Emotions are the gateway to knowing ourselves

​Most days emotions can feel like bad things. I suppose because they often feel like walls and not gateways. They feel like hurdles in the exact middle of a relationship - demanding distance - not invitations.

I was hiking in a dense wilderness with a friend a couple of years ago. I was a little bit ahead of her. There was silence. Until I could hear her crying - sobbing, really. It entered the silence out of nowhere.

I wanted to run away. That's what I wanted to do because that's what I'd always done. There was something scary about it all. Crying comes with an unease you don't find with laughter.

I didn't run away, though. I made myself stop. And turn around. And go to her. And hug her and ask, are you ok?

Clearly she was not ok, but sometimes that's what emotions are. They are often words that can't be spoken. They are a way of asking for questions we don't know we need to be asked.

Are you Ok?

Would you like to talk?

Is there anything I can do?

She wasn't OK. And she told me why. Then she stopped crying and out of nowhere I started telling her about my own tears in life. Not because I owed her that in return, but because I wanted to. Because emotions had created this gateway into a place where I could explore my own life in connection with her emotions.

Gregory Boyle says, "we all taste eternity when person merges with person. We need to find ourselves poised to enter into relationship with anyone anywhere."

I do believe that about eternity. That in some supernatural way we will all be one. We will be merged. We will all be merged but with our own stories. I imagine - with a smile - that the difference will be that we will suddenly embrace each other's stories with acceptance and compassion and love.

Our emotions will have walked us through the ultimate gateway of discovering who we are. Through the gateway of discovering that who I am is a lot like you.

Emotions often try to hide that truth from us. But if we allow them to, they will absolutely lead us to living in that truth.

A truth found looking through the eyes and hearts of relationship.