When we learn to see our illness as a companion or friend, it really does change the way the illness is present. The illness changes from a horrible intruder to a companion who has something to teach us. When we see what we have to learn from an illness, then often the illness can gather itself and begin to depart. A friend of mine has been through an awful illness in the past three years. It was a strange viral illness. He lost his walk and his sight for a period. I was overwhelmed by the gentleness with which he was able to meet this hostile destroyer. Of course, he focused his mind firmly on the horizon of healing and tried to shelter in the luminosity of his soul. He did not constantly quarrel with the illness or turn it into an unworthy enemy. Sometimes, when you see a thing as the enemy, you only reinforce its presence and power over you. He befriended his illness; he travelled with it, remaining very mindful and holding on as far as he could to the shelter of blessing. Well, the illness took him on an amazing journey over mountains that he could never have anticipated. He has returned now and has entered health again. But he is a changed person. He has learned so much. His soul now enjoys a quiet depth; his gentleness has grown. His presence enriches you when you meet him.
When different places within us are in pain, we should extend the care of deep friendship towards them. We should not leave them isolated under siege in pain. A friend of mine went to the hospital to have a hysterectomy. A priest friend came to visit her on the evening before her operation. She was anxious and vulnerable. He sat down, and they began to talk. He suggested to her that she have a conversation with her womb. To talk to her womb as a friend. She could thank her womb for making her a mother. To thank it for all her different children who had begun there. The body, mind, and Spirit of each child had been tenderly formed in that kind darkness. She could remember the different times in her life when she was acutely aware of her own presence, power, and vulnerability as a mother. To thank her womb for the gifts and the difficulties. To explain to it how it had become ill and having it removed was necessary to her continuing life as a mother. She was to undertake this intimate ritual of leave-taking before the surgeons came in the morning to take her womb away. She did this ritual with tenderness and warmth. The operation was a great success. Her conversation with her womb changed the whole experience. The power was not with the doctors or the hospital. The experience did not have the clinical, short-circuit edge of so much mechanical and anonymous hospital efficiency. The experience became totally her own, the leave-taking of her own womb. When a part of your body is ill, it must be a lonely experience for it. If we integrate its experience and embrace it in the circle of recognition and care, it alters the presence of the illness and pain. Externally, we should endeavour to remain alert to others and their distress at our condition. How often do we see sick people comfort their comforters?
The dark visitation of illness needs to be carefully encountered, otherwise the illness can become a permanent tenant. A friend of mine was involved in a terrible car accident and was seriously injured. One of her legs was badly damaged. She told me of being in hospital and thinking how her body and her life were terminally damaged. The darkness of this realization gripped her totally. She spent days locked into the prospect of her bleak future. She became addicted to the wounding of her body. She felt that she would never again be able to shake herself free of this burden. Then one day, it hit her, almost like a ray of light through a dark sky, that this was the wound that would make her a life prisoner. When she began to see the power it was assuming, she realized with desperation that she could not permit it permanent tenancy. So she began to distance herself from the wound. Gradually, over a period, she regained her confidence and poise and came back to healing.
There is perhaps a moment in every life that something dark comes along. If we are not very careful to recognize its life-damaging potential before it grips us, it can hold us for the rest of our lives. We can become addicted to that wound and use it forever as an identity card. We can turn that wound into sorrow and forsakenness, a prison of crippled identity. It is difficult to be objective and gracious about your wounds, because they can hurt and weep for years. Yet wounds are not sent to make us small and frightened; they are sent to open us up and to help graciousness, compassion, and beauty root within us. Wounds offer us unique gifts, but they demand a severe apprenticeship before the door of blessing opens.
