I was making eggs the other morning and was feeling the pain and sorrow surfacing from old wounds, and in that stillness of the moment, a sudden realization came to me:
What if I could just accept this?
What if I could accept the lessons of those wounds?
What, then, would be the spiritual lesson?
That was/is this trying to teach me?
It was a subtle, but dramatic shift.
Instead of continuing to ask “why?,” as in “why did this happen to me?,” I could begin to ask “what?” — “what is this trying to teach me, and how can I grow from it?”
And it will be helpful, of course, not to run away from this pain or push it down or hide it. But to see it. Hold it up, and explore it. Understand it. And from this deeper sensitivity, attention, and acceptance of the wounds, to understand their wisdom, lessons… and deepen further in compassion for myself, and for those who suffer.
Life often breaks us open in order to teach us.
This is how you heal and grow, I’m coming to learn. To accept. To understand. To love.
Matilija poppies, Santa Cruz, Calif.
