In defense of the poor of spirit
This is hard and harsh, so feel free to skip it
Dawn-dawn wrote a piece about an emotional bank account the other day and it got me thinking. Especially the part about putting yourself in another's shoes. Seeing things from their point of view. This is a wonderful thought, except for those of us who have been in REALLY bad fitting shoes. Shoes that we were taught are the best that we can hope for, because they are the best that we deserve.
I am one of those people who has attained more than I was taught that I deserved. It is a hard story. A story I have learned not to share, but to move past. Yeah. It is that bad. Worse, actually. You see I was taught all that I know about love by people that hated so much better than they loved. People that learned about real love even later than I did. When it was too late to teach those they were supposed to care for the most. Too late to teach me. People that were taught that they were not worthy of the love most of you take for granted. You can not imagine the messed up things that people define as loving. And, I don't want you to imagine those things. I SO do not want you walking in the shoes I wore... shoes that I still sometimes put on. Some lessons are better not taught. Some lessons are better not learned.
But I learned them.
Some things you cannot unsee.
But I have learned different lessons.
I had a lot of REALLY good teachers.
People that didn't care what I had been taught. People that lived a better version of life and of love.
And it took a lot for me to accept and learn this new version of life and love.
Hell, I still miss a step. Lots of steps.
That's just the way it is.
I had nothing to draw upon. No bank account at all. There was nothing in my account that was worth sharing with another human being.
Oh I knew some of the tricks. How to appear normal... if you didn't look too close. But when push came to shove there was nothing backing my money. No gold in the bank.
So I feel for the poor of spirit. Those who settle for so much less than they are worth, because that is all that they can imagine being worth.
And yes, it is sad.
And no, you can't talk them out of the hole they have dug for themselves.
Talk is cheap. Talk is meaningless.
Pain is real.
You can count on pain. It will never let you down. Pain lets you know where you stand.
It may not be good, but it is dependable.
Always.
And it doesn't kill you.
Sometimes you wish it would, but pain is crafty that way. It counts on you being bigger than it is.
And you are, but pain will never tell you that.
It can't.
Pain keeps you within the nice safe boundaries of your fears. After all, it really IS better the devil you know, right?
When it comes to pain, that is all there is.
Knowing.
Pain is dependable.
It will never let you down.
And pain is something that you can inflict on yourself when there is nobody around who loves you enough to hurt you the way you need to be hurt. Of course, that is because pain is love. It is the only love you can depend upon.
Pain knows you.
Intimately.
It will still be there even after you have been beaten into submission. Long after you realize that there is no getting up off the floor.
That there are only degrees of failure.
Love is not a lie.
Love is pain.
And pain never lies.
Those good feelings - They end.
But the pain goes on and on and on and on.
Pain is forever.
Until you die... you hope.
Oh yeah. Don't forget that the one possible escape is blocked by hell. Let's not forget that.
Pain knows that you don't deserve anything better, even in death.
There is no escape.
Welcome to my world.
The world of the poor of spirit.
The world of one who has been hated by those that were supposed to love and nurture them.
We know who we are.
The flawed few.
The un-forgiven.
The un-redeemable.
But some of us escape.
We aren't sure how, except that we latched on to something that wasn't pain. Sometimes it was just a lesser form of pain.
Sometimes it was just the idea that doing something, ANYthing different was preferable to what we were stuck with by doing the same old thing.
Pain.
The old.
The familiar.
The dependable.
The immortal, because you can ALWAYS count on pain.
You can always count on being hated.
That is just the way life is.
Ask the Dread Pirate Roberts: Life is pain. Anyone who says different is selling something.
This is the world of the poor of spirit. Those of us who never had an emotional bank account. Those of us who were paid with counterfeit money.
And no one can tell you different.
Experience is the bottom line.
And pain is a hard act to follow.
Everything ends, but pain.
Pain will always be there waiting for you.
That is just the way it is.
Time without end.
You really can't argue against pain.
That is a dead end street.
Pain wins.
Period.
But you can argue for other things.
But you have to pick the thing to argue for. The thing that you are going to choose instead of pain.
And you won't get it right the first time, beginner's luck aside.
It takes unrelenting practice.
It takes being able to fail and still not stop trying.
It takes stopping when it gets too hard and then trying again. For a little longer this time.
What it isn't is easy.
And no one can do it for you.
That is what is different.
For pain you can go to someone else.
For everything else there is only you.
And you can't even give what you learn away.
You only really get to experience it yourself.
Everything is like that.
You may or may not be able to hurt someone else, but the pain you feel, well that starts with you. It might not end with you, but you can bet that it is yours to experience first forever.
