Holding what is...

Dawn Mauricio offered a beautiful metaphor at the retreat a couple months ago at Spirit Rock, and it’s really helping right now…maybe helpful for you too… 
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When we are holding difficult experiences, it’s like a tight fist. And we can spend so much time desperately trying to PRY our fist open so we can feel better…trying to dull the pain, deny it, fight it, negotiate with it, indulge it. It’s exhausting + often just exacerbates tension and anxiety around the pain.

Instead we can hold our fist with love and compassion as it slowly releases itself in the tender embrace of faith, gentleness, patience. This fist of pain will release if we can relax into that loving awareness, the holding, and trust the unfolding.

As I sit with my own grief and the helpless feeling of watching those I love grieve, I trust that this fist of heartbreak will unfurl, and in the meantime I will hold it patiently, tenderly, trusting this moment is exactly as it should be.

It’s like this right now. And all is well.

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