The power of okayness: Dharma talk with Jaya Julienne Ashmore of Open Dharma

Pain naturally flows out of our cultural veering into disconnection. The collective focus and value placed on stories of individual heroism-- individualism--naturally brings pain to our actual, interdependent beings.
Spiritual path or vocation is a lot about feeling our way to respond to our unique individual needs and gifts--accepting uniqueness not as an isolation, but as the way we are called to participate in and serve the best interests of a whole.
Being okay with our shifting needs and our lifelong gifts,we find the "many ways of praying" that we each naturally have and can cultivate--from enjoying the sensuality and tenderness of the breath to "being weird" each in our own way.
Being okay and knowing we are fundamentally okay acts on us --not as an excuse to stop learning, but as a freedom to live with confidence and joy.

We can actually walk through different phases of healing even from trauma...For example, we can sometimes be okay with needing complete removal from things that remind our systems of trauma, to being less triggered or even interested in these triggers and their energy. We can learn to let each person's healing process unfold--knowing that what happened and when and how often, etc., brings unique wounding and potential for healing.
The most important loyalty in leaving behind pain is the shift in loyalty: we shift away from a sense of needing to stay true to the wound, away from keeping a victim mode to honor and suffer with the suffering.

Meditation and okayness can bring us to a new and powerful, empowering sense of needing to stay loyal to the healing of the wound rather than the wound itself.

Then, the all-important shift in our motivation for practice moves from meditating in order to get away from the pain. Our practice initiates from belonging rather than alienation, from participation and connection.