Spending some time alone, especially extended periods of time alone, has made me reflective of the experiences I’ve gone through in life. This might just be my nature, but this reflection is usually on those experiences that were brutal in some way. I’ve begun to notice just how often I respond to situations based on the bad shit that has happened to me. It’s a bittersweet mixture. I’m someone that never regrets the things that have transpired, nor the ways in which they unfolded, because deep within me I know that they had to go down in that way, and that there’s something precious about that pain that was felt.
This has been explained in many different ways, with many different catch phrases.
“Everything happens for a reason”
“Bad things are often blessings in disguise”
“Some day you’ll look back and understood exactly why that painful thing needed to happen”
“What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger”
These are all meant to give us the strength to get through the shitty thing and restore our faith that not all is lost and the light will come to us again. But recently, my mind went somewhere else with this.
I was recently on a long drive in India and passing through field after field. I drove by rice fields and orchards and saw dozens upon dozens of vegetable and fruit stands and it made me think of the earth that all of these jewels came from. The earth has to be disturbed in order to give birth to all of these goodies. If the soil is left untouched, it doesn’t create; it lays dormant, with all of its potential preserved but never catalyzed.
What if that’s what we’re like. Our trials and tribulations are the tilling of our spiritual soil. They release our most fertile goodness and with that, we get the chance to savor the most delicious parts of ourselves and share them with everyone else we come into contact with. I’m still going to be brought to my knees and my heart will bleed, but I’m going to do my best to see my ache as the sowing of my spiritual field and to think of my tears as watering the earth that’s within me so that my beautiful soul seeds can be watered. And I’ll remember that the day for my internal feast will come and how sweet the nectar will be.
Very well written.
Thank you very much!