Last Week I Went To Spend ...

Last week I went to spend time with my good friend who lost her baby 3 months ago. It was an awful miscarriage, which she's still healing from the emotional and physical wounds. It took a while for her to allow me in. Maybe she was afraid that I was just being kind out of obligation. Later she admitted "I'm sorry, I don't know how to be friended. You know, you are one of the only friends who's tried to visit or call. I've gotten use to dealing with my pain alone"

This really made me think about pain and suffering. We've been friends for 25 years. We've been there for each other for every milestone in life - birthdays, graduations, when she met her husband, her wedding. We are so open to sharing in each other's joys, but shouldn't we also share in each other's pain? This is when we need each other's love the most, yet so many of us go inward. And on the other hand, our general society is scared of suffering. We numb it. We don't want to feel it. We haven't seen or experienced real pain to understand what we would need. So when someone we love needs our support, we don't even know how to give it.

One of my biggest lessons I learned from my trip in India is through the highs and lows in life, what we need is each other. What we need is to just be with each other. No agenda - no expectations - without trying to "fix" anything. Just be. I am so grateful that I learned those lessons, so that I could just be with my friend.