Beyond the Skinny "I"
"And who do you
think you are sauntering along
five feet up in the air, the ocean a blue fire
around your ankles, the sun
on your face on your shoulders its golden mouth whispering
(so it seems) you! you! you!"
— Mary Oliver, "On Thy Wondrous Works I Will Meditate (Psalm 145)"
Spirituality is, according to Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, an I-Thou relationship. If it were just "I" and I-alone, we would fall into a solipsistic world that does not regard anything outside oneself as true or worth noting. The "I" needs a "You." We know this to be true everyday of our lives. We fall in love; we make friends; we pray. We may even devote our life to God, the Great You in whom we live and move and have our being.
When we surrender to the Great You, the skinny "I" widens out to include the lavish expanse of You; it then cascades out to you and you and you! It quickly escapes the confines of humanity, reaching all creatures born of the earth. The red cardinal at my window is "you." So is the industrious ant and the lowly beetle.
Once we catch hold of this Great You who searches and knows you and me and the woodchuck who roams my backyard, we begin to experience the I-Thou wonder in everything and everyone around us. It's like falling in love, when you see the beloved everywhere you turn.
Patricia Adams Farmer, excerpts from "Y" is for You
think you are sauntering along
five feet up in the air, the ocean a blue fire
around your ankles, the sun
on your face on your shoulders its golden mouth whispering
(so it seems) you! you! you!"
— Mary Oliver, "On Thy Wondrous Works I Will Meditate (Psalm 145)"
Spirituality is, according to Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, an I-Thou relationship. If it were just "I" and I-alone, we would fall into a solipsistic world that does not regard anything outside oneself as true or worth noting. The "I" needs a "You." We know this to be true everyday of our lives. We fall in love; we make friends; we pray. We may even devote our life to God, the Great You in whom we live and move and have our being.
When we surrender to the Great You, the skinny "I" widens out to include the lavish expanse of You; it then cascades out to you and you and you! It quickly escapes the confines of humanity, reaching all creatures born of the earth. The red cardinal at my window is "you." So is the industrious ant and the lowly beetle.
Once we catch hold of this Great You who searches and knows you and me and the woodchuck who roams my backyard, we begin to experience the I-Thou wonder in everything and everyone around us. It's like falling in love, when you see the beloved everywhere you turn.
Patricia Adams Farmer, excerpts from "Y" is for You