Life can seem so cruel at times.
I recently heard of a friend’s sudden loss, and cannot imagine the pain she must be going through.
What are we supposed to say to someone whose wounds are still fresh? “I’m sorry”?
I can’t see how that helps, and personally I try to avoid saying it.
Do we offer words of comfort?
We can try, but if our efforts fail to reach their mark, we have to be careful not to end up suffering ourselves.
I’m going to take a gamble, and say that it is our presence that is paramount to another in times of pain.
It’s what we all inherently have, but not all of us dish it out quite so freely.
We don’t always have to be in the vicinity of someone for them to feel our presence. Our presence can break the barriers of time and space. That’s the power of intent, thought – love.
I feel that more of us are becoming more sensitive to such an unconventional way of communication. Sometimes it’s just a feeling that, regardless of the chaos surrounding us, everything is going to be okay.
Of course, we are more adjusted and used to communicating through our physical selves, so we have to ask:
- Can we be with someone who is suffering without adding anything other than our presence? (Which shouldn’t feel like anything has been added to the moment at all.)
- Can we try being with their suffering without attempting to extinguish it?
It can be so easy to add to the flames without intending to. We want to help, but everything we do or say seems to make matters worse.
Sometimes it’s because we are in too deep, and their pain only reminds us of our own unresolved issues.
Many of us shy away from being silent. The radio is on, but we are not listening to it. The TV is on, but we are not watching it. They are doing their job, though – they are drowning out what we are trying to avoid.
The noise within.
Silence is the number-one amplifier of such noise.
Being silent with another is so rare. But when there’s suffering, silence can be the greatest healer.
Silence – true silence, not just not talking – accepts the suffering, the pain, the anguish, the shock, and gives it space.
And when we create space around our suffering, or around the suffering of another, without wanting it to go away (which would be resistance, resulting in more pain), we are saying yes to it.
Saying yes to suffering is saying yes to healing.
A moat of space is created around suffering when we accept it. It’s there for us to breathe in to, to smile in to, to cry in to it, and we continue to fill it up, knowing it can never be filled, overwhelmed or flooded.
Because it’s space.
Give any form of pain space, which is the opposite of clinging to it, and we begin the process of being free from it.
If letting go of your suffering gives rise to guilt (maybe because a part of you feels it is your duty to suffer) then create space around the guilt, too.
The more we spend time in that space, the more chance we’ll see and realise that life, actually, isn’t cruel.
Life just is.
Only when we cling to suffering, and add to it our stories (from the mind), does life appear unfair.
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Love & Light to us all.
Gavin Whyte 
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