Pain

Be brief; for it is with words or with sunbeams – the more condensed the deeper they burn.  Southey Notes 4:7

“The real voyage of discovery consists not in finding new landscapes but it having new eyes.  Marcel Proust

 

Gibran, “Pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses our understanding."
  
In this brief statement we can understand the purpose of pain. Pain without purpose creates psychological and spiritual suffering. The irony is that we can choose what our pain means to us. Most of the time we do not choose pain or painful experiences. We can choose what the pain means and we can choose how we deal with the pain.

Gibran goes on to say that pain is very much part of nature and life. But if we could be observers of our pain, our pain would not seem less wondrous than our joy. (From Kahlil Gibran, the Prophet)

There is always purpose to our pain.

The pain of all pain is when we have no purpose in our existence, when we are alive but find no purpose in that life.  This is a spiritual pain – the irony of this pain is that is comes mainly from “nothing happening” to us. We call this neglect.  Neglect is the most insidious kind of pain and abuse. Nothing happened, but it should have. The brain is not equipped to deal with nothing, so it makes nothing (neglect) into something, and that something manifests itself biologically in the brain, as largeholes, and psychologically as “I must have no value.”  This creates a spiritual pain of having no purpose while still alive. While this is not true, this level of consciousness creates such suffering for the person who holds it. 

Neglect is the withholding of love and validation. So it is quite easy to conclude that, “I’m unworthy and undeserving of being loved.”

Note:  (The brain is wired neurologically because of stimulation from environment.)  The brain wires everything even the nothingness of things – wires all data, accurate and inaccurate.

The brain in its capacity is infinitely complex, so much in fact that it cannot possibly comprehend itself.  However, it knows exactly how it functions in relationship to everything else. The brain/mind can comprehend many things, and by its very nature wants to comprehend all things. By the way, that is what we call God, “all knowing, all comprehending.”  It is not something we can know cognitively (psychologically); it is however, something we can sense (heart & brain combined).

Nick Hanson, PhD, and Richard Mendius, MD, in their book, “Buddha’s Brain,” state “The number of possible combinations of 100 billion neurons firing or not, is approximately 10 to the millionth power, or 1 followed by a million zeros; in principle, this is the number of possible states of your brain. To put this quantity in perspective, the number of atoms in the universe is estimated to be ‘only’ about 10 to the eighteenth power.”

Thinking about that, how much of our “brain power” do we really use?  How much of our brain power is actually wasted over things that are so unimportant, to the healing of the self and the planet?  How much brain power do we use in worry about things that we do nothing about?

"Relate To" as opposed to "Having An Agenda For"

Recently I had a client who told me a story about his relationship with his wife.  They had spent the day together, had laughed and joked, had had a nice dinner before going home.  Sometime earlier his wife had made the comment that she wished he would be “more spontaneous” in their relationship.  As he prepared for bed he took his cealis, shut the door and approached his wife, she apparently said to him, “What do you think I am? Some kind of whore?”  As you might imagine his expectations of the evening were blown out of the water.  I know from previous experience with stories about events that there are always at least two or more versions.  Whether the story is factually accurate is not what is at issue here.  The issue is: What happens when we have expectations or agendas that get frustrated or go unmet?

In relationships it is impossible not to have any expectations of the relationship.  However, this phenomenon of having expectations sets us up for many disappointments and frustrations.
   
When we make our expectations explicit the other person can say “yes” or “no”.  This requires a vulnerability that many are very uncomfortable with.  If we are in a relationship we care about, we are vulnerable.  Pretending we are not vulnerable creates so many more problems that have long lasting consequences.  The most critical is that people start withholding love, affections, validation.  More relationships are injured because of what doesn’t happen than what does.  I’ve stated in earlier discussion one cannot protect oneself from one whom you love.  If you love someone you have expectations that that person will not hurt you and most of the time that is true.  I don’t know many relationships where one person intentionally hurts their partner.  Most hurts occur unintentionally.  They hurt, but they are not to be personalized.

Couples should work to provide a safe emotional space where “all of us” can be known and loved.  When we make this an “agenda” for ourselves, we are more likely to provide that safe space for our partner.  We can relate to them rather than believing they should know our agenda and comply.

Embrace Your Uniqueness

Recently I had a conversation with my granddaughter.  This is a granddaughter that I believe is absolutely beautiful, talented, extremely intelligent, sensitive, kind and very wise for her age.  As you might guess, I think she is perfect.

We were discussing something that she didn’t want anyone to know.  She was very concerned that if people knew of her heritage that they would not see her for her, or they would judge her because of her more popular and well-known parent.  This parent really has not played an active role in her life.  However, I believe many of the strengths and gifts she has is because she has had to deal with many hard times and disappointments.  She has dealt with this pain with grace and dignity. However she does feel some shame because she “is not like the other girls” she knows.

Like all of us, we really don’t want to be different, even though at the conscious level we know we are different.  It always seems that “our difference” is different in a bad way, especially if you are thirteen.  This sense of “being differently bad” causes us to hide what is very obvious about us.  We cannot hide who we are.  This unconscious attempt only has the impact of alienating us from others and causes the self to fracture.  We end up feeling like a fraud, ashamed of who we really are.  No one ever really plans this, it just happens as we try to navigate this painful journey called life.  Trying to hide ourselves from ourselves and from others adds so much unnecessary pain to this journey.

As my beautiful granddaughter and I talked, what kept coming to mind was the phrase, “the truth shall set you free.”  I was reading from the book by Mark Nepo, “The Book of Awakening,” and he quotes Angels Airien, “Show Your Hair”:

My grandmother told me,
“Never hide your green hair –
They can see it anyway.”

The truth is that my granddaughter has nothing to hide, she is complete, whole and beautiful.  She has nothing to apologize for or to be ashamed of.  She cannot possibly hide these qualities without great damage to herself.  The very sad thing is that many people do try to hide their uniqueness, their talents and gifts, because they are afraid of others’ disapproval.

Disapproval always hurts, especially if it comes from someone we care about or someone we identify with.  The very sad reality is that many of us can only approve of ourselves when we think others approve of us.  Navigation of life requires us to rise above this tendency to define ourselves by what we think others think of us.  While that is difficult, it certainly is possible.

The counsel I gave my granddaughter was to let everyone see her; they are going to anyway.  But learn to stand in the light of her own love and self-acceptance.  If she hides what is obvious about her, she loses, and gifts she has for the world will be lessened.