You are alive and able to think because of the cells and neurons that make you up. Those cells are able to perform their specific function because of the DNA that explicitly tells it which proteins to manufacture. Your DNA and proteins are made up of many atoms that transfer bits of energy in the form of electrons. So, by the transitive property, you are alive today because the atoms within the molecules within the cells within you are able to exchange bits of energy.
When you view yourself from a bottom up perspective, the fact that you can think at all is astounding! You can broaden your view of yourself to identify not only as a human, but as the atoms and energy that make you up. Your energy has been through an incredible, nearly 14 billion year long journey and it still has plenty more to go. You can be proud to know that your atoms will continue on their journey long after you die; only your physical body is bound to death.
When a loved one dies, people often claim that their spirit stays with us and keeps us company or comforts us. It is not the person’s spirit that you keep contact with, it’s the character that you have created of them. We say that people live on through their spirit and through other people’s memories of them. As long as someone keeps you as a character in their mind, you live on. Factor in our ability to write and record information for future generations and you’ve got a ticket to eternity.
Seeing yourself as simply an idea, like viewing yourself as energy, will take some mental adjustment. However, would you disagree that Cleopatra, Jesus, or Thomas Jefferson still live on today? Their bodies have long decomposed and their atoms have moved on to another form, yet we still know their names and many stories about them. All you’re really doing is creating characters with a few traits and stories synapsed to them, just like what you do with everyone you meet.
While you might not reach the level of global fame as someone like Jesus, you still have the ability to live on forever. When you view yourself from a top down perspective, you see that you are just one of the 7 billion current members of the human species living in an interconnected, global society. We have reached the point where our survival as a species is nearly guaranteed, a luxury many of our ancestors did not have.
When you put both perspectives together, you can see yourself as a member of a society and made up of a collection of energy. This is the feeling of oneness. You are made up of the same stuff as everything else in the entire universe and you are nearly identical to every human that has ever lived. While an individual person may have discovered electricity or invented vaccinations, your entire species accomplished those feats. Since you are part of the species, that would mean you accomplished them too.
When you know the truth of all that your pieces and your species have accomplished to get us to this point, you can feel a sense of pride in it all. We’ve fought the odds and we’ve progressed faster and faster to discover ourselves and unlock our potential. We’ve gone through a lot so far but there are plenty more stories yet to be made.