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Cwald, this is in your honor, since you reference it regularly. I thought it would be good to have it here in its entirety. Quote:An aging master grew tired of his apprentice’s complaints. One morning, he sent him to get some salt. When the apprentice returned, the master told him to mix a handful of salt in a glass of water and then drink it.
“How does it taste?” the master asked.
“Bitter,” said the apprentice.
The master chuckled and then asked the young man to take the same handful of salt and put it in the lake. The two walked in silence to the nearby lake and once the apprentice swirled his handful of salt in the water, the old man said, “Now drink from the lake.”
As the water dripped down the young man’s chin, the master asked, “How does it taste?”
“Fresh,” remarked the apprentice.
“Do you taste the salt?” asked the master.
“No,” said the young man. At this the master sat beside this serious young man, and explained softly,
“The pain of life is pure salt; no more, no less. The amount of pain in life remains exactly the same. However, the amount of bitterness we taste depends on the container we put the pain in. So when you are in pain, the only thing you can do is to enlarge your sense of things. Stop being a glass. Become a lake.”
Indeed. How does a person become a lake to dilute the pain? By reflection. By listing those positive things that the church/gospel/mormons bring to your life, not only the negatives. By disciplining negative thinking. By seeking balance in your opinions, by acknowledging progress in the church, regardless of speed. Boundaries dilute the intensity and frequency of negative experiences. In a way, we have much to be happy about in the church. We have more open-minded leaders at the top. They ARE making incremental changes. Society is moving in a more compassionate way, and the calcified approaches to missionary work and church administration aren’t necessarily producing the same kind of numbers they produced in years past. These kinds of hard, business-level forces do impact the speed with which the church changes, for the better.
Heber13 wrote:How does a person become a lake to dilute the pain?
I know that DW has helped me dilute my pains. Together my pain can be diluted in two glasses. Together her pain can be diluted in two glasses.
People here have helped me dilute some of my pains. Together, maybe we make up a small bucket.
Any person we make a connection with that is willing to bear one another’s burdens, that they may be light increases the size of the container.
Of course this all breaks down if you look at it from the perspective of everyone bringing the same size glass and the same handful of salt to the collective table. Maybe the answer to that is that the size of our glass and the amount of salt we carry varies at different points in our lives. Sometimes our glass is a shot glass, sometimes our glass is a big gulp. Sometimes our hands hold a tablespoon of salt, sometimes a teaspoon.
I think we become a lake as we make deeper connections with humanity. Not just ourselves in isolation, not just ourselves as some small sect, a subset of the whole, but when we can find connections with more and more people.
It makes me wonder why I don’t share more than I do, why I sometimes avoid making those connections. Perhaps I’ve thought that my pains are so bitter to me that I worry that sharing that burden with others would only bring them bitterness. Experience has show that more often than not this is not the case, yet it’s a fear that permeates everything I do. Sometimes I’m too afraid to be anything more than a glass. In my explanation you’ll also note that opening yourself up like that has the potential to introduce even more pain. Fear strikes again. Be not afraid, only believe is a tough concept for me when it comes to my pains.
From a gospel perspective, Jesus is the living water. Could Jesus’ atonement be viewed as an infinite lake? We certainly have that concept, cast our burdens upon the lord. I’ve got some thoughts there but I’m not quite sure how to phrase them. I’ll be back.
I think I’ll just lift my thoughts from a post I made somewhere else: Quote:I like the idea that the atonement was an event where a god was able to feel every negative thing that could happen during the human experience. He bore all pain so he could know how to succor his people. I also like the idea of how as members of the church we take the name Jesus Christ upon ourselves. We (the church) are the body of Christ. If you put all of us together you might be able to say the same thing. In the collective we have suffered all the negative things that can happen during the human experience. We’ve felt every pain. As a collective we’re then able to succor others. That’s one of the reasons I hate to see people leave the church. We lose some of that ability… especially those that suffer from some of the pain of cognitive dissonance that comes as a result of reality not matching the fantasy. The “doubters” either leave or remain silent, incapable of reaching out with a healing hand.
To that I’d make an addendum: there’s no reason we should be artificially limited to receiving and giving help within the confines of a church. We can reach out to anyone, anything. Some people look to their church community first, church can be a tribe where people speak our language. In that sense it is sad when we lose church members that otherwise could better insulate the group.
nibbler wrote:Sometimes I’m too afraid to be anything more than a glass. In my explanation you’ll also note that opening yourself up like that has the potential to introduce even more pain. Fear strikes again. Be not afraid, only believe is a tough concept for me when it comes to my pains.
For me the fear is of rejection. I am afraid of being outwardly ostracized, distanced, and isolated. I therefore keep some things to myself. Isolated within my own head.
To take the metaphor further – I believe there is something to be said for both the quantity and the quality of the connections. There is value is knowing and being known by many people. There is also value in being deeply known and accepted by a few.
The Great Salt Lake, Dead Sea, and other salt lakes have no outlets. All the water that flows into these lakes escapes only by evaporation. When water evaporates, the dissolved salts are left behind. To be healthy…I think we need outlets in our lives besides just church. Exercise, careers, education, home improvement, reading, sports, social activities, family vacations or other hobbies and things that help good things flow in and out of our lives, keeping things fresh.
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