Intimacy, Not Fusion
Intimidad, no fusión
A student describes a new experience of deep connection with nature and other people, and wonders whether it might be an unhealthy "fusion." The teacher and a fellow practitioner help distinguish genuine intimacy from psychological enmeshment.
Intimacy, Not Fusion
A student describes a new experience of deep connection with nature and other people, and wonders whether it might be an unhealthy "fusion." The teacher and a fellow practitioner help distinguish genuine intimacy from psychological enmeshment.
I have been having this new experience. A friend of mine called it "fusion," and I wanted to understand what it is. I feel a deep connection, with nature, with another person. It never happened to me before.
Without asking too many questions, what comes to me is that the sense of fusion has to do with identity. Is this something new for you, or has it always been there?
It's new. I'm perceiving it for the first time.
If it wasn't new, what I was going to say would be different. What's coming to me is that this sense of fusion arises as you begin to see through false identity in yourself. The mechanism of identifying gets projected outward. As you start to touch the reality that the center of self is empty, the mechanism of identity begins looking for where to identify outside: in a person, in a tree, in nature. The antidote that comes to mind is to see that that which you feel fusion with is also empty. You can only fuse with a concept, an understanding of what is there.
Differentiating fusion from intimacy
A friend of mine told me it was fusion, so I wanted to talk to someone about it. When I'm in nature, I close my eyes and walk a few meters. With my eyes closed, I begin to relax. When someone is watching over me, there's a feeling or sensation, I don't quite know what to call it, but it's as if I am simply there, frozen. I can just be there, and I cannot explain anything else. It's as if I'm in such intimate contact that I don't have thoughts. It's just being there.
That doesn't sound like fusion. Intimacy is the opposite of fusion. I think your friend's interpretation was a misunderstanding. The word "fusion" was applied to your experience, but what you're actually describing sounds much more like intimacy. It sounds like reality.
So it's not a problem?
In fusion there would be a kind of compulsion, and that's not what you're describing. From what you've shared, this is intimacy with reality. But the fact that it's so new to you is also a sign. Fusion is a psychological phenomenon that tends to have a long history. To me, it sounds like you are discovering reality: intimacy with nature, with another person. There might be an aspect coming up as a worry or a fear. Is that your experience?
Yes. My friend's words confused me, because I actually feel very grounded. I feel so separate and present that when she told me it was fusion, I thought, "Okay, I want to talk with someone else about this." I understand now what you're saying, because when I'm in that state, I don't have many thoughts or sensations. I can be so fully there that someone would have to call me very intensely to get my attention, because I was very connected. Now the words come better: it's a really different kind of connection.
The role of early conditioning
If there was a difficulty separating from a parent early in life, this new experience might feel similar, and that old conditioning and fear could surface alongside it.
Yes. I have my history with my parents. This is a big change for me now. I feel things in a different way. When you began speaking about family, I thought, "Okay, this has to do with my mother," and I touched that.
I would encourage you to explore that. Give time to the experience with nature. Go into it fully. Let it happen. And naturally, what surfaces psychologically will come up on its own. As we dissolve compulsive identifying, which is the contraction of always being "me" and defining and separating, something important happens. It doesn't simply stop. What happens is we learn that we exist prior to identification. We discover that we can be unidentified, and then identification can arise as a form of function. It becomes operative: we can be more or less identified as the situation requires, but we don't truly identify anymore, because we see it as a function.
What dissolving identity brings to the surface
As we work through this dissolving of identification in a healthy way, all the reasons we were compulsively identified start to come up. For example, something with a mother, the attachment, the dynamic. It can be hard to distinguish what is what, whether something is unhealthy or healthy. But my sense is that you are discovering a relationship with intimacy and reality that is new and very healthy. It might simply bring things to the surface. For instance, the fact that your friend said something and it worried you, and suddenly the beautiful thing you were experiencing became labeled as "fusion." There's a worry that something isn't right. But then you describe the experience itself, and it sounds very positive.
Okay. Thank you.
Interpersonal dynamics are a different matter
That said, in a dynamic with a person, a partner, something psychological might also be happening. That might be something worth looking at and addressing separately.
Yes, that's very important. I agree totally. I am discovering a completely new relationship with my partner.
And that's exactly what I'm saying. If you encourage in yourself the exploration with nature, this process of intimacy with reality, then you can come back into relationship with a person where the psychology is going to activate again. But you'll have a different perspective, a different grounding, and you can see all of the patterns from a new vantage point. That's where there can possibly be some fusion or other dynamics at play. But what you're describing with nature, I would really encourage. Treat it with preciousness. Give time to it. I think it's a very positive thing.
Thank you very much.
And ultimately, there is no fusion possible, because there are not two things that fuse. It is only a problem when we are still psychologically caught in a dynamic. Otherwise, you cannot fuse with nature, because you are nature. What you're describing is this intimacy with the reality of what you are, in which you and the grass are not two things.
Thank you. It takes a lot of time, but I appreciate it very much. Thank you all for being present.
You're very welcome.