When the darkness clears

On those mornings the darkness and pain of former days recedes I am so grateful. I open my blog and read all the beautiful supportive comments from fellow bloggers I feel so blessed to call friends and honestly it brings tears to my eyes. There is so much to be grateful for despite all of the pain, and the truth that I am coming to is that its a blessing to be able to celebrate the fact that if we are empathic and awake and alive in our emotions we are actually given a great gift, for if we did not know how happiness feels and tastes and expands us we would not know pain and vice versa, the seeds of each are intrinsically sown into each other.

It broke my heart watching the movie A Star is Born over the past two days. As a recovering alcoholic who also often used drugs I could identify with Bradley Cooper’s character Jackson Maine. That the unkind words of a guy who was out to make a lot of money out of his partner Ally in the movie drove the final wedge into a heart already labouring under so much shame and guilt really highlighted something for me. The people with the kindest hearts and the most hidden emotional damage often end up in AA or recovery. Don’t get me wrong there are some mean defended people in those rooms too, I have fallen foul to them at times. At times I have been told I was wallowing when I was in intense grief that I really needed to feel, that said I know there needs at times to be a limit to grieving as we need to live and not abandon others emotionally either. But that Jackson then died under his own hand just broke my heart. As it breaks for all addicts who don’t make it. I know Bradley Cooper as a recovering person made this movie to express powerful truths. It really packed a gut punch.

I know we do self defeating things. I know we are not always our own best friends, I know at time we can be our own worst enemies, but the sheer raw vulnerability is what is not often seen. That is why I appreciate so much the support shown to me here and also by my therapist, certain people just seem to GET IT!!! Those are the people whose comments I take on board. I personally now really feel sorry for those who cannot forgive, for those who cannot embrace, tenderness, raw emotion and pain. I accept that there are those who have to be like this to so called ‘survive’ in the tough jungle but it still makes me really sad.

It seems that some are so shut down in the inner child that they just unwittingly perpetrate its abuse onto others.. One thing we need to develop is the wisdom to see when such projections are in operation. It happens to us all at one time or another at the hands of narcissists. We need the wisdom to see when we must not take on board that shame dumping and pain. A person with a kind heart will literally bend over backwards for others but we should never have to do it at our own expense. And we need our self protective boundaries of love, a firm belief in the power of our intrinsic goodness or Buddha nature despite our awareness of our very human wound, flaws, psychic vulnerabilities and weaknesses. For where we may be weak others may be strong and we may be strong where others are weak.

Can we help each other? I think we can, when we reach out in love, when we open our hearts, when we try to show empathy or take the time to enter and wonder about another person’s inner reality or past life, we are doing our very best to make the world a better place. And for that I am so so very grateful every day to and for this loving Word Press community. Your stories and struggles move me, you poetry opens my heart and inspires me, your presence here gives me hope in human nature, on the darkest days you show me there is a reason for it all and in time the darkness fades again and light once again appears on the horizon.