Alternative Title: What Does It Mean To Be Human?
Hey all. I’m in the process of reconstructing pretty much my whole life, and I have a question for everyone, in your various states of living and interdependence at this particular point in time. Here is my inquiry — what does it mean to be human? To clarify, I am not talking about scientific DNA kind of stuff, but more so being a person and/or cultivating personhood. We’ve all been through stuff, are going through stuff, or will be going through stuff very soon, and I’m just very curious to get your collective thoughts on this particular topic.
RESPONSE 1:
I never felt like I had constructed my life. Or am building my life. For me life is perpetual changes and it is a process. Life is messy and powerful. So what does it mean to be human? . It means navigating all the ups and down, all the émotions, all the crazyness. Hopefully find some love and community with others, and be aware enough to recognize we are social beings, have compassion.
Being human is messy. And maybe what makes us definitly human is our ability to try and makes sense out of all of it. For better and worst.
That’s what I have for now.
(a little later)
I certainly believe the biggest mystery is into knowing ourself, our capacity to learn, to develop more awareness, to understand agenda and motivation. To cultivate a sense of freedom and options. The consciousness that we are alive.
In the end, I want to believe we do our best with what we’ve been given and under the circumstances at play. So yes we may judge the action but reserve judgments on the person. And I mostly need to remind myself that life is not fair. and to revisit my expectations knowing that.
During my mom’s cancer til her passing, it was about balancing what was good for me, for her, safeguarding the sense of who I was, am, my belief and perception. Honoring contradictions, feeling loved, loving and being kind.
(and then)
Oh and i might add, sometimes, being human means not answering messages lol.
Even when we care … some will know.
RESPONSE 2:
Succinctly:
Being a normal human being is the goal. Not a “god” or godlike, nor anything else. Not chasing euphoria/self-advantage, not nihilism, etc. Not extreme.
Flexible and able to express natural (contextual/local) range, even during times of stress, pain, trauma, etc.
Human dignity is precious and radiant.
“I don’t know” is the luminous/sublime baseline.
Meaning (making) is a kind of imaginal play(ing).
When in doubt, rest.
More elaborate:
Pain, fear and hunger/desire are wisdom teachers. Death (darkness, void, chaos, etc) is the mother of all.
Our body (organ system, the yin of physiological matter) is/are the ancestors.
Time/nature/reality is a circle/cycle without linear progression, absolute beginning or absolute end.
Everything is a kind of Dream(ing).
RESPONSE 3:
My philosophy of who I am as a person is something that’s emergent from within and very solid. It’s very me. It’s not that surprising. What’s surprising is the stuff I have to deal with and my inability to deal with it in life, but that’s part of the question…
We have an inside and an outside. And though we typically define ourselves by our outsides, the inside is really the truth of who I am… the inside is the system by which I create myself. What kind of car I drive, what color skin I have, whether I’m skinny or fat or live in Ohio or Texas… this is all on the outside and how we describe ourselves. The inside involves our understanding of ourselves and the insight of the inner system — and that system is a self-directing, self-organizing, self-balancing, self-healing. It is us, and we don’t tell it how we want it to be…
My relationship with who I am involves dealing with the challenge in my life that come from the outside, mostly by finding myself on the inside and by developing myself on the inside and developing my own inner awareness and my ability to be responsive to that self-organizing principle…
When the circumstances of life or the world makes us feel confused in who we are, we have to update the belief and understanding of the model we have of ourselves. The first step in that process is to recognize we have that inside and how the inside works, that it’s self aware and that it is really the actual source of our identity. It is the source of the homeostatic and harmonious and integrative and deep kind of intuitive aspects of who we are.
We don’t all have the same inside, just like we don’t all have the same outside. And so I think the answer is one of emergence and emergence from within requires awareness, sensation, and movement within.
RESPONSE 4:
Please remove me from this group.
RESPONSE 5
Being a human is to feel cozy for a short while, upon remerging with the great sea of awareness we don’t have quite the same personality to snuggle up with. Enjoy it while it lasts.
RESPONSE 6:
Sorta shamanic but also ancient practice lens – incarnating into this dimension, into these bodies, is characterized by the senses and relational connections.
Being human, being a person, is about experiencing with the senses, the senses being a connection to/through the body, and the ability to experience contrast and dualism. Right/wrong, choices, all that. This planet is the planet you incarnate on to experience dualism and desire and pleasure.
In all my ramblings I find connection to self enables connection to other. Internally reject or suppress something in you and most likely you’ll be unavailable for connection to any external beings of any kinds human or otherwise.
