Christmas Even dinner at Duc’s
Merry Christmas, God!
Christmas is a Wonderous Day . . . in which You break into our Time and Space . . . again and again. Year after year — moment after moment — You keep on offering us another way of seeing. Offering us another Vantage Point. Offering us a way of reversing our Background and Foregrounds.
Our daughter, Suzanne, did that for me this morning. Yesterday I had Back Pain. Oh my goodness, God, I never hurt and so the Shock of Hurting was an added source of Pain. As I write that I feel a wave of gratitude. I’m thankful! But, at the same time I am thinking: There is so MUCH pain in the world — perhaps I am not doing my share of dealing with it?
Next — tiptoeing in after that thought — came the question: How does one deal with pain? Hmm. How indeed? I tend to think of pain, and misfortune in general, as just part of living amidst a Random Universe. Sort of like the rain falling on the just and the unjust — both the icy rain of winter storms and the soft gentle rains of Hawaii.
Still, there is another (deeper?) part of me that wants to assign Reasons and Blame. It is the part that queries: What did I do to bring this on? Thus, it was that Suzy found me this morning, lying in bed playing solitaire and distracting myself from my Inner Inquisitor.
Suzy lovingly suggested that sometimes pain doesn’t come from bearing burdens but in releasing burdens.
What a lovely reframe! Now I can experience the pain as a temporary pain that comes as part of the release of putting down a load — of offloading responsibilities onto Other Shoulders. I felt better almost immediately! Such is the Power of Reframes!
Story teller,
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