You and I are Earth
On the charade of separateness.
Dear reader,
No matter how far removed I am from Gaza, I don’t actually feel separate from the grief erupting there. It isn’t that I want to center myself or piggyback onto the pain of others, or because I need to project my own undefined pain onto something specific. I think it’s because you and I are earth, and because your pain is my pain.
A few weeks ago on Instagram, I reposted footage from Gaza of bloodied, screaming children in a moving car, and a residential building being exploded. In response, someone reached out to me and requested that next time, I preface similar posts with a trigger warning.
Dear reader, I say this with love: I am confused why anyone who has the luxury of scrolling in their spare time feels entitled to a trigger warning right now. Perhaps you can help me find more grace about the whole thing, but the way I see it is that there is no trigger warning when it comes to war. People don’t get a warning to run for their lives, and when they do, there is often nowhere to go. I wonder if the very idea that we should be able to pick and choose when we give our attention to atrocity stems from the same sense of separation that makes us feel helpless to stop it.
I’ve been thinking about what it has done to my spirit to live in a fragmented society, to be unaffected by genocide and war in a direct and material sense, but to know about it all the same.
For me, it feels like my life isn’t actually real life, but more of a charade. It’s as if every day is a theater production. The plot involves waking up in an agrarian paradise, cleansing myself with the earth’s water, eating eggs, driving a car with plenty of gas, and continuing with made-up projects.
I sit at a computer to type emails and process artwork orders, taking breaks for leisurely walks to nowhere in particular. All the while, behind the stage curtain is an ever-growing, unconscionable evil. I know it’s happening, but I pretend like it isn’t.
I take my place because the show must go on, and it does — but not really. I can’t give my full attention to the masquerade; something fucked up is spilling out from both sides of the stage. And like anything I avoid, the more I ignore injustice, the louder and sicker it gets.
It’s become increasingly difficult for me to reconcile the both/and of living a nice life in California while bombs are being being dropped on thousands of people across the world, which is actually very small in the scheme of things. I feel sad that killing people is still on the table as a viable option for anything. And yet, my ability to continue with the complacency of my own life, despite an innate feeling that all of our lives are connected, confounds me. Is it because war hasn’t arrived on my doorstep yet? Is it as simple as the rage of the privileged never being the same as the rage of the oppressed?1
My ability to show up with love for my life while others are being buried is, in many ways, a testament to the resilience of the human spirit. But it is also because in a fractured society with defined yet arbitrary borders, I am disconnected from others just enough to forget about them. I am conditioned not only to believe in my separateness, but also to just keep going, even when people are being murdered for no good reason.
Why do I tolerate it? Does the structure of my survival make it feel like I would have to sacrifice my life if I devoted it to justice? How does one unravel themselves from a system in order to actively prioritize and stand for peace? Is there something more effective than becoming a martyr?
It was Andy Warhol who said, “If everyone isn't beautiful, then no one is.” I’d argue that it is the same for freedom. I am only as free as my most oppressed neighbor; my experiences of abundance are only as rich as those who have the least. I know it doesn’t look that way materially — I have everything, including safety — but at what cost to myself and others?
The only way I can stomach it is to embrace the facade of living a normal life through distraction and denial, and a gratitude practice, I guess. But at the end of the day, my humanity knows no territory. There is no real distinction between what’s mine and what’s yours. Similarly, on a cellular level, I believe there is no distinction between our suffering.
On earth, war is still the dominant creative solution to getting our way. I wonder if we will ever come close to our capacity for love, innovation, and magic if military force and violence remain acceptable responses to big questions. In their book The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity, authors David Graeber and David Wengrow remind us, “We are projects of collective self-creation.”2 I agree, and it feels like our collective project of being human on earth is currently stuck and wholeheartedly limited.
I believe that new ideas are born from demand. They are born from the courage and patience required to sit in the uncomfortable void of Not This while humbly waiting for an answer.3 Perhaps only when there is a reverence for all human life will we be able to access the true depth of our wisdom and our capacity for togetherness. A better solution may only reveal itself to us if we make it clear that we are open to trying it. Until then, we’ll continue with trying to survive while marching behind a death machine. How much time and collective creativity is being squandered, or downright crushed?
There’s nothing wrong with trying to survive. It’s not bad that I can go surfing and bake bread and lay under the covers safely next to a friend. It’s just that for me, these experiences feel empty the more I know how unlikely it is that they will be shared experiences across the world. It’s as though the good things bounce off of my heart instead of lodge themselves inside of it, the way I imagine they might if we were committed, above all, to life instead of territory, control, and comfort. It’s as though I know, deep down, that this could all be so much more beautiful.
Love,
Anna
bell hooks, source unknown (please share if you know).
Graeber, David, and D. Wengrow. The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity. Signal, an Imprint of McClelland & Stewart, 2023.
Oh Anna, I felt this on my bones. Every word. Thank you for your articulation, your words, your mind and heart ❤️🔥 Free Palestine ❤️🔥
Thank you for writing it down. My own life has been one of running toward an immediate fire lately, while also feeling the grief and weight of what is occurring globally. We all live here. The Earth is really just a small town in space. I have two jobs. In one I hold the grief, suffering, and crises of human beings. In the other I pour and sell wine to people who are looking to have a nice day in their time away from work. The dichotomy is profound and such a glimpse into how fractured the world is and continues to be and I find that I cry equally about both camps. And yet, feed the cat, brush the teeth, celebrate my son's birthday. I don't even really know what to say. Gratitude for what I have while being ever aware and not turning away from the suffering of others. No trigger warning necessary.