I said: what about my eyes?
God said: Keep them on the road.
I said: what about my passion?
God said: Keep it burning.
I said: what about my heart?
God said: Tell me what you hold inside it.
I said: pain and sorrow?
He said: ...stay with it.
The wound is the place where the Light enters you.
~ Rumi
2016 has been a hell of a year for our family. And not just for us, but also for our community, our city, and our country. I know a lot of people who have been through a lot of pain this year. I've watched friends writhe in the pain of pervasive betrayal, others grapple with the new reality of life-altering health conditions, and others try to somehow continue living after the loss of a beloved parent or infant child. I've seen good men brought to their knees by cutting words, friends betrayed by those supposed to protect them, and others give themselves over to the hands of surgeons with a prayer for healing and new life. I've seen our city and our country divided again and again over race, religion, and politics.
What are we supposed to do with all of this? How am I supposed to walk through all this pain with my children, my neighbors, with myself? The only answer I have for this is: SHOW UP. Show up to the hurting people (spoiler alert: this is everyone). Show up to hear their pain and to just sit in it with them. No fixing, only listening. Show up to your neighbor's pain, to your city's pain, to the world's pain, and to your own pain too. Sit with it and listen to it. Actually feel it with them. Maybe it will move you. Maybe it will light up a broken place in your heart that is also a broken place in God's heart. Then maybe S/He will tell you to move into that pain and find a way to help heal it. But, only after the listening and the hearing and the crying and the wine and the massaging each other's shoulders has happened. A lot.
I can't bury my head in the sand and try to avoid it all. And I don't want to. I want to keep my eyes on the road, keep my passion burning, keep my heart open, and stay with the pain and sorrow. You can't heal a wound by saying it isn't there.
Stay with it. The wound is the place where the Light gets in.
