The Power of Knowing Others (and why we need to know how to end this story)
Wonderings about the global impact of migration on narcism + how to prepare for the next chapter
I woke in the darkness of dawn, and left dreamtime with the instruction to watch the sunrise. So this piece was created while on a walk through the Topanga mountains. You can read or listen.
These mountains always have so much to say, especially at this time of day.
Being a resident of LA — I come into a lot of contact with Narcism. (Side note: I once heard if you want to study tortoises go to the Galapagos, and if you want to study narcism, go to LA).
I’ve been wondering how global migration may be one of the creators of narcissism as we know it, and what happens to people when they’re cut off from their roots as they travel, are separated from the systems of community of support, and the nature of life and survival. My hypothesis is that one of the consequences of immigration (for clarity: I mean this in the sense that the majority of people in the US have origins from other countries) is that when parents, doing everything they can to survive, aren't within their own support systems, their capacity to fully support and be present for their children is limited. And so, too many children go unseen and unknown, left to figure out who they are on their own.
There’s something about what it is to be living in a country of so many people who have grown up unseen and unknown— having to discover oneself—the gift and the shadow of that. Which brings to mind the story of Narcissus.
Narcissus is a figure from Greek Mythology who was so handsome that he fell in love with himself when he saw his image reflected in a pool of water.
But I actually believe that narcissism has morphed in our times: and is expressed through social media through a constant pulse: See me, see me. Know me, know me. Like me, like me. There's the shadow. It’s a hunger that breaks the giving and receiving cycle of life. While some go into social media with real gifts, insight, humor to give…there is that other thing happening as well: a hunger to be seen and to be known.
I wonder if this isn’t consciousness living through us trying to make sense of itself in constant request for a reflection because a healthy expression of being known is missing from the family/community systems?
With this lack of being seen, being known, it makes sense that more people than ever are living with the question: Why am I here? What do I have to give?
In the times I’ve had the opportunity to sit and listen to indigenous wisdom, one of those ways of being is about the community’s responsibility to see and call out the gifts in younger people.
I imagine this impulse to the gift in another was not frivolous: It was about survival. A community's recognition wasn’t about the individual’s satisfaction of being seen—
it was about the community’s need for recognizing and receiving what each person had to bring.
The community needed the gifts of every person to thrive.
While some could hunt, others could build, and others could sing, and other could cook, and all of this was needed.
Today I come with a sacred invitation: for the next seven days, tune your eyes to the people around you. Not in a state of comparison, judgement, or critique, but really look for the gifts and talents in those around you—not in those who have already claimed and are expressing their gifts, but in those still discovering them.
The invitation is to try on the role of being the one who sees, names, and calls out the gift that may be laying dormant in someone else. (Perhaps you will notice someone near you has been fantasizing about fixing things, and will be the best plumber, or perhaps there is an opera singer near you who hasn’t opened their voice and you hear them humming…)
So for clarity… today’s invitation is not not about finding your own gift; it’s about strengthening our ties to community by recognizing the gifts of those around you—whether they’re young, in their 20s, 30s, 40s, or older. There are those who may have gone through life without ever having their gift named or claimed.
What if you could be the key that opens the door?
(Side note: there is research that says one of the most powerful antidotes to depression and PTSD is service. So if you are feeling one of those things, or anxious of depressed, this could be a good rope ladder out of that space for a few moments).
HOW THIS TIMES INTO THE NEED FOR GREAT ENDINGS
As an eternal optimist, I want to believe we’re part of some divine orchestration.As storytellers, we know it’s easy to start a story—Once upon a time—but it’s not always easy to end a great story; this requires craft and skill to create closure.
But as storytellers and creators, we know the next story doesn’t get to begin until this one has fully ended. (The metaphor is there for us: for a new relationship to be as magnificent as it can be, the previous one must not only be complete but also healed.)
I like to believe that those of us who are alive and awake to these times signed up for a big assignment. We must have been bold on the other side to say, Yes, let’s go be part of the one of the greatest transformations of consciousness in human history.
And it would seem the time has come: we know that there are many things that need to shift, change, and ways of being that need to end for us to come to a state of thriving on this planet.
As those who are here for the end, we are then responsible to plant the seeds for the next story to begin.
Our job is to hold both—letting what needs to end, end, allowing ourselves to heal and grieve so we can begin again. No one said that these are easy times.
But perhaps that is why seeing the sunrise makes me optimistic.
Because the nature of life reveals that every sunset is met by a sunrise; we get to experience this simple truth daily when we rise to meet the dawn.
It’s not all cut and dry. But here I am, sitting with you, watching the sunrise over the mountains, feeling this call from the land to be present for each other in as many ways as we can. And what rises in me with this sunrise, is the awareness, and the call from life to move away from the me, me, me mentality —- to actively recognizing that what people have to give is far more valuable than money.
We give comfort, we give kindness. We give service, We share joy, We provide access to grief. We have so much to give.
When we change that story about what is valuable, and feel that truth in our bones, we will be part of changing the story of our time.
So, this is your sacred invitation. If you feel called to participate in this invitation— to really look for and call out and invite the gifts in others, please share what you discover!
I would love to see what you see.
Until next time. Have a lovely day, and I hope you get to watch the sunrise or sunset and listen for what is your role, what is your story, what is your song, what is your poem, what is your dance through this time of transition?
I love this, Leah. Thank you. I was thinking about the story of Narcissus this week as I told Iron John for the first time. There is that moment where the young boy leans over the golden spring he is meant to guard and sees his golden reflection, and then his hair turns gold. Instead of becoming intoxicated with his own beauty, he keeps it hidden, and goes to serve in the castle kitchen and gardens. He even gives gold ducats away when the princess tries to reward him for bringing her wildflowers. He knows the gold isn't just for him, that his beauty must be of service to others before it can be revealed. He is exposed only after he he has served the king and three times caught the golden apple tossed into the air by the princess. The king offers him gold, but he refuses, saying "I have all the gold I could ever want," and requests the real treasure, the hand of the princess. The masculine and feminine are wed and the kingdom prospers. At every moment in this story, the community is conspiring for this moment to happen. It is the opposite of the isolated, cut-off Narcissus. Up until I told it, I'd only heard and thought of Iron John as a story about gendered male initiation, but it really landed in my audience as something more. An antidote to narcissism, perhaps.