Tribe of One

Jeremy just didn’t get it. This is his story.

Jeremy had a problem fitting in. All his life he had never been able to find a group that he felt comfortable being a part of. And no group ever seemed comfortable with him in it. To put it in today’s internet vernacular, he never found his tribe.

He had an aversion to ‘tribes’ despite an undying yearning to be part of one. It was a dichotomy that had torn him apart his entire life.

There were several times in his life when he thought that he had finally found a group that he could be a part of but it always ended badly. Looking back on his life, it was crystal clear that one of the primary reasons every group experience ended badly is because Jeremy, once he was accepted into a group, almost immediately commenced to try to become the leader of that group. He did not know how to be merely a member of a group. His natural inclination was to be the leader.

But the sad truth, Jeremy realized upon reflecting on his life, is that he was a terrible leader. He had forced his way into the leadership position of a few groups during the course of his life and every time the whole group ended up leaving and he was left alone. Over time he became a slightly better leader but that only meant that it took a little longer for everyone to leave. Inevitably he was always left standing alone.

Once, instead of joining a group, or tribe, Jeremy decided to simply be a leader and hope that a group, or tribe, formed around him. To his amazement it seemed to work. People began to gather around him and they heaped praise upon him. The tribe began growing and growing. Jeremy concentrated on loving and uplifting those people who gathered around him. He tried to be the best leader that he could be. He felt so empowered by those people. They seemed to bring out the very best in him and he continued to push himself to be an ever better leader.

Then, suddenly, everyone left. Everyone! After several years of being a successful leader of a tribe he was once again all alone. Not a single member of that tribe would have anything to do with him again.

Jeremy’s instant reaction was to blame the tribe. He had taken all of them beyond their limits to new heights but they were unwilling to go further. They seemed to resent his pushing them into uncomfortable territory. They began attacking him and calling him names. They began pointing out all his mistakes and questioning everything he said.

Looking way back to that time, Jeremy realized it was not the tribe’s fault. Everything he had blamed them for was actually his own problems. He had reached his own limits and could not push himself into new territory of thought. He had pushed them to their limits but when reaching his own limits he could not go beyond those limits and blamed the tribe for not helping to push him further. Just as the tribe did, he began questioning himself, he began denigrating himself and he felt and exuded failure. He felt that he did not deserve his leadership position. He realized that he did not have all the answers. He felt like a joke and that he deserved the fact that everyone left.

After so many years as a tribal leader, Jeremy was suddenly alone like he had been so many times before. There was not a single tribal member left who would even speak to him. Not a one.

Jeremy became defiant, I don’t need a tribe, he thought. I don’t need others and I don’t need to lead others. I don’t need others’ support. I don’t need others holding me back. That’s all just a bunch of ego. I can live and learn and prosper and go beyond all my barriers without the help of others. When it really comes down to the truth, we are all alone. How, unless I am alone, can I truly find self-realization? This human need for a tribe is surely just a fear of being alone and facing everything inside us that we must go through on our own.

Jeremy entered a period of years when he would have nothing to do with tribes. He never tried to join any and he certainly never tried to become a leader of any. Sure, he smiled and waved at other people and shared a few polite words but he never interacted with others beyond that. He became a hermit, a recluse, an ascetic.

At first, he blossomed. While he avoided humans, he opened up to nature. He realized that he could find joy in solitude and nature. He became intimate with the non-human world and thought that perhaps this was his true tribe. Nature was something that he could not rule nor lead. And nature only accepted him as long as he was silent and in a state of surrender. It seemed like the truest of tribes. And there was so much joy and beauty and wonderment….

While Jeremy opened up fully to nature and the non-human world, he completely shut down and withheld his energy from his fellow humans. Although he barely interacted with other humans he still observed them and judged them. He deemed them as hopelessly screwed up.

The longer he lived in his tiny little bubble, his tribe of one, the more he sank into a state of poverty and despair. In the past money had come to him fairly easily and so did the things money could buy. And he had always been able to find jobs.

Now, no one would hire him to a full-time job. He had applied to scores of positions but those humans interviewing him all seemed repelled by his energy and all those jobs went to other people despite Jeremy’s qualifications.

He finally landed a job as a janitor but it was only a part-time job of 30 hours a week. He found himself cleaning up after other humans and, to his surprise, he actually enjoyed the job. A big part of that enjoyment came from the fact that he never had to deal with those humans he was cleaning up after. It was a solitary, after-hours job that he performed all alone. While he was quite content being in the company of his mop and cleaning rags, the pay was barely enough to pay his rent and not much more.

Jeremy had become destitute. He was not unhappy, though — at least he did not seem to be. He still took daily walks out into nature. He had always been an avid reader and, thanks to the local library, he was able to continue that. He could not afford TV or the internet but as long as he had books in his life he was content. Although he no longer had internet access he still had his laptop and he would spend a few hours each day writing stories. He had been a compulsive story writer for as long as he had been an avid reader and this, too, brought him a modicum of happiness. Of course, no one ever read those stories.

Every payday Jeremy would take one dollar of his earnings to buy a lottery ticket. It seemed like the only hope of ever breaking out of his bleak, destitute situation. Of course, he never won.

Jeremy was happiest when he was out in nature. There was a small lake at a park near where he lived. He would take walks around the lake and then sit on a park bench overlooking the lake for an hour or two just communing with nature. This is what kept him from losing his sanity.

One day after an especially invigorating walk around the lake Jeremy came home to his tiny apartment and picked up a book that he had checked out from the library. Instead of opening the book and reading it from the beginning, Jeremy held the book in his hands then closed his eyes. Slowly, he then opened the book and let his hands flip through the pages until he was compelled to stop. With eyes still closed he then dropped a pointed finger down upon the page he had stopped on. He then opened his eyes and read the paragraph his finger landed on. (He did this often.)

The paragraph was a one-sentence paragraph that began a chapter entitled, Abundance.

This is perfect, he thought. I could sure use some abundance in my life.

That one-sentence paragraph read, “Whatever one is lacking in one’s life is exactly what one is withholding from the world.”

Jeremy quickly shut the book and sat down. He thought about that sentence for a very long time. He realized that he was essentially withholding himself from the world. He was withholding everything from the world. It was no wonder that abundance eluded him.

But giving of himself fully to the world was always something that seemed to backfire for him. It was not something he enjoyed doing. Abundance never seemed to flow unimpeded to him when he put himself out there.

Then he thought of his stories which sat in his laptop unseen and unread by anyone but Jeremy. Perhaps he could offer those stories to the world and then maybe some abundance would flow his way. Those stories were a big part of him so by putting those stories out there he was putting a big part of himself out there.

So Jeremy scrimped and saved and sold a few of his meager possessions and finally he got internet service. He found a website where people shared stories and he joined. He began publishing his stories; one every few days. He felt himself opening up to the world.

At first, his stories were read by only a tiny handful of people, few of whom liked the stories enough to respond. But Jeremy kept at it. After several months of publishing stories the stories still were barely ever read. His readership did not grow at all. The stories were read only slightly more than when they were locked in his laptop. And abundance never came.

There must be something else that I am still withholding, he thought. But what? What?!

Sadly, Jeremy just didn’t get it.

Copyright by White Feather. All Rights Reserved. This is a work of fiction.