We scour the globe looking for cure. Cure for our depression. Cure for our pain. Cure for our broken dreams and relationships. But is life about curing or living with vulnerabilities? Can we accept our flaws? Can we live with imperfection?
One wise saying goes, "Life is easier than you'd think; all that is necessary is to accept the impossible, do without the indispensable, and bear with the intolerable." Can we accept things that we are powerless to change? The past is one example. A terminal illness is another. Does success mean that we must always be richer than our neighbor - possessing and accumulating more than them? Doesn't the rat-race clone rat-like behavior out of all of us - skittish, edgy and most of the time, lost.
"The perpetual circle of self-improvement makes anxiety spiral. It is not enough to be married: we must be marriageable and employable," so bemoaned Stephen Covey, the author of the best seller, The seven habits of highly effective people.
Let's go back to accepting our limitations... Must we strive to the death to outdo and outrace our competitors? Must we know everything? Can't we bear with some form of ignorance? Do we really believe that we are immune from trouble? Can we measure a sunbeam with a ruler? Can we know the heart of God or the secrets of the universe? Can we turn back time and correct our past? Can we ever find the cure of cures to all our needs?
Life's complex problem has a solution, so the saying goes, that is simple, neat and wrong. If kindness is bearing the vulnerabilities of others, then kindness to ourselves is bearing our own vulnerabilities; far from finding a cure for it. Maybe in our weakness, we are made strong. In our pain, we understand more. In our loss, we find peace. Maybe the solution of life's problems is not looking for it but living without it. In quiet submission and reflection, we learn from it.
Like a guest, we invite them in, sorrow, loss and pain, and sit in stillness to learn from them. After a season, they will leave on their own accord - once the gift of learning comes to an end.
As we bid them farewell, we become wiser. Just like the four seasons in a year, trouble and joy take their turn as guest in our spirit. Each takes turn to impart lessons before they quietly depart. We cannot chase them away. We cannot bolt the door or shut the window. Or hide in the basement. They will not leave until we can face them, invite them in, accept them for who they are, and learn from them.
Until then, our spirit will not find rest because we treat our guests bearing "gifts" as enemies aggrieved.
Want to check out a letter I wrote about marriage entitled "MAGIC OF MARRIAGE"?
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