I recently came across two stories that seemed unrelated at first, yet kept resonating within me, so I began to sense perhaps there was a link.
The first story appears in the audio program To Love and Be Loved by Stephen Levine and his wife.
Family
How to support someone in a really difficult place?
I had started to collect my 450 client-therapy hours towards becoming a UKCP registered Psychotherapist. It was tough, as I was exposed to psychological and personal challenges I was absolutely not used to as a Coach.
I was trying my best, but something wasn’t working. Some clients came for a few sessions, then abruptly stopped. That was hard to take emotionally, and I began to question my ability to support psychotherapeutic clients.
As I was talking the cases through with my supervisor Steve, he leaned back, looked at me, and asked if I knew the story of the wind and the sun. I did not. It’s quite profound.
“The wind and the sun were talking one day as they observed a man sitting on a bench. It was rather cold, so the man was dressed in a scarf and a coat. Out of the blue, the wind suggested a little challenge to the sun. The wind said, “I’ll bet I can blow that man’s coat off.” The sun scoffed. “I’ll take that bet and I raise it. You can’t do it … but I can.”
“You?” said the wind. “What power do you have? No way.” And so, the contest was on.
The wind began to blow in chilly winds from the north. The man tugged his coat up tighter around his neck. So, the wind kicked up the intensity of the wind speed a few notches. As the wind blew stronger and stronger, the man struggled to sit upright on the bench. The more powerfully the wind blew, the tighter the man wrapped his scarf and coat around himself. Now, the wind was blowing at full force and it was freezing cold. The man, gripping the bench with both hands, pulled his knees up and huddled in a kind of ball in a desperate attempt to keep from freezing. No way to take of his coat! The Wind had failed.
Now it was the sun’s turn.
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What does life expect from you?
Nine months after he had married his wife in 1942, the Austrian psychiatrist Victor Frankl and his family were captured by the Nazis and transported to the Theresienstadt Ghetto – a waystation en route to the extermination camps. They were forced to abort their unborn child, and Frankl’s father died only months later of starvation and pneumonia.
In 1944, together with his wife and 1,500 other inmates, Frankl was placed on a train. They assumed they’d be transported to one of the Nazi armament factories to be used as forced labour. After days cooped up in the windowless wagon, one of the inmates glanced at a signpost outside. What he read out made the desperate passengers shiver with fear. “Auschwitz!,” he screamed in disbelief.
Separated from his wife upon arrival, Frankl was a man without any connection to his former life.
„All you need is …!“
On November 16, 2019, I sent an email to family and friends inviting them to celebrate the “half-time of my life” at the end of May, 2020. I could have also called it the “31st anniversary of my 19th birthday,” or simply let them know I would be crossing half the half-century mark. Many had signed up, and in February 2020, the organisation of the event was done.
But sadly, we all know what happened after that. The world went into a stand-still for 2 years. It was impossible to even think about having a party and celebrating with friends. By the end of 2021, I started another attempt at organising the event, and with the world opening, it became more and more likely it could happen in June 2022.
As the big day drew closer, I was quite anxious about how it would go.
Nobody is an island
Quite some time ago I came across the following song by the German songwriter Gerhard Schöne. It takes the form of a parable.
Many years ago, a man arrived at the gateway to heaven. As he had lived a good and humble life, he was pleased to stand outside the glowing gates of heaven, ready to ascend into the light and love of the afterlife. But there was a thought he struggled to let go of.
The gatekeeper, being quite observant, noticed his hesitation and asked the man: “What is bothering you, my friend? You seem troubled. Is there unfinished business?”
“Not really,” said the man. “Everything is sorted just fine down there, but I find myself wondering what hell is like. I never really believed in heaven or hell all my life, but now, I am really wondering what it looks like.”
“You may be surprised.” The Gatekeeper smiled: “As with all great truths, it’s not as simple as you may think, yet also, far simpler. Let me show you.”
