For about fifty-five years, I’ve been sorting out what it means to be in connection with other human beings. In particular, I’ve been musing about what our culture calls a relationship. I now am trying to figure out what it means to interconnect, be in a relationship without clinging or attachment. I think this is a new insight for me.
I am now wondering if there can be an interconnection without anxiety about loss, without grasping for continuity, without surges of jealousy, without worrying fear. I would like to interconnect without regard for the future, only attentive to being present, here and now.
It seems that my culture conspires to stir up all the anxieties and fears associated with grasping and attachment. It seems intent on making me suffer. I have been encouraged to make promises about the future and rely on promises someone else must make. I live in a culture that puts the emphasis on relying on what another person will do, not on what is happening right now. I am trying to answer “will you be there tomorrow” rather than are you here now. I am encouraged to promise “I will be there tomorrow” rather than make the most loving statement “I am here for you now.”
I am convinced that if I attempt to promise what I will do, I set up expectations I will never meet. Promises lead to attempts to control, grasping, attachment. All this leads to suffering.
Of course, this means that an interconnection can only be between people who are equal. There is no possession, no ownership, no superiority, no dependency. It means I have to be able to say, with true authenticity, “I am here.” That is something I must first be able to say to myself.