Everything That Needs To Be Said

Maybe we don’t have to fix the problem.

Resolve the issue.

Map out the next three steps.

In their moment of hurt perhaps all they want from us is our presence, to silently sit in their mud with them, to give them a safe space just to be, to remind them in the loneliest of moments that they aren’t really alone at all.

At a time where there are often no words, we need not bother looking for them.

Sometimes our presence says everything that needs to be said.

Photo by Transly Translation Agency on Unsplash

The Ever Present Presence Of Pain

The constant annoying chirp coming from the ceiling was doing me a huge favor. The batteries in the smoke detector were kind enough to tell me they needed to be changed.

My annoyance eventually shifted to gratitude as I climbed the ladder and replaced the two AA batteries. Grateful to be made aware of a situation and to proactively take care of it.

But not everything that is broken tells us that it is.

Especially when it comes to people.

We humans are quite good at masking pain, aren’t we? Of hiding the hurt behind radiant smiles and jovial laughter, creating an outer perception of “all togetherness” while being anything but on the inside.

The expression of pain and hurt is viewed as a weakness, an emotional liability in a world which seemingly only values strength. So facades are built, walls are constructed, and the painful Continue reading “The Ever Present Presence Of Pain” →

Trauma, Healing, Compassion, & Empathy

Perhaps this would have changed everything?

Just a few right words spoken at the right time could have significantly shifted the direction of that life. Or those reassuring conversations which were vulnerably started yet were met with a defiant wall of silence, the desperately extended hand not grasped by one who could have pulled us to a space of emotional safety.

The seeds of our greatest possibility never watered, the weeds of our insecurities and fears never pulled.

As I sit here this early morning, I find I am reflecting upon some of the stories I’ve both witnessed and experienced, some deeply painful life trauma stories others have bravely entrusted me with and the painful ones I’ve lived through on my own.

Our deepest pains are personal and seldom understood by others. Or even our self. The screams are often silent, and we carry this heaviness alone, simply moving forward the best we can, sometimes in rather unhealthy ways as we try to numb a pain only we can feel. Trauma is alive and invisibly thriving within all of us at one level or another.

As I’ve worked with my own traumatic experiences I’ve come to respect their presence in my life. No longer do I attempt to minimize their impact upon me. No longer do I chastise myself for letting events and outcomes I did not control actually control me. The pain and its impact have yet to be fully worked through, and perhaps they may never be fully processed. But there is no longer anyone to blame, neither the ones who unknowingly inflicted a pain that would shape a lifetime, nor the recipient of the pain for letting it do so.

This is where my healing truly begins.

I often wondered what life would have been like had those few right words at the right time been Continue reading “Trauma, Healing, Compassion, & Empathy” →

Making Space For The Hurt

I bet Mother’s Day has always sucked for Shawn and Zig.

Shawn and Zig were two friends I grew up with in the neighborhood. Both lost their Moms when they were quite young. They were old enough to understand what had happened, yet not quite old enough to understand why it happened.

I don’t think they’ve ever understood why, even all these decades later.

Their pain was never something they brought up. They just carried it with them, silently, as they bravely tried to move on with their forever-changed young lives. Time simply doesn’t heal wounds of this magnitude. You just learn to deal with it, in your own way, in your own time.

To look at them both you’d never know of the heaviness that was weighing them down, their pain undetectable to the uninitiated. But that’s kind of how we deal with our pains, isn’t it? Silently. Isolated. Our burden, ours alone to carry.

While pain may be visibly undetectable, life has taught me that the vast majority of us silently carry our own degree of pain and hurt just below the surface. Life certainly is a contact sport and we all have our scars and bruises inherent with simply being alive.

Everybody hurts.

Yet, do we make space for the hurt?

You’d think with the commonality of pain we all share we’d all be a bit more understanding. Since we do Continue reading “Making Space For The Hurt” →

Is It Safe For Me To Talk About Mental Health?

Life certainly has it’s share of pain, doesn’t it?

May is National Mental Health Awareness Month. One of the goals of NMHA Month is to hopefully provide a safe space for uncomfortable conversations around mental and emotional health. The unfortunate stigmas surrounding mental health often prevent any conversations from even getting started. That silence keeps us suffering…alone. Alone with the pain and the hurt and the anxiety and isolation we may be experiencing.

