Finding Atma

Throughout my adolescence, I was pursuing an exclusive mix of connection with my friends and lawless freedom. I lived in an inner world that cared only for myself and those I was in a direct relationship with. I noticed others’ challenges and felt sympathy, but very little empathy or compassion. My unfounded belief was that I had no responsibility to concern myself with others’ struggles and certainly no power to help alleviate them. This lasted until I became more aware of my parents’ histories, which led me down a path that I never imagined.

After a trickling of information shared from my Father and inquiries to my Mother, I learned that they both endured intense abuse in their childhoods. Their experiences included physical torture, sexual assault, extreme shaming, and threats to their lives. Additionally, my Father made a most vulnerable disclosure, sharing that he has lived a lifetime of closeted gender dysphoria. These traumas and adversities have had a significant effect on their lives and as soon as I was made aware, so many of my subconscious, self-centered perspectives were promptly revealed and flipped on their heads. Like mud to the lotus flower, the closeness to my parents’ plights served as the seemingly paradoxical fertile ground from which my sensitivity began to bloom.

Most profoundly, after hearing of my Father’s difficulties silently existing in a body he feels disconnected from, empathy rushed through me with the ferocity of a river down the steep slopes of a mountain. Immediately, I felt as though I could interpret his entire life and all of his actions more clearly through the lens of this difficult truth. Surprisingly to me, this wasn’t a fleeting feeling or one that was directed only toward him; empathy quickly consumed my mind and began to direct my life.

I became more aware of everyone’s experiences with heartfelt connection, and to explore my own, I began psychoanalysis therapy. Through therapy, I understood that my personal history of distress and trauma was relatively low. Juxtaposing my upbringing with little inherent challenge alongside my parent’s backgrounds and others’ hardships I was now more in tune with flipped my internal switch from empathy to deep compassion. Empathy suggests a resonation with others’ circumstances, but compassion adds the desire to alleviate suffering. Naturally, there began an incessant internal questioning of how I could contribute to countering the endless anguish in our world.

To start my effort, I began analyzing the lives and wisdom of history’s most effective social advocates to uncover how they had arrived at their achievements. Universally, the most necessary lesson I recognized was to develop an equal vision of all sentient beings.

An equal vision suggests we see every living being through the truths of: just like me, you are seeking happiness; just like me, you are seeking alleviation from pain and suffering; just like me, you are seeking connection; just like me, all actions you take are striving for these outcomes; just like me, what has happened to you causes fallibility and unintentional harm. The final line above is vital; to understand that all unfavorable behaviors are born as a reaction, typically subconscious, to what has happened to us.

What has happened to us includes our genetic impressions, our history of relational health, and the entirety of our experiences; non-experiences; environments; and cultures that we inevitably live in and through. Undergoing these elements of life, particularly in our formative years, shapes our world view, internal voice, and therefore, actions. Grasping the effect on the mind that the unavoidable realities of our genetics and early lives cause can give rise to a remarkable depth of empathy and compassion. Without even having the knowledge or language at the time, this is exactly what happened when I became immersed in my parents’ childhoods.

I began to practice living with these truths top of mind and quickly experienced why they are so widely heralded by the activists I’d studied. I found that by viewing the world through the lens of equal vision, there was a shedding of judgment; resentment; hate; and fear, a positive effect on myself and those I interacted with, and fuel being added to the already roaring fire of compassion inside me. Additionally, existing through this perspective more consistently was revealing a compelling likeness in every living being; something synonymous with a word I came across; atma (aht-muh).

Atma is a Sanskrit word that indicates a localized essence in all living beings; the proverbial shoulders holding an angel opposite a devil; the what it’s like to be me-ness; the den of the two wolves; or consciousness itself. When peering through the lens of equal vision, one may find that the atma is pure and only the seer of experience, never actually altered or impaired as so often felt that the self can be. This realization indicates unending hope for nullifying the problematic content of one’s inner life by working to heal the effects of what has happened to us and facing the challenges in material reality.

Continuing the practice, I began noticing a momentous, self-perpetuating circle of events: approach the world through the lens of equal vision; glimpse the atma in every being; feel greater compassion; act on the feeling of compassion; experience the favorable effect of the action, reminding me of the value of equal vision; repeat. Acknowledging the powerful efficacy of what I’ll call an atma vision, I knew that this perspective was the route to curb suffering that I would work to exemplify and share with others.

Throughout my exploration, I’ve found that there are particular exercises we can engage in, voices we can hear, pieces of literature we can read, products we can purchase, and questions we can ask that can lead us to a fruitful embodiment of compassion. This will be the work you find through this multidimensional entity called Atma.

I’ll start by spotlighting others’ work, personal anecdotes, and various compiled inspirations through blog posts on this website. Next, guided by a business plan I’ve written, I hope to share this concept through more intriguing forms of products and experiences. Throughout, the mission and vision are universal: To inspire and empower compassion to encourage a world where suffering is diminished and quality of life is equitable for all.

- aspiring for atma vision