Pleasure and pain must exist together.
So on my recent trip to Costa Rica I had a great time. It was filled with deliciously enjoyable foods, deep conversations with new friends, laughter to the joyous natures of the peoples, adventuring trips, beautiful landscapes and overall a relaxing trip despite the throughly packed journey and long bus rides and red eye flights.
That all seems fantastic. Where is the pain of such pleasure? Well the universe taught me that lesson. The last 36 hours of the trip were marred with some sort of viral GI bug. After every major hike, to my total surprise I started off with diahorrea. The washing machine in my stomach was on a full wash cycle as I explored many stalls at the base of a volcano, the rest stops at the waterfall, the little hut in the rainforest !
That night after everyone went for dinner, i stayed in the room, exhausted and alone. I did not have the fortitude to party while the party in my gastrointestinal system had not stopped. In the middle of the night I woke all diaphoretic ( sweaty) with total dehydration, lightheaded and almost passed out on the floor. I crawled back into bed, nursed myself with electrolytes and water. The same incident occurred at 330am again. I thought I had recovered as the morning and early afternoon had continued.
A long 4 hour bus ride to the airport and a quick stop for a late night dinner ended with more diahorrea and a mad rush for new symptoms of vomiting at the airport toilets. I stood in the checkout counter with the family, felt quizzy and politely told the lovely ticket counter lady, “ You have my passport, you know what I look like, I am now going to the bathroom I don’t feel good” She smiled and continued to work on my boarding pass as I decorated the toilet bowl with my dinner.
Sorry for the gory details.
Pleasure and pain, pain and pleasure. Nothing can exist with out them and neither can exist without the other. It is part of the charged particles of everything in the cosmos and at the quantum level. This is not about my Gi mishap but more a statement of the fundamental constant of the universe. When we carefully examine each incident that occurs in life, we find that even the happiest of moments contains challenges of pain and the saddest of times contains support and pleasure.
Yet how we navigate our life is just as important as the outcomes which inherently that come our way. When we are able to see the balance in all things we create a different world. We can see the cosmic hand of love that is forever there gently guiding and nourishing us.
While I had all the Gi issues, I had the most amount of support from my new friends and family, despite the pain I was going through I felt the love and support. Even this incident kept me focused on seeing the balance of what was occurring with gratitude.
Pain of stomach upset, pleasure of losing 6 pounds of weight… it’s all perspective.
Hope you can see the support in the darkest of times and the challenges in the easier times for when see both, we see the true light within and around us, Love.
…………
I love you
