Hydrogen and Oxygen

     Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pains. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”  ― C.S. Lewis   



    One of the ways I sense when the Lord is trying to teach me something is that I tend to recognize a theme. A theme in conversations or books or podcasts anything that crosses my path. I have started to recognize these as whispers from the spirit and I try to lean  into them and listen.  I have come across a lot of struggle themes lately. But with a twist.
       I have started to recognize - and maybe I'm the last one - that for the most part we all  attempt  to flee from struggle or pain  of any kind. This is after all nature - it's how we are born. Even as a baby we feel discomfort and cry until the discomfort is gone. We feel the discomforts of hunger and eat to remove it. The discomfort of heat and jump in the pool to remove it. these examples seem obvious but what about deeper discomforts?  
    What about the sadness that we have been hurt by a friend? What about the anxiety over finances? The fear of a health scare? What is our first reaction? Well personally - it's to make it stop. Go to the friend and hope for an apology - get another job to lessen the financial strain  get to the doctor as soon as possible to start FIXING me.

    Anyone who knows me knows I exercise . I love it because it makes me a better person,  a better mom and Im the rare person who LOVES to sweat. One concept I have recently accepted in yoga, (no I'm not praying to the universe or any of the other yoga misconceptions... I'm stretching sweating and hurting) is to allow myself to feel the burn of my muscles - let the pain be there, maybe even enjoy it. What if we take a new approach? What if our goal is not to FIX it ... At least right away. What if we switch our mindset and allow ourselves to lean into the struggle so as not to miss the purpose of it in our lives.   
        I was sitting on the beach a few weeks ago with a dear friend who first introduced this concept to me . We were discussing the discouragement a mutual friend was feeling in her life and the "fixer" in me wanted to help. My motives were pure and out of love but my wise friend suggested " why don't we let her lean into it... Allow her to work through it in her own time lets not rob her of the lesson here by removing her from the struggle quite yet". wow. Why was this such a novel idea to me? Don't run from the pain and struggle?
      I read an article this week ( again. .. I'm telling you the spirit is laying this theme everywhere lately ... Kind of nervous ) where the author describes pain and happiness as a combo deal. He says you can not drink water and ask for only the hydrogen skipping the oxygen ... Or only the oxygen and pass on the hydrogen. No they are a combo deal . Maybe the same goes with life here on earth . Pain and happiness are a combo deal. In order to relish in one you need to lean into the other .
     I'm so glad our sweet Lord didn't run from the pain. Was it a temptation? Even for Him? Yes it was but He took the pain of the WORLD on His shoulders leaned into it and WE came out forever changed by HIS pain.   
     Our sweet Jesus has Lesson for us in the pain. The amazing thing is we have hope. Hope  that not only will HE walk through our pain and struggle with us but hope that we will not emerge from the pain unchanged by Him if we allow it.  And I'd venture to say we then will experience the freedom and joy HE offers us even deeper than before.