Wednesday, January 17, 2007 Everything is good By Rene Lizada Papa's Table
I AM reading Gary Zukav's Soul Stories. In one of the chapters he says that we must look at life the way our souls do and one of the ways that our soul looks at life is to believe that everything that happens to us is good.
Now that may be good for reading and for discussion but when it comes to the reality of things, things can be a little different. Sure it is easy to say things like everything is good and that good things will come out of all our sufferings and sorrows but it is an entirely different when it pain happens. Nice to read but when it happens!
A broken marriage is good? The death of a loved one is good? A demotion? A betrayal? A broken heart? A terminal disease? Suffering? Disappointment? These are not good things and they are painful. When these things happen to us we ask ourselves, what is the good in this? In our despair and pain we cry out in the injustice of it all.
Something in us, something strong in us reasons out and says, this may be bad but in time it will be good. That may be but how difficult it is when we are going through it. When our marriages are torn and our families are ripped, there is very little good in that.
When we grieve for someone we love, what good is there in that? When our dreams have been shattered and our wishes have been shredded, where is the goodness there? When you finally stare at life and all its twists and turns and valleys and pits, you ask yourself what good can be possibly found in all the pain and the sorrow?
All of us would like to be brave, to be strong. All of us would like to be noble and pure but there are days, there are times when we simply cannot be. Sometimes the wounds are too deep, the lines have been crossed and you just have had enough. In these times it takes a lot to see the light in the darkness.
One of the most popular phrases nowadays is "moving on." We all hear in our lives. With friends and family, even in talk shows on radio and television. We read it too. It is a catch phrase for almost everything. "Nag move na ako." "Let us move on." "Let us not stay in the past, tapos na yan, it is time to move on."
That is good. There is nothing wrong with moving on if it is a sincere and a true realization. Because moving on entails the truth of discovery and reality. You can only move on when you finally realize and discover. Other than that it is merely cheap and insincere way of putting things aside. Moving on is forgetting but remembering. It is holding on but letting go. It is taking but discarding.
When you forgive someone, you forget what they did but you remember what you did. When you forgive someone you hold on to you what your learned but let go of the pain and in forgiving you take the grace that you chose and discard the heartbreak.
That is the way to forgive and to be free. That is the way to move on but in order to do so one must realize what they have done in order to reach a point of realization. Otherwise it just cheapens the forgiving part. And to reach that point one has to undergo the process of feeling what needs to be felt in order to move on.
We cannot deny ourselves of the anger and the grief, the sorrow and the heartache. We must undergo whatever needs to be experienced so that we may be fully cleansed and purged of all that needs to be purified. Suffering purifies, tears wash away the sadness.
We cannot deny ourselves of that because to deny or refuse the experience will only worsen it. Let it all out. Cry, write the letter, emote, curse of you want. But keep it to yourself. Feeling your anger is not the same as acting on it. It is one thing to be angry with a person, it is different when you go out and cause harm.
We need to undergo the pain so that we may come out of it clean. To cause harm when you are mad is a sign of something wrong. Terribly wrong. The jails are full of stories of people who could not handle their emotions properly. These people when they lash out may look strong and powerful but in truth they are the weakest persons on earth because they cannot control themselves.
Moving on demands one simple truth, that you finally realize what you went through and because of that, you move on. In order to do that, you need to accept the truth of your emotions, the consequences of your decisions and the effects of your actions. You need to stare at yourself and accept the truth. We all do
When I read that chapter of that book, I realized that I had a long way to go. A very long way to go. But we will get there. All of us will. And perhaps one day we can say to ourselves that everything is indeed good.