Other things can be like that too.
Hope.
Charity.
Acceptance.
You might be able to bring these things to others, but the only thing you can count on is that you feel them first. Perhaps only you will feel them.
But each moment of hope is a moment not given over to despair.
Each moment of charity is a moment not given over to poverty.
Each moment of acceptance is a moment not given over to hatred.
Period.
A single pure drop may look like it is lost in a lake of pollution.
But those drops are not pollution.
Those drops count.
But the poor of spirit never get to see the pure lake. They are taught to ignore anything that isn't pain, because we humans are searching for something, ANYthing that lasts. That is what our souls are about.
We seek what we are: the immortal.
And pain feels immortal.
It is the gift that keeps on giving.
But all we really want is for it to stop.
But when it does stop, we are afraid.
It is said that the opposite of love is not hate, but fear.
I have spent most of my life afraid of different things.
I have what I have because of the courage that has been shared with me in the face of a polluted ocean of experience.
And I have so little.
I feel myself on the edge of disaster every single moment of every day.
I don't deny those feelings.
How can I.
They are real.
But I can choose differently.
I choose to hope.
I choose to give.
I choose to accept.
I also choose to believe despite an endless well of experience that says I am unworthy of anything better.
It isn't about deserve,
It is about choosing.
Period.
And I am not particularly good at the choosing part.
But I am practicing.
And I have friends that remind me every day that there are different choices.
But I have to make them.
No one chooses for me.
Now THAT is a leap of faith, because pain know better.
Pain knows it is a choice that will always deliver. No matter what.
This is what the poor of spirit know.
This is what I know.
And maybe that is what faith is about: Choosing differently when you have no reason to trust in anything else.
I don't know.
I once told my mother that if she knew what I was going to do, then it wasn't trust.
It was the only argument I ever won with her.
The only one.
So if you are one of the poor of spirit sitting out there reading this... you aren't alone.
You aren't wrong.
You aren't bad.
You aren't even pitiful.
You just aren't practiced at anything else.
So just once a day, try something different.
Something that isn't pain.
Hell, try something different just once a week.
Try something different just once a month.
Try something different just once.
Just try it.
I promise you nothing, so I can't fail you. Because if I can fail you, I will. I am good at failing. We poor of spirit are like that.
But I will promise you something different.
Dawn-dawn wrote a piece about an emotional bank account the other day and it got me thinking. Especially the part about putting yourself in another's shoes. Seeing things from their point of view. This is a wonderful thought, except for those of us who have been in REALLY bad fitting shoes. Shoes that we were taught are the best that we can hope for, because they are the best that we deserve.
I am one of those people who has attained more than I was taught that I deserved. It is a hard story. A story I have learned not to share, but to move past. Yeah. It is that bad. Worse, actually. You see I was taught all that I know about love by people that hated so much better than they loved. People that learned about real love even later than I did. When it was too late to teach those they were supposed to care for the most. Too late to teach me. People that were taught that they were not worthy of the love most of you take for granted. You can not imagine the messed up things that people define as loving. And, I don't want you to imagine those things. I SO do not want you walking in the shoes I wore... shoes that I still sometimes put on. Some lessons are better not taught. Some lessons are better not learned.
But I learned them.
Some things you cannot unsee.
But I have learned different lessons.
I had a lot of REALLY good teachers.
People that didn't care what I had been taught. People that lived a better version of life and of love.
And it took a lot for me to accept and learn this new version of life and love.
Hell, I still miss a step. Lots of steps.
That's just the way it is.
I had nothing to draw upon. No bank account at all. There was nothing in my account that was worth sharing with another human being.
Oh I knew some of the tricks. How to appear normal... if you didn't look too close. But when push came to shove there was nothing backing my money. No gold in the bank.
So I feel for the poor of spirit. Those who settle for so much less than they are worth, because that is all that they can imagine being worth.
And yes, it is sad.
And no, you can't talk them out of the hole they have dug for themselves.
Talk is cheap. Talk is meaningless.
Pain is real.
You can count on pain. It will never let you down. Pain lets you know where you stand.
It may not be good, but it is dependable.
Always.
And it doesn't kill you.
Sometimes you wish it would, but pain is crafty that way. It counts on you being bigger than it is.
And you are, but pain will never tell you that.
It can't.
Pain keeps you within the nice safe boundaries of your fears. After all, it really IS better the devil you know, right?
When it comes to pain, that is all there is.
Knowing.
Pain is dependable.
It will never let you down.
