Beautiful....just Beautiful

There was an man named Michael Finnegan,
He had whiskers on his chinnegan,
Along came the wind and blew them in again,
Poor Michael Finnegan. Begin again!

Whiskers grow back. Every time you shave them they begin to grow again starting over from the root. Certain plants are this way; prune them back to the terminal bud or cut them back to the ground, feed, water and give them sunlight and the bloom again. Of course they go through a short unattractive period where they are all foliage and nub. Still the beauty is inside the plant hiding, waiting for the right conditions to blossom. It all takes patience, nurture, care and intimate knowledge, on the part of the gardener, who knows the secret of what is held within barren branches

Mike is not feeling especially beautiful. He's feeling a little pruned and barren. He's not feeling especially attractive as a result of cancer and surgery. Dr Madoff and his team took more than a colon and cancer out of Mike; in six and a half hours they undid what took me eight years to accomplish.They saved his life but they took his sense of self beauty. And now I am having a difficult time getting Mike to see that he still holds beauty in his heartwood. While I think he wants to believe he will feel beautiful again he doesn't exactly trust it. Mike feels unbeautiful.

When I first met him I was drawn to Mike's ability to see beauty in extraordinary places and his ability to write so succinctly about those observations. He was a broken shell but there was an inner light which seeped out through cracks in his shell. I wanted to touch and be touched by that light. I thought, if I could bring that beauty outward, if I could show Mike how beautiful he was inside, if I could get him to believe in that beauty he would, well heal and bloom. And he did. Beautiful!

It took eight years. Eight years before he finally came to believe he was beautiful and when he did he unfurled like a flower bud in warm morning light and became even more beautiful. Other people began to notice. Family and people who have known him for years began to see his beauty. I finally could tell him I thought he was beautiful without his eyes darting away to look for what? affirmation or permission from the cosmos to take the compliment or believe it? He came, after eight long years, to look at me, smile and say, "thank you" instead of "I just don't see it Karen. I feel broken."

Mike is still beautiful. Inside and out he is beautiful. Nothing has change there. Not for me. Not for many of you who have come to know Mike; who have watched him grow as a man and watched his long suppressed beauty unfold. For Mike, however, things have changed. His outward appearance is a little altered and it's hard for him. So much of our society is based on outward appearance. Our acceptance of self and others is tied up in what we look like. We base our concept of beauty on what we see with our eyes. Mike sees his entire sense of "beautifulness" as linked to his outward appearance. This is a normal reaction to an altered appearance. It's grief.

As I laid my hand upon Mike's chest the other evening I reminded him that beauty comes from the heart. What makes a person truly beautiful is not the outward appearance but what is in and what comes from the heart. I see Mike with my heart first and I still think he is still beautiful. He is still so very beautiful. I know there are others in our lives who see Mike with their hearts and believe that he is beautiful. We just have to care and nurture Mike until he sees it again. Until it's time for him to flower.

There was an man named Michael Finnegan,
He had beauty in his heart again,
Along came a storm and pruned it back again,
Poor Michael Finnegan. Begin again! 

Bloom again!

Peace,

Karen