When a mother who has lost her child breaks down and weeps beside me I am able to feel her pain with the same intensity because I know first hand what it feels like.If I let the acceptance of Death as a universal truth and tthat there is no need to feel pain in it , grow it’s deep roots in me , I will not be able to take the grief of another mother to heart or console her as she needs to be.

Pain is only when ‘I’ am. It’s only because I still hurt that I am able to empathise equally with the pain of another mother . Because we are social beings we are bound together by links of interdependences. Even my child is not in pain, even if another child is, this is why I will feel it just as keenly . This is just what stirs me to make social interventions. If everyone becomes indifferent accepting births and deaths s universal facts of Life ,society will lose its dynamism and come to a standstill.

If you desire to live as a link in the chain of being that sees itself as a unity, you need to first be able to understand the Pain of another even as you yourself suffer. 

When you feel the pain of the other as your own, you will start seeking salve for them the same way you do when you yourself suffer.

When you feel the pain of the  other as your own, you will start seeking salve for them the same way you do when you yourself suffer.

From ‘my ‘sorrow,’ somebody’s’ sorrow the sense of connectedness  grows into the understanding that it’s ‘our’ sorrow. 

When we reduce the distance between our desires and our reality, the depth of pain decreases as well. Along with this, if we are able to understand the Pain of another as one’s own and seek to solve them, a fine human society will take shape.

We tend to forget the fact that in the wide canvas of this cosmos, this world, all myriad beings in it , man is merely one small entity. This is the cause of spiritual agony. 

The same person who feels sorrowful when a bird packs at a termite feels happy when they see her feed it to her hungry little fledglings .

The flourishing mango blossoms and the ones that wilt and fall are all part of the cosmic truth.

Humankind, my country my siblings, my family, my home, my children, Me… As our canvas shrinks and shrinks , the possibilities of Pain multiply.

The remembrance that the human being is only one amongst the multitudes of life forms on Earth and that we are subject to the complex cycles and secrets of Nature as all other beings are and it’s acceptance, reduces our spiritual suffering.

When some other things or smells or sights or people arrive or come together we experience and share feelings of joy and happiness.

Falling, Wilting, Withering, Death… All these are Nature’s decisions. If we are able to stand aside a little and  watch it’s currents within us like that of a flowing river, then this sort of pain gradually ceases. We need to grow a mind that’s like a blade of grass -ready to be crushed at any given moment.

When some other things or smells or sights or people arrive or come together we experience and share  feelings of joy and happiness.

Whereas,I feel, pain is something we just cannot divide into pieces and share.

Yet … when we are hurting terribly… like someone’s tight grasp; like the way we lean on a loved one’s  shoulder; like his strong armed embrace ; like the desire for a soothing caress… It’s possible.

 It’s definitely possible  to participate in Pain.