I wonder
How many lifetimes could a single life pack?
…
I’d like to tell you about a little jewel of wisdom that I received one night not so long ago. A treasure wrapped in pain.
“NoooNoooNoooNoooNooo” I howled ceaselessly on that night, as I drew on the little breath I had left in my contracting body, not a hint of a care that this should ever end. Nothing in existence other than pure horrified disbelief, expressed as a never ending “no no no no no”
The pain of losing a father.
I was lucky. Lucky to be confirmed in my disbelief. Lucky that it was in the end, all just a bad dream. And yet with time, I have come to regard it as more than merely a bad dream. I now regard it as a little jewel.
A jewel through which new ways of consciousness could be seen.
So where was the jewel hidden in this painful dream?
…
As we all know, not all grieving souls are confirmed in their disbelief, and however hard it is to imagine, some losses are still less bearable than losing a father. This I have witnessed myself. I have heard its howling cries in the night and held tight its inconsolable hands during the day. This is the grief of losing a second child by utter backstabbing surprise.
It is a pain that can most literally break a heart and break it for good.
I always knew that this was possible. For the physical heart to succumb under the weight of grief. I knew about that pacemaker and those heart attacks and I knew very well where they came from. Now for the first time, I feel that I understand what I always knew. I feel this because as soon as I awoke, I could feel clear as day that with time, the strength of my heart could lose the fight against the crushing energy of the “no no no”. In fact, in the thick of the experience, it was hard to imagine how it could possibly win. How I could possibly win the battle of grief.
Seeing this was a little jewel of consciousness.
It cleared up a region of the human experience that was previously hidden from my awareness, the land of grief. Now, when I hold the inconsolable hands of my loved ones I can better see where they are on the landscape of consciousness. I can sense the crushing gravity of loss consuming their hearts, I can see the void of horror swallowing them from below and the darkness that occludes all hope and horizon from their view. All seen through the little jewel from a painful dream.
Where is the gift in this jewel?
When people see their loved ones in the grip of grief the first instinct is to pull them up as hard as possible. “Live for all the love and life that still surrounds you”, “Wouldn’t they have wanted you to be happy and healthy after they’re gone?” or “They’re still with you if you choose to have them”. This is all great pulling, but how can we know if it will help if we can’t see where they are standing? Perhaps there is nowhere for them to stand where we are pulling. Perhaps, where they are standing, the love that we see around them is hidden from their view or perhaps their feet are buried too deep in the mud to take the steps that the deceased would have wanted for them. We might get a lucky pull, but on the whole, we are unlikely to help them along very far if we are working in the dark.
So there was the gift in the jewel.
Now when I take grieving hands into mine I can better see what I am holding and where I am pulling. Before my dream I remember feeling powerless and defeated before my grieving family. How could I possibly fathom the loss of a second child when I don’t even have a child? I had no idea what to say or do, I could just sit and hold their hand for whatever that was worth. After my dream, it felt different. I still feel like most of the grief goes over my head and I still don’t feel that the powers to heal are in my hands. Yet I no longer feel blind, powerless or defeated. I feel that I can matter, if only a little.
All sparked by a little jewel of consciousness wrapped inside a painful dream.
…
It is a wonder
It is a wonder how our dreams can grant us wisdom from life experiences we have not yet had. How they can carry us ahead of our current walk of life and reveal the realities of life that exist beyond our current horizon.
It is a wonder how our ancestors learned to access these jewels of consciousness at will. How many lifetimes of experience could one true dreamwalker harness in a single walk of life?
They say that wisdom comes with age and experience. Yes, but perhaps we can pack far more experience into our age than we can imagine?
Perhaps by ways of consciousness.
…
How many jewels of consciousness could we collect in our lifetime?
How many lifetimes could a single life pack?
I wonder.
…
Happy Trails,
Sagi