Emotional pain is interesting because it is inevitable. Life's twists and turns, including relationships (even good ones) bring their painful moments. While pain is real, I often think pain is life's ultimate "bogey man." Some people spend their whole life running from it. Some experience their emotions in their body, others are gripped by fear and avoid things chronically. Depression can seem like a long-term relationship with pain. One thing is certain, we all wince at idea of real emotional pain. We feel pain from the past, we try to orchestrate all kinds of maneuvers to prevent it in the future, but in my view this reveals how much our difficulty with pain runs (or in worst cases ruins) our lives. We will avoid potentials for big successes to reduce or eliminate potential pain...taking a relationship further, a business opportunity, and many other experiences that might bring us positive things. Pain's power (or actually or resistance to pain) can be crippling. S. Young writes that, "Suffering equals pain multiplied by our resistance to pain." The ability to find the courage, compassion, and acceptance around our feelings of pain has the potential to free us to stop running, become more resilient, have better health...and more...
RSS Feed