Death of a parent is the most unique, tragic lived experience we are subjected to, as Jordan Peterson says. The grief that seeps deep into our soul stains us forever, burns us forever. We all take life for granted, those who live for us for granted. The thought that I will no longer see, hear the person I have known since birth flits across my conscious mind, refusing to stay long because it seems quite unreal. It has not really been understood by my mind though I know the facts and I have acted accordingly for all practical purposes. There just doesn't seem to be a way out of the pain, guilt trips I take constantly or the horror of the reality I have not yet found the courage to face.
'Caught in a strange land in a net with other butterflies, I'm a caterpillar yet undecided to remain a caterpillar and perish or turn into a beautiful butterfly and live a life full of joy.' Readers don't laugh. But I came up with this one night recently when I was travelling in a train. I tossed and turned, not being able to sleep, upset over unexplainable things and frustrated over events not in my control. Then it occurred to me that our life and its usefulness depends on our decisions -- whether to remain a crawling caterpillar whose existence otherwise is either ignored by all and sundry or who is cursed for just being there and thrown out with a stick, or to develop wings of life and metamorphose into a beautiful butterfly whom everybody adores for its beauty and colour, for its flitting liveliness, for its service to the flower's pollination... I thought that I should be a butterfly, of service to others, but then again I thought, anyway, who really cares?
Indeed death of a parent is an unknow the mind which exists only by the known struggles to reconcile with. Nevertheless, in not trying to escape from the fact, in staying with and looking at the structure of the whole movement of the mind through grief, guilt, fear, one may find true understanding of death as integral part of life and find freedom from all the disorders.
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