I saw this PBS show yesterday about dogs. They showed that a dog’s brain lit up with dopamine response better with a human’s praise reward than with a food reward. The researcher was trying to show that dogs care about the connection they have with humans and it more than just a food response. I believe this to be true.
However, at the end of the show, they also posited that there are some humans that have a hyper-socialization response, and they suggested that dogs do as well. I don’t know if this is true or not. Yet, if it is, then I don’t have it. In fact, I think I am the opposite of being hyper-social. It isn’t that I don’t want to feel a connection to others, I just don’t feel a strong connection to other people. I hate to admit it, but I think that it isn’t in genetics or intelligence or even the whole nature versus nurture debate. I believe it goes much deeper.
People feel this amazing connection to others when they do the “wave” in stadiums, but I don’t. I don’t even want to do it. This reason why is that it is very superficial. Sure, doing the “wave” gives the impression that you are connected to the other people in the stadium, but you really aren’t. If you are connected at all, it is only for that moment in time. If those fans ever met you anywhere else, they wouldn’t even recognize you. It is a fleeting, superficial feeling of connection that doesn’t really mean anything. Yet, people create these feelings of connections all the time and hold them dear as if their very identity depends on it: just spend a few minutes on social media and the proof will be right there on the screen.
I don’t want superficial connections with other people. I don’t want to count my acquaintances as my friends. I want to believe in true connection with other people, even if it is only for a moment. I would rather have a conversation with someone that share the “wave” with them. Almost every Saturday, my husband and I go to an organic grocery store to buy produce. Many times, there is a clerk there who is happy and enthusiastic. Whenever I see her, I smile because she greets everyone who walks in with a smile and a warm welcome. A couple of weeks as she was checking us out, I told her that I was always glad to see her because of that. It wasn’t a big deal, but for just a moment, I let her know that I truly saw her. That interaction was real. She got to know that someone saw her and appreciated the person she is. That interaction means more than jumping up and down in a stadium full of nameless faces.
It isn’t about my feeling a sense of connection to others. I don’t really care if I feel like a belong, not really. So often in life, that feeling can be fleeting and illusory. The feeling I want to feel is when I know I have looked into someone else’s eyes and seen them as a child of God. When I know that I have seen the Light of God within them and have felt the love that God hope I will feel for them. The Light of God within another and the love in my heart for them, those things are real. Even if this life is a computer program, a dream, or just an illusion, God’s light and my love are things that I know without a doubt are real. Not some silly “wave”.
My faith saved me. May God’s peace reside in all of our hearts.
