Friday, February 5, 2016

Numb eyes

Don't ask me how I did this because I don't know, but, a few weeks ago I cut my right eyeball. On a scale of 1 to 10, the pain was a solid 13. At that point, I didn't know I had cut it. I didn't know what was happening. All I knew is that I couldn't see and that I had some sort of injury so I went to an ophthalmologist. He discovered the cut...and the ulcer that formed over it...and the infection now spreading to the other eye. Yikes.

The first few days were terrible. I could not keep my eyes open because I could not bear the light. But closing them was even more painful. And there was nothing I could take for the pain. There was nothing I could do either. I couldn't read. I couldn't write. I couldn't drive. I couldn't stand myself. Everything hurt. Every thought, every interaction, every conversation. 

On my follow-up visit, the doctor put anesthetic drops in my eyes so that he could examine them. That was the best I had felt in days! I left the doctor's office with a little skip in my step. I had no pain. Not until the effect of the anesthesia wore off. 

I enjoyed seeing the world for a while without feeling it. I enjoyed it very much. I said that out loud and realized that there is another way we can enjoy the world without pain, without self-created suffering. It is that pain that we tend to suffer because we assign a certain meaning to people, circumstances and things. But what if every once in a while we looked around without feeling anything? What if we didn't judge what we were looking at? What if we didn't label what we see, hear or experience? Even if for a moment, we could enjoy life without labeling anything as good or bad. Today is a good day to do just that. Take one moment today and look, just look. It is what it is. Let it be what it is without judgment. How does it feel? 

Image found at otherworldmystery.com. 
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