I never realized how much it hurts to have compassion. While I do not claim to have "seen it all", I feel like I have seen enough- directly and indirectly. I am not sure of "why me" in the grand scale of having certain life experiences and survived; let's just say God has given me a high degree of resilience and survival instinct. Over time, however, I have been questioning my own resilience.
Painful experiences can have a way of hardening a person. I think I first noticed this happening to me following when our youngest child was born with a fatal birth defect. I was so concerned about everyone else, and in staying strong for my family, that in the process I became numb. I couldn't grieve, I couldn't cry anymore, and I thought, thank God for getting me through this.
New experiences both good and bad with all sorts of opportunity to experience all ranges of emotion came and went. After time, it dawned on me that there was very little emotion left in me. I was a dead person inside of a living soul. I fervently prayed that God would help me to feel again and bring tears back to me once again.
My prayers were eventually answered, and I remember that moment. I was reading the newspaper, which that days news told of the tragic killings of child hostages by terrorists at a school in Beslan, Russia in 2004. I sobbed in grief, not only my own, but for all those children and their families. It was a turning point and a very different kind of compassion that I had not ever experienced.
It's not that I was not compassionate before this; to the contrary. I was always extremely sensitive and aware of others in their weaknesses, and I was intolerant of unkindness or cruelty. What became different in this instance of compassion was the connection I felt in the actual physical suffering and anguish over these children.
Time has not made it easier. Be careful what you pray for! It is hard for me to describe what happens now. I feel more pain with each new instance of not only difficult events and circumstances in my personal life, but those happening to friends and in the world as well. The pain I feel often comes to the point of anguish. It is humbling for me who was once resilient to anything that came my way. Yet, because I feel so weak, I am forced to see others differently; maybe with more tolerance or patience, and certainly with more compassion. It has helped me to forgive more quickly and fully, because when compassion overwhelms me, I cannot feel anger.
Sometimes I say I am relieved, but why does it feel so bad? Why do I need to feel so much and hurt so much? Thank God, and may He have mercy upon me. Maybe I am beginning to see a tiny glimpse into how He sees us, and if I could just love others in a small way the way he loves us. I am at odds with myself. Part of me wants to run away from the experience of pain, but when I really think about it, I never want to simply survive. I want to live.