That silence, at times, can even end lives.

That’s how I lost my brother Steve.

As a man, I was taught to keep my emotions to myself. I think most men have been told or shown the same. Expressing emotions is a sign of weakness, they’d say. “Real” men simply “suck it up” or “deal with it” or are told to “man up”. Manhood and emotions don’t mix, I was told. Generational stigma often keeps us from even admitting that we are struggling, let alone actually seeking some help and guidance. And while I’ve only experienced this from my male perspective, mental health stigma is not gender specific.

Mental and emotional health challenges quietly impact every section of our society.

The silence perpetuates the stigma.

This stigma needs to end.

There are many of us dealing with the heaviness life sometimes forces us to carry…the loss, the anxiety, the uncertainty, the unhealed traumas, the emotional scars, the pressure, the unmet needs and Continue reading “Is It Safe For Me To Talk About Mental Health?” →

I Found Your Broken Heart On The Beach

You’d think with all the miles I’ve walked on beaches over the years this would have happened sooner.

But there it was, at my feet.

A heart-shaped stone.

I’ve jealously seen a great many heart-shaped stones posted on social media, many from beaches I’ve actually walked on. Yet never had I seen one in real life. But there it was.

And it was broken.

The symmetrical shape of the symbol we equate with love wasn’t quite perfectly symmetrical. A small section on the upper left side had broken off, the roughness of the break contrasted against the weathered rounded and smoothed surface of the rest of the stone.

I found a broken heart on the beach.

This broken heart got me to thinking about the symbolism it may contain. Was there some significance in such a find? Was there a particular message or lesson behind me being in the right place at the right time to discover a fractured heart right in front of me?

A broken stone heart is easily seen. A human broken heart is much more difficult to see, the fractures and pain concealed within, with facades of smiles and laughter concealing the hurt even further.

Most of us with some years behind us carry within our own asymmetrical heart, a heart fractured and broken by the impact of simply being human, of simply being alive. Maybe finding this broken heart was to remind me that while broken hearts, specifically the human ones, can never be perfectly fixed, they can be cared for with love, kindness, patience, and understanding.

Hurt is universal.

So, too, is our capacity to respond with compassion.

Towards your heart.

And mine.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Turkeys, Trees, and The Tradition Of Pain

There’s nothing like the smell of chicken hearts and gizzards boiling in a sauce pan on the stove.

Deb is a holiday traditionalist. And one of her most important Thanksgiving traditions is making her Mom’s stuffing. It’s become a more significant tradition now that her Mom is no longer able to celebrate the holiday with her. For years they’d gather the day before Thanksgiving to combine the bread and the meat and the spices and, yes, the boiled chicken hearts and gizzards, and create a staple of their holiday meal.

It was more than just making stuffing. It was a bond between mother and daughter forged in the ritual of perpetuating a very important tradition.

Beautiful.

Yet, now bittersweet.

Sometimes the holidays can be quite painful. T’is not always the season to be jolly. Loss and emptiness can be excruciatingly magnified at a time of expected joy and glee. We’ve all experienced our own form of hurt, longing for what once was, longing for what never was, now seasonally contrasted against the backdrop of all things shiny and bright.

I think back to some of the more traumatic events in my life, wounds annually reopening as I balance my own levels of bitter and sweet this time of year. I think of friends and their childhood traumas and how their inner pain silently crushes their holiday spirit, no matter how much they may be smiling on the Continue reading “Turkeys, Trees, and The Tradition Of Pain” →

You Are A Superhero And Love Is Your Super Power

I’m not sure if I saw this coming. My daughter’s infatuation with super hero movies. It wasn’t something ever expressed when she was a child, but now you can be certain she has seen the most-recent Marvel release more that a few times. And she already knows when the next one will be released.

Super heroes have come a long way from the days of Superman and Batman from when I was a kid. I guess the world of super powers is a highly competitive one, with superheroes needing to step up their games in order to rule the box office.

We tend to think of super heroes as mythical beings gifted with unique talents, gifts, and abilities which can impact the world for good.

You don’t need to be mythical to impact the world.

