why

Come on, can't somebody help me out here? What's going on in this unreality? From where comes this sudden intensity? Why is life getting so much more challenging for the ones trying to be awake and alive and openhearted? And not, apparently, for the ones content or intent to stay complacent and eyes-closed? Why is there so much pain and struggle, and why do so few seem to feel it? And I need to know, for myself, why I am carrying so much of it. Not so much in proportion to the life of the world, surely. But far too much in proportion to my own life. Which, while unstable and inexplicable, is not threatening or harsh or unkind. Not at this point. And yet the pain comes back and back again - this week, both in body and in heartmind - in seeming disregard of how smoothly anything is flowing, around me. Am I responsible for all this pain? Did I create it somehow, through habit or lack of habit? Through intention or lack of intention? Am I channeling, possibly, some pain that is not mine? If so, where is it coming from, and what am I to do with it? This is surely too much to ask of just one person. If I knew of a place where I could go and join hearts with others who had this irrational, continuous experience of pain, and turn it to healing somehow, surely I would go...

Or maybe I wouldn't. There were two events this weekend that could be spoken of as healing. One directly so: local traditional healers offering to share their skills, for minimal donations. The other less direct but perhaps just as effective: a time of prayer and devotion to the spirit of what sustains, in the green growing life of the world. But I avoided both. Not for lack of interest, respect, or wish to connect. Because I'm so very tired. Tired of carrying this pain, heavier than I can walk upright with, into the presence of other people and asking them to understand. Or, asking myself to be present with them while they, and I, don't understand.