Like it or not, so the saying goes, you have to take the good with the bad.
Split them and you violate the integrity of truth and beauty.
Trying to hold them riven is only human; but doing so risks wounding that very humanity – and our capacity for compassion. Feeling sorry for our selves and each other dissociates. It is not compassion. It muffles the sounds for whom the bell tolls.
Compassion is not a feeling. It is a realization of the integrity of truth and beauty in our oft times bumpy encounters; engagements with our unfinished, always to be re-articulated, humanity.
Like the atmosphere, taken for granted unless evaporated, there is a vital space in which we abide; a space holding unrealized possibilities for love and understanding. The sufferings of compassion are what allow that space to remain pregnant – not aborted with what we ‘know’ before we encounter our unique differences. What re-emerges is the always-new rediscovery of the truth and beauty of our very being – a being revived only in our meetings.
If there were no laughter held within our tears or a whiff of irony in our humor, would we even notice the green reach of a crocus breaking through winter’s frosted earth? Can there be wonder without pain? To reference the philosopher: all knowledge begins with wonder.
What is love or compassion without the pain of wonder?
***
Window rain
how a mood can
be
so undecipherable
deep joy behind
a sadness
something missing
simply
in the way things
are
such beauty
on a rainy day
© 2019 James Donnelly, DSW.LCSW
All rights reserved
South Garden Press, New York
For thoughts and comments, please e mail to: jdonnellydsw@gmail.com