and we can not mistake ourselves for that ball. This bit of knowledge makes an easy place for respect. It is with this same frame of mind, that a person might pick up a bug and put it outside... out of respect for a creature with, in that moment, less power.
Certainly this may be at odds with the subconscious programming that the whole of us have generally been set loose with.... but it is nonetheless still there...
If we do find ourselves in that position of being different than the norm... and with the currency that we have so defined ourselves by taking a hit... will we have that same type of nerve, follow through, and dedication that we may define and rank ourselves by?
Maybe there is no true measure of a person, but the above philosophy has one up on the narrow context that we tend linger in.
This may make us uncomfortable but a person has to know when an uncomfortable feeling gets in the way of truth. At least if we are interested in growing up in that way.
Really this all just means extending compassion and respect to other expressions of life. We are all in a process of change and are presumably more than just one stop along the way.
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