WE

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I, Thou, We

 

I do a lot of reading

as most of my friends know

I have shelves of books

some of them new, barely explored

 

others old friends among whose pages

I have wandered countless times

 

Sitting there small, but not insignificant

among heftier tomes

is Martin Buber's little masterpiece

"I and Thou"

 

Buber's work has been referenced

in at least three other books I have recently read

used different ways

but all still talking about the way we

through dialogue

help shape and form and create each other

 

When the relationship is I - Thou

rather than I - It

(or in these days it might be even more powerful to think of "I - THEY"

 

it is a lover-beloved relationship

in which people find not only each other

but in fact, themselves...

 

your "Thou", helps me discover my "I"

 

Gone is the functional, calculating relationship

where affection and value must be earned and is not just given

 

One author goes even further

and suggests what would be even better is if we went beyond “I-Thou”

to "we"

 

to a place where our encounters with others

leads to kind of a profound synthesis

which is somehow better, more evolved than what was there before

 

I love that idea

Which brings to mind the concept of synergy

where 2 + 2 = 5, or 6

or more

 

 

The idea that two people, when they come together

in a radical connection of love,

(perhaps Spirit fueled)

create a reality that is bigger

better

wiser

more loving

than if they had never come together at all

 

And yet, we seem to be so stuck on “I”

in that "I - It" world

where one must be right and the other wrong

where one must lose in order for another to win

 

Yesterday I sat with a number of people

I also sat with cancer and impending death

Crisis

Anxiety

I sat with frailty

and heart failure

I sat with addiction

 

It was a day just to sit

and listen

and try to be a Thou

so they could be an I

and the kind of I that allowed them to be a Thou

(confused?  I am)

 

Mostly it was a day to just “be with”

sometimes mostly in silence

to create a 'we'

a moment of transcendence

a moment that was sacred, loving, and healing

 

where 2, or 3 were gathered

and Jesus was there

in the midst