I feel drawn to deep stillness. Some days it is hard to find it because of my racing thoughts, but I find myself dedicating more time each day to be with this stillness. Right now when I spend time in stillness, it brings me to a deep level of grief, pain, depression and suffering.

Yesterday, I felt the fullness of my suffering and it weighed heavy on my heart all day. These feelings aren’t completely connected to my own story anymore. It is about the story of my parents and ancestors. I too carry all their suffering in every cell of my body. Not only do I feel this ancestral pain, I also feel the suffering of the world as well. It is because I have had the great gift of empathy my whole life and I feel the energy of others in their grief, pain and joy. I took on the energy of my students when I was teaching in the inner city and it still resides in my core. Unfortunately, I have never really learned how to manage this empathy up to this point. However, I would never give up this gift of empathy, but I am trying to learn not to let it overwhelm me.

Today,

my empathy and my suffering bring me great compassion and understanding for myself and for others. What I am able to do today is to hold myself with great kindness and gentleness as I feel the grief, pain, depression and suffering of others as well as myself. I have learned to hold myself with more and more gentleness and kindness and I have embraced (with joy) the gifts of compassion and understanding. My life has become fuller and happier because I am finding a greater sense of freedom and peace. Furthermore, I am living my most authentic self and that has brought me a sense of renewed vitality. This is what I strive for in my stillness.

I feel a depth of gratitude for the lessons I continue to learn about holding grief, suffering, pain and depression because I know that I am living so fully alive. I am experiencing the depth of the human experience. I am making a good life within the suffering. I am also embracing and touching into the collective compassion in the world by living with my heart wide open and experiencing life and its vulnerabilities, gifts and challenges. Right now, my heart is weeping because I never thought I would feel so alive while living with physical and mental illness.