Feelings of being separate, disconnected, or, worse, unsupported, can all too easily snowball into anxiety, complete with all of the unpleasant symptoms anxiety can bring. A participant in a Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) class once described this as feeling like she was in a bubble while the rest of the world was connected. She said she felt invisible, removed, and alone, and that it was gradually deepening her despair and a sense that she was different from everyone else and could never fit in. Perhaps you also have experienced this. The truth is, we all have moments when we feel isolated and painfully separate and long to experience our integral unity with life.
We all have moments when we feel isolated and painfully separate and long to experience our integral unity with life.
Mindfulness practice allows a different perspective and supports you in seeing what’s actually happening. When you pause and recognize thoughts as just thoughts, emotions as just emotions, and sensations as bodily experiences, you develop a great sense of connection. While your present-moment experience may not be comfortable, you are in touch with the emerging moment, in touch with yourself, and quite possibly more in touch with other people. As your practice of mindfulness deepens, your sense of connection will gradually increase, easing your access to your deepest strengths and resources and to the whole of your life and the world.
Informal Practice: Reconnect
Here’s an informal practice that you can do in the moment as soon as you recognize that you’re feeling separate. There’s no need to wait until you feel pain or a strong sense of disconnection; use it as soon as you have the sense that you’d like to feel more connected. You can do this practice in any position: lying down, sitting, or standing. One key way in which it differs from other practices is that your eyes remain open and engaged with your surroundings.
- First, deepen your awareness of your entire body. You might become aware of points of contact with the chair or surface beneath you, a sense of weight as you rest in the security of gravity, or a feeling of how you fully inhabit three dimensions through the length, width, and depth of your body. Pause here and invite a softening of any tension, perhaps in the belly, jaw, corners of the eyes, or hands. Allow your vision to expand, deliberately softening your gaze and widening the lens of your perception to take in your entire field of vision. Also connect with your breath and your heart, softening through your chest, being present, and actively bringing kindness to yourself.
- Next, engage your visual field and body awareness together. Open your peripheral vision so you can be aware of your hands on your lap or more fully sense your entire body, perhaps your torso, thighs, or the width of your shoulders. Allow this sensory experience to extend to what you can see: light, colors, and shapes both in the foreground and the background, taking in the experience of being a part of the world. You might also expand to other senses, perhaps including smells and sounds as well. Allow yourself to become part of the fabric of the moment, seeing yourself in the wider field of your surroundings, hearing the sounds around you, feeling sensations in your body, and gently acknowledging any thoughts and feelings you find. Hold all of this spacious, open-eyed awareness.
While your present-moment experience may not be comfortable, you are in touch with the emerging moment, in touch with yourself, and quite possibly more in touch with other people.
The Power of Interconnectedness
Sensing yourself within the wider field of your surroundings is a practice that can broaden limitlessly as, throughout your day, you attend to the web of life that you’re a part of and share with all living beings, all interconnected and interdependent. When you deeply reflect on the ripples of interconnection that pulse through your life, you can directly experience how you are never isolated. Everything in your life, from the food you eat to the furniture around you, connects you to the lives of others. We are all connected to our planet, nourished by its water and air. We are all connected to the sun, which supports all life on this planet. You exist within vibrating patterns of connection, which you will readily sense if you pause in any moment to feel your feet firmly planted on the earth, to receive the sun’s warmth on your skin, to refresh yourself with a drink of water, and to sense how the flow of air as you breathe connects you with all of the life around you.
Being in nature and making time to experience and honor the natural elements of this world can provide a powerful reminder of the deep interconnection you have with this planet and all of its beings. Recognizing the forces of light and dark, gravity, weight, sunshine and moonlight, the cycles of seasons and weather—in short, the simple realities that unite us all—can be such a profound affirmation of everything you share with others and all of the ways in which you belong.
When you deeply reflect on the ripples of interconnection that pulse through your life, you can directly experience how you are never isolated.
At times, it may also be helpful to recall the many ways in which you’re connected with other people. For one, you’re part of a network of millions of people around the