Revealing the Tenderness Within

Conversation is such a great revealer of what's going on within. I catch myself regularly in conversation saying things that are opinionated and judgmental which I could slide right past if I didn't hear myself say them in conversation.

We reveal ourselves regularly when we talk but we usually miss the signals because we're so used to saying what we say, believing what we believe and assuming that how we see it is the way it is. There's a fine line between having opinions about what is going on in the world and believing what we are opining. For instance, I heard recently that right now there are something like 18 veteran suicides in the US every day. That was a jaw dropper for me even though I am aware of  there being 10s of thousands of homeless veterans which kind of blew me away when I first heard it too. I have no objection to suicide per say, as Neale Donald Walsh pointed out in one of his Conversations with God books, most of us are committing suicide in some way or other, it's really just a matter of timing. What captures me is how poorly veterans are treated after serving their country. I have an opinion about that and I feel sad about it. Not that I'm pro war or the military but these are people, often young people, who seem to be treated as disposable commodities.

The fine line for me is in the tendency to judge those who are 'in charge'. I don't know the big picture, I don't have all the information and even if I did, there's so much more going on than I can fathom that it is really not possible for me to judge anyone, including myself. Even with all my opinions the only really sensible response for me is to come to the place of not knowing and allow compassion and understanding to emerge which it inevitably does when I go beyond my opinions and judgments.

An interesting note to this kind of melting away of judgment is how tender I end up feeling. I find myself getting teary eyed just watching news or a commercial or seeing people who are having difficulty of some kind or rejoicing with someone's achievement or victory in a way I do not when I'm hiding behind some kind of judgment or strong opinion. I'm here to tell you, I'd much rather get teary eyed for the flimsiest of reasons than barricade myself in the cold emptiness of criticism and fault finding. I know that place only too well.

Namaste