Poignancy – The Revelation of the Real

This moment feels like most of the others. I am just driving home, aware of many “happenings,” but not all that connected emotionally to the stuff going on around me. And then pops into my head, a story I recently heard:

Late one night, a pregnant mother’s water breaks and her contractions begin to come announcing the imminent arrival of her second child. She wakes her husband and let’s him know that “it is time.” As he begins to pack the bags for the hospital, she heads up stairs to her three-year old daughter’s room. She opens the door quietly, climbs into bed with her sleeping child and begins to sob. This is the night everything changes.

I cry every time I think of this story.

I am not a mother, nor has this kind of thing happened to me (yet). But I can feel it, and it feels poignant. I feel pain and truth and love all at once. I become instantly intimate with the truth of the present moment, like the floodgates of feeling are wide open and are teaching me about the power of now and that “forever” feeling of intimacy. And simultaneously, there is grief. It’s like a messenger from the Mystery pulling me toward my own longing, and simultaneously preparing me for the truth of impermanence.

Because this story was shared with me — because someone was courageous and revealed their authentic and vulnerable feelings from this most intimate of experiences — I have begun to cherish this phase of my life with my son even more. And for that, I am filled with gratitude.

Did I not know that these early years are precious? Have I not been told a thousand times by as many nostalgic parents? — “Enjoy it. It goes by soooo fast!” Of course I have, and these reminders have been very helpful in bringing me back to the present moment. But a story is different. After feeling this mother’s moment of extreme vulnerability, the poignancy of my time with Kai is now just a heartbreak away.

There is something inexplicably powerful in the sharing of our vulnerability. When we contact and reveal the moments that are most real — and most raw — with each other, this moment opens up. And when it does, the real in each of us becomes revealed.

It is like vulnerability is the crack through which we enter the profound and the sacred. Where everyday moments are revealed to actually be the Mystery dancing in front of us, cloaked as my son or your daughter. When we fully grieve the inevitable passing of time — then end of a chapter, the disappearance of their cutest phrases, and the seeming loss of their innocence and purity — I believe we continue to find new delights on every step of the journey. I think — maybe — it is our inability to grieve, to thoroughly mourn that which we love and miss, that closes the door to the next revelation. It is our defendedness that keeps us from seeing with the fresh eyes that which only a good cry can provide.

“There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are messengers of overwhelming grief… and of unspeakable love.” — Washington Irving

So find out what you love right now. Make it explicit. And tell people about that love. Find the tenderness within you and don’t cover it up with nervous laughter or platitudes. Find that crack of vulnerability and learn to cherish it. It is not a pain to avoid; it is your essence calling you home.

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