Welcome to The One in the Many! My name is Arshak Benlian.
The moment we take our first breath at birth we are confronted by the many. The many things we see, hear, smell, touch, taste and feel attack our fragile self with the acuity of blinding rays of sunlight, with a thunderous commotion of confusion, with obscene odor of unknown displeasure, with bitterness of poison deforming our delicate palate and we are ready and eager to cry. So we cry out- loud, until exhaustion and love calm us down and we find peace in the embrace of the one who carried us in her body. Then the radiance of the sun rays comfort us with warm touch, the mellow sound of a breeze orient us in an orderly direction, the aroma of the meadows below expand our lungs with fresh air, the taste of morning dew on a basil leave is soothing to our palate, the feeling of a future moment is familiar and welcomed. We develop natural curiosity and look forward to the next day, month or year, so we can never lose our connection with the one in the many that surround us. We are united and whole, we are the one in the many with our life giver and life begins with the openness and energy of laughter.
This natural process of being born out of one and thrusted into the manyfold world outside the womb and the consequent reunion with the one who bore us in her embrace is the hallmark of integration. We grow from interpersonal, extrospective, to introspective experiences building a life in the context of nature we inhibit. This foundational experience sets the stage for the budding actor in us to set and act on goals, to lead a life guided by nature and directed by our consciousness.
The One in the Many is the way we think about the world. It is our capacity to see the world as an integrated whole. Integrating, that is, unifying, putting together separate things, combining two or more things to make a whole, that process is universal and ubiquitous. I am fascinated with integration. When discovered, the one in the many is inspirational, when practiced, the one in the many is corrective. It is as real as biology, chemistry and physics and is sensible as music, lyrics and psychology.
In understanding psychology, my primary focus here is to show that integration, implicitly and explicitly, is inspirational. In the context of psychotherapy, integration is corrective and energizing.
To conceive life requires the effort of at least two to make at least one. Since birth, we are immersed in a group of people the closest of which is our parents and siblings, then our grand-parents of both side of our parents, their other children, our uncles and aunts, their children, our cousins, our parents’ best friends and their families, our friends and their families, the ring expands into never ending circle. By the time we meet the one in the many of our life, the person who is more important than any other person on earth and add her never ending and expanding circle of human connection, and at the time we decide to bring another person to life as a creation of our union, we are again on the perpetual cycle of bringing the many to one so that the one gets in the many yet again. There is no one without the many, and there are no many, without the one. The one is in the many.
Join me, as we follow the history of human development and become noticeable that life requires time and energy. We need time to form and grow from fetus to baby, we need time to become adults, we need time to discover who we are, we need time to act on our goals, we need time to connect with others like us and the world at large. But, to grow through time we need energy in the form of nutritious food, to act on our goals we need inspirational and motivational energy to keep us going, to live in harmony with others we need the energy to compensate for the difference with others. Time and energy are constantly present in the formation of the one in the many, as energy is proportionate to its frequency.
In this podcast I’ll explore the one in the many in all aspects of life that pertain to human existence and human reach: from the metaphysical to simply physical, from the knowable to imagined, from good to bad, from the dawn of our first inspiration to the dusk of our final exhalation, from our connection with our mother to the connection with our enemy, from the beautiful to the dreadful. We are going to find out what it is that glues everything together to make us who we are from a single cell to an ideal human being. Integration, the one in the many, is the principle of life.
Drawing on the central theme in psychology I will concern myself with the three variations of integration.
What happens if I don’t integrate my life? What happens if I integrate my life inappropriately? What happens when I integrate my life?
The answers to these questions and the questions arising from them will be the subject of my focus in the episodes to come.
Find me and subscribe at The One in the Many podcast, The One in the Many You Tube channel, and on my website blog at oneinthemany.net
May you have a value-driven day!