It’s an awful wrenching experience when we see the faults and mistakes and wrongs of another person. It is meant to be. It’s supposed to be. Likewise, it feels the same way and should even feel worse most of the time, when we se our own. Again, it is meant to be. It’s supposed to be. We should really try to stop running from the “pain and the process”.
Sometimes we can never fully embrace the truth about ourselves until we allow ourselves to feel the full effect of the pain we have caused ourselves, our God, and the fabric of our collective togetherness to all humankind and our society and culture. And we will never do this if all we can think of is running to someone and screaming “hurry up and get this thing out of me”. < Or, as we’ve heard it said before, we will be “forced to repeat the same offense”>. And until we have our cup full of these things we can never taste the full benefit and wonder of the realization of the truth that sets us free and makes us whole and new.
Far too many of us, while we’re being shown the damaging evidence, are so horrified and grieved and lamenting that we spend too much of our hearts ways and emotions complaining about and trying to avoid the awful way it feels, instead of allowing the fullness of the process, and even being grateful for the immense pain and suffering we’re experiencing while being confronted in our soul. Yes it’s real hard to do because of the immense “pain and shame”, but not as hard as our inborn carnal nature has us convinced of. We wrongly assume that to “hurry and get this thing out of me” we will also just as quickly rid ourselves of the pain of the shame and guilt that is supposed to accompany it all. And if we find our selves re-visiting that same place that got us into such pain then it’s usually because of our failure to properly and fully “handle” the whole experience the first time or even any previous time.
It’s much like the person who has a huge wedge of old rotting wood deep in their skin like a huge raw sliver and it hurts bad, it’s bleeding but not profusely, and you know it must be removed. Yet, maybe we are no where’s near a hospital at the time or the correct supplies and all we have is some alcohol some olive oil and some salt. We suddenly seem to know what we must do. We must allow our traveling companion < hey, where’d they come from > to use the oil and the alcohol and the salt to pull out this massive sliver and begin to heal. So then there is and/or should be at some point a gladness and even an eagerness to get the job done, even a joy that’s somehow waiting in line to come up and out of your heart and soul as soon as the job is done. And then there’s no sleeping gas allowed only a topical anesthetic, the promises of the healing and the assurances of your skilled companion. < who is this companion anyway – no, it’s not your husband or your wife or any other human on the same road, and you won’t find it down inside of yourself – it is our Divine Fatherly assigned and imparted guide who knows His stuff > To scream about the process and the pain certainly will not deter the “doctor”, so to speak, but it won’t help us endure and get the full benefit from the pain and process.
Yes, there is meant to be not only help but benefit from the pain and the process and not just something to “deal with” while we wait for it all to be over. We are never told just to simply endure, like the poster of a little wet kitty kat hanging on by it’s claws ‘hang in there baby”, we are told to overcome and be even more than that, more than a conqueror. If not, we may not be able to avoid that “place” where we got impaled by that stick in the first place and it will happen again, and “ouch”, in almost the same spot. Waiting this all out and being “distracted” from our everyday lives by the whole experience forces us to be reflective and think about how we got in this mess in the first place. It is meant to do that. But if we’re too busy clanging about the process and the pain, before, during, and after, we could entirely miss the better benefit. Also read < Matthew ch. 7> We all too often forget about the same pain others are experiencing with their “log” < at the time the splinter is stuck in there it feels like and may as well be a log or a beam> that we have felt with ours.