Perhaps you happen to know the feeling of being stuck by personal judgements ? Otherwise I will gladly share one of my experiences here:
On duty I was asked to visit an old man who was living by himself, he had severe pain in his heel. On arriving he opens the door and invites me in and he walks quietly on both feet without difficulties and without complaining. Sitting in his chair he points at his heel from where the pain arises. There was absolutely nothing unusual to examine compared to his other heel, and the old man couldn’t tell about any traumatic event that had happened. When sitting quietly he had pain and if I touched the heel he had pain, but when he walked on his foot there were no pain. I really searched for all possible diagnoses in order to deliver some understanding to this old man, since I felt that he wanted so much the relief that often accompanies a diagnosis together with the treatment that often follows. I couldn’t deliver what he wanted. I simply said the truth of the moment: “I am sorry I don’t know why you are in pain“.
Usually when people are suffering from symptoms of “unknown origin” I am able to find another way to support them in understanding that it might be their personality, which is suffering, explaining to them that the emotions (including the emotion called “pain”) are felt in the body, and that it is not really the emotions in the body we are suffering from, we are suffering from the way we think of ourselves and a situation.
With this old man I felt so stuck. I could either not suggest stronger painkillers than the morphine he already was prescribed for other reasons of “unknown origin” and I could not suggest any further examination to clarify the reason for his symptom. So I left him in “not knowing”, feeling a bit uncomfortable by the situation.
Later I realised what happened between us. This old man expected me to relief him for his pain, just as a doctor usually is expected to do. For this old man, the symptom was not a part of him, and he gave me the impression that the symptom had nothing to do with him, so naturally it was my job to fix it. He was stuck in his belief on diseases and his expectations to a doctor. I was on the other hand stuck by his expectations to me and I was also stuck by the belief that this old man was not able to understand how everything arises from within. I was too stuck to give it a try, though I did get the opportunity as he stated in a brief moment of despair; "I am ready to eat all these painkillers in order to get read of my pain". I thought that he would probably die of that dosis being worried about the dosis more than the true content of the message he tried to convey. In hindsight it seems to me that this statement of true despair, which I did not respond to, was a true calling from the soul, a key to a deeper truth.
What happens to this Old man I don’t know. My job that day was to take care of urgent diseases and as odd as it may sound, “Despair” does not belong to urgencies in physical terms of emergency. It was a great lesson to realise how we may get stuck when we entirely relate to each other from our personality not listening to a deeper moment of truth that arises from within.
If we relate to each other, entirely through our personality, we see what we expect to see, and we meet what we expect to meet. In fact we meet our own fears and desires, our own projections.
“The moment of truth from within" is of course a wording chosen by my personality. What I would like to convey with this expression is that there is a deeper truth, which is completely true in the right moment in the right situation, if we listen carefully. This truth comes from out of the blue from nothingness, from the soul.
It is liberating to follow a moment of truth and indeed it is also a great challenge to let go of expectations and the need to fix and control others in trusting that the way to the truth comes all by itself, although we may support each other just as we do either we are stuck or unstuck by our personality. Each truth is liberating, and there is always another truth to be discovered by the one who search. In letting go of searching All is the truth.