Integration

Integration is crucially important. I think we live far too fragmentally. It's not good for us. We compartmentalize our lives, our bodies, our minds. All things are separate. In some recent conversations with friends I began to realize how integration was something we were all seeking. We all approached from slightly different angles, but we were not that far apart.

I think most people may not even realize how we fragment ourselves. We have our home life in which we are perhaps at most rest. If we live in a tumultuous house, then we have some place that we are most ourselves.

Then we have a personality for work. Some people are very different at work. For me, some of that was necessitated by appearance. I just couldn't look like myself at work. It was not accepted. But now I have built enough credibility and maneuvered into a place that I can relax into my own appearance somewhat more. Time alone helps because I entered the professional world early and the tastes of my generation hadn't caught up yet. Now my generation is more in the mainstream and while not everyone looks like me, at least they are familiar with the look and aren't put off by it.

Then we fragment socially. Church is horrible about this. If you don't go to church you probably don't know what I mean...which is good. But if you've spent any amount of time in churches you'll know there is always some bit of a persona that people carry off. Some more than others. In the best sense, it's simply things you don't talk about or say, that you might normally. At worst, it's a whole fake persona. I wouldn't ever go so far as to say that is true in all churches, just out of sound logic, but I have actually seen one...just one...where there was no persona. So there may be others.

In other social aspects, we fragment from other people by keeping distance. We may have some really close friends, but many of us don't have as many friends as close as we would like. I'm not talking about anything wierd or perverted. Just an open easiness that lets us be who we really are with each other. The primary unit of humanity is not the nuclear family, but the tribe. Without being a part of a pack, we will never truly be whole.

We can also fragment physically. We have separate times for work, play, fitness, and entertainment. In varying degrees of course, these can become full fragments of our personality. For example, I know a whole part of Tampa where most people will drive home from work, change clothes into workout wear, load their equipment, and drive to an appropriate workout place. Perhaps the silliest is runners and bikers who will drive to a place to run or bike, even if it's only a couple of kilometers from home!

But I want integration of all parts. Faith colors my study and meditation, which feeds into my physical practice, which affects my work (both home and office), and I enjoy all. None are excluded for any other part of life. It all flows seamlessly together like a river where varying currents may come to the surface but none stop flowing. All is water.

There are many ways to achieve this, I'm sure. For me, it is a lifestyle of Contemplation, Practicing the Presence. This is coupled with a warts and all approach to relationships, even at work. Add to this the physical discipline of Parkour, which integrates mind and body, and it's pretty much a complete package. Even hobbies start to flow into it, such as gardening, and woodwork. What integrates is good, what doesn't is not attractive.

It's imperfect by far. I am still far more fragmented than I want to be. But I am trying to learn to forgive myself...not in the sense of any one specific flaw, but by simply not holding myself to such a high standard. Of course, I think one of the first steps toward integration one must take is to let go of one's self altogether. It's not something that happens in sequence, but is a primer that must continually be primed. A base flow, to use the language of my scientific discipline.