A meditation on suffering.

 Dear Reader,

The following is an excerpt from my meditation journal. May it be helpful and a source of hope.

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There are cycles within cycles - epicycles if you will. There is the great cycles of the Ages. Within these cycles there are cycles of birth, growth, and decay. Currently, we are witnessing a transition point within a cycle. There are parties working to interrupt and, ultimately, end a cycle of systemic abuse that is deeply entrenched in the collective consciousness of the United States. For some this process represents a destructive force and it evokes great fear in them. For others, this is a step in a healing and growth process and it evokes determination and hope.

The epicycle of social reform moves of its own accord but the pattern can be seen as we look back into the history of the nation. It comes with growth pains and struggle. This is because all periods of growth are the fruit of struggle and pain. It is a natural law of this plane of existence we inhabit. This natural law can be taken as a sign of how far we are removed from Déa. It is tempting to make this argument but it begs the question if the one that is in greater relative pain to the other farther removed from Déa?

It is uncharitable to argue that they who suffer are farther from Déa than they who do not. The fact that life is burdened with pain is a sign of how far this realm as a whole has fallen from our Celestial Mother's presence. The uneven distribution of sufferig in this realm is a sign of how it is flawed, partially. It is also an indicatior of the complex interplay between personal wyrd, collective wyrd (also known as orlog), and the wyrd of the entire realm. 

It is far too simplistic and cruel to say that suffering is the price of past transgressions or to say that our souls have chosen the path of suffering. While these are distinct possibilities, it is far more llikely that our wyrd in this life has fixed points of suffering where by we may have a window into the suffering of Our Lady and her Mother. Our Lady descended into the manifest world and she had to suffer the agony of the absence of her Mother. She became afflicted with the weaknesses and pains of this world for she had become mortal. Her descent into the Nethereworld brought greater pain and suffering.

Our Lady's pains were not the fruit of a transgression. They were due to the fallen nature of the realms she travled. So too are our pains. Because of wyrd, our pains move in cycles. Becaue of Our Lady's sacrifice, there will come a time when our pains and suffering shall be relieved. Our souls shall ascend through the rarified realms above until we reach Avala and then move beyond to the embrace of the Dark Mother, where we shall rest in her arms until it is time for the great cycle of existence to begin again.