Brokenness and need

The picture describes how I feel this morning. My back has gone again. After a good few years of freedom, it's happened again. The old injury has reasserted itself and the pinched nerve pain is back. This morning it took me 5 minutes to roll around trying to find a position so I could get up out of bed, without shooting pains. I feel so frustrated but successfully got to the bathroom. I felt so insecure needing to use wall doors etc to help me walk, or even move.

Back pain is a major problem yet the pain in the legs and backside aren't where the problem is. The ache is referred from a pinched nerve in my back. The shooting pains are, I think, linked to the nerve and muscles which tense trying to protect me. Yet because of the tension I have no back strength to move rather generate more pain when I move.

I have reached that situation where I'm really struggling and pure will power is not enough. About 10 days ago, Iris smiled in a situation where I bit off more than I could chew and told me that she felt good because I needed her. She's an international who came to help me. I must remember that in my ability to serve and help that I must also learn to receive. For some it is vice versa, but for me it is to allow others to help me in my need. For some it is the spiritual discipline of service, perhaps others it is the spiritual discipline of discipline of being served. For me often my identity is based in what I do or can do, yet true relationship has some aspect of reciprocity, on a human to human level this should be mutuality. But on the divine to human level we encounter something very different. We serve and yet we are also served.

In this time I'm struggling. I have to be open to being served with all the implications that are involved.