Jun 15, 2010

curtains




photo credit



Some time ago, a friend wrote to me : "I often have felt like your blog is like a window with a light curtain in front of it, opened just a sliver, so that we can see a bit through, but not enough to get the full picture, if that makes sense."

It’s a friend that I met here, in blogosphere, a very beautiful soul, Karin. She has the ability to see through the curtain and without knowing much, she always says what I need to hear. Even without talking with her, many times her arts talks about something concerns me at the current moment. A nice coincidence .

So , yes, my blog and I have this light curtain. Those knew me , say how a strong person I am. And I am strong. But there is a weak part inside me, the one that is afraid, that pains, that needs to cry , that needs a big hug. And with this part of mine I find it hard to make peace to accept her, to show compassion.

Not a long ago I had a strange experience. I had one of those severe back pains , because of a problem I have in my hip. I took medicines but the pain was there. Almost my whole body was in pain and especially my leg, the one with the injured joint. I was so in pain that I really need to cry… but no, I had to be strong. Suddenly, I felt that my whole body had disappeared, it didn’t exit, and only that leg in pain was what I was. Severe pain. I was sitting on my couch and screamed silently. Then, I felt I was in another place too. I was !!! Really. I was in a hospital’s room, in a bed, very young and my leg was in pain too. I always remembered that rom. A nice room, with a big window and me in the bed. What I can’t remember was how much difficult it was. I have hide those memories because… as everyone says “I’m strong!!!”

This incident lasts for a couple of seconds. I was here, now in my home and I was there, in that hospital room. Two different moments in a time line, two or one person and one pain.

I talked to some people about it. Some couldn’t understand it and asked a lots of question. But there where some that they did understood and said not much. A couple of words and one of them was compassion.

If I’ld had to describe that incident with one word , that could be “compassion” . I don’t know if this words meaning is used as we use it in my language, Greek, but the Greek word is symponia .( feelings the same pain) and we/I literally felt the same pain.

I still haven’t manage to show some compassion to my weak part but for few seconds I could do that, I could fell her/my pain and just say “so , this is how it was ?”

Today I have one of those pains again. One of those days I have to do that surgery. There are many reasons that I don’t . Needs money I can’t afford now, need a big break from work that its not really easy to leave, but what is really a reason I don’t is that for some months someone has to take care of me. And this is something I can’t accept easily , because I was programmed to be strong and take care of myself and if I do that surgery I have to be in the other side and at the moments I can’t cope with the heavy feelings of burdened others.
I knew someone that he had peace with his “weak” side. Its was shocking for me to hear him talking about it. At the beginning it made me mad and it took me a while why I was so frustrated hearing him. It was because I couldn’t do the same. I told him, and I heard a smile. I was by him during the last moments of his life in this planet. He was brave and had his weak time to but even then, he was brave. After he left, I thought that if I could choose a way to die, I wanted to be like he did. But some incidents made me think that if I could choose the way I’ld live that would be like he show me.

We can’t choose when, or how we will die, but we can choose how to live. We can’t have control about everything but we have a choice. We can’t serve two masters but we have to choose the one. And its our choice after all.

The curtain becomes and bit more transparent for those know me, and for me too. What makes me glad , is that there are people in my life that show compassion in frond of that curtain. They teach me to have compassion for my self too. Today they told me “you are strong” not the way usually I’ve been told by some others. I was just strong to acknowledge how difficult is to accept my weak side, and my need to make peace.

One of those days, I’ll be strong enough to ask a big hug and let myself cry, like I cried that night. The night I had to say good bye to him. The night I was given a present . The night that when I asked Yijing to explain me what happened I got

Line 14.3 A prince offers it to the son of Heaven.
A petty man cannot do this.
~ Wilhelm

This is the present, our choice to be the prince or the petty man ?

The curtain become and bit more transparent …

6 comments:

  1. I believe you have stepped out from behind the curtain for this post M!! I can feel both the physical and emotional turmoil working through you. Your experience with your leg, what I would describe as a body memory, seems to have brought you back to root pain - yes? Currently felt, born long ago... Perhaps at that time you signed a Sacred Contract with yourself, made a kind of promise deep inside (described well by Caroline Myss in her book Sacred Contracts: Awakening to Your Divine Purpose) to not be weak; to not allow yourself to be seen as weak, which means doing it all, on your own. Perhaps safe care was not readily available, and being strong for yourself was needed then, but these decisions must not be set in concrete, as you are finding. The pain grows, and weakness has found a new definition. Rejecting vulnerability may be our greatest weakness. My strength is often best expressed through my cries, tears, and surrender. I wish I was there, able to sit by your side to give you that hug, or shoulder to cry on in person, but know I am there in spirit, a soul sister on this journey through weakness and courage, battles and triumphs, pain and healing. love, Karin

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  2. you are here !!!
    you listen , you understand, you see through the curtains . Everything you say disminish the distance. You are here and thank you for that.

    :)

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  3. Don't know if I'm too late to comment
    Dont' know if this makes any sense
    But I want to sing with/for you this one:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rk_sAHh9s08

    Asked or not, I send you a big mexican hug ;)

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  4. Thanks for the hug Rodrigo !!! Oh, and its never too late :)

    Can't hear the song ( forbiten for my country says youtube :( but its the thought it counts .

    Hugs from greece

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  5. OMG... forbiden??? how come? Oh, well.

    The video was Enigma's "Return to innocence" (the best "hexagram-24-song" IMHO) I think the lyrics match your post in a lovely and daoist way (or Way?).

    Hope you agree with that

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  6. Yup !!! perfect match... and I really like this song.

    Thank you :)

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