For anyone, whether off the radar or at the centre of power, to renounce control and choose to be helpless is at first deeply repugnant. We resist it. Until the end of the long process, we bargain for little ways of staying in control. The end only comes when we can say, with our last breath, “it is accomplished.” In the instant of pure helplessness we come into authentic hope. We reach the goal by a last, effortless renunciation. Until then we learn by repeating the same mistakes, what certainly is not hope. This can be frustrating. But it is the work of mercy. Until the moment when truth dawns, we imagine mercy to be moments of good fortune that seem to give us what we want. Mercy is not indulgent like this, though we may have to imagine it is. It is gentle and kind but also uncompromising.
The instant of pure helplessness
-
Most Recent Posts
