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'The Grace of Solitude'
Overlook, Back River, Georgetown Island, ME
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Anthony De Mello -
Six months ago, I was in St. Louis, Missouri, giving a workshop. There was a priest there who came to see me. He said, "You know, I accept every single word you've said over these three days, every single word of it. And you know why? Not because I've done what you encouraged us to do -... No, about three months ago I assisted an AIDS victim on his deathbed. And the man told me the following. He said, 'Father, six months ago the doctor told me I had six months to live.'" The man was dying, see.
"'He said I had exactly six months to live, and I believed him. And you know something, Father? These have been the six happiest months of my whole misspent life. Happiest. In fact, I've never been happy till these six months. I discovered happiness.' He said, 'As soon as the doctor told me that, I dropped tension, pressure, anxiety, hope, and fell, not into despair, but into happiness at last.' "And the priest said, 'You know, many is the time I've been reflecting on the words of that man. When I heard you this weekend, I thought, The guy's come alive again. You're saying exactly what he said.'" Here's a guy who had it. Here was a man who found it.
*Rediscovering Life.
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De Mello relates the experience of the AIDS patient, not to happiness as pleasure, but the deep sense of contentment. This is the untouchable joy Easterners refer to as "bliss." This is what we call "bliss" or "joy."
Contentment is part of the flavor of bliss, so bliss is contentment. De Mello likens the patient's new life to a scripture in the Christian Bible. Philippians 4.10-13 (PHILLIPS) is the writer's response to the Philippian church's generosity in supporting him materially -
It has been a great joy to me that after all this time you have shown such interest in my welfare. I don't mean that you had forgotten me, but up till now you had no opportunity of expressing your concern. Nor do I mean that I have been in actual need, for I have learned to be content, whatever the circumstances may be. I know now how to live when things are difficult and I know how to live when things are prosperous. In general and in particular I have learned the secret of facing either poverty or plenty. I am ready for anything through the strength of the one who lives within me.
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The patient encountered the quiet, gentle, and contented bliss that had been there all along, lurking below the surface of his sleepiness. Bliss is about the dropping off of that keeping us asleep to truth. This is a resurrection, a new life. In his case, realizing - not just in abstract - nothing in this world, including the patient, lasts became an opening to this joy.
Now, we may think for this joy to arise, what we call "bad" must drop away. The good drops away, too. "Good" is still present, as is "bad," only you are not clinging to it. Clinging to good and clinging to bad is clinging. So, grasping is that tight grip that leads to suffering.
You can experiment with this by holding tightly to anything. Notice how the entire body tenses, even if what one clings to is small. One can feel the opposite, the release, by letting go of holding tightly to the object and letting the hand simply hold it. Hence, hand and it are present, but no clinging.
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A step from the body-emotion suffering is to embrace "good" and "bad" apart from differentiating them as opposites. Daily, I am in pain from mild to severe. The Way has taught me to feel the pain as pain, not as "good" or "bad." This integration helps release attachment to the pain. Pain is not bad, nor is it good. Pain is pain.
One could ask, "Do you ever cling to the pain as 'bad'?" What do we do when we realize we are clinging to anything? Clinging is a reminder. The suffering it brings is a reminder. Seeing it, we invite release, like opening the hands. We feel the constriction when we cling. We feel the freedom when we let go.
We can even cling to letting go - clinging to not-clinging. Letting go becomes an obsession. In time, with a conscious letting go, letting go becomes more spontaneous. It becomes part of the flow - clinging, letting go, clinging, letting go ... This, while we grow toward equanimity as our norm and attachment as the exception.
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Being joyful while the pain is present does not mean the pain is pleasing. Here, we see the difference between happiness, as commonly understood in the sense of "pleasant" or "fun," and bliss. I can know joy during the pain, yet pain is not pleasing, and, certainly, it is not fun. Yet, the need is for me to drop any opposition to the pain, as such resistance is a form of clinging to the pain as suffering, rather than being in communion with the pain.
In intimacy with what we see to be "good" or "bad," we find release from its power over us. Hence, we can be with it. In being with, rather than against, we find release from the life defined by our attachments. We discover joy amidst the very things we once clung to, and we find ourselves closer to and more appreciative of things. Hence, in the release, we enjoy a new life. We discover by not clinging, we do not lose anything.
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In clinging, we do not enjoy things. We cannot be content with plenty or little. In clinging - an expression of possessiveness -, oddly, hugging something closely, tightly, we push it away. How can we enjoy something when we push it away? So, pushing the pleasant away creates suffering, even as pushing the unpleasant away does the same. So, the closer we pull something in, the farther it is from us. While we affirm our possession of anything or anyone, the more it recedes.
Hence, we become discontent, having pushed even good from us. Yet, if it could all - "good" and "bad" - return to us, we would enjoy joy.
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So, the patient spoke of letting go of various things, among them "hope." Now, who would see hope as bad? Yet, for the patient to live joyfully meant living joyfully now. For him, hope would direct him to a future, possibly a hope-so feeling. In its common understanding, hope projects us mentally into a fantasy - that fantasy is the future.
We need to be fully here, and we need to fill up this one moment. That is where the patient discovered joy. That is where we live in joy, also.
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*(C) Brian K. Wilcox, 2021
*Brian's book, An Ache for Union: Poems on Oneness with God through Love, can be ordered through major online booksellers or the publisher AuthorHouse. The book is a collection of poems based on mystical traditions, especially Christian and Sufi, with extensive notes on the teachings and imagery in the poetry.
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