We have all experienced pain. Financial losses, broken relationships, bad personal decisions, loss of some close to us, being let down by someone we trusted, misunderstandings or circumstances that changed things for us. And the pain of not having done something, not having spoken up for someone, having let someone down or taken people for granted.

Feeling pain is human. But sometimes we don’t know how to deal with our pain. Denial is no solution. Suppression is not going to help. We tend to blank it out of our mind in the hope it will disappear forever. But from experience, we know that is not true. It comes back to hurt us time and again.

We must acknowledge our pain. Our ability to accept the pain we carry and realise its root cause is the start of our inner healing process.

It brings to our awareness that whatever be the cause, it was in the past. The event cannot be undone. Acceptance stops the mind from circling back to wondering why it happened. This question that agitates us, needs to be put to rest.

It makes us realise that the pain of the past, is eclipsing our joy of the present. And the present is all that we truly have.

We need to move beyond the pain to the learning and insight from the experience. And when we share this with others, especially our children, we suddenly turn our pain into an asset that helps us prepare others in life.

We shift our own inner position and allow ourselves to reconcile when the opportunity presents itself. We can only do this when the dark cloud of emotion has been lifted by the light of acknowledgment.

We start understanding the fundamental principle of life – As the Night, the Day. Pain and pleasure are two sides of the same coin. Both are just an emotion we need to learn how to handle. Crying through the night, we cannot appreciate the majesty of the stars in the darkness. Till we don’t acknowledge our pain, we won’t be able to open our eyes to the several blessings in our life.

Just because we have pain, doesn’t mean we need to live a painful life. When we acknowledge our pain and decide to move beyond, we discover that sometimes pain can be the gateway to tapping into the love that we are capable of.

(Picture-Flowers in Bangalore)