Opening to Compassion

 by Student Andrea Brachfeld

My story is one of an opening to compassion and to the heart.

On April 24th I was up at what I call my “pandemic" cabin, as I bought it when we were in the beginning throes of the Covid event. I had been in contact with some people there and they invited me to go kayaking with them. As I was yearning for human connection and more than anything, the outdoors and definitely missing nature, I immediately accepted the invite. This would be the first time I went kayaking so I was very excited! I went to Debra’s house to help her load the kayaks as she was loaning me one of hers. She asked me how my upper body strength was and since I had been working out I quickly replied that it was great! There was a slight stirring in my solar plexus chakra but I ignored it as I was too excited about this new adventure! Perhaps there was a message I was ignoring? We loaded the kayaks and off we went to the lake 10 minutes away. We met several other people from the community there and the day was developing rather nicely. We took the kayaks down and I dragged mine down to the riverbank. I hopped in and within seconds acclimated myself to the ebb and the flow of paddling and to the tides of the river. It was beautiful and exhilarating being on the lake in open air without masks away from the cement gardens of Jersey City. Others commented on how quickly I adapted and my kayak was moving along nicely. That stirring came in once again but I ignored it. When we had paddled at least a mile, we turned back and mounted the kayaks again on the car. All had gone well! It was great! That was a Saturday. On Monday I started to feel something funny in my arm and neck. I did some yoga, took a bath and figured it would just go away. But it didn’t go away. It kept getting worse until I couldn’t drive, get dressed, practice my flute or virtually do anything except lay down. My mind went to, “How can I make this go away?”, so I started consulting healers, went to my acupuncturist, chiropractor and, at last resort, called my doctor. Nothing relieved the pain and at this point it was 24/7! My Indian friend even suggested a muscle relaxer which reeked of onions so I smelled like perpetual onion soup!!

About three weeks into this, after going to every possible healer I could think existed on the planet and watching every YouTube video about shoulder, arm and neck pain, I had an epiphany. God wanted me to feel this pain and I needed to surrender to it. So I lay there and moved into the pain. I moved into the inability to do absolutely nothing all day long. My ego was battling me every step of the way. Then the release began and the tears started flowing uncontrollably. I finally received God’s message. In my entire life of 66 years I had never experienced physical pain like this except perhaps childbirth. I was an expert at emotional pain but not physical. I realized that I had built armor as thick as I could around my heart when people had physical pain, as my mother was always sick and was always in pain. Her weakness as a person triggered all my inner children and didn’t serve me. I had to survive in the world and being sick all the time wouldn’t work for me. So this experience, as I lay in intense pain, with the inability to do anything, broke my heart open and I think at that moment I felt every bit of pain everyone on the planet had in that moment! I felt compassion for everyone! So now you’re thinking, “And God healed her on the spot.” Well , not quite my friends! I still had two and a half months of pain but things started to shift. My doctor suggested that I go to a physical therapist but I couldn’t drive and could barely walk. I did have to get food so one day as I was walking to get food I noticed a sports place where they had a chiropractor, physical therapist, cold laser treatment, acupuncture, and massage. I had passed this place so many times and never went in! This time I went in and spoke to the receptionist, whose name by the way was Joy! I knew I was in the right place! Lorenzo became my Angel and physical therapist and it was located one block away from my house! In any case, by July 4th I could say I was 95% healed! Now, every morning when I wake up, I say a prayer of gratitude to our dear Lord for not having any pain. My heart has remained open and I’m living in a compassionate world now. Thank you for reading my miracle story!!

Connect with Andrea:

Andrea's recording for yoga and meditation

Andrea's spiritual website