The Cosmopolitan Gaze: How to Be Surprised by Life Again
The spiritual practice of recognizing what's been in front of you the whole time
You know that wide-eyed, childlike joy when you explore a new place or culture? You’re not there to judge anyone but to eagerly learn a different perspective from people who live a very different life. You’re there specifically seeking diversity, not familiarity. You’re humble, curious, and open-minded.
This is the cosmopolitan gaze.
Cosmopolitans recognize others as fellow citizens of the world, equal to each other, and able to teach each other. A cosmopolitan perspective can help us question our biases and assumptions, which often hinder us from being compassionate. And we need more compassion.
We face so much suffering that can’t even be addressed because we refuse to see the world through this compassionate lens. We refuse to learn from others, and assume everyone else has something to learn from us.
But a lot of us have also gotten a lot better at this. And it’s transformed us. We’ve learned how to turn this compassionate gaze toward issues of injustice. And our politics have transformed with it.
But what we forget is that we can always turn this cosmopolitan gaze on our own lives too. Take a closer look at the people and places that have become so familiar to you. You’ll be surprised at what you find.
Explore the places you regularly visit like you’re a tourist. Analyze your own culture like you’re an anthropologist. Learn from your friends and family like you’re an investigative journalist. Reexamine the world like you’re seeing it for the first time.
In her book, Cosmopolitan Theology, Namsoon Kang claims that being religious means having this cosmopolitan gaze. It’s about learning to see everyone with a feeling of universal love and hospitality—not because of their similarities, but because of their beautiful differences. That’s my kind of religion. And I’m a Christian because I’ve learned to reclaim that part of Christianity.
What good is a spiritual practice, or a theology, or a church if they don’t help us engage the world this way? Religion should reconnect us to the world, not encourage us to escape it. God is in whom “we live and move and have our being”, as the apostle Paul said. So if everything is in God, and God is in everything, then our connection to God should ground us in the world.
After posting about the inspiration behind the title of this newsletter, EVERYBODY’S GLOWING, my friend, Levi sent me this quote he was reminded of:
“There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun.”
The American Christian monk and activist, Thomas Merton said this after describing a spiritual experience he had.
I read it and thought, “Yes! This is exactly what I’m talking about!” Let me share the full quote with you:
In Louisville, at the corner of Fourth and Walnut, in the center of the shopping district, I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all these people, that they were mine and I theirs, that we could not be alien to one another even though we were total strangers. It was like waking from a dream of separateness, of spurious self-isolation in a special world. . . .
Before we read the rest, let me ask you, have you ever experienced this sudden shift in perspective? We forget that we don’t have to be drunk to lower our inhibitions and recognize how lovely everyone is. Sometimes it just happens to us. Something comes upon us and we feel like we finally see the world for how it actually is. And we just can’t help but respond with unbridled love. We need a spirituality that trains us to get better at this practice.
Merton continues:
This sense of liberation from an illusory difference was such a relief and such a joy to me that I almost laughed out loud. . . . I have the immense joy of being man, a member of a race in which God Himself became incarnate. As if the sorrows and stupidities of the human condition could overwhelm me, now that I realize what we all are. And if only everybody could realize this! But it cannot be explained. There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun.
Spiritual experiences like this help us recognize what’s been in front of us this whole time. We just never noticed.
One of my favorite Bible stories is from Genesis, when Jacob is on the run, and he wakes up from a dream from God, and says “Surely the Lord is in this place—and I did not know it!”
We can have that experience anywhere. You don’t have to put in any extra effort to force something to happen. Just be open. Breathe. Slow down. Look at the world with a new gaze. And give yourself permission to be surprised.
I’m writing these to help us get better at that. You can get this newsletter sent directly to your inbox every time I post by entering your email address below.
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