Pensieve

Pensieve 60: We Are So Much More Than The Pain We Experience

We get hurt. Sometimes mildly. Often badly. Deeply. Irrationally. Pain can be as simple as an exclamation of "Ouch!" when you prick your finger with a needle. But sometimes, it is so much larger and deeper than even ourselves. It can start from that tiny needle prick, from life's simplest disappointments and discontents, and slowly build into a scream we feel is much larger than ourselves, as we lose more and more hope, as we get hurt deeper and deeper still. And often, screaming is never enough. Some wounds heal as soon as we need them to. Some take longer to heal. Others run really way too deep for healing, all the way to the very fibers of our being, changing us slowly from within.

But the world does not stop just because you're in pain. School has to go on, work has to be done, bills have to be paid. There are always expectations to meet, responsibilities to fulfill, roles to be performed. The world does not wait until you heal. Everyone wounds, and everyone works and everyone fights. No matter how torrential the rain, life has to go on. With the endpoint being, everyone hurts, but everyone says they're okay. Mostly anyway. Because often, we have to.

If you're lucky, you have real friends and a supportive family or a life partner to fall back on when the world hurts you. People who understand your pain and are there for you. That's really good.

If you're not so fortunate, you have real friends and/or a supportive family or a life partner who do not understand your pain and are willing to share it and be there for you anyway. That's even better. That's something real and sincere on their part.

Worst case, scenario is you're totally alone. You have family and friends and still you feel alone. Or you have no family, no friends and no one to turn to at your lowest possible point. Or at least you feel that way. And that's okay. You still have you. Strong, amazing, beautiful you.

We get hurt. We feel like we hit a dead end. We feel we can never be happy again. We feel that this is all our life is going to be. We fall deep into a well of depression and desperation and it seems to be taking forever before we hit the bottom. We are so shrouded in our misery that we can no longer see the beginning or the end of it. Hell, we can see nothing but it. We constantly think about jumping off the cliff and ending our lives. Too often more than we should.

And that's okay. All of that, and even more than that, is okay. And you might be alone, or not and either of that is okay too.

What's not okay is to give in and be controlled by the pain we are feeling, because our ability to overcome life's negativity is only as strong as our ability to feel it. Every turning point has a temporary dead end, that space of transition where an old road ends and a new one begins. And sometimes, the most painful moments in life are just that. Turning points. New beginnings. Leaving a toxic job that has no appreciation for your talents. Taking off from relatives who have to put you down. Forgetting toxic friends who are only using you. Walking away from a partner who is cheating on you. We shed off the old skin that hurts, that we no longer deserve, and emerge with a new one into a brighter and better version of ourselves, enlightened by experience, humbled by mistakes, and strengthened by our pain.

So whenever we hurt, no matter how deep, no matter how painful, in whatever stage of life we may be, we can take a deep breath, calm down, relax, and think that this is only a turning point. And we can overcome it, because we are so much more than all the pain we experience. And the pain that does not kill us not only makes us stronger, but naturally renews and transforms us.

"Happiness is beneficial for the body, but it is grief that develops the mind".