HUG Corner: Thought for the Week 1/28/19

January 28, 2019

Healing After Loss (Martha Whitmore Hickman)

“We cannot afford to forget any experience, not even the most painful.”

– Dag Hammarskjöld

Why not?

Think about it. Even to ask such a question throws into relief how our lives would be impoverished were we to forget our painful experiences.

There is an old folktale about a group of people, each of whom was given the chance to throw one trouble into a central heap in the middle of the room. Then they were invited to choose one from the pile. They each ended up taking back their own.

I suppose this seems so right to us because we know we are, each of us, the sum of our experiences, and to negate any of those experiences, even the most painful – maybe especially the most painful – is to deny not only what we have learned from those experiences, but also our very selves.

I will embrace my life, all of it. If there are changes for the better that I can make, I will try to make them. Where I cannot, I will accept that, too. But – even if I could – I will not forget my pain. I will honor it. It is a part of who I am. 

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