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Mother Pain & God Trust
By gartenfische | June 10, 2008
Today is a day for dealing with family stuff (mentally, I mean). I went to my homeopath* and somehow ended up on the topic of my mom. So much pain there.
Over the past couple of years, I had come to the conclusion that endlessly analyzing my family situation and all the problems it brought, and brings, into my psyche and my life doesn’t help. It actually keeps me stuck in the past and in the pain. And my homeopath said the same; she said trust your practices—meditation, yoga, prayer—to bring healing, you don’t need to know why this and why that to heal. Yes, I must continue to surrender. To trust that the story of my past (and even present) wounds is not the story of me. Can I trust God or not?
I have an ultra analytical mind that tries hard to understand the why of things. I didn’t grow up with spiritual training, so never learned about trust and faith—those concepts are new to me. I was taught that we have to rely on ourselves, but for me, that was a dead end. I tried hard, over many years, to figure out what to do to get better. (Go into any bookstore and look at all the volumes dedicated to helping us “get better.”) That it is about surrender more than effort is a revelation. And trust? When your own parents cannot really be trusted, where does it come from? Thankfully, my present family is polar opposite to my birth family and this is one place it comes from. My spiritual experiences, which I’ve written about here in the past, have also taught me trust. It takes time. It takes God.
Then I came home and read Linda’s post about her mother and her own painful past. Linda is truly a survivor. (I think I am too, but sometimes I have doubted how well I was doing it.) It seems the day for reliving mother stuff for some of us. And then I popped over to Trent’s and read this:
If God is found in our hard times, then all of life, no matter how apparently insignificant or difficult, can open us to God’s work among us. To be grateful does not mean repressing our remembered hurts. But as we come to God with our hurts—honestly, not superficially—something life changing can begin slowly to happen. We discover how God is the One who invites us to healing. We realize that any dance of celebration must weave both the sorrows and the blessings into a joyful step.
Henri J.M. Nouwen
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You may have noticed I haven’t been writing much. Words seem incredibly superfluous lately. Today, it was the intersection of three unrelated related things (and the people behind them) that brought me to words. I don’t want to dwell on my own pain, but I want healing for all of us and sometimes sharing our personal journeys can help.
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One day I will write about my experience with homeopathy—let’s just say it’s been life changing. Thanks to N, my life has been transformed; I went from suffering three to four horrific migraines a week to about two to three a month that are generally mild, and I keep improving. Before seeing N, I couldn’t do many things that most people take for granted—migraines ruled my life (and ruined many family get togethers and special events, etc).
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See part of J.K. Rowling’s commencement speech at Harvard—about Amnesty International and its amazing work—at wyrdbyrd.
June 10th, 2008 at 6:09 pm
I’m sitting here, wondering what to type. I’ve only been to your blog a couple of times, so I really don’t know you yet. But I hear you. My husband and I each carry our loads of mother pain, and so I know that it is a hurt that can go very deep. I think you’re right that analyzing alone will not get you the release you need. I am praying that God will make the old pain less intrusive and that you will continue to find positive ways to go forward.
June 10th, 2008 at 6:28 pm
*Online hugs to you, brave one*
yes, words can seem superfluous but think about birds chirruping at dawn & dusk going ‘I’m still alive–are you? And you? And you? I’m still alive!’
maybe twittering & chirruping do for them what writing does for us.
So glad your homeopath made such a difference to you. We all owe her big time.
June 10th, 2008 at 7:01 pm
Thank you, Ruth and Ovidia. I hope, hope I didn’t sound too pathetic—that’s the danger of writing about something when you’re still wrapped up in it, like I was this afternoon.
June 10th, 2008 at 7:05 pm
Do I ever hear you on mother pain and on the ultra-analytical mind! Coming from a lot of that, as well, what I’ve learned is that the power to forgive is a greater gift to both, your mother and yourself, than the power to analyze every last moment that went wrong. Yes, forgiving takes courage, but once you try it, you won’t want to go back.
And yes, a runaway monkey mind is hard to stop. I like what Eckhart Tolle says in “The Power of Now” about controlling the mind so that it doesn’t control you, and so that you gain the extra mental space that will fill up with trust and faith.
Many hugs.
June 10th, 2008 at 8:00 pm
Oh Charlotte, you are absolutely right. Forgiveness is the really important element that I left out of my post. To be honest, I haven’t forgiven yet, but I am praying for help with it. I want to, and I can say the words, but I can tell I haven’t really done it. But I believe I will, with God’s help. I have to!
And yes, controlling the mind is SO essential. I think the meditation is what started me on that path because it is a form of mind training—controlling the mind so it doesn’t control me.
