Almost thirty years ago, during a week-long meditation retreat with my Zen teacher Joko Beck, something snapped in a very negative way. Seemingly out of nowhere, the chronic, relentless pain that had been in my head for the past 10 years seemed to intensify, and over the next few hours my mind felt as though it might shatter. The very pain that I’d been learning to hold and be-with was suddenly unbearable. Everything in my life that had begun to make sense, now seemed an illusion.

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Immediately I reverted to my earlier certainty that life was suffering and suffering only.

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I was desperate to talk with Joko in the midst of this all-to-familiar free-fall; it was as though I was reliving my childhood. While

making arrangements for this conversation, the monitor with whom I was interacting seemed to be exceptionally kind, calm, and focused. Was it her tone of voice, her quiet smile, her unrushed manner? I didn't know, but as I entered the consulting room to talk with Joko, I mentioned my momentary interaction with the monitor. Then I named my overwhelming despair about how the pain in my head was suddenly, yet again, swamping me.

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Joko listened with great care, saying nothing. Finally, after several minutes of silence, she asked a question that included a central observation: "Kent, you don't really know much about tenderness, do you?"

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The world literally stood still. In that stillness a childhood of loneliness and ever-present fear exploded through my body.

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I began to sob. "No, Joko, I do not. I don't think I ever have."

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Her next statement would alter my life forever: "What do you think this is all about?" (As she said the word "this" she gestured with her arms in a full circle.)

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"What do you mean Joko? Are you saying that enlightenment has something to do with tenderness?”

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She slowly began to smile, nodding in agreement.

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I continued to cry throughout the remainder of the retreat and into the weeks that followed.

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During another retreat, maybe a year later, Joko said what I now consider to be a summary of her teaching. "If there's an orphan in our lives, it's our pain. Nobody wants their pain. We want it gone. That's a big part of what meditation offers, no longer pushing pain away. Sitting, just being-with this exact pain. Every moment is just another opportunity to stay simple and hold the orphan of your pain."

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All these years later, the continual pain on the right side of my head continues. On most days, most of the time, it is no longer an orphan.

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