Different colors. Different stories. Different beliefs. One Human Tribe. Maybe underneath all the labels, we’re more alike than we remember.

Years ago, in my yoga studio, I put the words HUMAN TRIBE on a wall and surrounded them with painted handprints.

Every person who came through the studio could add their hand.

Different colors.

Different sizes.

Different people.

One wall.

One tribe.

The idea was simple:

You did not have to be the same as everyone else to belong.

There was no judgment about where you came from, what you believed, what you looked like or what you were carrying when you walked through the door.

We were all human.

We were all trying to figure some things out.

And maybe we could help each other along the way.

Before All the Labels

From the moment we enter this world, we begin collecting labels.

Some are given to us.

Some we choose.

Some become important parts of who we are.

Others may eventually stop fitting at all.

But underneath all of them is something much simpler.

We’re human beings.

Human Tribe isn’t about everybody being the same.

It isn’t about everybody agreeing.

And it certainly isn’t about creating another group that tells people how to live.

It’s about remembering that we are human beings before we are all the labels we have accumulated along the way.

Different experiences.

Different bodies.

Different beliefs.

Different paths.

Still human.

Listen Without Immediately Trying to Fix

Something else happened inside that yoga studio.

People talked.

And people listened.

We could listen to one another without immediately trying to fix one another.

That’s harder than it sounds.

Sometimes when somebody tells us they’re struggling, our first instinct is to solve the problem.

Give advice.

Tell them what we would do.

Tell them what they should do.

But sometimes people don’t need us to fix anything.

Sometimes they need someone willing to sit beside them while they’re upside down.

Someone who listens.

Someone who doesn’t judge.

Someone who doesn’t make their struggle about themselves.

Maybe that’s another form of unreasonable hospitality.

Being completely present for another human being.

Love Doesn’t Mean Losing Yourself

Being part of a tribe doesn’t mean taking responsibility for everybody else’s life.

We can offer help without taking responsibility for someone else’s choices.

We can care deeply and still have boundaries.

We can love someone and say no.

We can disagree and still recognize the human being standing in front of us.

We can listen without surrendering ourselves.

That’s important.

Because Human Tribe isn’t about losing yourself in everyone else.

It’s about knowing yourself well enough that you can stand beside someone different without needing them to become you.

Your Life Is Still Yours

We are responsible for our own lives.

We are responsible for our choices and our responses.

We are responsible for learning ourselves.

That can sound like a lonely responsibility.

I don’t think it is.

Because we don’t have to do any of it alone.

That’s the beautiful part.

Your journey belongs to you, but you don’t have to walk it by yourself.

We can learn from one another.

Encourage one another.

Laugh together.

Eat together.

Move together.

Sit quietly together.

Help someone flip back over when life knocks them upside down.

And sometimes simply remind one another to look around and realize we’re here.

Right now.

Together.

Maybe This Is Unreasonable Lifestyle

After all the soul-searching, reading, conversations, meditation, yoga, movement, stillness, surfing, observing and questioning, perhaps this is what Unreasonable Lifestyle really means.

It means being unreasonable enough to question what we’ve been told.

Unreasonable enough to listen to our bodies.

Unreasonable enough to protect our peace.

Unreasonable enough to say no when no is the honest answer.

Unreasonable enough to stop waiting for the perfect time.

Unreasonable enough to believe that our lives are worth experiencing now.

Unreasonable enough to take care of ourselves with the same attention we give everyone else.

Unreasonable enough to listen to another person without immediately judging them.

Unreasonable enough to remember that different doesn’t have to mean divided.

And unreasonable enough to slow down long enough to hear our own hearts.

Where Is Your Heart?

Because maybe the answer isn’t somewhere out there.

Maybe we have been looking in the wrong direction.

Maybe the body has been talking to us the entire time.

Maybe the heart has been beating steadily underneath all the noise.

Maybe the question isn’t:

“What am I supposed to be?”

Maybe the question is simply:

Where is your heart?

And then, once you find it, perhaps the next step is the simplest one of all:

Listen.