What can you do?

"It's like the person is in a burning house, but you can't do anything to rescue him..." the monk said, as he recalled on the phone his experience of having to deal with the slow, gradual death of his disciple. It's true... how hopeless I often feel, how incapable, how tied my hands are to want to remove someone's fear and worry, but feel so utterly useless because I do not know how!

And because I do not know what I can do to help, I feel like I'm failing miserably at being with mum, at taking care of her, at making her feel secure and supported. This sense of worry and sense of failure is multiplying in my mind, which has been racing and restless largely because of this (and partly because of my longings to go home...) for so long I feel so exhausted, physically and emotionally. This mind of ours... it's so perpetually bombarded by worry, fear, and longing! This mind of ours, creator of our moods and the worlds we live in.

I must learn to tame the mind, tame the mind to be in one place, to be focused on one thought at a time, and not to let it wander around  like curious little puppies. Be in this place, be in this moment, be with the person you are with, and enjoy every single moment together. That is living fully, that is living without worry, without fear.

The monk comforted me, and reassured me that often all we can do is be there, be supportive. Nothing else, however inadequate it may be. Even if you want to do more, what more is there that you can do...? I'm not a healer, I'm not a trained physician... I'm not God who can miraculously will or wish the cancers away. I'm just a son trying the best I can do help, to offer support. It may feel inadequate, it may not feel like it's enough, but really, what else can I do...?

"Don't think about how you're going to die, but how you're going to live in this moment," the monk said. Bring her joy, show her love, show her compassion. "I'm sure she appreciates your being."

And she does. She reminds me almost daily by telling me how many of her friends are so impressed by me, how her friends, or even strangers on the street, praise me for being so caring, so loving.

I have to believe that, accept that, and tell myself over and over again, I am doing the best I can in the circumstances. And that is enough!