Each of us is a superhero. Because each of us has the capacity to love.

Love is powerful. It heals, it saves, it protects, it creates, it soothes, it warms, it accepts, it restores, it Continue reading “You Are A Superhero And Love Is Your Super Power” →

A Teaspoon Of Love, Compassion, and Kindness?

Something was missing.

I’ve made my Turkey Chili & Beans for years. After countless tweaks and adjustments, the recipe has evolved into a family favorite. Always yummy all the time.

But this time it was off. It just didn’t have the flavor it was supposed to have.

That’s what happens when you forget to add the spices.

I had pre-portioned out the blend of cumin, cilantro, chili powder, and turmeric and set them aside, waiting for the right time to add them to the simmering pot. Apparently I forgot to add them in, and the result was rather bland.

The spices made up such a small percentage of all the ingredients, yet their absence made such a huge impact on the entire dish.

Little things certainly do make a big difference.

In cooking.

And in life.

Things like love, compassion, and kindness, three of life’s most important spices. Their absence will also make a huge impact. Yet their presence has the power to change the world.

Your world. My world. The entire world.

When life feels a bit bland, when it feels like something is missing, maybe that’s the time to add a bit of love, kindness, and Continue reading “A Teaspoon Of Love, Compassion, and Kindness?” →

Emotional Baggage and The Habit Of Self Compassion

Off come the shoes. And then the belt. Wallet, keys, phone, coins placed in a little tray on the conveyor belt and through the machine they go. I get to walk, shoeless, through my own machine, being scanned just like my personal belongings are. Just to make sure I’m not bringing anything dangerous with me on my journey.

Welcome to the airport.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have such a machine at home? A machine that would scan you as you left the house to start the new day. Scanning you to see if you’re carrying anything dangerous with you into the new day.

Not like a knife, or a gun, or a concealed explosive.

I’m talking about thoughts and emotions.

Which, at times, can also be rather dangerous.

Emotional baggage. The unfortunate carry-on. Often we don’t even know we’re carrying it. Probably because we’ve been carrying it for so long it just feels natural. The anger, the frustration, the narrative. Usually we just mindlessly take it with us as we start the journey of each new day.

For many years I was too angry and too frustrated to notice how angry and frustrated I was. A combination of anger, frustration, fear, doubt, and worry were readily present to some degree. The “feedback” of others was never welcomed, it was simply dismissed because I was the only one who understood my journey which somehow validated the baggage I was carrying.

Until I got past that “logic”, the baggage was never going to be put down. Until I was able to see and understand what was going on inside of me I was never going to own it. Until you own it, you’re never going to try and fix it. Because you don’t think it’s you who is broken.

One of the greatest gifts I’ve ever given myself has been the gift of compassionate self-awareness. The ability to compassionately look into myself and actually notice what I’m carrying with me. Good or bad. And not judging myself for carrying it. Self-awareness is in many ways just like the security screening at the airport. It’s allows me to see the concealed stuff I’m carrying with me, the stuff that could be emotionally dangerous.

Self-awareness isn’t always easy. It’s a process. An intentional process. Often, though, our self discovery is met with a non-compassionate response. How often do we habitually get mad at ourselves for feeling the way that we do? How often does our inner voice simply beat us down for somehow not being better, for us not being able to deal with what we are dealing with?

A more compassionate response? That took me some time to learn, and I’m still learning. It doesn’t change what is, but it changed how I dealt with what is. I now attempt to respond to myself in the same manor I would respond to a good friend. It sounds simple, yet we are often much harder on ourselves than we ever are on our friends.

I can assure you I still at times get caught up in the moments of anger, frustration, fear, doubt, and worry. I’m just now better being able to respond to them when they do arise.

How do you respond to you when life is getting the better of you? Have you ever simply stepped back and noticed how you respond? Is the anger met with more anger? Does the frustration make you more frustrated? Once we know how we respond we can decide how we can choose to respond going forward.

It’s not always easy, this compassionate self-awareness. Changing habits is never easy.

But creating new habits, habits of compassion which serve us instead of hurt us, is something worth working towards.

Photo by Lesly Juarez on Unsplash

Peter Mis LivingHalfFull.com

Lessons From A Life Unfolding

Category: compassion