How We Stay Separate

As my husband was watching the world cup game this morning, I overheard that one of Paraguay’s star players was not at the world cup because he had been shot in the head. I felt sad and then I found myself wondering about how that happens. The announcer said they have someone in custody and that it was supposedly over soccer that this person shot the player (who, by the way, is still alive). It seems to me that when someone kills or hurts another person intentionally, they have to look at this other person as if he or she is not a person. The person becomes an object rather than a human being.

I think most of us live our lives as if we are the center of the universe. I am the star of my own movie and everyone else is just a side character, a supporting actor, an extra. And it’s not very often that we really stop to think about how everyone else is going through all of their own struggles and difficulties, having all of their own experiences and insights, and that I am, in fact, just an extra in their movies. Last night, my husband wanted to barbecue—it was late and I was tired and found myself in a conversation in my head about how I wanted something else to be happening (he should have started earlier, he should have been more prepared, he should have done this on a different night, etc.). Then, he couldn’t get the charcoal started and I offered to go to the store to get lighter fluid. The story really got going during that trip to the store—he never does the shopping, he’s so this, he’s so that. It wasn’t too hard for me to notice that everything that was going through my head was about how he wasn’t “right.” And I saw that I was turning him into an object and all that mattered was the impact that this object was having on ME.

When I shifted my perspective and thought about how he is doing his best and wanted to make a nice dinner and probably wasn’t thinking about how I would be feeling when I got home from work (not because he is thoughtless, but because he is a human being just like me prone to looking at things from his own point of view), I was able to let go of my stories and most of my irritation and carry on. The most sure-fire way of staying angry at, irritated at, frustrated with, hurt by someone is to keep that person as an object, where I am only thinking about how they are impacting me and my life, not looking at him or her as a human being.

The translation of the word yoga that I like is connection. Through my yoga practice, I find I have less ability to discount another person. I can’t stay in my own little story in my own little world. Sometimes I am able to make my way out of that on my own and sometimes I need to talk to a person, listen to that person to remember that they are real. Based on my own experience, it seems like a lot of difficulties can be diffused, side-stepped or worked through more quickly and easily when I am able to widen my perspective. What I see, hear, experience is limited and other people are real human beings who see, hear and experience something different but no less valid. It’s not rocket science, but I think if we examine our day-to-day life, we might find that we are objectifying people more than we think. And certainly, if you are a news-watcher, there is plenty of evidence there. Tara Brach suggests a practice of simply looking around at people and saying in your mind, “You are real.” Try it out and see what you think.