Raising children under any circumstances can sometimes be frustrating for sure. Raising a child who is physically challenged can often be doubly so. That is no reason to berate yourself.
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Wednesday is Question and Answer Day on the blog…a time for exploring many of the questions that people have recently asked about the nine Conversations with God books and the New Spirituality. Here’s this week’s entry…
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Question: I’ve always said when I died I’d have a list of questions to present to “God” if I could even find Her. You beat me to it with most of them. I still have a few. How come my kid was born handicapped? I wonder if my frustration with her challenging behavior is out of “fear,” but fear of what? When I’m tired (physically, emotionally, etc), there’s neither love nor fear present, just a lack of energy, i.e., I’m tired! Peace and power, A. B.
Neale’s Response: Dear friend…Thank you for your letter and kind words. The question as to why some people come into this world with physical challenges is addressed in Conversations with God. We do not know the agenda of the soul, but the admonition is not to judge, nor call it wrong, but simply to see it as a blessed experience in the life of that soul.
It is the purpose of life to bring us all every experience that the human adventure allows. The up and down of it, the left and right of it, the male and female of it, the here and there of it. The soul will not rest until it has had the sum and substance of the human experience, the totality of its possibilities. Perhaps it is for this reason that in some lifetimes souls enter a body that is what you have called “handicapped.”
You ask about frustration, and I tell you that all frustration within the human experience finds its origin in fear. I grant you that frustration is a very mild form of fear, yet it is fear nonetheless. The one who comes from love and only from love never experiences frustration. Frustration is, of course, a fear that what we are doing cannot be continued; that we will run out of energy; that it is all “just too much;” that we have reached the end of the line. Frustration is our announcement to ourselves that we need to move back into love in order to find our “center” once again.
You say that in your moments of frustration there is neither love nor fear present, just a loss of energy; in other words, you are simply tired. “Tired” is not a condition which is known in the presence of love. Lovers who are deeply in love have been known to stay up day and night for long periods of time, simply being with each other. It is when love changes to fear that energy rapidly drains, leaving the system of the human body.
Don’t berate yourself about this, or beat yourself up. It is a normal human experience and not something to be ashamed of. In your moments of frustration, simply notice that you are frustrated, do whatever it takes to move through that experience in a way which benefits and serves you, and then go on with your life without self recrimination.
Of course you are frustrated. There is much to be done, there is a great deal of challenge in the doing of it, and most people would be frustrated. Don’t look too deeply into this. There is no “mystery” here. There is only what is obvious. And it is all perfectly all right.
Be kind to yourself, and good. And bless you for your service to the soul of your daughter, who could not have picked a better Mom.
(Ask Neale may be accessed on a daily basis in the Messengers’ Circle at Neale’s personal website: www.nealedonaldwalsch.com. Each week Neale selects a question from those posted there and publishes it in this blog.)