Harmonizing With Others’ Pain

All of us are amazingly complicated by nature. If we consider only our physical selves, our bodies, each of us is about thirty trillion cells interacting. Skin, lungs, heart, brain, digestive track, bones……all connect and communicate.

Internal physical communication is our natural design. A pain in any part of our body influences the rest. The whole responds to the part. A cut on our finger is recognized and understood by the whole body, and the body as a whole responds by going to the bathroom for a band aid.

The response of the whole to the part is a universal truth. Considering our bodies deeply we may also recognize the physical interacts with emotional and mental elements as well. At any moment our physical, emotional and mental awareness is weaving itself into our current reality, from the part to the whole.

You may now be experiencing simultaneously all three parts to reality, and very probably considering them as personally yours. ‘My‘ body, feelings, thoughts. In the use of our words we reflect our ability and habit of pretending to separate from the whole of our existence. Recognizing the body as “mine” is both essential and potentially confusing. When we overuse our ability to separate mentally, we experience a pain I’ll call emotional upset.

The experience of being separation as, let’s say “lonely”, is part of life’s power. Any one of us can do that at any time, any place. Any of us are the ability to choose separation to the point of pain.

Courage in accepting emotional pain, both ours and others, comes with recognizing our ability, our nature, as choosing to feel apart or joined……the path of growth and spiritual maturation. All of us negotiate perceptions and thoughts capable of bringing compassion or suffering into existence through our awareness. We are just as capable of being “connected” as we are of being lonely.

Compassion for another’s suffering is potentially pleasure and pain. Pleasure when we care, pain when we feel/believe we ourselves are separated into powerlessness so broad and deep that we are lost rather than inevitably connected and beneficial.

Your family and its interactions are guaranteed exposure to peace and conflict. You cannot escape. I cannot escape. Peace and conflict will continue to meet as long as we exist. Our choice, our magical ability is harmonizing with others’ pain, accepting a broader, deeper good than they feel/think, so they are present to peace.

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This post was previously published on THEFATHERCONNECTION.WORDPRESS.COM.

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