Vachon Imagined

An eye for an eye.

If I give you anger, you will, apart from truth, give me the same.

It is human.

It is instinct.

It is the reflex that answers hurt with hurt, wound with wound.

It is not yet evolved.

Vengeance takes what is wounded within and throws it outward.

It destroys reputations.

It divides families.

It begins wars both large and small.

But vengeance is never born in the event itself.

It is born in the heart.

In the heart wrapped in desire.

The desire to be right.

The desire to be seen.

The desire to be vindicated.

The desire to make another feel what we have felt.

And still, something greater holds all of it.

There is a profound protection in existence itself.

We are permitted to hurt one another.

We are permitted to circulate anger, vengeance, resentment, and strife.

Not because they are good.

But because freedom allows them.

Wholeness makes room for every movement of life without becoming any one of them.

The tragedy is not that anger appears.

The tragedy is that we mistake it for ourselves.

We become so identified with the spirit we are carrying that we no longer recognize we are carrying it.

It begins speaking before we do.

It walks into the room ahead of us.

It shapes what we see.

It shapes what we believe.

It shapes what we become.

The Spirit of God—wholeness itself—allows every one of these movements.

But it is none of them.

Watch your mind the way a hawk watches its prey.

Not with fear.

With precision.

With stillness.

You will begin to see where thought ends and awareness begins.

This is where double consciousness becomes a gift.

This is where self-awareness has its purpose.

But do not become attached even to that.

Awareness is a doorway, not a destination.

Walk in the light.

Return to the light.

Vengeance cannot live there.

Hatred cannot breathe there.

Only life remains.

And life, when nothing is grasping at it,

is beautiful.

It is whole.

It is extraordinary.