There is so much pain and suffering in the World
and I think to myself how lucky I am that I don’t suffer all the time. Since last
September though, I’ve often experienced a bit too much pain for comfort—it’s
a fact! Pain in the back and leg, pain in the eye, pain in various joints—and aside
from the physical pain—quite a bit of emotional pain too. This last one goes
hand in hand with the actual pain—they come together as a package. Can’t do much about it of course, except
live with it. Well, that’s not exactly true, because just like we all do, I
have tried to get rid of it or at least make it less troublesome. I’ve seen a
chiropractor, a physiotherapist, various doctors and an eye surgeon. I’ve also
taken more eye drops and pain-killers (why do we call them that?) than ever before.
Thankfully, and blissfully, at this moment, there
is what Thich Nhat Hanh refers to with a whistful sigh..... as….. ‘the absence of pain’.
He says this with—as I distinctly recall, a
beautiful half-smile—or at least he did until recently when in his 80’s he had
a stroke. He is recovering now and they say his smile is coming back—although
he can’t speak again yet. I wonder if he is able to be mindful of his moment-to-moment
experience now.
I do hope so.
Some of the time I’m grateful to be mindful of all
this pain. It does remind me that I’m alive. I hope I ‘practice what I preach’
in guiding others to directly turn towards the pain themselves in the moment
and over time look deeply to notice how the sensory qualities of the pain change
in intensity, together with all the thoughts and feelings that accompany the
pain. Just Noticing, Observing and Witnessing. When I tell people I do this myself, for example when visiting the dentist,
or when having the eye operation recently at the hospital—as an ‘opportunity to be mindful’—they
often laugh and say I’m a masochist! I don’t think I am—I find the experience
neither pleasurable nor painful. Well not as painful as it might be if I
weren’t being mindful anyway. I should add that I don’t want to be a pain—the pain by itself is real enough—I
just don’t want to add to it. But I know that I can be a pain some of the time.
I’m sorry for that—please forgive me. Not being able to do things like go to the gym,
ride my bike, or play as much with the grand kids can be very tiresome, frustrating
and irritating. So plenty to be mindful of there.
Bit by bit, I hope I can
recover some of the ability to be as active as before, but to be honest in
darker moments, my biggest fear is that maybe this is it and I’ll have to
accept any limitations just as they are. I suppose that does happen naturally
anyway—accepting limitations that is. Like fading eyesight concealing the ravages
of time—nature can sometimes have a way of letting us down gently. So it was a
bit of a shock recently after having a cloudy lense in my eye replaced with a
crystal clear one. Blimey!! The brightness and the colour and the sharpness and…. and….
is that me?! Oh heck, I thought I was
still 25.
