Collateral...

Collateral.....finish the phrase. I'm looking at the word from one perspective with two possible outcomes and it is this: there is a central piece, a something in the middle that by its expression, extends itself out, moving laterally, or to the side(s). The term collateral damage can be used metaphorically to describe the choices of one person who impacts many around them, like a bomb going off and the shrapnel cutting through and piercing the hearts and souls of those around them...the spiritual ramifications reverberate and the wounds can present, or manifest physically, in other words, a wound unattended can fester and cause disease, treatment for healing is required. Let's just look at the soul. An organism, say me, you, the human brand of aliveness, cannot live alone, we are dependent on many elements for our maintenance. Emotionally, psychologically, spiritually, collateral relationships thrive and conversely stifle, depending on the central piece, the middle of each human. The collateral damage of unattended pain, pain supplanted, masked, somatized is that while the living being is suffering, in attempts to allievate pain, choices lend to creating more pain, not only for self but also for others, collaterally. Escape, justification, rationalizations are the temporary fix misplacing that thing that hurts, that aching and longing that never seems to go away no matter what attempts are made to allievate IT. Ahh, we all have our brand of poison, our feel good ways of subverting, don't we? Let's not kid ourselves, shall we? Let's be really clear, your pain, my pain, is not our own, neither is our joy, it is always and forever shared whether or not we choose to believe that we have impact in the world, that ripple effect thing, it's really real. Look at your centre, the middle of you, what is there? If you don't like what you see and you fear that you are collaterally causing damage, chances are, it's true. If at the centre of you is love and the collateral impact is loving relationships all around you, chances are, it's true. Choices abound and it is never to late, you have never gone too far, to start the healing process, no matter how arduous it may be. I belong to you, you belong to me, your my sweetheart~we are nothing without one another. Namaste, I see you and I feel you, this is the pleasure and pain of being connected as members of the human race.