the only one
I’ve heard it said that, “Once you’ve heard one person’s story… you’ve heard one person’s story.”
You might have thought the phrase would go, “Once you’ve heard one person’s story, you’ve heard them all.” But we are all profoundly unique. This fuels our desire to be seen, known and loved for who we are. We think we’re so different, surely beyond lovability or relatability for one of the reasons that makes us distinct. We disqualify for uniqueness. We compare and so often dismiss because of distinctives.
We’re sure we’re the only one…
And yet we crave for someone to understand. Someone to truly be able to relate. So we try to find someone like us to love, maybe really trying to find love for ourself… to validate ourself and our experience. We feel alone, not in beneficial solitude but in destructive isolation.
We don’t want to be the only one…
Yet just as every analogy breaks down, every comparison to another’s life breaks down. The scenarios aren’t quite the same. The context doesn’t quite match. This and that element are genuinely unique.
And we circle back and try to prove we’re the only one…
In a culture fractured and segmented by types from birth, we find we don’t fit into any box. We don’t have a place.
Place.
We long for place. Beyond the sorting system, we want a home. To be seen, known, loved, to have a space we know we are given welcome.
What if your home was disrupted? What if your place was dislodged? What if you grow out of your box? What if the boxes don’t work anymore?
And we find ourselves alone, the only one.
Where can we find commonality, a shared experience, connection beyond identical stories? A true community with a variegated expression and yet common roots? Who can understand? How can we understand each other?
Is there a way that can carry the weight of our shared AND unique experience to connect us?
Could it be that to live and move and breathe and have our being, we are formed into a collective where we can find our wholeness in the One who speaks us into existence and yet then get to commune with those who share the deepest? That our sameness comes from conditions of the heart more than the external details. That the boxes can serve to divide and sort us apart from each other until we’re left alone whereas true community comes with sharing suffering, common temptations, hopes, heartsickness, fears…
So we find at the end of the day (or sometimes at the end of a long night), we’re more the same than we thought we were.
That no temptation has overtaken us except such as is common to humanity. Please don’t take offense, but our struggles aren’t actually that unique.
That there is a common fellowship we find in the midst of places of suffering. Not in a misery loves company way, but in a deep well of connection when you’ve trudged through the deeps with other souls. Like when you know with just a look, that you know.
That through weeping with those who weep and rejoicing with those who rejoice, this empathy can help us have the same mind as others and cherish the same things together to have greater harmony.
That we are placed into a family with a name that gives us belonging that is greater than time, greater than anything this earth tears away. Greater than anything our tears have grieved.
And we find at the end of the day (or sometimes at the end of a long night), we’re more sure and secure in being unique than we thought we were.
That we are uniquely designed to reflect glory and beauty as only we can, right here and right now.
That our ultimate home won’t be found right here and right now because our longings can only be perfectly fulfilled in the presence of Jesus when we see Him face to face.
That our lives are a poem without even one word wasted.
So we can be the only one and not be the only one.