The Capriciousness of Gratitude

How do I find gratitude in these days of massive confusion. Scurrying, busy-ing, wondering if life will ever be quiet and clear again?

It becomes essential to recognize grief and loss, but to also recognize gratitude for what is occurring, not what could occur if I had my way.

Because there is only God’s will. If I resist this will, I become confused, and my mind becomes violent. The only hope we have is to align ourselves to this will. And it is always good.

So, I write in the quiet of early morning, watching my dog and cat sleep near me.

Always sweet gratitude at night when the animals sleep.

The negative, stressful thoughts fade into nothingness – questioned already, put aside until morning light as the mind slides into acceptance. Sweet, sweet dreams of the past, the future, fantastic possibilities of yet to come.

Or is there a possibility? What is that? What is possibility?

Am I happy? How do I recognize happiness? I remember the sweetness and radiance of waking up in the country house, the smell of winter, the color of the white light of winter, the little blonde baby sleeping soundly in the other room, the sound of his leather work boots in the hall, touching the folds of his flannel shirt, smelling the raked leaves.

A fire is built. A cat jumps on my belly. Each day gallops and catapults one on another in joyous gathering. It is getting better and better.

And I recognized happiness as this feeling of looking forward. There was always something to look forward to. I would look at them and love them so much my heart would burst, and I would look forward.

And I could describe and feel this happiness, this joy, this ecstasy in my body and mind and sing and celebrate.
My life was a chant. I praised God with every breath.
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Who can hold anything when it turns upside down? Who could hold anything when it is thrown backwards at you in spite and venom? How does one stay stable and balanced remembering the smells and beauty and light and joy?

How long does it take for anyone to go bad? How long does it take for anyone to lose trust? To lose hope. To forget the good.

I sit in the new living room. There are no smells. There is only light. Too much light. Bright, caustic light. Outside the hills are brown. They are tan. There is no green. Dogs bark. Bad dogs bark.

He is nowhere to be found. He has left us. He comes back, reeking of gin.

The blonde baby, who is not a baby any longer, frets to and fro, looking for alcohol in the expensive car.

You are making bad choices. You are desperate to be held, desperate to be stroked, petted, told you are loved. You are young, beautiful, vital.

You break your back while sledding. They give you pills you have never taken before. They are good. You take too many of them and want more. It becomes a nightmare, wanting these pills, never getting any, then never getting enough.

You are a goner. You have lost everything.

You struggle up. Slowly, slowly, you try to make a go of it again. You refuse the pills.

Then come the headaches. A new kind of pill comes. You want more. Anything to ease the pain of this terrible life visited on you now. The green gone. The smells gone. The love gone. You throw away the pills and resolve to hurt.

You make bad choices.

He comes along. He promises everything you have not had. Security. Love. Fathering for your daughter.

You move and it becomes hopeful and happy. You become somewhat joyous again. You become clear. Your mind clears. Your business flourishes.

But how long before this turns upside down again?

The trauma. The numbing. He has held his bad parts in abeyance and reveals his malignancy slowly, tortuously. It is too much. Again, you go into denial. It is unbearable. He is a monster, a tyrant.

What he does to you and your daughter is unspeakable.

The betrayal – watching frozen as the innocent mind becomes twisted by a trust gone sour. Guilty people deny, mitigate, minimize.

Innocent people have breakdowns. They blame themselves. They begin a descent into madness and blame of self and minimization which continues into languishing and ugly diminishment. There is no coming back. The strength of the self, the vital consistency of the ego-syntonic personality, is forever gone. One feels the flimsiness of the personality and senses that people who walk by can feel it as well.

There is a wanting to hide. A wanting to acknowledge publicly and flail the chest. See me, “I’m bad! I’m bad!”
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And years later, after hiding and pretending to be okay, building a business, re-inventing everything, brailling through, it becomes evident that all guilt, anger, shame, doubt and distrust are manifestations of unresolved grief, both personal and universal.

The hardening, scarcely noticed, always acted through, so good at flamboyance and pretense, begins to crack.

Thomas Merton’s assertion about prayer flies startingly in the face: “true prayer is learned when prayer becomes impossible, and the heart has turned to stone.”

The dark night of the soul persists. It is always 3:00 a.m. - day and night, it is always 3:00 a.m.

Realizing the spiritual journey is again here/ now; nowhere to run or hide, a time to recalibrate, journey within, investigate everything- the warp and woof of even emptiness itself- then, then, the work begins. Then some opening is made into the chasm of confusion and chaos.

Hearing deeper and deeper and deeper my teacher telling me to love myself. Hearing truer and truer the words of the Buddha: “You can look the whole world over and never find anyone more deserving of love than yourself.”

And the true work begins. The reason I came into this difficult incarnation. The true work begins.

It begins with gratitude….

Love, Gopita