The Healing Power Of Love

by Victor_E 2 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  Victor_E

  Cliff was an alcoholic who worked for a telemarketing company down the hall from my office. Every time he would see me in the hall way his eyes would light up and he would grab me to tell me the latest jokes he had. He took it upon himself to be my source of laughter. Since he lived from hand to mouth and was always broke he would always borrow a 10 or a 20-dollar bill till payday. I could see the deep deep sadness and pain in Cliff’s eyes that he masked over with his jokes.

  One day he knocked on my office door and asked me if I had a few minutes, as fate would have it I was available. He started by asking, “you do therapy don’t you”? I said, “yes is there something I can help you with?” He said “did you know I used to have a very good life and at one time I made a lot of money?” I listened as he continued; “I used to work as a technician and then as a manager for Mitsubishi nuclear medical equipment. He related how he loved his job but having to manage a territory that spanned half the country had ruined his life. His wife had left him for his best friend and it had just devastated him. He drowned his pain with booze leading to him being fired from this high profile job.

  I felt a deep sense of compassion for Cliff or with 20/20 hindsight I don’t know if I was feeling it for me as I saw the parallels in cliffs story. He went on to relate how he turned to God and even had his own church back east. He pulled out his pastor’s laminated card. He beamed with pride; I asked him how come he left that position. He said he felt like a hypocrite to preach about the sins of drinking while he was a full-blown alcoholic behind closed doors. I told him I had just what he needed; I laid him on my bioacoustics equipment and played inspirational light music. He could not contain the heavy emotions and went into a catharsis, he cried like a lonely abandoned child. After about 30 minutes I asked him to get up and tell me about his experience. He was deeply moved and could not talk, the only thing he could utter was “I know it’s going to be ok, I know it’s going to be ok now.”

  The days passed and I would see Cliff at times drunk as he staggered to work still intent on telling me jokes. Days passed and I did not see Cliff and when I asked his manager about his where abouts he denied hearing anything. About a week later he told me they had found Cliff dead from a week of binging on alcohol. I felt a deep sadness in my heart but it came as no surprise. When they tried to contact his nearest of kin, they refused to make the trip and he was cremated as a pauper.

  Cliff was a troubled soul that felt unloved, unwanted, betrayed, and abandoned by his family and in the end by all. As I write this in my office, I feel his presence thanking me for that bit of joy he felt when I played the music for him. Cliff, it was a pleasure and an honor to have known you. You and I have traveled down similar paths my friend, the only real difference between you and I is I chose to live by loving myself and searching against all odds for the one woman that would complete my last part of my journey and contract with this life. If we meet again in heaven or wherever you are I hope you have some new jokes because you sure were good at telling them.
  Victor Escalante
  “Few are they that see with their own eyes and feel with their own heart” A Einstein
• 

  Helen

  gawd this is so sad, and I know it was painful to write..hugs.
• 

  Victor_E

  Jose was raised as a JW, he was on a fast track to being a stellar publisher in the congregation. He was giving number five talks at a very early age and was better than some of the older brothers. His heart was in the right place and the brothers were liberal with their accolades for his heart love for Jehovah. As fate would have it, Jose fell in love with the prettiest teenage girl in the congregating and the daughter of the presiding overseer.

  The troubles and Jose’s destiny were now set in stone. The girl’s father disapproved of Jose for his daughter. He now became the brunt of discrimination on the part of the elders at the instigation of the girl’s father. He no longer got as many talks, or parts on the service meeting. His only crime was to fall in love with this pretty elder’s daughter. They both ached to fully express their adolescent love towards each other, but a father’s jealousy and his abuse of power would condemn Jose to a life of crime.

  He hated her family and harbored much anger in his heart. This in time led him to join a neighborhood gang and things just escaladed down from there. His father a lowly publisher begged the elders to try and rescue Jose from this path he was put on. His request fell on deaf ears. In less than two years Jose could not be recognized from the clean cut kid who spoke of fine spiritual truths. He had grown up considerably in size and in street smarts. His arms were full of tattoos and now he was a petty drug dealer.

  I came across Jose when he was put into a group of adult public offenders that I facilitated, who were on probation. As I spoke about my JW past and how past programming affects our beliefs and decisions we make as adults he seemed to play close attention and was very interactive about his criminal past. After the first group meeting he came up to me privately and shared his experience about growing up as a JW. I felt a deep sense of purpose that my past experience has not been in vain.

  One day I got a call from Jose he was desperate to come see me for some personal problem. He came in with his wife and small child very anxious. He related to me that he wanted to separate from his wife to just be alone from her constant nagging. Of course I knew there was more to the story and as I probed privately, he confessed he did not love his wife but was in love with a woman at work. He was so starved for the love he had from his childhood sweetheart that if he found any semblance of it with any woman, he abandoned reason and threw common sense and caution to the wind.

  They agreed to separate and she nosed dived into a state of depression. All her insecurities from her childhood were now in full bloom. I agreed to do some sessions pro bono with both, since Jose was living from paycheck to paycheck working as a Denny’s short order cook. He improved significantly and understood how his anger had driven him to the path he had been. I told him his experience was quite common and showed him how he was a victim of circumstances. He agreed to educate himself and read Crisis of Conscience. In time his love for the woman at work wore thin and he missed his child and wife so he returned back home.

  I often wonder what became of Jose, having traveled a similar path in life I know the feelings of emptiness and the desperate anxiety to calm a troubled heart and soul. Wherever you are Jose, I send you my best wishes, the woman you search for is also searching for you. In order for you to manifest her you will need to slay your inner demons and rekindle that love you once had. It may take many years but the search and wait is worth any hardships you may encounter. Never give your heart to a second rate romance. You must have that youthful passion to use as a beacon of light in your darkest hours when you feel like giving up.

  “All men must die, few men ever really live.” Braveheart
  Victor Escalante