Seeing the Wholeness of Life

 Family life is, in truth, a mixture of joy and sorrow, highs and lows. Yet before I began learning, I had no capacity to see this reality. I wanted only the “good” and rejected the “bad.” In doing so, I created much unnecessary pain, conflict, and inner contradiction for myself.

 

When I began to learn, I slowly discovered that everything carries both light and shadow. What we call “good” is not always truly good, and what we label “bad” is not necessarily bad. Life simply is as it is. There is joy and separation in human relationships; there are phases of fullness and emptiness in the moon; the earth moves through its seasons—spring, summer, autumn, and winter.

 

Yet in the past, I insisted on only the pleasant parts—only the rise, never the fall. I could not move with the rhythm of life, the pulse of the universe. I lived inside my mind, inside my desires. Whenever something did not go my way, I blamed those around me for my suffering, and in doing so, I created even more pain and conflict.

 

Now I can see that everything was whole from the beginning. The ups and downs of life, the waxing and waning, the brightness and the shadows—none of it is lacking. All of it belongs. Flow and change are natural laws. Because I once clung stubbornly to my own preferences—grasping what I wanted and rejecting what I did not—I generated much suffering. But when I began to see that relationships naturally rise and fall, that life naturally includes challenges, just like the seasons, I became able to say yes to what appears.

 

In those moments, what I need to do is simply be still and stay with it—with him, with her, with it. I allow the current to pass through me. And within that current, I learn the wisdom, insight, and courage it has come to offer.

 

Then harmony and love arise on their own.

 

By Suzanne Yang