“Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.” ~ Khalil Gibran

I took this picture when I was running while on vacation in North Carolina OBX. I saw this in the distance and then stopped when I got closer to ~ what I perceived as a “shackled shrub.” I felt sad and almost felt as if I couldn’t breath looking at what these webworms did to this shrub. It inspired this post. 

“The pain–body is a term that Eckhart Tolle used in one of his books. It is an accumulation of painful life experience that was not fully faced and accepted in the moment it arose. It leaves behind an energy form of emotional pain. It comes together with other energy forms from other instances, and so after some years you have a “pain-body,” an energy entity consisting of old emotion.”

I prefer to not connect through pain ~ Our stories can be pain filled, sometimes our days are “endured, lived and spoken”  from our painful memories. But there has to be a point where you stop and listen to yourself and reevaluate what you are saying and how you are moving through your day. That is of course if you desire to Stop and Listen to yourself. 

My life’s direction is about seeing, viewing, revealing, connecting to, understanding and being in overall awareness of these painful experiences. Then through conscious awareness I learn to listen, discern and decide what wants to be spoken about and what is being talked about through habitual repetition.

I am NOT saying that pain doesn’t exist or that speaking about or delving into our painful past isn’t valuable and important. What I am saying is that there comes a time when we might want to start using the pain and those painful experiences as a way to move forward in life with awareness and empowerment.

Pain is a part of living. And pain is subjective.

I can never know what you are going through unless you reveal your innermost thoughts to me. I want to know them. I desire to see you and to also be seen. I want to hear about your life and what makes you who you are. This is a very important part of my way of relating.

And then ~ Let’s dance and laugh and be in our present moment experiences together.

So when is enough ~ enough?  This is a question I have been asking myself for quite some time. Mainly because I love to dive deep and long into what makes each of us tick! And then I want to move on.

Can we move on together or will we be encased by the disconnect that the pain body creates?  We must be able to bring some semblance of consciousness to our unconscious actions. That is what brings us forward in our understanding of self and present in our current relationships.  However, if we are not in awareness of our unconscious actions then we are unable to bring ourselves forward in the present moment. I see this as paradoxical!

If someone is stuck inside an old pattern or behavior than how can they see their own stuckness? Interesting!

The way I have been able to view myself is when loved ones in my life have the courage and willingness to share with me what I am unable to see within myself. This is not an easy thing to do or to be on the other end of. However, for me it is a way to be able to see those parts of myself that I am not in contact with because of my own pain body experiences. This is intimacy and transparency and it also takes self dedication and self direction to be able to share in this way.

I say self-dedication because the person that is bringing that information forward would need to be able to say it in a way that does not cause a defended response. Then also be able to stay present with whatever might be rising inside the person they are speaking to. All of this takes a deep level of desire and understanding and compassion from each person. The person receiving must have a deep sense of self and desire to hear and with a willingness to stay connected and present with all that might rise in this experience. Relationship at its best.

As with the webworm who are feeding and resting and then eventually the outter casing will blow in the wind or be destroyed by the snow, rain and cold of the next season. It is not permanent. It is a collaborative relationship for the shrub and the webworm for the growth and regeneration. We are the same as nature except nature does it in its own way without all the drama and words and feelings that go along with us as humans. In nature things just seem to be. The cycles of life seem ~ well ~ more natural!

What seems like destruction is actually nourishment to one part of that system. The leaves are sustaining the webworm. The webworm is growing and being nourished. Everything has a season. 

 Flowering, flourishing, nourishing, nourishment, dormant, stagnant… Begin Again!

“There is no end. There is no beginning. There is only the passion of life.” ~ Federico Fellini