Anam Cara

The Stranger

The stranger is an unknown person, one whom one has not met before. The limitation of human individuality means that we know only a few people. Most of the world remains unknown to us. Most people remain strangers. This is one of the shocking things about travel; we can descend from the sky into a different country and people, right into the middle of an ongoing life. We know nothing of the people’s names, lives, or place. Yet into the journey of each person there is the occasional intrusion of the stranger. We immediately recognize the stranger as someone we have never encountered. When a stranger approaches, we usually exercise caution and keep him or her at a distance. This is the fascination of encounter. Humans are ancient creatures with millennia of experience in their blood. We are rational animals. The animal side of our nature knows the danger of the intruder, stranger. Every friend was once a total stranger. The stranger can bring blessings and encouragement and can become the most intimate anam-Cara and companion of our deepest intimacy. New life can come through the encounter with the stranger. Destruction and negativity can also arrive with the intrusion of the stranger. There is always danger in the stranger. Because we sense this, it usually takes a while before we open to let the stranger in. Strangers circle each other for a good while before familiarity begins to build. Each one of us enters the world as a total stranger. No one had ever seen you before. You came without a name and yet you entered fully into the belonging of your life.

It is poignant to remember that even the most intimate anam-Cara friendship cannot dissolve the strangeness between and within two people. The friend remains partly stranger. It is a naïve acquaintance that presumes that two people can ever know each other completely. Real soul friendship acknowledges the mystery of the other person, which can at times delight and at other times disappoint you. This strangeness keeps the passion and interest alive in a friendship. It is when two friends become predictable with each other that the kinship begins to fade. This is why space and freedom nourish and enrich friendship. Each person remains always partly a stranger to himself as well. Part of the wonder of being a person is the continual discoveries that you find emerging in your own self, nothing cosmically shattering, merely the unfathomable miracle of ordinary being. This is the heart of longing, and what calls ever to new forms of belonging.

It is impossible to be on the earth and to avoid awakening. Everything that happens within and around you calls your heart to awaken. As the density of night gives way to the bright song of the dawn, so your soul continually coaxes you to give way to the light and awaken. Longing is the voice of your soul, it constantly calls you to be fully present in your life: to live to the full the one life given to you. Rilke said to the young poet, “Live everything.” You are here on earth now, yet you forget so easily. You travelled a great distance to get here. The dream of your life has been dreamed from eternity. You belong within a great embrace that urges you to have the courage to honour the immensity that sleeps in your heart. When you learn to listen to and trust the wisdom of your soul’s longing, you will awaken to the invitation of graced belonging that inhabits the generous depths of your destiny. You will become aware of the miracle of presence within and around you. In the beginning was the dream, and the dream was Providence.