Part of Me Pours Out of You - Lessons from Japan
Last year, I travelled to Japan during a period of extended and chronic grief after losing three members of my family in a very short time. The shock left me disoriented and the grief eventually left me isolated and empty. I was comforted only by the isolated task of observation.
It is in this seeing role that I found my own voice and a growing awareness that actual “other” exists only in the mind. The moats, the trees, the falling blossoms are no different from the windows and the people that give them context, as each is an inseverable part of the whole. We simply perceive them as separate as they rise and fall within awareness.
Yet the perception of “other” creates an opportunity for deeper understanding. So perceived, nature and people help define one another. It is as if they complete a circle. Each is a point completing and connecting the other points along a continuum of this time and space.
When in in Japan, I felt something that allowed grief to co-exist with joy. My loneliness was abated by the sense of order within a vast space. It gave me a feeling of rightful belonging to something large and indefinable. I had a transformational reorientation of my ideas.
We are often unaware of the light, the sound and the smell of events as they flow through the world. It is through recognition and reconnection that we can honor and claim our place within the larger context of life.
