Rein In Your Emotions

Poignant tale, isn’t it? They removed their caps as they entered and held them under their arms. Both men stood ramrod straight. They were not at attention, but they appeared to be. They looked at her sympathetically. Strange things were happening to her. She could feel her unborn child kicking inside her. She was deathly cold and feverishly hot at the same time and in different parts of her body. Her infant daughter, awakened by the unusual noises, started bawling loudly. The taller of the two men nodded. He too was deeply moved and seemed close to breaking down. We’re so sorry, ma’am, he choked, and then the tears came down. Still crying, he caught her expertly as she collapsed and laid her gently on the couch.

Awaiting On You All

The other man rushed to the kitchen to get a bowl of warm water and a towel. Gently he wiped her face and revived her. For the next few days, April was in a haze, moving like an automaton. They helped her clean and bathe and feed her daughter. They made sure she ate at least something, sometime. She had no conscious memory of all this, just a vague understanding that they meant well. Time collapsed on itself and stretched on interminably. Her husband was never going to come back. They weren’t going to buy that tiny home in the new development they both loved. She would never again see him crinkle up his face and astonish visitors by touching the tip of his nose with his tongue. He’d practiced and practiced until he could do this and had been so proud. Her jaw had dropped in astonishment the first time she saw it, and he’d stood there grinning bashfully like a schoolboy.

Kiss Your Past Good—Bye

The men in uniform came often and helped her around the house and talked to her. They belonged to the same unit, had served in the same theater of war, and had known her husband well. In some ways, they’d known him even better than she did. They told her how he would pass around pictures of her and her daughter and how those pictures got grimy from being in his shirt pocket over his heart, so he got himself some clear glue, cut strips of thick, transparent plastic, and laminated them. She burst out sobbing uncontrollably at this, and they were more circumspect from then on. Gradually they stopped coming. Then one day, weeks later, they were back. The door was open, and they rushed in without knocking, whooping and hollering. Her husband was alive! The bodies had been so badly burned that identification was difficult. Her husband had taken an early shot to the head and been knocked unconscious beneath a bush. It was a crease, and he eventually came to and found himself alone in enemy territory. He was weak from loss of blood and would have perished except that a peasant found him, hid him in his house, and nursed him back to health.

Weather To Fly

Then, under cover of darkness, the man took him to the outskirts of his camp and pointed out the way. A great joy seized April. She would see him soon. She could talk to him right away. The soldiers were waiting to take her to the base, where she could speak to him in his hospital bed. The bits and tattered pieces of her dreams started reassembling themselves. She fainted, and in a reprise of their first visit, the tall soldier caught her and took her to the couch while the other went to the kitchen for water and a towel. Do you feel sorry for April, the pregnant, widowed mother of a young child who, as it turned out, was not a widow at all? Did you vicariously share her despair and exult with her reprieve? Quite a few people do. Empathy is a wonderful human emotion. April’s story has a really important lesson, one far deeper and more significant than sharing the suffering of a fellow human being. If you really learn this lesson, it will help you immeasurably in all kinds of situations. It will truly and completely turn your life around. What is this momentous lesson? It is the knowledge that April made it all up! Nothing really happened. The anguish that gripped her? She manufactured it in her own mind, and it was strong enough to have a physical effect on her. The relief and joy she experienced? All on her own, all in her head, she went from pleasant existence to utter melancholy and then to exultant joy. She just never realized she was doing it. They all exist in your head and only in your head. This is where I get tremendous push back and vociferous protest from participants in my workshops. Some get really worked up. What do I mean she made it all up? Don’t I know that the poor girl thought she had lost her husband and become the single mother of an infant with another on the way? What am I advocating, that she forget her husband immediately and move on? Don’t I know what it means to be human? I have heard it all. Before you jump on the accusatory bandwagon, pause for a moment, rein in your emotions, and consider what I’m really saying. The emotions that April experienced were something she created in her mind. She thought they came from outside, but they really didn’t. They were her conditioned reflex that came into play instantaneously. You too have gone through painful experiences and reacted in a similar fashion. You too originated all that turmoil in your mind and all by yourself. Think of a continuum. At one end is someone who is completely bowled over by some tragic occurrence and unable to get on with life. Like the couple whose teenage son died in an accident. At the other end of the continuum is a trauma surgeon. She does what she has to do and then moves on.