Unseen Pain

Last week I wrote about my 18-year-old daughter and the shocking challenges she is facing as well as her attitude about those challenges.  I thought of her and of many of us today as I was looking at this beautiful hanging plant on my back deck.  It is thriving and beautiful.....or so it would seem.  As I turned the plant to admire the side that is not visible from where it hangs, I was startled to discover that the other side of this beautiful hanging pot looks nothing like the front.  Instead it is sparse and dead-looking in places.

As I explored this startling discovery further I realized that the pot is hanging slightly at an angle, and the water it has been getting every day has been going mostly to the front of the pot, leaving the back of the pot quite dry, hence the difference.

I can think of quite a few analogies about this pot, but today I was thinking about my daughter, and about you, and challenges we all face in life.  My daughter's challenges are quite obvious now, though she was able to hide them for many months, just like my pot.  She truly has a beautiful spirit about her, and that is what people see, but she is struggling in ways no one knows.  I thought about all the people around us who have heartache and challenges that are not seen, that are not visible.  Many people present a beautiful and healthy front, while struggling and dying in the unseen recesses of their lives.  I suppose this is human nature.

Henry B. Eyring passed on some profound advice:  “When you meet someone, treat them as if they were in serious trouble, and you will be right more than half the time.”  

It is easy to see the sparse and dead-looking parts of our own lives, but only the beautiful and thriving parts of other people's lives.  I think we all have beauty, and we also all have sparse and dead-looking spots that are the unseen challenges and heartache in our lives.  

What if you and I were to take Henry B. Eyring's advise and treated each other as though they needed our love, caring and watering?  Without knowing the pot was a little off balance, maybe we could love each other well enough to reach even the dry and painful parts.