If, as we are told, life on Earth is a pain factory, a "vale of tears", how can any of us hope to avoid suffering?
We can't. Suffering is built into human life, and nobody escapes their share of it. We've all lost people we love because of death; we've seen friends or family members suffer injuries, illnesses and losses; we've undergone many different types of loss ourselves. Such trials and burdens are normal. It's impossible to imagine a perfect life, marked by no sorrow, in this world - when novels or films try to depict such a life, as in "The Brady Bunch", we know it's completely fake. How could it not be?
What defines us is not the nature of our losses, but how we cope with them.
Do we react with resentment, anger, blame, or self-pity?
Or do we resign ourselves patiently, without complaint, and simply accept suffering as part of our lot?
The Good Householder knows that nobody can be free of suffering, but if he or she has a strong religious faith, that faith can give guidelines as to how to handle it when it comes.
And yet, even those of us with faith will necessarily grieve at the loss of a loved one. It's a natural part of life, yes, and we may know or hope that the person we've lost has gone on to a different kind of life in the world of Spirit, but the pain we feel is still real, still acute.
If we try to deny it, if we attempt to leap from grief to acceptance in one enormous jump, we're trying to bypass our suffering. Such a spiritual bypass can never succeed. We might, for a while, manage to put on a happy face and stuff our feelings back down into our unconscious mind, but inevitably they will fester and grow, only to surface, perhaps much later, in destructive ways.
Therapists know that grieving has five aspects, which often alternate, coming and going in no particular order for perhaps a year or more. If the acute form of grieving lasts longer than two years, then some sort of help is probably indicated; but there is no real relief for the normal course of grieving. Anger, sadness, denial, bargaining and acceptance - all take their turn in the round of stormy emotions that sweep through us on the death of someone we cherish.
Eventually, we hope to reach acceptance, which is not an approval of what has happened, but a bittersweet feeling that means we acknowledge our pain, are thankful for the life of the person we lost, and for what he or she meant to us, yet know that it's time to leave the deepest pain behind as we continue with our lives.
The Jewish tradition of mourning is one of the best I know: members of the family of a newly-deceased person spend a week in deepest mourning, sitting in their homes with darkened windows, visited by friends and other more distant family members who offer them comforting words, prayers, and concrete help in the form of food and drink. Nobody who has just lost someone dear to them should have to cope with the daily necessities of life, in that tradition. That's where the whole community comes in, faith with its sleeves rolled up, ready to work.
After the first seven days, a somewhat less acute form of mourning is sanctioned for thirty days. Grieving people may return to work and to their normal duties, but are not expected to take part in celebrations or festivals, and are excused from participating in many communal activities as they gradually begin to recover from their loss.
Personal mourning continues, of course, even after the thirty days, but at the end of a year the gravestone is set and the family bids a public, final farewell to the person they've lost.
In Catholic countries, public mourning, share sorrow, and the eventual, joyful funeral "wake" helps the bereaved to cope with their loss.
With clear boundaries like this, which everyone knows and respects, grieving is much more manageable. But so many of us in the West have lost our common traditions, and don't know how to handle grief, either in our own case or in relation to others. It's not uncommon for people to actually avoid speaking to a newly-bereaved spouse or child, to even cross the road in order not to have to say hello to them, simply because we no longer have any sense of what to say. And this, of course, isolates the bereaved and causes them even more grief.
People today often fear death because they feel no assurance or hope about what comes after. With no uniting religious traditions, a huge loss like this is almost impossible to cope with. When, in the sixties, society began to jettison all religious paths, all moral constraints, and adopt a hedonistic approach to life, a sense of connection, of community, was lost.
Today, many react to the reality of death like a child afraid of the dark. We deny it in a thousand ways, through plastic surgery and artificially youthful looks, so that we can pretend to ourselves that we are still "only" 40, not 60 or 70; through a myriad vitamin supplements and odd diets to stave off the ageing process, none of which work; through constant mental distraction with entertainment, trivia, intoxicants.
Queen Elizabeth I was so terrified of ageing that, even though she claimed a strong Christian faith, she banned all mirrors from her palaces and wore a thick mask of makeup to try to hide the ravages of time. It sometimes seems as though many today would like to do the same.
Other losses - financial, emotional, physical - affect us less acutely but are nonetheless part of our lives.
A Good Householder lives without the expectation of a smooth ride, an easy journey. Whatever comes, she handles with equanimity and acceptance. If a job is lost, then the family may have to move home, but instead of bewailing their problems, Good Householders simply make the necessary arrangements and set up a new home hundreds of miles away, where work is to be found. This has actually happened to several members of my family and to me and my husband. In no instance did those affected want to leave their home neighbourhoods, but all saw the need, and simply did what had to be done in order to support themselves and their dependents.
There is no particular merit in acting thus, and it used to be the norm. Much mockery was made of the British "stiff upper lip", which was lampooned in films and books, but today the British war slogan - Keep Calm And Carry On - confronts us everywhere in the form of bags, t-shirts and posters. Clearly, while it could be overdone and lead to unhealthy repression, it also embodies a stoicism that people recognize as missing from an often hysterical society.
In the AA Big Book, mention is made of the universal need for acceptance of life on life's terms. Life often gives us unwelcome shocks, but if we know that this is quite normal we will live our lives with a calm acceptance of whatever may come. We may not like it, but what seems like a bitter blow can reveal unexpected gains if we handle it aright.
In the case of my own house move, to a different area where I knew nobody and felt ill at ease, I discovered two new Work students, and to this day am extremely grateful to my Higher Power, whom I choose to call God, for bringing them into my life. My husband, for his part, found good work that enabled him to help many suffering alcoholics, addicts and codependent clients. We both feel that the move was in the end a very good thing.
A Good Householder is not an unemotional, unfeeling robot. She does feel, often deeply, but she knows that sometimes feelings are best left unexpressed, and are certainly not always the right guide to action. She believes, along with Hegel, that "freedom is the recognition of necessity", and that we can't expect any real happiness or satisfaction from life. She does her duty, accepts her responsibilities, without seeking any reward. She knows that life itself is full of difficulties, but she also knows that life is not an end in itself. There is something higher, and that is where she places her trust.
This is the path of dharma, and right thinking people have followed it for thousands of years. Eventually they will reach enlightenment; they are assured of the loving care of God, however they conceive that God, because they live according to their real conscience.
Twelve Step programmes, if diligently followed, help the still suffering alcoholic or addict to reach the stage of the Good Householder.
And that is already at a much higher level than many of us.
No comments:
Post a Comment