Experiencing life...

We never truly know anything until we experience it for ourselves. No matter how hard we try to understand, how lengthy the books we read, courses we take or lectures we hear, the lessons remain incomplete until we touch it, do it, feel it ourselves. In this age of online connectivity I, like everyone else, see the experiences and read the thoughts, accomplishments, joys and sorrows and on and on, of acquaintances, friends and family. Most get a quick like click, some a comment, then there are the shares… you know the ones. Clicking a heart or care emoji seems so inadequate. I try to stop for a moment to hold the person in compassion.

I type as much while thinking of the countless shares I’ve seen of people dealing with various life trials—illnesses or missing a loved one—a parent, or spouse, or god forbid even a child. Pain and sorrow, a hole in the soul that all the words in every language of the world cannot begin to make sense of.

I’ve been fortunate in this life to have lived well into adulthood with both of my parents alive and in good health. I’ve been equally fortunate to live in an era in which it’s possible to talk with them in real time—to see their faces even. It’s all been a mere click away.

Both my parents are still alive and relatively healthy as I type this. Alas it was always mom who knew how to do Skype or texting but since her most recent brain surgery it looks like those days are over. It was her who’d see what I share on social media as well but that, like being able to call, appears to have come to an end. I’m sure that’s why living out my adult life as an expat has felt a bit more distant this past month or so. I’m beyond grateful for the best brothers and sisters-in-law any guy could ask for—for getting to see them a lot more often via zoom so they could keep me in the loop through all of this and them even calling on Facetime when visiting so we can see and talk to my mom in the nursing home. She’s a fighter and has a stubborn streak 10 miles wide so I ain’t about to give up hope yet, but then again…. 

Well, the thing about life is we’ll all reach that point sooner or later—every life on earth will come full circle by and by. We can only hang on to life as we know it till it changes. 

It always changes. 

Thus acceptance and gratitude are key I think. Learn anew to see things as they are and let them go as they go. Be grateful that all of life is right here, right now, in each and every one of us this very moment. Sit and breath and be grateful for this miraculous moment of life. I’m grateful too for modern medicine—for doctors who can literally cut open a person’s skull and stop bleeding in the brain and the patient can come out of it able to recognize loved ones at all, even ones on an iPhone from 5k miles away! And again, my brothers and their wives and all they’ve done and are doing to help mom and dad. Gratitude beyond words with a big side of admiration.

For those who don’t know, my mom’s recovered well enough physically that she’ll likely stay on this side of the daisies for years to come. That said it doesn’t appear she’ll return home, at least not anytime soon, nor be back on FB or be able to navigate an iPad well enough to answer a Skype call, etc. Thus it’s one more life experience that’s helped me understand and able to feel compassion a little deeper for those of you who share of illnesses or, worse yet, of missing a loved one who’s moved on.

All just one more indelible reminder that we’re all in this life game together. Here’s to playing it well—to living it with compassion and kindness when we can—or at least refraining from calling someone an asshole and writing them off forever. Again, when we can. 

Life as a human…. It’s not a very easy thing to do I think.