Sacred Mixture of Emotional Paradox
Listen: “Hot N Cold” by Katy Perry
Joy and sadness commingle—often—in our human experience. Our human tendency is to avoid or push away from unpleasant feelings, but learning to stay with our unpleasant feelings through mindful awareness, mixed simultaneously with our pleasant feelings, is a pathway to wholeness instead of numbness. It increases our capacity for embracing the creative, immersive experience of aliveness.
A close friend of mine, Pastor Michael Brooks of The Oasis Church in Kansas City, Missouri recently asked a group of pastors how we deal with simultaneous sadness and joy in life and ministry. Pastor Brooks is in the season of celebrating the dedication of their new church building (September 25, 2022) after a long haul of online services through Covid. In the midst of this season of celebration, he received the news that his closest friend had died. How can he celebrate and grieve at the same time?
Another close friend, Augie Grasis, lost his radiant wife, Pami Rapp Grasis, to mesothelioma on September 3, 2022. At the celebration of life service, Augie gave a eulogy of Pami’s life. It was one of the most beautiful tributes to a beloved wife I have ever heard. It was full of love, humor, tenderness, and gratitude for Pami in whom he truly delighted. I wept and laughed as Augie beautifully celebrated and mourned the passing of his wife.
I am reminded of how many times I experienced sadness and joy in the same moment as a pastor. As the church I founded and pastored grew to several thousand members, people would often ask me what was the most difficult part of overseeing and pastoring such a large group of people. I always gave the same response: it was the frequency of grieving with some and celebrating with others, many times in the same hour. In a large church, within the same hour of the day or night, it is not uncommon, for example, to celebrate the birth of a new baby in one moment and then grieve the loss of a loved one in the next moment. The Apostle Paul admonishes us: “Be happy with those who are happy, and weep with those who weep” (Romans 12:15).
Over the last three years, I have done my share of grieving big losses in my own life such as my church community, my marriage, and my career. I live in the same community in which I pastored for almost thirty years so I cross paths with former church members almost daily. There is always a tinge of sadness and joy: sadness for how my pastoral career imploded and joy for the people who share with me how their lives were positively influenced by my pastoral ministry.
Tara Brach, who is a mindfulness meditation teacher, asked the question (in “The Power of Awareness”): “Why would we want to stay with unpleasantness?” And a follow-up question: “What happens when we avoid?” Brach shared four negative experiences related to avoiding: (1) tiredness (even chronic fatigue) because it takes energy to push away unpleasantness; (2) more unpleasantness because of the anxious contractions generated by contracting against a contraction; (3) a chronic sense of apprehension or foreboding because our psyche still knows; and (4) our identity forms around “the resisting-self, the defending-self, or the controlling-self.” According to Brach: Pain + Resistance = Suffering. Whereas: Unpleasantness + Mindfulness = Grounds of Freedom.
By recognizing and allowing a mixture of sadness and joy, we can honor both experiences at the same time. We may do this by sitting with our emotions through meditation and journaling—not resisting, but receiving the emotions with curiosity, openness, and self-compassion. We may do this by sharing our emotions and experiences with our friends, loved ones, therapists, and communities of support.
In so doing, we give expression to a sacred mixture of emotions. Sacred because it’s an experience which transcends and unites all humans—the laughter and the tears. Sacred because it embraces the breathtaking joy of life itself and the heartbreaking sadness of loss. This sacred mixture is us.
Shalom
©realfredherron, 2022
