Getting Fed
A dear friend and loyal blog reader recently told me she had been thinking a lot about using and being used. When, she’s wondering, is she being grandiose? When she loves being used by her students, is that grandiosity? Like when her class is engaging in a hopping discussion and she’s
full of joy,
isn’t she actually using her students? To get fed? Emotionally and intellectually? And isn’t that a bad thing?
No.
But I can see why she’d worry. My dichotomy of using and being used might make it seem like all using is usurious. One-way. If we decide to be used, then we’re agreeing to
de-subjectify and be objectified.
But that’s not entirely accurate. We all use each other all the time. Because we’re living organisms. We get our work done, our existing done, our relationships done, by fitting together. By using each other.
So I want to add, here and now, a third element to the deliberate decision about whether and how to be used:
why?
Of course, “why?” means What’s in it for them? How can I engage in this relationship in a way that benefits the other?
But also, “why?” means
What’s in it for me?
Yes, I actually wrote that. I actually mean that.
Because we all need to be fed. Not just by healthy food and walks in nature and soul-stirring, blood-rushing music and a good book. But by each other. By our relationships.
If I’m not getting fed in some way when I agree to be used, I am setting myself up for resentment. Which isn’t good for my relational partner. And it isn’t good for me.
Asking “What’s in it for me?” does not give me permission to be usurious in turn. It does not make me selfish (if being selfish is in fact a bad thing). Rather, it invites me to look for different types of answers.
Like (what’s in it for me?)
a feeling of joy
an opportunity to know someone better
an opportunity to know myself better
an experience of care
a chance to replace self-absorption with other-absorption
groundedness
an exercise in listening and learning
a moment of sanctity
So many options!
Bottom line is this: Just because you decide that you will be used does not mean you have to disappear. Rather, you must show up. For their sake. And for yours.
Mantra: We have to feed each other.