Becoming more “me” as a person is in not rejecting, but observing and welcoming all experiences that pass through me, including “imaginary” ones, which I have a dozen lenses I switch through that have contributed to that. I believe nothing is really imaginary, but that goes a bit farther than this question I think.
Person –> body -> feel things through senses through body, even noncorporeal things > anything you try not to feel or sense creates disconnection > anything you feel potentiates connection to other people > more connection to other people contributes to feelings of wholeness but so does more connection to things inside yourself > the circle continues
And then managing all that in different environments.
RESPONSE 7:
For me, being a person and cultivating personhood, is a lived experience. First I, as a living organism, dive into the world. In this intersubjectivity I engage in multiple encounters with what is out there. Through these encounters, I begin to realise my sensations, my emotions, and latest my cognitions which come with it. With time I get a glimpse of who am I, what drives me towards something and away from something. I want to describe it with color. I get color, which underlies also a dynamic process. A constant flux, in which I try to stabilise myself to the degree, to not loose my personhood which is a work in progress, every step to a improved regulation to hold the encounters which shape me in an intersubjective experience.
RESPONSE 8:
My answer to this probably will change over time, as my personality has transformed many times over the years I have surrendered to the fact that a personality is just a vehicle to take you to your goal so as my goals changed I learned to let go of old identities and beliefs/thoughts attached to that identity.
Since nowadays my goal is enlightenment and raising my conciousness level as much as I can to serve as a healer, I will say for this goal, I define being human as learning to let go. Feeling everything deeply then letting them go. It is incredible how many times I let go STUFF in a day since I began this practice. It is like I have been hoarding thoughts, beliefs, emotions, sensations, memories, traumas etc… Since I began confronting old patterns and surrendering to this letting go, I realized there is so much more to being human then defining yourself with a limiting I/ME… So much beauty and freedom in expanding the minds walls to infinite possibilities of different versions of human. MAybe even different levels of human. So I would say there is infinite ways to be human and to define human, but the more important question is: What’s your goal right now?
Thank you for asking this question :).
(exchange 1): Thank you for this answer.
I agree about the need to let go, but keep finding
myself asking why I hang on to things.
A part of the process, methinks?
I think it gives a sense of (false) security. A solid ground of sorts. Feeling secure in an everchanging identity is very different than the security of a fixed one brings. It requires trust in a higher power and a hell lot of certainty that whatever happens it will be good for you.
(exchange 2): You have gone on your
own journey regarding this?
Oh yes, I have been on this journey for 6 years now since giving birth and being a mom triggered a series of chaos and change in my life. I am now emerging anew I feel like. Lots of new energies and new identities forming in me nowadays. I am excited to see what is going to come out of this.
RESPONSE 9:
I’d have to say for me to be a human being is to learn. There have been different stages and parts of that for me. I had moments where I was learning who I was alone, in a relationship with x, who I want to be after x, how much I want my identity wrapped up in my career or my passions, how much I want my career and passions wrapped up in each other. Feels like as long as I’m continuing to learn I’m on a good path, even if the path doesn’t feel that good in the moment.
RESPONSE 10:
Being human is to be an animal wrapped up in many false ideologies. Divorced from our true nature and confused about our intuitions and what is “best”. Able to understand and comprehend so much of this physical reality, but able to have actionable impact in far fewer directions.
Life itself is absent of any inherent meaning. Therefore, recognizing one’s “spin” or take on the world allows us to make meaning our of our circumstances as the story of our experience unfolds.
These and all other wonderous things about the connections we make and hold on to.
RESPONSE 11:
To be human is to stop protecting yourself from the whole of experience. It is to recognize that the world you created and live within might not be as fantastic as that which exists outside of you. It is to be willing to change beliefs, despite all the evidence you have mounted that your way is superior because you could both function in society and rip a hole into it to make others’ lives better. It is to realize that the rules you’ve made up to govern such a seemingly mystical existence are in fact made up, and can be changed at any time, whenever you are willing to admit you might be wrong. It is to decide to be affected and connected, and to notice the stories you tell to try and convince yourself you are not. Being human is to be disappointed again and again, and still try. It is to accept the hurt that comes from being open. It is the long and difficult path to see yourself as you actually are, and be willing to love that being as if it was your duty to do so. It is to acknowledge that you are the same, when everything that ever resonated with you affirmed that you were different.
[Feature Photo by Sylas Boesten on Unsplash.]