I like to think of myself as a compassionate empathic person but lately I am seeing that I may have judged certain members of my family in a more negative light.. I think some of this comes out of insecurity and fear as well as a sense of fearing shame, especially as a recovering person who struggled a lot in her life and never seemed to “make it’, which if you come to think about it is a value judgement in and of itself.
Now that I am opening up to certain family members as the issue of my sister’s mental health challenges all of us, I am seeing family members with more insight and compassion. It is not always easy to understand what a person needs when they can no longer communicate this to us. I know sometimes being with my sister can drag me down into a vortex but only when I start to see myself as somehow responsible for what is happening to her and feel the deep sadness of her feeling so lost and immoblised
The other day she tried to tell me a comment of hers had influenced her to change her hairstyle. Truth is, at the time, she told me she felt like a change and she seemed happy with the new style for months, but now she hates it. That made me burst into tears with the psychiatric nurse the other day. I just spoke to her son and he said this is all part of the illness, judging her hair, feeling she never has enough of or the right kind of clothes, we were both discussing how this is not really the key of the underlying issue and her constant judgement or dissatisfaction isn’t a allowing her to foster a sense of self love or a feeling of being blessed.
Today I was reading some lovely chapter’s in Henri Nouwen’s book Life of the Beloved in which he speaks of the need to feel blessed. It reminds me that how we talk to and talk about others does have a power to influence. I feel sad now I said my sister’s old hairstyle looked a lot like a ‘helmet’ and I realise that now, it was just an opinio. Usually I do try to build my sister up. I also realised that over the past months I have also talked a lot about past traumas instead of focusing on the positive, but that was essential too…..
Anyway this chapter on Blessing in Henri’s book is so beautiful I wanted to share it with you.. I had a beautiful time with my Higher Power down by the lake earlier.. I got give a brilliant reading on deepening my spiritual connection and listening in the silence to the voice of intuition given to me from my Al Anon book and then I spent some time reading Nouwens’ book as a magpie came to sit by me and look me in the eye (again.. second time in a few days).
In that chapter Nouwen also talks of this act of talking with and listening to the voice of love within us.. What a powerful antidote to the constant downward spiral of critical thinking that only works to blame, shame and judge as well as tear ourselves and others down. Even if there is something we feel the need to point out to others about how they have hurt or upset us, we can try to do this in a loving way.. but if the criticism doesn’t stick do we even need to do this? Do we have to give away the power to be offended to another human being if we can be honest about criticism and open and learn to self support and self affirm?
Here is the reading and I will end my post with it.
If you develop the discipline of spending one half hour a day listening to the voice of love you will gradually discover that something is happening of which you are not even conscious. It might only be in retrospect that you discover the voice that blesses you. You thought that what happened during your time of listening was nothing more than a lot of confusion.. (but) the movement of God’s spirit is very gentle, very soft – and hidden. It does not seek attention. But its movement is also persistent, strong and deep. It has the power to change us radically. (it) … reveals to you that you are blessed as it gives you the power to bless others.
You can also cultivate a sense of being blessed by developing a cultivation of presence.. that is of being attentive to the blessings that come to you day after day, year after year. The problem of modern living is that we are too busy – looking for affirmation in the wrong places? – to notice that we are being blessed. Often people say good things about us but we brush them aside.. It is not easy for us, busy people, to truly receive a blessing. perhaps the fact that so few people offer a real blessing is the sad result of the absence of people who are willing and able to receive such a blessing. It has become extremely difficult for us to stop,listen, pay attention and recveive gracefully what is offered to us.
End of quote
For myself time in nature allows me to feel blessed… tuning into a spiritual reading allows me to hear God’s voice or the inner pull of intuition telling me to call someone or go somewhere. Keeping an open mind and also stopping nurturing fixed opinions and judgments about others I only see from the outside (and do not fully understand from the inside) also helps me to open to a truth that they too are blessed on some level having gifts, feelings and opinions, as well as insights different to my own that I might actually learn something from.
Emerging From The Dark Night 