Cherishing The Wound
By Susan Groves
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About this ebook
Susan Groves exquisitely describes how we might approach the wound - our own and that of our culture/society. Let this book be part of your healing process.
“Maybe when we’re closest to the wound, we’re also the closest to beauty. Perhaps the wound is the gift.”
“Reading Cherishing the Wound felt like a meditation.”
Zubeida Jaffer, journalist and author of Love in a Time of Treason.
About the author
Susan Groves has trained in social work, theology and Core Process Psychotherapy. She lives in Cape Town, South Africa where she writes and runs a practice.
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Book preview
Cherishing The Wound - Susan Groves
Dedication
With love for my tribe – the white tribe.
What remains?
the white psyche
the song
Table of Contents
Dedication
What remains?
Starting out
Daring to honour the wound
The white psyche
Naming the wound
A prayer for the child
Settling
The Great War and Granddad
Has the war ended?
War casualties
Approaching the wound
Safe
Sentences
The presence of birds
Taking refuge
Connecting with nature
Resourcing
The space around the wound
Healing comes
The wider field
Enjoying
Creativity and psychotherapy
The frame
Africa and the wound
Today
What do we do with badness?
An assumption of dominance
There’s something huge Africa wants to teach us
Sensual
Body
Waking
In peace
Genocide
Relief
Pacing
Watcher of the south
Words for Siyabulela Qoto
The natural world
Honouring the daily movement of the earth
My creed
Does nature lure us back to her?
Reality
Keep it natural
Spiritual practice
Morning prayer?
Prescription
Empty mind
Breaking bread: the Christian tradition
Living
Neighbourhood watch
Africa south
Equal
Living in South Africa today 98
An echo 100
Conclusion: how then might we proceed? 103
Wholeness 105
Don’t be ashamed of the wound 106
Live close to the wound 107
Protect the vulnerability of the wound 108
Judge not 109
Start where you are 110
Cleaning the wound 111
Knowing the wound 112
Hanging out with joy 113
Play fair 115
Meditation? 116
Loved 117
Last word 120
Closing song: A prayer to the earth 121
Endnotes 123
Starting out
Daring to honour the wound
I was in conversation with F, who had been diagnosed with lung cancer about eight months previously and was willing to share some of the challenges of this experience in a small public group. D was present. In the course of the group dialogue, I realised that D’s husband had died exactly a month before. (I had known he was seriously ill.) D and I chatted briefly after the event over tea.
‘He had this wound in his neck.’ [She indicated the area at the front base of the neck – in that hollow.] ‘It was awful. I was so scared of this wound. Then it was suggested to me that I treat the wound daily. The thought horrified me. But I was taught how to do this and it began to be a sacramental experience. I came to love to dress the wound. And in his final stay in hospital, he said to the staff: Don’t worry, my wife will dress the wound
.’
Despite her loss, she looked whole and well.
The wound. We speak so easily of ‘being wounded’ but do we ever think of the actual wound? I hadn’t. The last thing we really want is to go near it. How delicate, what a mess, how hard to negotiate it is. We need help in going there at all.
Maybe when we’re closest to the wound, we’re also the closest to beauty.
Perhaps the wound is the gift.
The white psyche
Has the white psyche been explored? Perhaps in novels and fiction.
I have an ambivalent relationship with ‘the white tribe’. But – at least in part – it’s where I belong and so I seek to understand.
Naming the wound
Song
A prayer for the child
A prayer for the child
A prayer for the