Healing Touch

One day I asked my mother: “why were you so possessive about me? You always wanted only the best for me. You never wanted me to be hurt. Even the slightest pain would make you feel miserable. You always wanted me to be only happy and have the best in my life.” She smiled and told: “you are my life. Your smile is my world. I never want to see you in pain so I did everything I could to avoid any unpleasant incident in your life.” She thinks as a mother it is her duty to fill my life with only happiness. As a kid I enjoyed this super protection which kept me away from anything bad happening to me. Slowly I realized, my share of pain will always find my address no matter who is trying to stop it from reaching me. My mother is one soul on this earth who will never even dream of hurting me but every time she combs my hair somehow a strand gets pulled so bad that her quota of hurting me gets served.

Getting hurt, feeling pain, facing fear, all build compassion within a person. In my life I have seen death of my grandparents, my uncle, illness of my family members, tragedy of losing my cousin and many such painful incidents. I have also seen how my mother took care of our relatives when they were sick, hospitalized or going through rough phase and how her compassion gave solace to family. I am the only kid and as an overprotective mother she always took me wherever she went. Along with family functions like wedding, pooja etc., I was always with her even at any funeral or hospital. She taught me how to behave at a happy, sad and unpleasant occasions. Her definition of my pain was only things which hurt me from her point of view. But being at places where the environment is unpleasant is unavoidable. She always taught me, here there is no choice and it is important to be there for the family.

I am lucky to have such a compassionate mother because today I know how to take care of a sick person, how to sit beside someone who lost their loved ones without saying a word and still ensuring they have a shoulder to cry. Me and my husband both come from very big families. I say that because we both have more than 25 cousins each😊. Initially I felt he was lucky because he had not seen as much of death and illness in his family as I did. But over a period, I realized the importance of going through such incidents early in life. What my mother did to me when I was a kid made all the difference to my life as an adult. She definitely wanted me to have a happy life but she never kept me away from other’s pain. She taught me if someone is ill and they are sleeping, waking them up at the time to give them medicine is the right thing. That is not called disturbing their sleep. She taught me if I have to hold an old lady’s hand when she finds it difficult to climb the stairs, allow her to feel you the way she is comfortable. Helping someone doesn’t mean we go overboard. It means we are there in plain sight so you can confidently stumble knowing there is someone to keep you safe.

The generation we are nurturing have small family and larger friend circle. They look at life as a fantasy. They are only taken to kid’s parties and places where they can have fun. Parents ensure that kid is not bored even for a minute. If there is nothing exciting, then there is always a phone in hand. We make mistakes of keeping our kids away from hospitals, death, illness, pain and helpless situations. We deprive them of any opportunity they can get to build compassion and confidence to display it. Even if they attend a funeral, we want to make them feel comfortable, so we let them play in phone. Killing someone in a video game and seeing someone die in our surroundings has become the same. Just feels like game over. Let’s start a new one. In this world when we lose our loved ones, we see our younger generation lose emotions also.

I feel fortunate to have seen illness, death, sorrow, old age and pain. All this gave me reason to cry and feel my emotions. I know to identify not only happiness but anger, pain, sorrow, satisfaction and relief also. It is important to teach our kids to take care of others not only at happy occasions but also at an unpleasant event. It is necessary for them to learn that taking care of our loved ones when they are sick is not easy, but it is the right thing to do. Compassion is a journey which breaks us and makes us. Getting uncomfortable to feel the pain is the first step in this journey which leads us towards a healing touch.

Kids are taught good touch and bad touch, but do they know what a healing touch is? It is our responsibility to teach them that a hug can do wonders. Some of us might remember “jaadu ki jappi”(magical hug) which came as a scene in a movie but the message behind it is very strong. We can’t heal all the pain but we can make them feel comfortable by letting them know someone is always there with you through your pain. The thought of having someone just to get back to gives a healing touch. Our mind is a complex system who wants a lot of things but doesn’t know how to identify, accept and say it loud especially when in pain. Healing touch is the answer for our mind to change from complex to simple system. Take your kids to unpleasant situations, familiarize them with problems so that they can learn seeing you, how you handle pain. If you want to cry and there is no one around except your kid, hug your kid and cry. Don’t hide. It is okay for them to see you being in pain. It is okay for them to feel bored when you attend someone in need. It is okay for them to say that they hate something bad happening in life. The lessons learnt when in pain help us value what we have.

Pain also has the power to Heal.
Touch also has the power to Steal.
Teach kids to feel the pain so that they can learn to heal the pain too.