Compassion

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Making things clear

Valid during several weeks: During this time you may be inclined to keep your opinions to yourself and not communicate them to others, even when you should. At the same time you may be more in touch with the hidden sides of your own personality, your unconscious drives and compulsions than at most other times.

The first of these two effects may be undesirable or inappropriate, but the ability to get at hidden areas of your character can be quite useful. The problem here is that you may feel that others will hold anything you say against you. And this may be true, especially if your words are motivated by petty ego concerns. But it is even more likely that what you don’t say will be held against you, so it is very important at this time to say everything that has to be said.

The interpretation above is for your transit selected for today: Mercury in the 12th House 12, activity period from 28 December 2007 until end of February 2008.

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I don’t know what’s wrong today, well yes I do know, I just ain’t gonna write down the details. But since it seems to be important today to make things clear I’d better give it a try. I’ll write down feelings and thoughts instead and perhaps I can come up with some answers. I feel like I lost something that was very important to me, I feel like someone punched me in my stomach, I feel powerless, I feel like I tried everything that I possibly could to help from where I am and yet I’m left with this hurt inside, feeling gutted and having lots of questions in my head.

And because of this I had a freaking headache and weird dreams all night, vivid ones, scary ones. I was trying to survive hanging from one of these propeller driven airplanes and at some point lying on one of the wings trying to hold on to anything I could grab while the plane was looping. All I could see was the pilot’s face and the horizon changing angle all the time. Seconds [or minutes or hours?] later I was trying to save a boat from sinking while a serious gale was going on. I was running around getting people off the boat and saving this little girl’s life. I can’t remember how it all ended, I guess for a reason…

At times I wish one could dose the amount of empathy one could have for a person but I guess it only becomes more and more intense if that particular person means a lot to you. I don’t think you could ever measure empathy, I know for sure *I* can’t. Perhaps I should try to change empathy into sympathy to make my own hurt go away? A while ago my dear friend and Lama told me I should hang on to one of the gifts I was given since birth because it was precious, to me and to others as well: my compassion for my own vulnerability. She told me not to let my wall take over, but try to be me and able to experience pain with someone…

She taught me a valid lesson one of many actually: someone else doesn’t need to change to make us happy, it’s all about their imperfect relationship with the nature of reality. It is either ‘compassion’ or ‘frustration’, starting with understanding your own hidden pains instead of blaming others. So I’m left wondering whether I feel frustrated or whether it is compassion. Oh I understand my own hidden pains all too well and I must admit it’s probably a combination of both and like most things in life the balance of it seems to change every minute, but right now I have been on the compassionate side for quite some time.

And I feel that no matter how much it hurts, this isn’t really about me when I let compassion speak. So perhaps I should just experience the pain for now, just sit in pain for a while, mine and the other person’s pain without moving to hide it, fade it or fix it, until I find that balance again. I’m gonna be silent for a while, so that when I’m needed I can be there in a genuine way instead of a selfish one, or when I’m no longer needed I could let go and move on. Either way, I will gain: when you have the opportunity to pluck and savor the fruits of life that come with a bit of sacrifice then I assure you, they taste sweeter than the sweetest Rambutan!

I have a few more hours to go before it’s midnight but I’ll probably be asleep, so I wish you all a grand New Year and I hope 2008 will bring everything you wish for!

© Rob Stephenson

One Day

I’m sure that one day I will laugh when I’ll read parts of this blog again, one day I will understand and realise why I wasn’t able to see things sooner because I was stuck in the middle and I couldn’t observe from a distance. One day I might be able to forgive but I don’t think I will ever forget. One day I might have learned enough lessons to recognise the red flags in time and run away as fast as I possibly can while I still can. One day I might be able to trust my own judgment and listen to what my gut feeling is telling me…

But today is just today, another day of five in a row so far, last time it was like this, it lasted two weeks where I tasted the bitter fruits of emotional abuse at any possible time of the day, or night, not to mention all those times where I decided not to write about it but keep quiet. I’ve tried to count the remarks and lost track but the words still echo in my head as if they were said a second ago. It seems that the harder I ignore them the more they hurt and I’m sure it’s not just from biting my tongue.

I’m not welcome here and the hints are anything but subtle these days, they’re harsh and cruel. This from someone who told me two days ago when I had a weak moment [one that I still regret], that he understood my tears and frustration so well; I should take time to recover and stay home because I can’t work for a while, I should just accept it… And minutes later the bullying starts again, indirect sneering criticism, threats and insults about anything that is basically me or related to me.

I’m told he’s only joking when I can’t bite my tongue no longer, but I ain’t laughing, au contraire… I just hide my tears when I cry myself to sleep again, trying to find a way out and stay focused which is hard when tears are blurring the view. Trying to understand why there are so many obstructions and what I need to learn from all this. Why my patience is tested once again and I so wish that this ‘One Day’ would be here as soon as possible, so I can laugh, laugh and feel free again.

‘I have heard enough warrior stories of heroic daring.

Tell me how you crumble when you hit the wall,

the place you cannot go beyond by the strength of your own will.

What carries you to the other side of that wall, to the fragile beauty of your own humanness?’

~Oriah Mountain Dreamer

How I miss my tiny garden

Where I used to sit still

With my bare feet on the ground…