An outlier is someone who stands apart from others of his or her group, as by differing beliefs, or religious practices.

In science, an outlier is an observation that lies an abnormal distance from other values. Synonyms for outliers are nonconformist, maverick, original, eccentric, dissident, dissenter, iconoclast.

In statistics, an outlier is an element of a data set.

In the broader sense, according to dictionary.com, an outlier is “something that lies outside the man body of the group that it is a part of, as a cow far from the rest of the herd, or a distant island belonging to a cluster of islands.”

You can perhaps see where I am going with this.

I have always been an outlier, this is a label I happily place on myself: The eccentric, the iconoclast,  the outsider, I am the cow far from the rest of the herd, and I belong to the tribe of outliers.

Some people hate me for this, some people flee from me for this, some people love me for it and keep me in their light. We connect with one another, we see into one another’s souls.

Since the police came last week to shoot the badly injured bear who crawled into our pasture to hide, I’ve been dreaming about him. Not every night, but several nights. And last night. He was, of course, an outlier himself, cut loose from his mother’s care, alone and wandering in dangerous territory to find his place in the world, running tragically into the human place in the world.

In the dream, this beautiful bear is walking down a path in the forest, and he sees me and keeps walking, and I see him, and keep walking. The sun cuts through the thick forest and lights upon his beautiful and shiny coat.

He is proud, strong, on his way to new territory, and he pays me no mind, other than to look at me and nod. We pass one another, and we are not afraid of one another, and then, he is gone.

Is this dream before he died, or after? I don’t know.

We don’t speak to one another. But I know there is a reason for this encounter.

Somehow, I had the feeling he came to  remind me to be human, to continue my search to learn how to be human. We all have our troubles, our challenges, our trials, this binds us together, even if we don’t know it. All of my life, I have run from people, and people have run from me.

Why would I feel this way? I can’t say.

I knew how to do many things, but I did not know how to be human. I had not seen it around me, I had no one to learn it from, I grew up trying not to drown in a river of anger, hatred and fear. I did not drown, I learned how to survive, even to prosper, but I did not learn how to be a human either.

I lived among people, but not with them, and I never knew the difference.

Today, I am celebrating the feeling that I am learning how to be a human. I see it in the friendships I am making, in the love I have with Maria, in the writing I am doing, in the pictures I am taking, in the way my heart is opening up to new experience and in the way people are reacting to me. They are not running away from me, I am not running a way from them.

This is a new experience, disturbing, challenging.

This week, an extraordinary experience.

I had to decide what to do about another outlier, someone who was throwing herself away out of shame and humiliation, who other people were  throwing away and judging. She had done something wrong, she knew it,  yet I knew her to be a good and gifted person. I could not bear the thought of throwing her away, or letting her throw herself away.

I offered my hand to her, and she took it. Then, many others offered their hands to her, and she took it. How to be a human.

It was a turning point, and it helped me to see myself in a new way because I saw her in a new way. She gave me and others the great gift of responding, or giving a new birth to herself, as I have given to myself. It is so easy to judge and condemn people, I have often done it in my life. It is so hard to shed righteousness and judgement, envy and anger. But I have been shedding it, it comes off me like the coat of a dog in the summer.

I’m not free to share the details of this experience, that is for  her to do if she wishes. She will not be thrown away or throw herself away.

I can and will share the remarkable experience of learning how to be a human and what it means, that is what I do.

And to discover the humanity that lives in so many people, perhaps in all of us, even if it is buried under layers of life. The outlier is often cast out of the ordinary world, he or she must find their back or perish alone. The outlier is forever seeking his or her place in the world, he lies an abnormal distance from the common values.

Suddenly, I am seeing things I never saw, feeling things I never felt. I am not running from people, I am running towards them, and they are running towards me. We met on our paths, just like me and the bear.  We stay together. Perhaps the bear was showing me how to walk on this path, how to stay on it.

Keep walking, straight and dignified and proud, right through the clouds of travail and joy.

It feels so good to be human, it is not like anything I have experienced before. I want to drink from this cup, and learn more from it, I believe is at the heart of life, it is the essence of spirituality and the beginning of wisdom. I’m not there yet, but like the bear, I can sniff it down the path.

I am not looking to be a saint, or a perfect man, or a noble one in any way. That is not what being human means to me.

The news from the other world has been a teacher for me this year, albeit it a disturbing one.  It teaches me what it means to be human. It teaches me every day who I do not wish to be.

Being human is not being a saint.

There is a kind of sweet joy and purity in being human, in not having only to be good or bad or happy or sad.

Being human is about being able to embrace all of those things, of being broken and whole, sometimes at the same time.

That, I think, is the song and the message of the outlier. Perhaps of the bear.