My suffering is transformed either on purpose or by accident. It’s usually by accident. It usually involves human connection and moments that remind me what it feels like to be present. An unexpected conversation at a party. A surprise meet up with a beautiful stranger. Or the aftermath of a long sweaty ball-chaffing hike.
But it’s not just enjoying the moment, but also that they’re experiences that put everything into perspective. It’s usually from moments like these that the suffering loses its grip. The pain might remain, but the torture starts to unravel.
When I’m trying to intentionally transform suffering: movement, sitting with it, and some sort of expression usually helps.
Brutal Honesty! I love that Paul. I soemtimes approach healing from something through the overachiever in me and this is a wonderful reminder to also allow for serendipity. To allow for life and for your tribe yo heal you. 🙌
We all gotta find our medicine, and it looks different for different people. And it looks different at different seasons and life phases. But I think for me, serendipity is a powerful one, and it's usually the result of simply showing up:
- November and December this past year was a time where many demons came out to play, and showing up to a birthday party for our dear friend turned into hours of conversation allowing me to let go of the internal ruminating and just be with people, allowing love and presence and relationship to do the healing work.
- Accepting an invite and showing up to a men's retreat in Ashland, OR lead to one of the most important pivots in my life, leading to several transformations of long running battles, that gave me the gumption to simply let go.
It's both awesome and terrifying to think that some of the greatest and most important moments in our lives can arise out of serendipity. And for me, some of the biggest transformations of suffering have only occurred when I never intended to find it.
Yea this is a big one.It reminds me of the concept of Pronoia (I dont think its a realy world) which is when the universe is conspiring FOR you (the opposite of paranoia). We need control to ease our paranoia but pronoia is all about trusting the serendipity. It has brought much ease to my life
I find that meditating on the source of the pain helps me remove some of the layers that my past trauma and my negative inner narrator are all too ready to weave into the fabric of any new experiences with any hint of negative valence to them.
Amen to this. Learning more and more than awareness itself is one of the most powerful tools we have for healing. Just being with pain can unravel so much. I have no idea how this works, I just know that it works :D Thanks for this
I’m finding lately that physical activity helps with pain, whether physical or mental pain, since it’s in the body that we feel pain, and the mind extrapolates that pain onto itself. I’m also reading a lot of Alan Watts, especially “The Wisdom of Insecurity”, which is helping me understand that the most acute sensation of pain is the inability to escape it. Prison narratives, like those by Solzhenitsyn, remind me every time I read them how good I objectively have it, and to appreciate the days or even the moments where nothing is wrong. This is all solitary work—the best palliative for me is the company of others, being out in the world, and if not partaking in life, observing it, being surrounded by it, getting to see people go about their day, catching people in the pauses between their errands, when the efficiency lapses, the people in the scene full of life in an animated stillness.
Henry thank you. I too find so much transformation of suffering simply in moving the body. I've found that I can't really meditate unless I've moved the body (well, I can, it's just a lot noisier). I'll have to check out that title by Watts. Thanks for your perspective here, it's a beautiful image you paint, how this solitary work can still (and sometimes must) happen in the presence of life, and everyone and everything in it.
I love how you are bringing this back to community and how the "work" is not up on the mountain but down here on earth in the mud and the unpredictable chaos that is two or more people colliding! Thanks Henry. I have not checked out Solzhenitsyn but look forward to!
My suffering is transformed either on purpose or by accident. It’s usually by accident. It usually involves human connection and moments that remind me what it feels like to be present. An unexpected conversation at a party. A surprise meet up with a beautiful stranger. Or the aftermath of a long sweaty ball-chaffing hike.
But it’s not just enjoying the moment, but also that they’re experiences that put everything into perspective. It’s usually from moments like these that the suffering loses its grip. The pain might remain, but the torture starts to unravel.
When I’m trying to intentionally transform suffering: movement, sitting with it, and some sort of expression usually helps.
Brutal Honesty! I love that Paul. I soemtimes approach healing from something through the overachiever in me and this is a wonderful reminder to also allow for serendipity. To allow for life and for your tribe yo heal you. 🙌
We all gotta find our medicine, and it looks different for different people. And it looks different at different seasons and life phases. But I think for me, serendipity is a powerful one, and it's usually the result of simply showing up:
- November and December this past year was a time where many demons came out to play, and showing up to a birthday party for our dear friend turned into hours of conversation allowing me to let go of the internal ruminating and just be with people, allowing love and presence and relationship to do the healing work.
- Accepting an invite and showing up to a men's retreat in Ashland, OR lead to one of the most important pivots in my life, leading to several transformations of long running battles, that gave me the gumption to simply let go.
It's both awesome and terrifying to think that some of the greatest and most important moments in our lives can arise out of serendipity. And for me, some of the biggest transformations of suffering have only occurred when I never intended to find it.
Yea this is a big one.It reminds me of the concept of Pronoia (I dont think its a realy world) which is when the universe is conspiring FOR you (the opposite of paranoia). We need control to ease our paranoia but pronoia is all about trusting the serendipity. It has brought much ease to my life
I find that meditating on the source of the pain helps me remove some of the layers that my past trauma and my negative inner narrator are all too ready to weave into the fabric of any new experiences with any hint of negative valence to them.
Amen to this. Learning more and more than awareness itself is one of the most powerful tools we have for healing. Just being with pain can unravel so much. I have no idea how this works, I just know that it works :D Thanks for this
Nice one Khaled. I've found meditations to help create that space too. Thanks for sharing
I’m finding lately that physical activity helps with pain, whether physical or mental pain, since it’s in the body that we feel pain, and the mind extrapolates that pain onto itself. I’m also reading a lot of Alan Watts, especially “The Wisdom of Insecurity”, which is helping me understand that the most acute sensation of pain is the inability to escape it. Prison narratives, like those by Solzhenitsyn, remind me every time I read them how good I objectively have it, and to appreciate the days or even the moments where nothing is wrong. This is all solitary work—the best palliative for me is the company of others, being out in the world, and if not partaking in life, observing it, being surrounded by it, getting to see people go about their day, catching people in the pauses between their errands, when the efficiency lapses, the people in the scene full of life in an animated stillness.
Henry thank you. I too find so much transformation of suffering simply in moving the body. I've found that I can't really meditate unless I've moved the body (well, I can, it's just a lot noisier). I'll have to check out that title by Watts. Thanks for your perspective here, it's a beautiful image you paint, how this solitary work can still (and sometimes must) happen in the presence of life, and everyone and everything in it.
I love how you are bringing this back to community and how the "work" is not up on the mountain but down here on earth in the mud and the unpredictable chaos that is two or more people colliding! Thanks Henry. I have not checked out Solzhenitsyn but look forward to!