Today I had a wonderful lunch with a woman I met at Friends In Deed recently. We were talking about Pema Chodron and her writings about sitting with "what is." And she also mentioned Jack Kornfield's story about getting hit in the shoulder with an arrow and how most of us send more arrows into the wound by saying things like: "Oh, I shouldn't feel this pain, I better get over it right now and move on, and forget about it, it's just getting in my way." Rather than feeling the pain, removing the arrow and taking the time to heal the wound. That acceptance of "what is" instead of "what we want it to be" is so crucial to living in the moment.
We were talking about how grateful we are for the very terrible things that brought us to Friends In Deed in the first place and how it has helped us to transform our lives in ways we could have never understood before. We would have said, "I would like to live a deeper, more fulfilled and happier life, and really appreciate life," but we would have only been using those words because we've heard them or read them. But now, it's how we actually feel. Despite the struggle I'm still in, going through a difficult divorce, looking for work, I do feel extremely grateful and work on my attitudes daily and attend to the wounds. So as hard as some days seem, I guess I am glad that I'm making my way through this journey and feeling such a strong connection to a spiritual core, or my "soul." And the ability to cry, after so many years of feeling numb, is a gift I really appreciate.
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