Attempts at loving
This is one of our periodic series from people whose writing, life, work, or volunteer efforts explore or illustrate love or forgiveness. In this, the first of four excerpts from author Mark Nepo’s Facing the Lion, Being the Lion, he shares “Attempts at Loving.” Mark is a poet and philosopher who has published many books. He serves as a Program Officer for the Fetzer Institute. To learn more about Mark and his work, please visit, www.MarkNepo.com.
How do I address the wound in you that is me?
Few of us intend to be hurtful, but we often perpetrate pain on others in our insistence and passion for how we believe good needs to be done. The truth is that we are frightfully flawed, and it is only our attempts to keep loving our mistakes into pieces of the path that make any difference.
In this regard, we have these choices about how to live. We can remain blunt and unaware and so replay our suffering on others. Or, if blessed to be thrown into open living, we can be drawn into what we need to learn. In time, this may allow us to face ourselves and others in an effort to own our own trespasses. This is liberating and humbling. Believe it or not, the effort not to tear each other’s wings can heal the world, if we can stand by our core and love each other until we surface our true nature. This is the work of being vulnerable; the word comes from the Latin word vulnus, which means the ability to carry a wound gracefully. It is difficult, but crucial, to be vulnerable.
The Sufis have a notion that experience and devotion will lead to “polishing the heart into a mirror.” This is another name for the transformative education of being vulnerable, which no one can escape, though we can stall or distract ourselves from all that matters. Let me tell you about three ways of being vulnerable.
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