I was recently introduced to a woman whose husband died of liver cancer at age 57, leaving her with four teen/college-aged children. A number of years had passed since his death, yet grief still wracked her on a daily basis.
She finally asked to see her spiritual teacher, one who is in such demand that private audiences are rare. To her surprise, he granted her a one hour interview. Her long-winded rush of emotional verbiage taxed my patience but finally, finally, she got to a point that fascinated and enlightened me.
Said teacher told her, "Your husband is a memory and he was even a memory when he was alive and with you."
In the sense that every perception of another is filtered through our own story of who we are and who we think they are, the whole relationship is a fictional play of ideas with a sprinkling of physical evidence.
In contemplating the deep meaning behind the guru's words, some bit of comfort siphoned off in my direction. It makes my own husband seem less absent and more alive in my mind - where he always lived in the first place.
She finally asked to see her spiritual teacher, one who is in such demand that private audiences are rare. To her surprise, he granted her a one hour interview. Her long-winded rush of emotional verbiage taxed my patience but finally, finally, she got to a point that fascinated and enlightened me.
Said teacher told her, "Your husband is a memory and he was even a memory when he was alive and with you."
In the sense that every perception of another is filtered through our own story of who we are and who we think they are, the whole relationship is a fictional play of ideas with a sprinkling of physical evidence.
In contemplating the deep meaning behind the guru's words, some bit of comfort siphoned off in my direction. It makes my own husband seem less absent and more alive in my mind - where he always lived in the first place.
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