Abandonment doesn't have the sharp but dissipating sting of a slap. It's like a punch to the gut, bruising your skin and driving the precious air from your body.
Interpretation
Abandonment causes deep emotional pain and suffering, similar to a physical injury.
In this quote, Tayari Jones powerfully captures the emotional impact of abandonment by comparing it to physical pain. Instead of a quick, sharp pain that fades, abandonment feels like a profound injury that is both physical and emotional, leaving lasting bruises and a struggle to breathe. This metaphor illustrates how deeply feelings of abandonment can affect one's life and psyche, emphasizing that the pain is often more than just a momentary wound; it can linger and reshape one's existence.
In practice
In a therapy session discussing the long-term effects of abandonment on relationships.
And this is how it started. Just with coffee and the exchange of their long stories. Love can be incremental. Predicaments, too. Coffee can start a life just as it can start a day. This was the meeting of two people who were destined to love from before they were born, from before they made choices that would complicate their lives. This love just rolled toward my mother as though she were standing at the bottom of a steep hill. Mother had no hand in this, only heart.
For a long time I was scared I'd find out I was like my mother.
Providing - that's not love. Being there - that's more important. I mean, we see that. We see that with all these rich socialites. They're crying out for attention; they're hurting for love. I'm not being judgmental - I'm just making an observation. They're crying out for the love that maybe they didn't get at home, and they got everything.
When I tell her what I’m thinking and she tells me what she’s thinking, our each ideas jumping into the other’s head, like coulouring blue crayon on top of yellow that makes green.
Marriage made more sense when it was indissoluble. It's the woman trying to cope with the strains of a one-parent family who will suffer most from the relaxation of the divorce laws.
The most dangerous word in any human tongue is the word for brother. It's inflammatory.
If you approach each new person you meet in a spirit of adventure, you will find yourself endlessly fascinated by the new channels of thought and experience and personality that you encounter.
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