This is the True Ride

 Rose seeds are coated with hard shells, the encapsulating husk is designed to keep the seed dormant, asleep. It nestles there in safety, awaiting the predetermined conditions for breaking dormancy, which have been left, encoded there, in the secret language of chemistry, a gift to the new generation, the experience story of ancient generations, who succeeded in sprouting before.  When those conditions are met, the husk of the shell splits, the plant to be, struggles, it must struggle, there is no other way, it suffers that struggle, to free itself from the prison of it's seed-like state. If it does not make this struggle, if it does not endure this suffering, it will surely die. The seed that once begins to sprout, can never return to being a seed again, it must grow, or die. If it endures this suffering, if it pushes through, it shakes off its seed-like coating and sprouts, puts out roots, develops leaves. It becomes a new being, that of a rose. Once it is a rose, it does not regret leaving the seed husk behind.

 When my mother died after a very long illness, at first I felt nothing, only numbness. I returned from the funeral in New England, where the family had gathered like a warm blanket to comfort and to connect at some deep level of awareness. When I went into  church the following Sunday, one of the women said that she knew exactly how I was feeling, as she had lost her mother a year before. She said, "I guarantee that within a year, you will be finished with your grieving." I was annoyed and muttered something about mourning taking its own time. 
I suppose this woman was, as we often do, struggling for words and coming up short. It's been almost three years and once in a while I run through that old conversation with myself ... what if we had had one more conversation ... could we have redeemed our rocky relationship. At first, I felt anxiety every time this thought came. Now, I embrace that thought ... we don't know .... wishing can't change anything that is no longer possible ... and as it flows through me, like a feathery breeze, I lean into it, and watch it move through and pass along. Everything changes.

 "Grieving our losses fully, without being betrayed by them" means to me to grieve deeply and fully while having and moving into the realization that nothing is permanent, everything that comes into form goes out of form, and to accept that reality.  All that is, animate and inanimate, loved ones, friends, pets, treasured things and our own self, is in form for a while.  I think we are betrayed by ourselves, not by them, by our not accepting the impermanence, clinging to what is in form, staying stuck in our grieving and not going on in our becoming.  Life goes on, as the saying says, and we betray ourselves by not going on.  Life's exquisitely precise compassion means to me that everyone who was dear and significant to me, along with every one and every thing that was, continues to be with me, no longer in form but in spirit, and are as dear and significant to me as when in form.  We develop the strength to stop making deals for a safe passage by, as the author says, waking up and growing up, learning to accept life on its terms, which will I believe help us with our passage and help us accept our our passage.

 Being human and 89 years old, I have gone through painful losses of friends, brothers, sisters, parents, in-laws, brother-in-laws and sister-in-laws, nephews and nieces, wife and a few highly evolved human beings. I do not need to convince anyone how much pain is created in our heart by such big losses. I have grieved, endured and accepted their immortality. I am also sensing the shadow of the inevitable life- taker death. I feel sad knowing very well that I will depart from my beloved families and friends and will cause pain in their hearts. When such thoughts come to my mind, I mindfully process them and let them go on their own. Living each day this way, makes me appreciate every act of kindness and love that others do for me and what comes out from my heart. I see  glimpses of light and experience  the fullness of living lovingly. I feel bliss, deep contentment and deep sense of gratitude. Loving, serving being kind and laughing and dancing  effortlessly with others and even by myself with none with  me or around me is very uplifting.

I am getting a little wiser as I am growing realizing the transitory nature of all living beings, Recognizing, accepting and letting go of losses liberates me from my self-created human suffering and lets me relate to  life fully as it is unfolding.

With love and gratitude,

Jagdish P Dave