New for The Wisdom Daily: life in the imperfect tense
July 21, 2016
The folks at The Wisdom Daily have published my latest essay. It's about my sense that divorce happens in the imperfect tense. (The decision to end the marriage may now be in the past, but it's also always continuing in to the present.) And it's about how the hard emotional work of ending a marriage maps for me, this year, to where we're at on the Jewish calendar. Here's a taste:
...This is hard work. And sometimes I am tempted to try to bypass it. Can’t I just focus on the positive, and turn my attention away from what hurts?
Not if I want to heal, I can’t. When a wound is infected, ignoring it or pretending it isn’t there won’t help. The only thing to do is grit one’s teeth and clean out the wound, and maybe suture it gently so that it can finish closing on its own. When the wound is emotional rather than physical, the same holds true.
No one likes to look at what hurts. But if we don’t face our own brokenness, we can’t sweep away the shards and prepare to rebuild.
That’s the lesson of this time of year on the Jewish calendar...
Read the whole thing: Exploring my imperfection during my divorce.