MAY 20
So often, we believe that we have come to a place that is void
of hope and void of possibilities, only to find that it is the
very hopelessness that allows us to hit bottom, give up our
illusion of control, turn it over, and ask for help. Out of the
ashes of our hopelessness comes the fire of our hope.
—ANNE WILSON SCHAEFWhen one is low enough, bottoming out on despair and
hopelessness, the thought of going anywhere at all is totally
foreign. It’s not that it would be too hard, it’s simply that
the prospect of any motion is unthinkable. Like a mule that
refuses to budge, life seems to have stopped in its
tracks—and no flattery, no promises, no cajoling, no threats,
can have any effect. The future has no appeal and no
promise.
At this point the path of integrity and, ultimately, of a re-
turn to health may be found by standing still and acknow-
ledging the degree to which one’s life is filled to the edges
with grief. But after a while even the grieving heart becomes
restless and thinks, This will not do forever. One begins to
look around, maybe step out of the picture, as it were, leave
that darkness behind, and begin to walk away, noticing a
flower growing along the path, a waft of cloud in a blue sky,
a friend who has been waiting all along.
At the bottom of the well, one can look up and see the sky.