You don't have to understand here...

I like to watch thoughtful television, shows that make you think, that explore deep topics. "Life" (I'm re-watching for the 4th time) is an exquisite look at living a life with trauma set in a standard sort of cop show. I just love it. Damian Lewis does a fantastic job playing Charlie Crews, a cop who spent 12 years in jail (think of all that happened to him), much in solitary, because he was framed. A condition he set on his settlement was his detective badge. No one understand why he returned to work with all his millions. The writing (and acting) around his trauma, which is an interesting setting for the plot of each episode, is bloody fantastic. I highly recommend this show.

"You don't have to understand here, to be here." 

Charlie Crews speaks all this Zen stuff, weird stuff, that makes little sense on the surface and drives his partner nuts.  But, throughout the two seasons, what he says paints an exquisite portrait of how he survived what he survived and how he navigates a world few will ever experience.  

"You don't have to understand here, to be here."

There is this really, really, really great episode with a teenage boy who turned out to have been kidnapped when he was very young and spent his life locked in by his captor.  Windows with bars.  Interior doors with locks.  There is this profound and beautiful scene where he talks with the boy about how (gosh I wish I could remember, though I've typed it out here before) no one is going to understand the captivity the two of them have experienced, that he wouldn't have the same life as other boys, but that he could have a life.  It was one of those scenes where so many words were not said and those that were said were perfect.

"You don't have to understand here, to be here."

This is a line from the first episode, which I re-watched today.  It struck me that it is a close cousin to what I wrote from Dr. Brown's research on shame Sunday:  "I can hear this. This is hard, but I can be in this space with you."   I don't have to understand this space to be in this space with you.

Part of what I have learned from Dr. Brown about empathy is understanding the other perspective, stepping outside of your shoes to hear what is being said rather that what is in your head.  But another part is being willing to listen in the first place, to be in that space. 

"You don't have to understand here, to be here."

Charlie's experience of captivity and isolation, of brutality and suffering, of hopelessness is not something many will experience, but what I love about the show is that living with trauma is something that millions and millions experience.  You don't just go on with life.  You don't just get over it.  Life isn't about walking some healing journey that will make you whole again.  You will never be whole.  But Charlie Crews story, the one he tells even when no one is listening to him, is that you can still have a life even if it isn't the life you expected or wanted, even if it isn't a life anyone would expect or want.  Even if it isn't a life other think it should be.  It is your life and you can live it.

"You don't have to understand here, to be here."

To me, this is what the creator of this series is speaking about befriending and loving folk with trauma.   Be there with them even if you don't understand.  But also, in a way, it is what the creator is saying to those who've survived trauma.  Be here, stay here in this moment, even if you don't understand it, understand yourself, understand your life.   Be willing to live.