Gentleness

Analea McGarey, one of my dear sisters-in-law died on Sunday morning. No matter how one anticipates loosing a loved one, no matter how your know that they may not survive and event, no matter it is a surprise.
I think that is because there is a hole in the universe of your heart. That the way that your heart is arranged shifts. It doesn't mean it will break but everything shifts around. It is like pulling a can out of the bottom of a pyramid and watching everything on top tumble.
It is never the right time. But it is THE time.
Gentleness with yourself is most important. It is what holds us together. It is what patches us up when we feel like we are falling apart. And it is what we need to be with ourselves, gentle, when we are hurt.
Gentleness is most helpful when we are hit by the 'wave' of grief that comes over us. That wave that seems to come out of nowhere and suddenly you are on your face on the ground.
30 years ago I was walking down the hall in Vanderbilt Seminary. Suddenly I was on the floor on my face. I wasn't hurt, there was no one around, I didn't stumble. Odd I thought. I returned to the main library and they stopped me and said that I had an emergency call. It was John calling to tell me my Grandmother Bane had died. That time coincided with my falling. Oh, that's what that was.

Gentleness is what we need for ourselves, but also for others. What if we treated one another always with the gentleness we do of a newborn babe or someone who is about to be born in a new way? What would the world look like? Would we find that we who received gentleness would more readily passed it on? Probably. What if we practiced that gentleness with ourselves and others for the next week would we keep doing int? I imagine so.
Be Gentle with yourselves and others.

God abide
Bobbie Giltz McGarey
@2007