The Eden Project

All relationships begin, and end, in separation. Through the bloodweb of our mothers, we start out connected to the pulse and rhythm of the cosmos. And then we are torn from the Mother, separated from the cosmos, separated from the gods, separated forever. And we close all the relationships of our lives through that separation we call death. We live our lives estranged—from others, from the gods, and worst of all from ourselves. Intuitively, we all know this. We know that we are  our own worst enemies. We never stop seeking to reconnect, to find home again, and in the end we simply leave it in a different way. Perhaps there is no home to which we can return. We can't return to the womb, though we try. So we live, always homeless, whether we know it or not. [11]

Nothing has greater power over our lives than the hint, the promise, the intimation, of the recovery of Eden through that Magical Other. No wonder, then, the dismay, the horror, of losing Eden again, when its precincts were glimpsed from afar. Who would want to live on, having lost it yet again? The repeated loss of Eden is the human condition, even as the hope for its recovery is our chief fantasy. Yet, we all know that the Other, a simple, flawed human being just like ourselves, can never carry the full weight of our Eden project. Nor can we carry the Other's. More than half of all popular songs mourn this loss of the beloved Other. "Who are you," "I don't know you anymore," "You've changed," "You've broken my heart"—that is, failed my Eden project. But since my Eden project, my desire to go home through you, is essentially unconscious, I am unaware of its origin in myself and can only blame you for this great disappointment. [50]

 

~~James Hollis, The Eden Project; In Search of the Magical Other