June 10th, 2008 at 8:26 pm
wow, thanks G! for the link love….
ah….so much to say….I gotta tell ya, as a very lapsed Lutheran, God never played a big part in my life growing up. we used to go to church on Sunday morning and I remember praying to God asking him to make my parents stop fighting, asking for happiness. never happened. so at a very early age I got very disillusioned about God and organized religion and learned to rely on ME. maybe that’s why Buddhism resonated with me at such an early age, in high school. it was about seeing reality as it is and knowing that suffering is self-inflicted.
June 11th, 2008 at 8:20 am
Linda, yeah, our spiritual paths are definitely different, and yet . . . not, in some way.
I wish you much love and healing.
June 11th, 2008 at 8:25 am
gartenfische, you definitely did not sound pathetic.
June 11th, 2008 at 9:10 am
It is always so unfathomable to me that some of the most wonderful, kindest, vibrant people (like you!) I know have had such painful childhoods. You do not sound pathetic at all. I admire your bravery in working through all of the “stuff.”
June 11th, 2008 at 9:36 am
“It is always so unfathomable to me that some of the most wonderful, kindest, vibrant people (like you!) I know have had such painful childhoods.”
yes, it is very amazing, isn’t it? because there was a time where I did not think I would live to see 21.
on the other hand, what happens to people who grow up with all the love and nurturing and support from happy families and everything they could ever possibly want, yet they end up totally screwed up adults?
what is the explanation for that?
June 11th, 2008 at 11:14 am
Oh Yogamum, how lovely you are! I certainly don’t feel wonderful and vibrant and kind. I feel confused!
Linda, interesting point about the screwed up people from happy families. Our current president comes to mind (probably because I was just over at Fran’s reading about him). I have a friend whose daughter is anorexic and she is a wonderful mother–very healthy and supportive, loving, all of it. Even a good family can’t counter all of the effects of a sick society, I guess.
June 11th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
Gartenfische- I was so glad to see that you had posted.
After reading this I had this image of you, a flower that was once so tightly wound in its bud, that it was so painful to unfurl. Would the sun be to strong? Would the wind carry the petals away? Would the dry leave the flower depleted? Would the rain pummel it down?
But no- no the sun, the wind, the dry, the rain did what they did and so the flower stayed and ever so slowly began to open its petals.
Slowly it began to trust the sun and the wind and the elements and it opened. But it hurt after being so tightly bound for so long.
But nature and practice and God are persistent lovers and they never let you down, so the petals still opened a little more at a time.
And now the most glorious flower is there, the pain still there, but hardly at all, the flower is open and rich, fecund, gorgeous with bountiful petals, beautiful and filled with the fragrance of grace.
(Holy cow - I don’t know where that came from. If you hate it you can blame me. If you like it please give all due credit to the Holy Spirit because I sure don’t know where it came from!!!)
June 11th, 2008 at 6:20 pm
Ah Fran. Wow. What words can be thankful enough for this? I treasure these words. I am holding them in my heart.
Thank you, dear friend.
June 15th, 2008 at 8:11 am
Hi Garten:
Yes, some things are beyond words…
July 27th, 2008 at 9:11 pm
Dearest GF,
I miss getting updated feeds for you. Is everything all right? Email me; I’m concerned.
Catherine
October 1st, 2008 at 3:32 am
hey was this your last post? i keep checking back and cant find any new ones???
October 1st, 2008 at 10:57 am
Dear nirvanadiva,
It wasn’t intended to be my last post. I haven’t posted a goodbye post because I didn’t decide to stop blogging. But I have stopped, apparently. The problem is, it ended up taking too much of my time, particularly reading other blogs, which I felt was my responsibility in the give-and-take of the blogging world. So I have been focusing on other writing, particularly poetry.
Thank you for sticking with me; I’m sorry I wasn’t clearer about my intentions, but that was because I wasn’t clear myself. This blog has been such a labor of love that it’s hard to let it go, which is one of the reasons I don’t just say, that’s it, it’s over.
Your comment has made me at least think about all of this again. I need to post a goodbye if I’m planning to stop. I will ponder this whole blog thing, and pray over it, for a few days and just see.
Thank you, and blessings and love to you.
October 14th, 2008 at 12:22 am
thanks for responding. Guess i’ll keep checking back. I just really related to the christian /yoga thing. I have a healthy obsession with both myself. It was refreshing to hear someone elses views .
February 8th, 2009 at 10:38 am
Hi there,
Wanted to wish you a happy new year (a little late!). I see from the comment above you are writing poetry. That’s excellent! Maybe you’ll post some some day.
Best to you,
Painter of Blue