When I wrote the first draft of Relational Mindfulness, my second book, my editor said, “In every chapter, you carry the voice of a compassionate sage... until the chapter on Technology, when you become a grouchy grandfather. Would you be willing to soften that chapter a bit?” So I did.
Now...here I am, once again, being asked by my publisher to soften a bit… to let go of the grouchy grandparent...and embrace the brightly lit screen of social media in order to share my new book, Luminous Darkness. This feels edgy to me; and in the spirit of emergence, it piques my curiosity. How can I creatively embrace this communication form while being mindful of its shadows?
Before engaging in social media more wholeheartedly in the months ahead, I want to first honor and voice my resistance to it. Voicing my resistance helps me to let go of resistance. It helps me to see more clearly what’s true and what I’m just being told by a complaining voice in my head.
Since I left the monastery, my commitment has been to live in the world without being of the world. This means not being bound by human conditioning… anchoring in source connection rather than the distraction of the mind of separation. I savor simple living. I have conscious boundaries with the news and my husband doesn’t even own an iPhone. A decade of my adult life was spent living off the grid as a farmer/ monk... When I returned to “the real world” in 2008, computer screens had taken over completely. I will forever covet the old days when we just called up using landlines and couldn't be reached while on a camping trip or errand, for that matter. I’ve seen social media used by so many to feed the mind of separation… through distraction, escapism, measuring, comparing, judging, and playing the popularity game.
I know social media is here to stay… and recognize the myriad ways it can be life-affirming and how it supported connection throughout the disorientation of the global pandemic.. But it has also fed unprecedented divisiveness, polarization, distraction, and confusion. I’m not anti-screen…I’m grateful every day to teach online… connecting with people across the globe whom I’ve fallen in love with — yet have never even met in person — and with less reliance on fossil fuels. I’m just happiest engaging in the world of living beings and embodiment.
I savor slowing down, settling deep into my body, and listening intimately to whomever I am with. I speak, teach, and listen from my womb...the dark fertile empty space of connectivity and depth at the core of my being. This sensual, sensitive, and powerfully alive energy center doesn’t care much for screens. She comes alive through the unfurling emergence of natural and creative processes that affirm source connection and deep time. I nourish this field by attuning to my subtle body, emptying out completely in meditation, dancing daily, and worshiping the earth in as many ways as I can. I’ve never found connection to the divine through the shiny billboard postings or eye candy of social media.
I teach relational intelligence. The practices I’m committed to affirm compassion and keep us awake to all that exists beyond the human realm. I’m not sure the time we spend on screens helps us to remember the relational intelligence that can be known only through our bodies. In fact, hasn’t social media created even more room to perceive each other from surface distraction rather than depth?
A beloved teacher once said "We can’t find genuine freedom until we let go of the pursuit in popularity... And no one can be a good teacher until they let go of this pursuit!" In honor of this, my commitment has always been to depth (vertical) rather than horizontal growth. I let go years ago of concern/care with numbers (how many sign ups or likes do I have?) Quality of experience means so much more to me than linear measurement. My work has grown organically, but I choose the freedom that doesn’t give a sh-t about popularity … and I’m suspicious that social media perpetuates that pursuit.
Long ago I learned that stripping down our experience to what is essential reveals the gift of freedom. While my vote would bring us back in time to the simple days before the iPhone took over, I know that it’s too late. And I know there are many people who love social media, and cross-pollinate online everyday through poetry, truth telling, art, beauty, and dharma, shared on the screen. Inspired by you, I am willing to enter into an experiment and be curious about Instagram as a vehicle for consciousness.
For coming months, I invite you to join me to reflect on your own social media habits and explore possibilities at the intersection of embodiment and social media. Here’s what I’m committing to:
To partake in the nourishment of social media in small sips, maybe once a day, and to continue to allow myself a couple days per week off the screen entirely!
To anchor in subtle sensual body awareness while on the screen, just as I’m doing now, writing this blog — AND to create posts that invite others into their bodies.
To more generously share my voice through social media, while being equally generous with my self. This means…holding conscious boundaries with any mind commentary that gets triggered in the process.
To pay attention. If ever I notice my commitment to emptiness, the fertile darkness, becoming “filled” by the screen, I will have compassion for myself and STOP.
To remember to use my inner vision, to see with the heart, even while I am taking in more visual stimulation than I’m used to.
To be light-hearted and forgive my human community for any nonsense, divisiveness, offensiveness or marketplace mentality I see while interfacing in this way. I recognize we’re all doing the best we can, and that this is a particularly confusing time to be human.
And lastly, to give myself permission, if I find it simply isn’t true for me to spend time on Instagram, to return to my yin cave, always a source of profound power and restoration.
Thank you, Community, for reading this. I hope this experiment is helpful for you too. I want to acknowledge the many ways the screen helps us to connect… and remind us that we need to be equally aware of its shadows and the choice we have for how we show up to it.
To join me on social media, click HERE for Instagram and HERE for Facebook. To order a copy of my new book, Luminous Darkness: An Engaged Buddhist Approach to Embracing the Unknown, click here.
Feel free to let me know how this blog resonates with you.
In Peace and Passion,
Eden