And pain is something that you can inflict on yourself when there is nobody around who loves you enough to hurt you the way you need to be hurt. Of course, that is because pain is love. It is the only love you can depend upon.
Pain knows you.
Intimately.
It will still be there even after you have been beaten into submission. Long after you realize that there is no getting up off the floor.
That there are only degrees of failure.
Love is not a lie.
Love is pain.
And pain never lies.
Those good feelings - They end.
But the pain goes on and on and on and on.
Pain is forever.
Until you die... you hope.
Oh yeah. Don't forget that the one possible escape is blocked by hell. Let's not forget that.
Pain knows that you don't deserve anything better, even in death.
There is no escape.
Welcome to my world.
The world of the poor of spirit.
The world of one who has been hated by those that were supposed to love and nurture them.
We know who we are.
The flawed few.
The un-forgiven.
The un-redeemable.
But some of us escape.
We aren't sure how, except that we latched on to something that wasn't pain. Sometimes it was just a lesser form of pain.
Sometimes it was just the idea that doing something, ANYthing different was preferable to what we were stuck with by doing the same old thing.
Pain.
The old.
The familiar.
The dependable.
The immortal, because you can ALWAYS count on pain.
You can always count on being hated.
That is just the way life is.
Ask the Dread Pirate Roberts: Life is pain. Anyone who says different is selling something.
This is the world of the poor of spirit. Those of us who never had an emotional bank account. Those of us who were paid with counterfeit money.
And no one can tell you different.
Experience is the bottom line.
And pain is a hard act to follow.
Everything ends, but pain.
Pain will always be there waiting for you.
That is just the way it is.
Time without end.
You really can't argue against pain.
That is a dead end street.
Pain wins.
Period.
But you can argue for other things.
But you have to pick the thing to argue for. The thing that you are going to choose instead of pain.
And you won't get it right the first time, beginner's luck aside.
It takes unrelenting practice.
It takes being able to fail and still not stop trying.
It takes stopping when it gets too hard and then trying again. For a little longer this time.
What it isn't is easy.
And no one can do it for you.
That is what is different.
For pain you can go to someone else.
For everything else there is only you.
And you can't even give what you learn away.
You only really get to experience it yourself.
Everything is like that.
You may or may not be able to hurt someone else, but the pain you feel, well that starts with you. It might not end with you, but you can bet that it is yours to experience first forever.
Other things can be like that too.
Hope.
Charity.
Acceptance.
You might be able to bring these things to others, but the only thing you can count on is that you feel them first. Perhaps only you will feel them.
But each moment of hope is a moment not given over to despair.
Each moment of charity is a moment not given over to poverty.
Each moment of acceptance is a moment not given over to hatred.
Period.
A single pure drop may look like it is lost in a lake of pollution.
But those drops are not pollution.
Those drops count.
But the poor of spirit never get to see the pure lake. They are taught to ignore anything that isn't pain, because we humans are searching for something, ANYthing that lasts. That is what our souls are about.
We seek what we are: the immortal.
And pain feels immortal.
It is the gift that keeps on giving.
But all we really want is for it to stop.
But when it does stop, we are afraid.
It is said that the opposite of love is not hate, but fear.
I have spent most of my life afraid of different things.
I have what I have because of the courage that has been shared with me in the face of a polluted ocean of experience.
And I have so little.
I feel myself on the edge of disaster every single moment of every day.
I don't deny those feelings.
How can I.
They are real.
But I can choose differently.
I choose to hope.
I choose to give.
I choose to accept.
I also choose to believe despite an endless well of experience that says I am unworthy of anything better.
It isn't about deserve,
It is about choosing.
Period.
And I am not particularly good at the choosing part.
But I am practicing.
And I have friends that remind me every day that there are different choices.
But I have to make them.
No one chooses for me.
Now THAT is a leap of faith, because pain know better.
Pain knows it is a choice that will always deliver. No matter what.
This is what the poor of spirit know.
This is what I know.
And maybe that is what faith is about: Choosing differently when you have no reason to trust in anything else.
I don't know.
I once told my mother that if she knew what I was going to do, then it wasn't trust.
It was the only argument I ever won with her.
The only one.
So if you are one of the poor of spirit sitting out there reading this... you aren't alone.
You aren't wrong.
You aren't bad.
You aren't even pitiful.
You just aren't practiced at anything else.
So just once a day, try something different.
Something that isn't pain.
Hell, try something different just once a week.
Try something different just once a month.
Try something different just once.
Just try it.
I promise you nothing, so I can't fail you. Because if I can fail you, I will. I am good at failing. We poor of spirit are like that.
But I will promise you something different.