001 * FRIENDS

I've done so much volunteer work in my life, and I have countless friends who are mentally challenged, or socially handicapped in addition to those who are physically handicapped. It kind of bugs me now that I realise I do not really treat them equally, like any of my 'regular' friends. It irks me that I make this distinction, intentionally or not. They have always shown me a pure heart and I don't understand why I've always treated myself as above them, regardless of what they say. As compared to friends that I am with on a daily basis, they are so much truer and so much simpler. So why do I treasure those friends that I am with on a daily basis more? It doesn't make sense, now you put it side by side. It's the same warped logic why you like this guy instead of the other when the other has so much more good qualities.

I've always been one to reach out to people who are sitting alone, or people who don't fit in. Even if they're not disadvantaged physically or mentally in any way. Yet I will never treat them in the same way as I treat my regular friends. Somehow the part of me that is 'being nice' can never be part of the 'real' me, it seems. I'm disgusted with myself, with the part of me that is elitist, that judges people on their thoughts, on the way they think.

Of late, it seems that there has been too much drama within this tiny boarding house. Fake friends, real friends, how do you differentiate? Does it really matter, since friendship is a facade anyway? I am destined to make friends with people who treat me as nothing, and people who treat me as everything. In other words, I am destined to live a lonely life. There might be bliss in solitude, but there is also the loneliness that hermits share, ironically.

If I were to lose the ability to think, please kill me.

When you begin to touch your heart or let your heart be touched, you begin to discover that it's bottomless, that it doesn't have any resolution, that this heart is huge, vast, and limitless. You begin to discover how much warmth and gentleness is there, as well as how much space.

- Pema Chodron