My mother likes to say, "This too shall pass," quoting that old parable about King Solomon. My father was a big fan of the Shelley poem, Ozymandias which utterly illustrates the concept of "this too shall pass."
I can't chew. My teeth hurt. My inner lip is torn up from the bottom bracket metal. I have more wax slathered on the braces than you'll find at Madame Tussaud's. In fact, I swallowed quite a bit of it. (Yuck!)
I'm a little miserable.
I have to go to the orthodontist AGAIN tomorrow (this would make 3 times this week) so that they can fix the broken bracket (yes, it came off again) which started all this trouble in the first place.
Each month I receive a newsletter from Awakening Artistry from Tama J. Kieves, and this was so apropos in her letter:
Your pain is your relentless guru. How do you gain instruction from the sting? How do you resist the urge to curse it, deny it, or lie down in a ball for a thousand years? How do you love yourself? How do you forgive yourself? How do you sit down right now and trust the perfection of where you are? This is the juncture of your freedom. This life is not about just sweeping the kitchen one more time, or sending in a resume. It's about feeding the wild blue bird in your heart on berries not of this world. It's about feeding the wild blue bird so that it flies free no matter what.
I do not wish you pain or suffering. But I know that pain will cause you to seek freedom and freedom will teach you who you are and why you're here. You are the light of the world, and you have love, talent, and healing to offer us. Because of the sand, the oyster yields the pearl. Peacocks grow their signature colorful feathers by eating thorns. "What is to give light, must endure burning," wrote Viktor Frankl, who taught about how he found liberation, through mental focus, in the harshest hours of living in a concentration camp. And Buddhist nun Pema Chodron says, "Only to the extent that we expose ourselves over and over to annihilation can that which is indestructible be found in us." You are the light of the world. And it's pain that reminds you, like a ferocious drill sergeant, to abandon your useless definitions of security, and penetrate the limitless grace within you.
We may not have easy lives at this time. But it's not because we're failing, falling, or inadequate. It's because our souls demand healing more than coping, soaring more than just reaching cruising altitude.
I do not wish you pain or suffering. But I know that pain will cause you to seek freedom and freedom will teach you who you are and why you're here. You are the light of the world, and you have love, talent, and healing to offer us. Because of the sand, the oyster yields the pearl. Peacocks grow their signature colorful feathers by eating thorns. "What is to give light, must endure burning," wrote Viktor Frankl, who taught about how he found liberation, through mental focus, in the harshest hours of living in a concentration camp. And Buddhist nun Pema Chodron says, "Only to the extent that we expose ourselves over and over to annihilation can that which is indestructible be found in us." You are the light of the world. And it's pain that reminds you, like a ferocious drill sergeant, to abandon your useless definitions of security, and penetrate the limitless grace within you.
We may not have easy lives at this time. But it's not because we're failing, falling, or inadequate. It's because our souls demand healing more than coping, soaring more than just reaching cruising altitude.
Yeah, what she said!
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