"We relentlessly judge ourselves for who we should be, and rarely accept ourselves just as we are. Whatever we are feeling in this moment is judged by some mythical ideal of what we "should" be feeling, what we should be doing, and who we should be. If we hurt, we think we should have been healed by now; if we feel frightened, we think we should be stronger; if we feel sad, we think we should be happier. Every moment every breath of our lives is subtly judged as unacceptable. Measured by the standards of who we should have been by now, we constantly fall short.
But what if the feelings that arise in us every day - even the sad, hurt, uncomfortable sensations of our heart and bodies - have their own value and carry something to teach us? If we are not "supposed" to feel sad, and we touch that sadness with anger or impatience, then we are unable to listen to what our sadness may be teaching us. Refusing to allow our sadness to be true, we see our sadness as a mistake, something broken, something to gotten rid of. But what if the sadness is not evidence against us, not a condemnation of how slowly we are healing but simply a moment of sadness, an instant of sorrow that has arisen in our body? What if that sorrow carries the seed of something forgotten, something wanting our attention? Who will listen? How can we allow ourselves to be human, to feel at times tender and broken, and not touch it with judgment and violence? Can we hold our pain and touch it instead with mercy and care?"